RiTides wrote: Good news on the personal front - I tested negative! Finally can stop worrying about who we might have infected, and at least go to the grocery store again . Stay safe and healthy everybody
Future War Cultist wrote: Well, quitting my job. Tried to help but not only have I been screwed over for 7 days in a row now, with my dumb ass coworkers constantly coming to within 2 feet of me, but they also failed to pay me. So, I’m out. I’m done. Going into isolation with all the rest of you.
That sucks FWC, hope you get your money soon and find something better! For now, enjoy hiding inside with us, I guess!
Thanks ATCM.
Turns out that threatening to walk gets results. They paired me back up with my old crew, so now we’re back on track. No idea why they didn’t just do that to begin with but they have a habit of being difficult just to assert their authority, which always backfires on them. As for the money, just an oversight because they’re short staffed. I’ll give them until Tuesday to sort it out.
More virus related; my dad’s friend’s dad isn’t doing so good. Last I heard he’s down to one lung and he’s on kidney dialysis too. But he’s still alive so, we can only hope.
My Chief of Staff ensured that the CO knew that he had an open line to me to use at any time.
It seems that it wasn't that open a line if he was canned for using it. Circumventing the CoC is a serious issue, but if he was being encouraged to do so by SECNAV and his Chief of Staff then its not entirely fair to say that he acted in the wrong. I've heard different versions of the same story as to what exactly went down (some which paint Crozier as a hero who is being railroaded for creating bad press for Navy leadership, and others which paint him as an inept grandstander trying to score some of those "political points" that everyone keeps talking about), one of which was that the memorandum (as opposed to the "letter" it is being portrayed as) was sent to the rear admiral aboard with SECNAV, USPACFLT leadership, and others who Crozier had been in contact with regarding the situation cc'd via email (which is not out of the ordinary). Someone leaked the memo to the press (I've heard some have accused Crozier of being the leaker but I've found nothing that supports the assertion) as it went out in an unsecured manner and got forwarded by some of the recipients. I've also heard whisperings from people that claim to be "in the know" (unverified) that the letter was written in part because the chain of command, Rear Admiral Baker included, were being non-responsive to the COs requests and not taking seriously the severity of the situation he was trying to communicate to them, and that Crozier was aware that this would potentially be a career ender for him when he sent it. Curious to learn more as time goes on.
Just to be clear I have no problem with him jumping the CoC (and when you do it, I'm even ok with CC'ing the people you'e skipping). But there are not close to 20+ individuals in that chain, when combined with the quotables we've heard from the memo it seems it was written with the press in mind so all those people could have been an attempt to hide the leaker. One thing the Navy is renowned for is relieving ship commanders much quicker than any other US service would relieve one of their commanders. I think he's nether a hero or inept but not being inept isn't good enough to be a carrier commander.
The part about unsecure isnt just because it results in leaks to the press, its because discussing specific shortfalls of operational warfighting capability should never, ever be sent unsecure.
Yup, let's blame them dirty foreigners, never mind Germany has actually more cases than all Slavic countries combined, and in any case, a worker on rural farm is not going to infect anyone, and you can even make an argument he/she will be bigger threat to their own country upon returning than to Germany on arrival.
Man look at my flag. Slavs are not other to me My point was that lockdowns are arbitrarily waived when they endanger profit.
Turns out that threatening to walk gets results. They paired me back up with my old crew, so now we’re back on track. No idea why they didn’t just do that to begin with but they have a habit of being difficult just to assert their authority, which always backfires on them. As for the money, just an oversight because they’re short staffed. I’ll give them until Tuesday to sort it out.
Glad it's worked out somewhat and you're not out of a job over it. Hopefully the oversight gets fixed!
More virus related; my dad’s friend’s dad isn’t doing so good. Last I heard he’s down to one lung and he’s on kidney dialysis too. But he’s still alive so, we can only hope.
Oh no. Is he going on/been put on the transplant list or is there a possibility of his kidney function improving after the virus is dealt with? You ever need to talk about this stuff (or even your friend) then shoot me a PM, I've dealt with kidney issues all the way through to transplantation so I'd be happy to help with answering any questions as best I can (though I managed to avoid dialysis, so only have more general knowledge on that).
Yup, let's blame them dirty foreigners, never mind Germany has actually more cases than all Slavic countries combined, and in any case, a worker on rural farm is not going to infect anyone, and you can even make an argument he/she will be bigger threat to their own country upon returning than to Germany on arrival.
Man look at my flag. Slavs are not other to me My point was that lockdowns are arbitrarily waived when they endanger profit.
Except food is an essential. It needs picking. The pickers have to come from somewhere and if there isn't any medical reason to go with Germans over other groups then why do that?
queen_annes_revenge wrote: British health Secretary confirms that 'you can drive somewhere remote to walk/exercise' yesterday on question time. Bout time someone cleared that up with a little good sense.
Seems foolish , too many people unable to drive sensibly on quiet roads , been an uptick in bad crashes round our way. Fly tipping has also become more popular now you can easily drive somewhere with no one about , both jobs our services shouldn’t be having to deal with at this time
Doesn't matter. Prosecute the crimes of speeding and fly tipping, don't infringe on law abiding citizens liberties (unnecessarily)
I see this as the reason the police have struggled to interpret what the Govt is actually directing. I have to say I was surprised at his turnabout on the subject, but all that does is make it harder for the police to do any job with any credibility.
Essentially he's asking them to restrict people's movements, but then changing the parameters so that they get blamed for being over zealous or not applying "common sense".
At times like this, good leadership requires clear direction and unfortunately we don't seem to be getting that.
A temporary restriction on normal liberties is perfectly acceptable in order to rationalise and prioritise limited resources. As military personnel, we're used to it anyway. I fail to understand people who are railing against such minor, temporary inconveniences.
If someone in the UK is only now noticing and complaining, they're too late to the party. For example, the UK already has almost total cctv surveillance and the Govt exercises a level of control over the popular narrative via a compliant media that would make Orwell evaporate in horror.
No it doesn't. Break up groups of people gathering. Escort suspected infected to quarantine or testing. That's it. They don't need to be questioning law abiding citizens, stopping cars or shaming people with drones, or setting up forums so curtain twitchers can snitch on their neighbours for leaving the house more than once per day. A restriction on liberties, yes, but the minimum necessary should be applied. You don't just sledgehammer everyone with it because you can.
Every crash puts more people in hospital , every police call out for stuff like this takes them away from actual important tasks . Ideally people should be able to do head out and about , but seeing as the “people” keep managing to prove over and over again that they are morons , at this time it’s a bad idea
In virus related news, a Japanese girl friend of my daughter at university flew back to Tokyo today. The flght was practically empty. In the video she sent, there was one other PAX visible in the economy cabin.
Idk why they didn't upgrade them. The cost of giving a few economy pax a free flight in business or even 1st is tiny compared to the cost of flying an Airbus and crew all the way around the world.
This one time I flew to Japan for New Year's Day. It was when my wife worked for Virgin, and she was rostered to fly on New Year's Eve.
There's a long standing tradition that if your spouse has to fly at Christmas or New Year, you get a free flight with them if you want it.
So feth yeah! That's a story I can tell for years. The plane was almost empty, and there were four husbands of Japanese crew. They put us all in first and we were the only people there.
Sorry for the tangent.
Anyway, this Japanese girl arrived and in Immigration she got swabbed for Covid-19 infection. Then they wanted to take a blood sample to do the anti-body test, but she had drunk three bottles of umeshu plum brandy and was too drunk, so they made her wait.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: British health Secretary confirms that 'you can drive somewhere remote to walk/exercise' yesterday on question time. Bout time someone cleared that up with a little good sense.
Seems foolish , too many people unable to drive sensibly on quiet roads , been an uptick in bad crashes round our way. Fly tipping has also become more popular now you can easily drive somewhere with no one about , both jobs our services shouldn’t be having to deal with at this time
Doesn't matter. Prosecute the crimes of speeding and fly tipping, don't infringe on law abiding citizens liberties (unnecessarily)
I see this as the reason the police have struggled to interpret what the Govt is actually directing. I have to say I was surprised at his turnabout on the subject, but all that does is make it harder for the police to do any job with any credibility.
Essentially he's asking them to restrict people's movements, but then changing the parameters so that they get blamed for being over zealous or not applying "common sense".
At times like this, good leadership requires clear direction and unfortunately we don't seem to be getting that.
A temporary restriction on normal liberties is perfectly acceptable in order to rationalise and prioritise limited resources. As military personnel, we're used to it anyway. I fail to understand people who are railing against such minor, temporary inconveniences.
If someone in the UK is only now noticing and complaining, they're too late to the party. For example, the UK already has almost total cctv surveillance and the Govt exercises a level of control over the popular narrative via a compliant media that would make Orwell evaporate in horror.
No it doesn't. Break up groups of people gathering. Escort suspected infected to quarantine or testing. That's it. They don't need to be questioning law abiding citizens, stopping cars or shaming people with drones, or setting up forums so curtain twitchers can snitch on their neighbours for leaving the house more than once per day. A restriction on liberties, yes, but the minimum necessary should be applied. You don't just sledgehammer everyone with it because you can.
Every crash puts more people in hospital , every police call out for stuff like this takes them away from actual important tasks . Ideally people should be able to do head out and about , but seeing as the “people” keep managing to prove over and over again that they are morons , at this time it’s a bad idea
youre not wrong, but just because some people are stupid, doesn't mean you create laws against them, otherwise drinking would be banned, amongst a whole host of other things. I keep saying over and over, that the police interrogating law abiding members of the public under fear of these new laws, is not helpful, its harassment. but all I seem to get is..'well just follow the rules' as if that makes everything ok.
First I've really heard out of Africa or Latin America with regards to the coronavirus impact. If anything this should tell us that warm weather might make this situation moderately better than it is now (after accounting for the disparities between the US and Ecuadorian healthcare systems, etc.), but its not going to put it to an end and the virus will keep right on virusing.
youre not wrong, but just because some people are stupid, doesn't mean you create laws against them, otherwise drinking would be banned, amongst a whole host of other things. I keep saying over and over, that the police interrogating law abiding members of the public under fear of these new laws, is not helpful, its harassment. but all I seem to get is..'well just follow the rules' as if that makes everything ok.
Of course you create laws because people are stupid! It's simply those of us that aren't morons seldom need to concern ourselves about them.
There's no law against drinking, but there's a raft of laws against things you shouldn't do when you have been, and people break them everyday, despite it being self evident that most of those behaviours are inherently potentially self destructive or could halrm others.
Does the fact you get told the same thing when you repeat yourself over and over not suggest something to you?
Only that the vast majority of the public have been whipped into such a fear frenzy that they will just blindly accept unnecessary, overly draconian laws with no scrutiny in order to gain some twisted illusion of safety.
and thats exactly whats happening here those of use that dont need the laws are being affected by them, in negative ways.
Some economists tried doing a benefit-cost analysis of this social distancing. Their analysis supported it, provided that the downturn isn't too steep and the recovery isn't too long.
gorgon wrote: Some economists tried doing a benefit-cost analysis of this social distancing. Their analysis supported it, provided that the downturn isn't too steep and the recovery isn't too long.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: Only that the vast majority of the public have been whipped into such a fear frenzy that they will just blindly accept unnecessary, overly draconian laws with no scrutiny in order to gain some twisted illusion of safety.
and thats exactly whats happening here those of use that dont need the laws are being affected by them, in negative ways.
You did catch the article that the police have already been told to reduce some of their more creative methods of enforcement?
Also yes we do need laws and police to keep people at home; heck even during WWII we required ARP Wardens and the police/forces to keep people from showing lights at night and that was when you could hear and see the threat of bombers approaching and had alarms blaring in the air.
This is a disease which is basically invisible and where "The enemy" really is everyone else around you. It's so casually caught and spread that yes we do need short term draconian measures brought in to help reinforce the policies we've adopted as a nation in order to help curb the rate of infection for a prolonged period of time.
It's not as if we are going to maintain these measures forever. These are short term measures designed to help the country through an exceptional situation that is far outside of normal operations. Within 3 or 4 years chances are we'll have a vaccine and Corona Virus will just vanish into the background of other illness that harms a significant number of people, but not vast swathes of the population. Meanwhile before that point many of the isolation and group break-up laws will be relaxed/removed. Nations simply cannot function in their current state forever.
youre not wrong, but just because some people are stupid, doesn't mean you create laws against them, otherwise drinking would be banned, amongst a whole host of other things. I keep saying over and over, that the police interrogating law abiding members of the public under fear of these new laws, is not helpful, its harassment. but all I seem to get is..'well just follow the rules' as if that makes everything ok.
Maybe that's because most people acknowledge this is a serious problem with no easy solution that requires some drastic measures to mitigate the worst of the damage. You keep beating this drum and it honestly just sounds petty. It's a god damn global pandemic, these measures aren't in place forever and they're clearly necessary because people aren't getting it.
gorgon wrote: Some economists tried doing a benefit-cost analysis of this social distancing. Their analysis supported it, provided that the downturn isn't too steep and the recovery isn't too long.
Pretty much in line with what most people that could think farther ahead than the next 5 minutes or tomorrows opening/closing numbers on their stock index of choice already knew.
There is one thing I wanted to point out though:
"To account for the possibility of overwhelming the U.S. health care system, we make a
critical assumption that the system has sufficient resources to provide adequate treatment for about
one half of the maximum number of individuals who would be infected at any one time in an
uncontrolled scenario, with no social distancing to slow down the virus."
This is being generous, as numbers I've seen elsewhere indicate that in an uncontrolled scenario the US medical system would have the capacity to treat only a fraction of the peak number of infections, and if/when those infections peaked the healthcare system would basically become non-responsive to post-peak infections for a period of several weeks to months afterwards as a result of the system being overloaded, effectively paralyzed, and essentially breaking down entirely until operations could be restored and normalized in some way (which itself would be subject to a ramp-up period). From the studies I could find, the one-half max figure would be accurate only if we curve-flattened the outbreak to a 6 month period, which would imply the existence of controls in place. If uncontrolled, the estimates I've looked at show that the peak would outstrip the availability of hospital beds (let alone ICU/ventilator capacity) by 6-8 times - post peak I can't begin to estimate what the damage would be, because I dont think anyone on the planet has any data to support what that might look like.
TL;DR - the cost of doing nothing is probably much higher than even this study suggests, there probably is not a lot of room for argument that we would be better off reopening the economy as some have suggested.
OK, clearly you're incapable of an actual conversation with substance, so I'm going to pass on continuing. I fail to see why you engaged with me in the first place.
youre not wrong, but just because some people are stupid, doesn't mean you create laws against them, otherwise drinking would be banned, amongst a whole host of other things. I keep saying over and over, that the police interrogating law abiding members of the public under fear of these new laws, is not helpful, its harassment. but all I seem to get is..'well just follow the rules' as if that makes everything ok.
Maybe that's because most people acknowledge this is a serious problem with no easy solution that requires some drastic measures to mitigate the worst of the damage. You keep beating this drum and it honestly just sounds petty. It's a god damn global pandemic, these measures aren't in place forever and they're clearly necessary because people aren't getting it.
Ad hominem isn't a valid argument. There are drastic measures, and theres pointless, unnecessary persecution of innocent citizens. Try again.
OK, clearly you're incapable of an actual conversation with substance, so I'm going to pass on continuing. I fail to see why you engaged with me in the first place.
With hindsight I wouldn't, I had no idea I'd made the mistake of assuming you understood the situation. As it stands you'd clearly be the guy in WW2 with his Christmas lights up and a giant illuminated Santa on the roof because you knew better than those pesky ARPs who were trying to opress your rights, and clearly those blackout rules applied to the stupid, and not you because you know better.
Your ignorance in this matter is as breathtaking as it is depressing, and I'll reserve substantial discourse for those who warrant it.
No strawmen here, unless you can convince me your issue with police stopping people and your issue with not being able to drive about to go elsewhere to exercise are in no way related.
In other news, my supermarket had toilet roll today for the first time in 3 weeks. I seemingly arrived at the right time as I walked straight in, but there was a massive queue outside when I finished. I can't really understand how it worked, as there wasn't anyone counting the numbers going in.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: In other news, my supermarket had toilet roll today for the first time in 3 weeks. I seemingly arrived at the right time as I walked straight in, but there was a massive queue outside when I finished. I can't really understand how it worked, as there wasn't anyone counting the numbers going in.
Similarly I headed out to Aldi for the first time in about 4 weeks, and was impressed by the stoic, well spaced and patient queue outside only to be met by every aisle inside filled with staff trying to fill the shelves with all their stock in the middle of the aisle, thus forcing everyone into close contact anyway.
The only time I've been touched by another human being in the last 4 weeks, thanks to living in the mess away from home, was when a bloke tripped and fell backwards into me in the bread aisle.
Immediate decontamination drills ensued.
Turns out that threatening to walk gets results. They paired me back up with my old crew, so now we’re back on track. No idea why they didn’t just do that to begin with but they have a habit of being difficult just to assert their authority, which always backfires on them. As for the money, just an oversight because they’re short staffed. I’ll give them until Tuesday to sort it out.
Glad it's worked out somewhat and you're not out of a job over it. Hopefully the oversight gets fixed!
More virus related; my dad’s friend’s dad isn’t doing so good. Last I heard he’s down to one lung and he’s on kidney dialysis too. But he’s still alive so, we can only hope.
Oh no. Is he going on/been put on the transplant list or is there a possibility of his kidney function improving after the virus is dealt with? You ever need to talk about this stuff (or even your friend) then shoot me a PM, I've dealt with kidney issues all the way through to transplantation so I'd be happy to help with answering any questions as best I can (though I managed to avoid dialysis, so only have more general knowledge on that).
Yup, let's blame them dirty foreigners, never mind Germany has actually more cases than all Slavic countries combined, and in any case, a worker on rural farm is not going to infect anyone, and you can even make an argument he/she will be bigger threat to their own country upon returning than to Germany on arrival.
Man look at my flag. Slavs are not other to me My point was that lockdowns are arbitrarily waived when they endanger profit.
Except food is an essential. It needs picking. The pickers have to come from somewhere and if there isn't any medical reason to go with Germans over other groups then why do that?
When people were storming the bottled water skids and buying two or three cases of water EACH when I last went to Costco (before the stay at home orders), all I wanted to do was scream at them, "What the hell do you think is going to happen? This is a disease.... they're not turning off the faucets in your house, you moronic idiots!"
Jesus Christ, at least in the city if the power goes out, the city water just keeps on flowing. Here in rural America we have a hand pump attached to our well that we can switch over to if the power goes out.
God damn. America, what the hell are you playing at? I've largely paid attention to what's been going on at home; with half an eye on Italy and South Africa. Then I turn around a week or so later, and New York alone is only 500 odd deaths behind the entire UK!!! And 250,000 cases?!
Is this the price of not having centralised healthcare? Or is it the orange chimp? Serious question, I've no idea why things are looking so bad over there as compared to elsewhere. From where I'm sitting, it looks like your society has just more or less decided that the poor and vulnerable might as well shuffle off and die (unless they've got money). What the hell is the American Government thinking:?
Ketara wrote: God damn. America, what the hell are you playing at? I've largely paid attention to what's been going on at home; with half an eye on Italy and South Africa. Then I turn around a week or so later, and New York alone is only 500 odd deaths behind the entire UK!!! And 250,000 cases?!
Is this the price of not having centralised healthcare? Or is it the orange chimp? Serious question, I've no idea why things are looking so bad over there as compared to elsewhere. From where I'm sitting, it looks like your society has just more or less decided that the poor and vulnerable might as well shuffle off and die (unless they've got money). What the hell is the American Government thinking:?
I think a big part of it is American people not taking it seriously. I work at a Walmart, and I see way too many people in there all the time despite the fact that my hometown is 10 days into a stay-at-home order.
The reason for that may be that the government has become the boy who cried "Wolf!" when it comes to infectious diseases. They played up the danger of West Nile Virus, H1N1, Bird Flu, etc. and none of those really blew up the way COVID-19 has. And now, here comes another disease, the government starts warning people, and despite the fact that this one really is seriously bad nobody pays attention.
Ketara wrote: God damn. America, what the hell are you playing at? I've largely paid attention to what's been going on at home; with half an eye on Italy and South Africa. Then I turn around a week or so later, and New York alone is only 500 odd deaths behind the entire UK!!! And 250,000 cases?!
Is this the price of not having centralised healthcare? Or is it the orange chimp? Serious question, I've no idea why things are looking so bad over there as compared to elsewhere. From where I'm sitting, it looks like your society has just more or less decided that the poor and vulnerable might as well shuffle off and die (unless they've got money). What the hell is the American Government thinking:?
Have some perspective. Namely that the U.K is a tiny country compared to the US. New York in particular is an extremely dense population center. 8 million out of the 19.5 million people in the entire state live in that single city. That would be comparable to 30 million of the UKs residents living in one location. The pop density of NYC is double that of London. Diseases spread in dense population areas like crazy, and how you pay for your healthcare doesn't affect that.
Healthcare type is not a factor. Given that Italy Spain and China are socialized healthcare and being ravaged doesn’t give any bonus points to their system. Italy is leaving bodies in people’s homes and not even collecting them. Nobody with Covid in the US is dying at home and being left to rot.
Across the board, this disease poses a lot of unique challenges that NO healthcare system is equipped to handle. Socialized or private or otherwise.
Ketara wrote: God damn. America, what the hell are you playing at? I've largely paid attention to what's been going on at home; with half an eye on Italy and South Africa. Then I turn around a week or so later, and New York alone is only 500 odd deaths behind the entire UK!!! And 250,000 cases?!
Is this the price of not having centralised healthcare? Or is it the orange chimp? Serious question, I've no idea why things are looking so bad over there as compared to elsewhere. From where I'm sitting, it looks like your society has just more or less decided that the poor and vulnerable might as well shuffle off and die (unless they've got money). What the hell is the American Government thinking:?
Have some perspective. Namely that the U.K is a tiny country compared to the US. New York in particular is an extremely dense population center. 8 million out of the 19.5 million people in the entire state live in that single city. That would be comparable to 30 million of the UKs residents living in one location. The pop density of NYC is double that of London. Diseases spread in dense population areas like crazy, and how you pay for your healthcare doesn't affect that.
Healthcare type is not a factor. Given that Italy Spain and China are socialized healthcare and being ravaged doesn’t give any bonus points to their system. Italy is leaving bodies in people’s homes and not even collecting them. Nobody with Covid in the US is dying at home and being left to rot.
Across the board, this disease poses a lot of unique challenges that NO healthcare system is equipped to handle. Socialized or private or otherwise.
Mate, whatever gets you through this.
I saw a vid the other day with an American militia made up almost entirely of bearded white men, virtually salivating at the idea that they were the only thing that were standing up for sanity against the virus and the Govt.
You guys have a very weird worldview, and I say that as a Brit and a fan. Lord knows we have a fethed up view of ourselves, Europe and the rest of the world but you guys really go the extra mile.
Ketara wrote: God damn. America, what the hell are you playing at? I've largely paid attention to what's been going on at home; with half an eye on Italy and South Africa. Then I turn around a week or so later, and New York alone is only 500 odd deaths behind the entire UK!!! And 250,000 cases?!
Is this the price of not having centralised healthcare? Or is it the orange chimp? Serious question, I've no idea why things are looking so bad over there as compared to elsewhere. From where I'm sitting, it looks like your society has just more or less decided that the poor and vulnerable might as well shuffle off and die (unless they've got money). What the hell is the American Government thinking:?
Have some perspective. Namely that the U.K is a tiny country compared to the US. New York in particular is an extremely dense population center. 8 million out of the 19.5 million people in the entire state live in that single city. That would be comparable to 30 million of the UKs residents living in one location. The pop density of NYC is double that of London.
Errr......this would be more convincing if 'perspective' didn't make it look five times worse. Hence my original astonishment.
London has about the same population grouped in one city (about half a million more actually, but who's counting), and a far, far less serious outbreak. London's got 9,291 cases. New York has...102,863 cases. Timescales for the first infections are roughly comparable. Deaths right now are standing at right now at 3605 for the entire United Kingdom as opposed to 2,935 for New York alone. From what I'm reading as well, NYC hospitals are absolutely overflowing and underequipped compared to what we've got over here. NYC is down to less than a weeks worth of ICU supplies at the current trend of increasing cases (it's likely to grow higher still), whilst London (coming somewhat under strain to this point) is actually finally bringing more capacity online and infection rates have flattened out over the last four/five days.
The population density difference only accounts for so much guv. You've got vastly more cases, less room to increase capacity and supply, a completely out of control infection rate which is going to jack it higher still...I mean, Jesus. Things are troubling here, but the more I read into NYC, the more I realise how well we're doing in comparison!
I mean, I'm reading stuff about different states bidding for medical supplies! Where's the command economy? The central planning?
Ketara wrote: God damn. America, what the hell are you playing at? I've largely paid attention to what's been going on at home; with half an eye on Italy and South Africa. Then I turn around a week or so later, and New York alone is only 500 odd deaths behind the entire UK!!! And 250,000 cases?!
Is this the price of not having centralised healthcare? Or is it the orange chimp? Serious question, I've no idea why things are looking so bad over there as compared to elsewhere. From where I'm sitting, it looks like your society has just more or less decided that the poor and vulnerable might as well shuffle off and die (unless they've got money). What the hell is the American Government thinking:?
Have some perspective. Namely that the U.K is a tiny country compared to the US. New York in particular is an extremely dense population center. 8 million out of the 19.5 million people in the entire state live in that single city. That would be comparable to 30 million of the UKs residents living in one location. The pop density of NYC is double that of London. Diseases spread in dense population areas like crazy, and how you pay for your healthcare doesn't affect that.
Healthcare type is not a factor. Given that Italy Spain and China are socialized healthcare and being ravaged doesn’t give any bonus points to their system. Italy is leaving bodies in people’s homes and not even collecting them. Nobody with Covid in the US is dying at home and being left to rot.
Across the board, this disease poses a lot of unique challenges that NO healthcare system is equipped to handle. Socialized or private or otherwise.
This.
And although I have no love for our chief executive, the rhetoric affected me too. I didn’t realize what was really coming until the 12th, when a family member who works at a hospital filled me in on the Covid freight train. That night I texted and called people, and told coworkers the next day. We all should have been better informed and known weeks earlier to prepare ourselves. Lives would have been saved.
I’ll also say that although the WH has bumbled it way through this and Kushner leading the charge makes me shudder, at least they were capable of doing some simple math about the cost of herd immunity and never thought they should “just let everyone get it”. Jesus.
gorgon wrote: And although I have no love for our chief executive, the rhetoric affected me too. I didn’t realize what was really coming until the 12th, when a family member who works at a hospital filled me in on the Covid freight train. That night I texted and called people, and told coworkers the next day. We all should have been better informed and known weeks earlier to prepare ourselves. Lives would have been saved.
I’ll also say that although the WH has bumbled it way through this and Kushner leading the charge makes me shudder, at least they were capable of doing some simple math about the cost of herd immunity and never thought they should “just let everyone get it”. Jesus.
Don't believe everything you read. Whilst people like to blame politicians for everything; the Cabinet during February were working off of models produced by (to quote this week's Private Eye) 'two scientific pandemic influenza groups made up of academics' and the advice of various sundry other health officials. There was no general consensus by the scientific lot at the time on the best way to proceed, and so the politicians basically chose to pick the option that did the least economic damage at the time rather than the worst case one. Perhaps not the smartest thing to do, but hardly a case of 'feth the poor/vulnerable' that some people espouse.
The minute that Imperial produced new modelling showing that the death rate would be much higher than original models predicted, we had a screeching halt and U-turn the next day where everything went into lockdown. I almost got whiplash from how fast policy changed! We went from 'wash your hands and keep calm' to ((Schwarzenegger voice) 'GET ORFFF THE STREETS NAOH IF YOU WHANT TO LIRVE'. Sunak discovered he was a socialist overnight!*
*Yes, I know he probably isn't one, but I was more referring to the effects of his emergency financial strategy.
Turns out that threatening to walk gets results. They paired me back up with my old crew, so now we’re back on track. No idea why they didn’t just do that to begin with but they have a habit of being difficult just to assert their authority, which always backfires on them. As for the money, just an oversight because they’re short staffed. I’ll give them until Tuesday to sort it out.
Glad it's worked out somewhat and you're not out of a job over it. Hopefully the oversight gets fixed!
More virus related; my dad’s friend’s dad isn’t doing so good. Last I heard he’s down to one lung and he’s on kidney dialysis too. But he’s still alive so, we can only hope.
Oh no. Is he going on/been put on the transplant list or is there a possibility of his kidney function improving after the virus is dealt with? You ever need to talk about this stuff (or even your friend) then shoot me a PM, I've dealt with kidney issues all the way through to transplantation so I'd be happy to help with answering any questions as best I can (though I managed to avoid dialysis, so only have more general knowledge on that).
Yup, let's blame them dirty foreigners, never mind Germany has actually more cases than all Slavic countries combined, and in any case, a worker on rural farm is not going to infect anyone, and you can even make an argument he/she will be bigger threat to their own country upon returning than to Germany on arrival.
Man look at my flag. Slavs are not other to me My point was that lockdowns are arbitrarily waived when they endanger profit.
Except food is an essential. It needs picking. The pickers have to come from somewhere and if there isn't any medical reason to go with Germans over other groups then why do that?
He’s been given 12 hours.
I'm so sorry. This must be so hard for you and your friend to go through. I hope everything is being done to make him as comfortable as possible.
Ketara wrote: ... Sunak discovered he was a socialist overnight!*...
As Geoff Norcott mentioned earlier in the Mash report, it's not exactly an endorsement of your worldview when it's only brought out to counter a global emergency. Probably the first Tory statement that I actually lol'd at, whilst kind of agreeing with. Poor old Jezza.
Ketara wrote: God damn. America, what the hell are you playing at? I've largely paid attention to what's been going on at home; with half an eye on Italy and South Africa. Then I turn around a week or so later, and New York alone is only 500 odd deaths behind the entire UK!!! And 250,000 cases?!
Is this the price of not having centralised healthcare? Or is it the orange chimp? Serious question, I've no idea why things are looking so bad over there as compared to elsewhere. From where I'm sitting, it looks like your society has just more or less decided that the poor and vulnerable might as well shuffle off and die (unless they've got money). What the hell is the American Government thinking:?
Any response to this winds up being political. Sorry.
Ketara wrote: God damn. America, what the hell are you playing at? I've largely paid attention to what's been going on at home; with half an eye on Italy and South Africa. Then I turn around a week or so later, and New York alone is only 500 odd deaths behind the entire UK!!! And 250,000 cases?!
Is this the price of not having centralised healthcare? Or is it the orange chimp? Serious question, I've no idea why things are looking so bad over there as compared to elsewhere. From where I'm sitting, it looks like your society has just more or less decided that the poor and vulnerable might as well shuffle off and die (unless they've got money). What the hell is the American Government thinking:?
Have some perspective. Namely that the U.K is a tiny country compared to the US. New York in particular is an extremely dense population center. 8 million out of the 19.5 million people in the entire state live in that single city. That would be comparable to 30 million of the UKs residents living in one location. The pop density of NYC is double that of London.
Errr......this would be more convincing if 'perspective' didn't make it look five times worse. Hence my original astonishment.
London has about the same population grouped in one city (about half a million more actually, but who's counting), and a far, far less serious outbreak. London's got 9,291 cases. New York has...102,863 cases. Timescales for the first infections are roughly comparable. Deaths right now are standing at right now at 3605 for the entire United Kingdom as opposed to 2,935 for New York alone. From what I'm reading as well, NYC hospitals are absolutely overflowing and underequipped compared to what we've got over here. NYC is down to less than a weeks worth of ICU supplies at the current trend of increasing cases (it's likely to grow higher still), whilst London (coming somewhat under strain to this point) is actually finally bringing more capacity online and infection rates have flattened out over the last four/five days.
The population density difference only accounts for so much guv. You've got vastly more cases, less room to increase capacity and supply, a completely out of control infection rate which is going to jack it higher still...I mean, Jesus. Things are troubling here, but the more I read into NYC, the more I realise how well we're doing in comparison!
I mean, I'm reading stuff about different states bidding for medical supplies! Where's the command economy? The central planning?
No. London does not have the same population parameters. London has a population of 8.9 million and a density of 5,666/square km. New York City has a population of 8.3 million, but a density of 10,715/square km. Almost twice the density. Density makes a huge difference to how fast diseases spread, particularly those that spread via coughing and other respiratory factors.
Also keep in mind that those does not include the rest of Long Island, just the city limits of New York itself.
The access to Healthcare quality is not a factor in catching COVID. Going to the doctor regularly doesn't mean you are less likely to catch COVID. The chance of catching COVID is entirely dependent on coming into contact with other infected people, IE: density is what matters.
Its not surprising at all that New York would have a worse time than London. Less than half the density means far slower transmission which means fewer people catching it all at the same time. One person sick with it in New York would reinfect far more people than a person in London, exponentially more. Socialized medicine would do jack squat in preventing that. Socialized medicine is not "better equipped" to handle a crisis of this magnitude. Italy and Spain are overrun and they have Socialized medicine. China is not to be trusted to give an accurate image of what is going on with them. Which if they had been honest from the get-go, it might have allowed the rest of the world some earlier warning.
gorgon wrote: And although I have no love for our chief executive, the rhetoric affected me too. I didn’t realize what was really coming until the 12th, when a family member who works at a hospital filled me in on the Covid freight train. That night I texted and called people, and told coworkers the next day. We all should have been better informed and known weeks earlier to prepare ourselves. Lives would have been saved.
Yes, but if some of your intelligence agents are saying this might be bad, but at the same time the WHO is saying its not that bad, and you also have other world leaders saying its not that bad, what are you going to do? I mean, the WHO is supposed to be the experts. This isn't the first time a sensationalist disease has popped up in recent years, and all the others were underwhelming. Taking a wait and see approach could hardly be something you could blame anybody for doing. And this thing hit so fast that nobody could react to it with the speed that was necessary.
Which is really how all pandemics happen. Outside of some stroke of clairvoyant genius nobody can every really say a pandemic is coming until its too late. The people that were screaming about this disease before it was a thing are the same people who were screaming about Ebola, and SARS, etc... The Boy who cried Wolf is definitely a factor here.
On the other hand, certain influential groups in two countries that, even when italy was unfolding, spent time claiming "it'll be just fine" are responsible for sending the wrong message to their citizens. Herd immunity nonsense, something no other country in the world even considered to my knowledge, was borderline treason. So was "this is just like flu".
Grey Templar wrote: Yes, but if some of your intelligence agents are saying this might be bad, but at the same time the WHO is saying its not that bad, and you also have other world leaders saying its not that bad, what are you going to do? I mean, the WHO is supposed to be the experts.
Grey Templar wrote: Which is really how all pandemics happen. Outside of some stroke of clairvoyant genius nobody can every really say a pandemic is coming until its too late. The people that were screaming about this disease before it was a thing are the same people who were screaming about Ebola, and SARS, etc... The Boy who cried Wolf is definitely a factor here.
I'd argue that having Nationalised health care, Im not going to debase the ideal by using the American perogative term "socialised" with its intrinsic negative connotations, actually helps situations exactly as we are seeing by the fact that population is willing to seek treatment earlier because they know that it is unlikely to cause them financial destitution.
Obviously every system has an upper limit before it is overwhelmed in times like these. No system can withstand such an onslaught without help, but I'll be damned if I'll concede that privatised health care is in any way the superior system to deal with a global pandemic.
As far as I can tell herd immunity is basically the pattern all the countries are currently going for. It's just that instead of allowing it to run rampant, they are trying to curtail its spread and smooth the curve of the rate of infections.
Ergo all pretence at full containment to the point where we eliminate all infection sources isn't on the cards. Instead there's a move toward stalling infection rates with the assumption that a majority of the worlds population will, at some point, become infected. With countries trying to curtail infection so that their health systems can cope with the infection rate.
The UK government might not so much have done things widely different, but reported them differently/more openly to the population.
A safe tested general population vaccine is still several years away and it doesn't seem that there's any means to curtail infection to 0 in that time. Nor can the world just shut down for 3 years or so. Even if specific countries can lock down, test, track, trace and isolate infection there's still carriers who won't show signs who can carry it around and spread it; plus other nations that will fail in lockdowns.
I still don't see, at this stage where its rampant over most of the world, that we can lock it down and isolate it. That might have worked if it was contained just to China or a region in China. But with it spread over most of the world a herd-immunity end result seems to be about the only possible solution in the next few years.
That is unless science can turn around a safe vaccine in record time (which doesn't have a great track record and the last thing we want is a fast fix that results in even worse medical disasters further on)
Automatically Appended Next Post:
r_squared wrote: I'd argue that having Nationalised health care, Im not going to debase the ideal by using the American perogative term "socialised" with its intrinsic negative connotations, actually helps situations exactly as we are seeing by the fact that population is willing to seek treatment earlier because they know that it is unlikely to cause them financial destitution.
I've friends in the USA who often say they can't even dream of going to the doctors for things because its not on their insurance or they don't want to risk their costs rising etc... Even for conditions and medication like insulin that we take for granted in the UK, becomes a serious long term cost for those I've spoken to in the USA. With an "attitude" toward medication like that I can well see that there might well be large segments of the population in the USA for whom the hospitals are just not an option they think of using. So there could be a cultural aspect there.
The access to Healthcare quality is not a factor in catching COVID. Going to the doctor regularly doesn't mean you are less likely to catch COVID. The chance of catching COVID is entirely dependent on coming into contact with other infected people, IE: density is what matters.
No, I'm sorry. This is not accurate.
Yes, population density counts. Is it the be all and end all? No. How fast a contagion spreads is contingent upon many many factors, such as how fast controls on movement are whacked in, to how closely they're followed, to general sanitation levels prevalent(there's more bodily fluids than saliva), to cultural behaviours (how many people to a house, how sociable the household is, how prepared they are to seek medical aid), and more. Handwaving and going, 'Ah, a higher population density means more infection' is mind-bogglingly simplistic.
To hammer home the point, look at Japan. They have 156 square miles of land in Tokyo housing a population of over 13 million people! That's half the space of New York and almost double the people. And Japan got their first case of coronavirus a fortnight before the States, meaning they had a whole extra two weeks to spread the stuff! So utilising your logic, if population density is the be all and end all, Japan should have hundreds of thousands of cases, right? More time, incredibly high population density, etcetc.
In reality, Japan as a whole has....2,617 cases. Now whilst low levels of testing mean it's probably double or even quadruple that? That just takes it to a small gap away from the UK. That is (to put this point to bed) with a population density roughly comparable to New York as New York is to London. So...yeah. You're wrong. And I suspect the reason you don't want to acknowledge that is buried in this little gem here:-
Socialized medicine is not "better equipped" to handle a crisis of this magnitude. Italy and Spain are overrun and they have Socialized medicine. China is not to be trusted to give an accurate image of what is going on with them. Which if they had been honest from the get-go, it might have allowed the rest of the world some earlier warning.
How could a centralised system not be inherently more efficient at dealing with crises? Do you think governments lock down procedure and freedoms during full scale wars for fun? A centralised command structure allows you to plan and deploy resources for optimum efficiency. My query on healthcare systems has nothing to do with 'catching' coronavirus, as you seem to be so fixated on, but treating it. 'Socialised medicine' (which as a Brit I have to say, is the weirdest way I've ever heard it put - you guys are really obsessed with reds over there) is to do with treating it more effectively! When the Governor of NYC is going on the air and saying that he's having to bid against other states for basic medical supplies, something is clearly broken in the system.
Ours here is literally just starting to get into stride. They opened the Nightingale hospital today, they've two more in the works, and they announced another two today established in other cities. The system is under strain right now, but from everything I'm reading, they're bringing more resources online ever so slightly faster than consumption is rising. Meaning things should, theoretically, start to ease gradually over the next month.
No no, it's all very well and good for a government to decide to turn on the money tap, it's even better when the industry base exists to manufacture. But it's all bloody useless if it can't be distributed effectively and efficiently to where you need it! Logistics is the underpinning of everything, and from what I'm reading, the fragmented nature of the American medical system is really biting the US response in the arse.
Grey Templar wrote: Yes, but if some of your intelligence agents are saying this might be bad, but at the same time the WHO is saying its not that bad, and you also have other world leaders saying its not that bad, what are you going to do? I mean, the WHO is supposed to be the experts.
Grey Templar wrote: Which is really how all pandemics happen. Outside of some stroke of clairvoyant genius nobody can every really say a pandemic is coming until its too late. The people that were screaming about this disease before it was a thing are the same people who were screaming about Ebola, and SARS, etc... The Boy who cried Wolf is definitely a factor here.
There are no excuses for government. There were people here on Dakka that called it and we were far from alone. They had the info, they had the expertise, they did not have the political will to act.
Yeah, I'm agreeing with you. Not only should they have known better, there's pretty clear evidence that they DID know better for quite a while and it mostly fell on deaf or incompetent ears. I wish we could have waited until the crisis passed before the partisan-fueled historical revisionism began.
The access to Healthcare quality is not a factor in catching COVID. Going to the doctor regularly doesn't mean you are less likely to catch COVID. The chance of catching COVID is entirely dependent on coming into contact with other infected people, IE: density is what matters.
This is factual, but like so many facts it fails to explain the entire story.
Going to the doctor regularly doesn't mean you are less likely to catch COVID, yes. But it DOES mean you're likely to be healthier overall, with a stronger immune system and fewer of those preexisting conditions COVID homes in on and makes worse. So someone who doesn't go to the doctor regularly is more likely to get a SEVERE case of COVID due to their general ill-health.
Additionally, someone who can't afford to go to the doctor regularly will look at the cost of an extended hospital stay with horror, and not go until their situation is very, very bad. This means they pretty much walk in the door and go straight onto a ventilator, where if they had arrived earlier their condition might have been stabilized short of that.
So access to health hare DOES matter, not in CATCHING COVID, but in how severe a case you get when you DO catch it, and how extreme the measures that will have to be taken when you do seek medical care for it.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ouze wrote: I wish we could have waited until the crisis passed before the partisan-fueled historical revisionism began.
What part of modern American history made you think that was even possible, much less likely?
Ouze wrote: Yeah, I'm agreeing with you. Not only should they have known better, there's pretty clear evidence that they DID know better for quite a while and it mostly fell on deaf or incompetent ears. I wish we could have waited until the crisis passed before the partisan-fueled historical revisionism began.
I am so glad that right now I am in a quite rural county in Michigan. Right now, there have been 5 confirmed cased in our county (with none of those being within 20 miles of my home), despite a couple of surrounding counties having a hundred or more. Probably 75% of the cases in our state are in a 4-county area around Detroit, a 4 hour drive away. We figure the chances of getting sick from the couple of stores in the 4-mile radius we now travel is pretty close to zero (at the moment, things might always change).
For all of you in large metropolitan areas, I feel for you. Everything about this situation has to absolutely suck.
New York is so messed up because as late as march the mayor was still telling people go out on town have fun and don't worry about the virus. Once he realized maybe that he should take some actions after a national emergency was declared he was prevented from issuing a shelter in place by the governor of New York so that didnt happen until a couple weeks ago.
AegisGrimm wrote: I am so glad that right now I am in a quite rural county in Michigan. Right now, there have been 5 confirmed cased in our county (with none of those being within 20 miles of my home), despite a couple of surrounding counties having a hundred or more. Probably 75% of the cases in our state are in a 4-county area around Detroit, a 4 hour drive away. We figure the chances of getting sick from the couple of stores in the 4-mile radius we now travel is pretty close to zero (at the moment, things might always change).
.
It likely will. I'm in a rural county as well, and we had none for quite a while (mid march). Then 2, then 6, then 8, and 12. Meanwhile the county immediately east was doubling every day before they finally got a firmer shut down order.
The problem is a lot of rural areas (I've got family in another rural county in New York state), people are acting like its a holiday, going out in groups, taking their kids everywhere, etc. With the exodus from NYC, those people are pretty much inevitably going to run into cases and take them home. Despite everything, 'it can't happen here' is still the top thought in people's heads.
You can see the progress spreading from Philly (and spillover from New York in the eastern counties) and the Pitt, with an extra little bonus in Center County from Penn State University, which acts as a wonderful hub for transmission due to 100,000 students with nowhere to go once they came back from spring break). And its slowly creeping out everywhere else.
Everything I said at the state level is public info.
At the federal level
I could point out that the generic nature of most intel reports and how half the time they aren't actionable and how there were probably half a dozen other problem areas in the same report.
I could point out for every exercise/wargame that says this might be a problem there's dozens more with other problems that need to be addressed that haven't bitten us yet and may or may not in the future and its disingenous to say oh this one was obviosly the magic one to pay attention to.
But as someone whose sitting at home isolated from his grandkids because his wife is a higher risk category and his sons work in hospitals I just want everyone to knock the partisan BS off for a couple months while we get through this, then lets figure out how to do better next time because their will be a next time. South Korea's preparedness after going through similar before is where I want to be when this happens again.
PS Despite me poking at Cuomo earlier I have to give him (and Newsome) credit for putting partisanship aside for the most part. There's still State/Federal disagreements but those are them looking out for their state first, I can respect that even if I disagree with their desires in the bigger picture.
Anyone else notice that the Homeless are not being mentioned or canvased in the US.
Also the H1 visa's (crop pickers) stopped being issued (I heard something to that effect). Wonder how many unemployed Americans going to pick up those jobs. Hell if I was in charge. All Illegals who pick crops will have their fee's waived for Citizenship.
Whats irking me is the retaliation against Asian Americans who has nothing to do with China and the virus.
Also want to add not being able to assemble a Rhino but actually have tracks not install with globs of adhesive on its side. Painted Ultra blue.....give two .22LR round as trade.
Also picking up ammo at BiMart and the weapon prices are the same. Rounds though are getting expensive. I did watch one guy who got pissed he had to wait ten days for a background check to get his pistol and offered to pay more to speed up the process.
WA a open carry state so in three months if it really goes nuts I be walking around in body armor and armed to the teeth. Even sharpen my old tactical tomahawk I used in Afghanistan. I've to ensure me recently hired strippers working the farm field for free room, board and food are protected. They also be packing heat for self defense.
Real note though. I wonder how much illegal poaching going to happen this year. Also WA last week banned recreational fishing. I deem that good. Gives a chance for salmon population to make a comeback
Also MRE's are hitting the food banks....
State of WA Gov Inslee made it illegal to evict anyone. Issue is after the crisis is over do they have to back pay? (Riptide not being Political here) Or not be able to payback and still get evicted. That really needs to get address with unemployment hitting 6.6mil
As for the Economy and getting hired. I bet my entire Tau force the resumes are going to finely combed through to get the best hire.
AegisGrimm wrote: I am so glad that right now I am in a quite rural county in Michigan. Right now, there have been 5 confirmed cased in our county (with none of those being within 20 miles of my home), despite a couple of surrounding counties having a hundred or more. Probably 75% of the cases in our state are in a 4-county area around Detroit, a 4 hour drive away. We figure the chances of getting sick from the couple of stores in the 4-mile radius we now travel is pretty close to zero (at the moment, things might always change).
.
It likely will. I'm in a rural county as well, and we had none for quite a while (mid march). Then 2, then 6, then 8, and 12. Meanwhile the county immediately east was doubling every day before they finally got a firmer shut down order.
The problem is a lot of rural areas (I've got family in another rural county in New York state), people are acting like its a holiday, going out in groups, taking their kids everywhere, etc. With the exodus from NYC, those people are pretty much inevitably going to run into cases and take them home. Despite everything, 'it can't happen here' is still the top thought in people's heads.
You can see the progress spreading from Philly (and spillover from New York in the eastern counties) and the Pitt, with an extra little bonus in Center County from Penn State University, which acts as a wonderful hub for transmission due to 100,000 students with nowhere to go once they came back from spring break). And its slowly creeping out everywhere else.
It'll be interesting to see what happens. Despite being in the top 5 of the country for cases, a vast majority of Michigan counties, even in the lower peninsula, have less than 5-8 confirmed cases, lots with just 1 or 2. Right now I live on the road that is the literal border of two counties, one with 5 (confirmed, anyway) cases, the other with just 2. Either noone is travelling at the moment, or numbers are way, way off. Probably helps that my county is mostly small little towns and villages. The closest town, which my wife teaches high school in, has less than 400 residents, with graduating classes of 35-ish kids.
The access to Healthcare quality is not a factor in catching COVID. Going to the doctor regularly doesn't mean you are less likely to catch COVID. The chance of catching COVID is entirely dependent on coming into contact with other infected people, IE: density is what matters.
No, I'm sorry. This is not accurate.
Yes, population density counts. Is it the be all and end all? No. How fast a contagion spreads is contingent upon many many factors, such as how fast controls on movement are whacked in, to how closely they're followed, to general sanitation levels prevalent(there's more bodily fluids than saliva), to cultural behaviours (how many people to a house, how sociable the household is, how prepared they are to seek medical aid), and more. Handwaving and going, 'Ah, a higher population density means more infection' is mind-bogglingly simplistic.
To hammer home the point, look at Japan. They have 156 square miles of land in Tokyo housing a population of over 13 million people! That's half the space of New York and almost double the people. And Japan got their first case of coronavirus a fortnight before the States, meaning they had a whole extra two weeks to spread the stuff! So utilising your logic, if population density is the be all and end all, Japan should have hundreds of thousands of cases, right? More time, incredibly high population density, etcetc.
In reality, Japan as a whole has....2,617 cases. Now whilst low levels of testing mean it's probably double or even quadruple that? That just takes it to a small gap away from the UK. That is (to put this point to bed) with a population density roughly comparable to New York as New York is to London. So...yeah. You're wrong. And I suspect the reason you don't want to acknowledge that is buried in this little gem here:-
Due to the lack of testing, actual cases are probably much much higher than quadruple. I would put my guess at more in the hundreds to thousands of times larger.
Same in the states. I expect millions of people are infected at this point due to how virulent it is. And we will never know because the vast majority of those infected will never show symptoms or only have mild cold/flu symptoms and think its just that.
Socialized medicine is not "better equipped" to handle a crisis of this magnitude. Italy and Spain are overrun and they have Socialized medicine. China is not to be trusted to give an accurate image of what is going on with them. Which if they had been honest from the get-go, it might have allowed the rest of the world some earlier warning.
How could a centralised system not be inherently more efficient at dealing with crises? Do you think governments lock down procedure and freedoms during full scale wars for fun? A centralised command structure allows you to plan and deploy resources for optimum efficiency. My query on healthcare systems has nothing to do with 'catching' coronavirus, as you seem to be so fixated on, but treating it. 'Socialised medicine' (which as a Brit I have to say, is the weirdest way I've ever heard it put - you guys are really obsessed with reds over there) is to do with treating it more effectively! When the Governor of NYC is going on the air and saying that he's having to bid against other states for basic medical supplies, something is clearly broken in the system.
Ours here is literally just starting to get into stride. They opened the Nightingale hospital today, they've two more in the works, and they announced another two today established in other cities. The system is under strain right now, but from everything I'm reading, they're bringing more resources online ever so slightly faster than consumption is rising. Meaning things should, theoretically, start to ease gradually over the next month.
No no, it's all very well and good for a government to decide to turn on the money tap, it's even better when the industry base exists to manufacture. But it's all bloody useless if it can't be distributed effectively and efficiently to where you need it! Logistics is the underpinning of everything, and from what I'm reading, the fragmented nature of the American medical system is really biting the US response in the arse.
Centralization has benefits its true. It also has massive downsides. Downsides that I personally find utterly unacceptable on a moral level. I'm more worried about the side effects that this pandemic will cause in that department. Long term government control is no bueno.
r_squared wrote: I'd argue that having Nationalised health care, Im not going to debase the ideal by using the American perogative term "socialised" with its intrinsic negative connotations, actually helps situations exactly as we are seeing by the fact that population is willing to seek treatment earlier because they know that it is unlikely to cause them financial destitution.
Obviously every system has an upper limit before it is overwhelmed in times like these. No system can withstand such an onslaught without help, but I'll be damned if I'll concede that privatised health care is in any way the superior system to deal with a global pandemic.
Lets not forget the US healthcare system is designed to operate near capacity full-time, as its a for-profit system and excess capacity is financially inefficient. Thats whats really going to hurt us as we have significantly fewer hospital beds per capita than most other developed nations.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: In other news, my supermarket had toilet roll today for the first time in 3 weeks. I seemingly arrived at the right time as I walked straight in, but there was a massive queue outside when I finished. I can't really understand how it worked, as there wasn't anyone counting the numbers going in.
Similarly I headed out to Aldi for the first time in about 4 weeks, and was impressed by the stoic, well spaced and patient queue outside only to be met by every aisle inside filled with staff trying to fill the shelves with all their stock in the middle of the aisle, thus forcing everyone into close contact anyway.
The only time I've been touched by another human being in the last 4 weeks, thanks to living in the mess away from home, was when a bloke tripped and fell backwards into me in the bread aisle.
Immediate decontamination drills ensued.
Well hopefully some of the hysteria has started to die down and people have realised that there aren't going to be food shortages. Or toilet roll shortages.. Maybe some common sense might begin to return to the general public.
Ketara wrote: God damn. America, what the hell are you playing at? I've largely paid attention to what's been going on at home; with half an eye on Italy and South Africa. Then I turn around a week or so later, and New York alone is only 500 odd deaths behind the entire UK!!! And 250,000 cases?!
Is this the price of not having centralised healthcare? Or is it the orange chimp? Serious question, I've no idea why things are looking so bad over there as compared to elsewhere. From where I'm sitting, it looks like your society has just more or less decided that the poor and vulnerable might as well shuffle off and die (unless they've got money). What the hell is the American Government thinking:?
Well US has been uniquely well prepared to get it worst. US itself is basically geared up to suffer from epidemics badly. In the "modern" westernized countries US was always highest chance of getting hit worst. Lucky for US corona isn't THAT deadly or they would be really screwed.
How could a centralised system not be inherently more efficient at dealing with crises? Do you think governments lock down procedure and freedoms during full scale wars for fun? A centralised command structure allows you to plan and deploy resources for optimum efficiency. My query on healthcare systems has nothing to do with 'catching' coronavirus, as you seem to be so fixated on, but treating it. 'Socialised medicine' (which as a Brit I have to say, is the weirdest way I've ever heard it put - you guys are really obsessed with reds over there) is to do with treating it more effectively! When the Governor of NYC is going on the air and saying that he's having to bid against other states for basic medical supplies, something is clearly broken in the system.
Ours here is literally just starting to get into stride. They opened the Nightingale hospital today, they've two more in the works, and they announced another two today established in other cities. The system is under strain right now, but from everything I'm reading, they're bringing more resources online ever so slightly faster than consumption is rising. Meaning things should, theoretically, start to ease gradually over the next month.
No no, it's all very well and good for a government to decide to turn on the money tap, it's even better when the industry base exists to manufacture. But it's all bloody useless if it can't be distributed effectively and efficiently to where you need it! Logistics is the underpinning of everything, and from what I'm reading, the fragmented nature of the American medical system is really biting the US response in the arse.
Firstly: Multiple reasons to the centralised parts, especially when you have it to do with historic fragmented societies, making decentralised systems especially small scale ones head and shoulders MORE efficent then centralized ones.
Secondly: Centralised command structures are also inflexible and lead to trenchwarfare and actual waste on burocracy or flexibility.
THirdly: You can have an massivily decentralised medical system still available to your population via the third way, aka corporatism.
On a somewhat related note, the crystals and essential oils quacks are now selling anti-corona stones and other assorted "cures".
No money back if you do catch it despite shelling out $70 for a rock, of course. Then again, if you think a rock at whatever price will stop you from contracting a contagious disease...
Still, if I had my way, these -I don't want to call them people- pond scum would be publically flogged.
Bran Dawri wrote: On a somewhat related note, the crystals and essential oils quacks are now selling anti-corona stones and other assorted "cures".
No money back if you do catch it despite shelling out $70 for a rock, of course. Then again, if you think a rock at whatever price will stop you from contracting a contagious disease...
Still, if I had my way, these -I don't want to call them people- pond scum would be publically flogged.
Who?
the people buying it? The people selling this junk?
The former are just as much at fault, unless of course you argue that the education system has failed.
The later? Beyond breaking for sure certain guarantee conditions and laws in certain countries one can also assume other laws applicable.
Frankly such people should be forced to publicaly appologize and forced to actually explain why this doesn't work.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: In other news, my supermarket had toilet roll today for the first time in 3 weeks. I seemingly arrived at the right time as I walked straight in, but there was a massive queue outside when I finished. I can't really understand how it worked, as there wasn't anyone counting the numbers going in.
Similarly I headed out to Aldi for the first time in about 4 weeks, and was impressed by the stoic, well spaced and patient queue outside only to be met by every aisle inside filled with staff trying to fill the shelves with all their stock in the middle of the aisle, thus forcing everyone into close contact anyway.
The only time I've been touched by another human being in the last 4 weeks, thanks to living in the mess away from home, was when a bloke tripped and fell backwards into me in the bread aisle.
Immediate decontamination drills ensued.
Well hopefully some of the hysteria has started to die down and people have realised that there aren't going to be food shortages. Or toilet roll shortages.. Maybe some common sense might begin to return to the general public.
Kilkrazy wrote: It's far to early for any country to congratulate itself on the effectiveness of its response.
We won't be able to judge until the whole thing is over and we can analyse the casualty staistics.
In general? I don't know off any country sofar that has started self congratulating?!
Carefull optimism is what you hear here, and there are talks that over capacity we have get's sent to the Italians. (after we helped out the french and germans it's just correct imo to help the italians out. Especially considering they weren't egotistical douches considering general supply of medical stuff unlike the other 2 countries. For the record i am talking about the German Zollbehörde and the general french government, only to stop this after they realised that we are helping them in Elsass out due to the proximty to Basel....)
Firstly: Multiple reasons to the centralised parts, especially when you have it to do with historic fragmented societies, making decentralised systems especially small scale ones head and shoulders MORE efficent then centralized ones.
Secondly: Centralised command structures are also inflexible and lead to trenchwarfare and actual waste on burocracy or flexibility.
THirdly: You can have an massivily decentralised medical system still available to your population via the third way, aka corporatism.
Points one and three I don't understand. One because I literally don't understand it on a grammatical level, Three because it doesn't say anything about why a decentralised system is remotely as efficient/good as logistical deploymnet, or....well, anything really. It just says it can make a medical system 'available'. I think it's disagreeing with me, but it doesn't really say anything.
Point Two is, as a literal bread and butter historian of military systems around WW1; is completely wrong. Pick up John Terraine's 'The Smoke and the Fire' if you want to find out why in a fairly easy to read book.
Due to the lack of testing, actual cases are probably much much higher than quadruple. I would put my guess at more in the hundreds to thousands of times larger.
Same in the states. I expect millions of people are infected at this point due to how virulent it is. And we will never know because the vast majority of those infected will never show symptoms or only have mild cold/flu symptoms and think its just that.
Eh.Not sure I buy that. Why? Because Japan is a nation of the elderly. If it was anywhere near that bad, the dead would be stacking up over there. I don't doubt that it's much larger, but there's a limit to how much larger it could be without notice or documentation. I could buy double easily, quadruple well enough and maybe seven or eight times higher with only a little evidence.
But hundreds to thousands? No. We'd see a much, much higher level of the dead, and they simply haven't got that. For whatever reason, America and NYC has it much worse than Japan, despite having had it for less time and with a much smaller population density.
From what I'm reading actually, Japan is why a lot of the earlier scientific opinions were split. The fact it didn't seem so virulent over there made the British Government (amongst others) think it could be managed without overly draconian policies.
So the question has to be, what's Japan's mitigating factor that makes it seem slower to spread there? Open to thoughts and opinions on that one.
Centralization has benefits its true. It also has massive downsides. Downsides that I personally find utterly unacceptable on a moral level. I'm more worried about the side effects that this pandemic will cause in that department. Long term government control is no bueno.
Out of curiosity, given that European medical systems are generally pretty good whilst being state run; what (in a few words) is the 'moral' tradeoff? Because higher taxes is hardly a moral concern, and we still have a private system here in the UK (meaning it's not taking choices away from people with money). I'm having a hard time conceptualising any moral objection beyond some kind of Andrew Ryan style rant about 'parasites'; let alone one which begins to measure against the moral concern about all the dead which may well result from more inefficient treatment.
Firstly: Multiple reasons to the centralised parts, especially when you have it to do with historic fragmented societies, making decentralised systems especially small scale ones head and shoulders MORE efficent then centralized ones.
Secondly: Centralised command structures are also inflexible and lead to trenchwarfare and actual waste on burocracy or flexibility.
THirdly: You can have an massivily decentralised medical system still available to your population via the third way, aka corporatism.
Points one and three I don't understand. One because I literally don't understand it on a grammatical level, Three because it doesn't say anything about why a decentralised system is remotely as efficient/good as logistical deploymnet, or....well, anything really. It just says it can make a medical system 'available'. I think it's disagreeing with me, but it doesn't really say anything.
Point Two is, as a literal bread and butter historian of military systems around WW1; is completely wrong. Pick up John Terraine's 'The Smoke and the Fire' if you want to find out why in a fairly easy to read book.
1: Sorry, it seems my autocorrect buggered me. What i mean by this is the following:
Historically divided societes (e.g. Multiethnic / national states Switzerland f.e.) have a tendency to deny centralised authorithy on a fundamental level. Due to the very real political cost associated wtih centralisation in regards to autonomy of the regions. Which makes it in general for such societies not only from a practical standpoint highly cost ineffective to have highly centralised institutions, (multiple languages for one) but also if you want to lower costs due to f.e. suggesting that you only work in 2 instead of 4 languages also have to fight political resistance.
2: Disagree vehemntly due to doctrinal differences. Prefering flexibility above but that is not a debate to be had here.
3: A decentralised system leads to a more spread out system guaranteeing basic healthcare all over a state therefore increasing general supply due to having various stockpiles at differing points and in general leads to slight over capacity which can be an issue if you want to save money as a state but also can be a massive boon when you need over-capacity and have the solidarity required within a country to move and organise them. Secondly the later part beeing more in regards to national healthcare vs free market healthcare system is an ideological comment basically stating that there isn't just black and white in that debate.
1: Sorry, it seems my autocorrect buggered me. What i mean by this is the following:
Historically divided societes (e.g. Multiethnic / national states Switzerland f.e.) have a tendency to deny centralised authorithy on a fundamental level. Due to the very real political cost associated wtih centralisation in regards to autonomy of the regions. Which makes it in general for such societies not only from a practical standpoint highly cost ineffective to have highly centralised institutions, (multiple languages for one) but also if you want to lower costs due to f.e. suggesting that you only work in 2 instead of 4 languages also have to fight political resistance.
So just to clarify what I think you're claiming here (because I want it clear what my response is to). it seems like you're saying that in certain larger nation-states, inter-cultural tensions and difficultiies can lead to bureaucratic inefficiencies cropping up in larger administrative structures?
If that's what you're saying, I can buy that as a difficulty against setting up a larger centralised structure. I would contend however, that it would be something limited by time. The longer the centralised system existed, the greater the odds of it smoothing out problems of that type. A more predominant language will be selected as the primary one (like it or not), procedures will aligned, and battles had to streamline things. New inefficiencies may well crop up, but I would argue historical example (and the development of professionalism and managerialism) clearly shows a tendency in large state run institutions to push to eliminate those sorts of problems.
So I think it's a valid point, but I would postulate it has more to do with the earlier days of such systems. It would require more time to study than I have to hand though!
2: Disagree vehemntly due to doctrinal differences. Prefering flexibility above but that is not a debate to be had here.
You can disagree as much as you like mate, my doctorate was literally in pre-WW1 naval procurement. When it comes to pros/cons of military logistical and procurement systems at that point in time, I could write you a chapter without thinking. But as you say, this isn't really the place for that one, I gave you a reference, you can follow it up or not.
3: A decentralised system leads to a more spread out system guaranteeing basic healthcare all over a state therefore increasing general supply due to having various stockpiles at differing points and in general leads to slight over capacity which can be an issue if you want to save money as a state but also can be a massive boon when you need over-capacity and have the solidarity required within a country to move and organise them. Secondly the later part beeing more in regards to national healthcare vs free market healthcare system is an ideological comment basically stating that there isn't just black and white in that debate.
Spreading resources out is inefficient. It isn't deploying them where they can do the most good, it restricts the ability to gather data on wider requirements/trends, in no way increases 'general supply' of services if the provision of those services is being accurately calculated, and actually tends (in the case of business led medical practice) to look to run exactly at capacity. Someone pointed out above how there are actually less intensive care beds as a result of the private healthcare system in the States; not more.
Otherwise, I'm not claiming (if this isn't clear to anyone) that a centralised system is automatically more efficient at saving money. I don't think that for a moment. Private systems always keep a closer eye on the bottom line.
That being said, I think in healthcare systems they probably do purely on procurement grounds. Operations and drugs are doled out on the NHS at a far cheaper rate per unit than in the States.
Applying free market economics to a product with guaranteed demand which can't go anywhere else due to IP and quality restrictions is basically a ticket to monopoly/oligopoly and incessant price raising. That cost alone far outstrips the natural bureaucratic bloat resulting from a centralised system.
1: Sorry, it seems my autocorrect buggered me. What i mean by this is the following: Historically divided societes (e.g. Multiethnic / national states Switzerland f.e.) have a tendency to deny centralised authorithy on a fundamental level. Due to the very real political cost associated wtih centralisation in regards to autonomy of the regions. Which makes it in general for such societies not only from a practical standpoint highly cost ineffective to have highly centralised institutions, (multiple languages for one) but also if you want to lower costs due to f.e. suggesting that you only work in 2 instead of 4 languages also have to fight political resistance.
So just to clarify what I think you're claiming here (because I want it clear what my response is to). it seems like you're saying that in certain larger nation-states, inter-cultural tensions and difficultiies can lead to bureaucratic inefficiencies cropping up in larger administrative structures?
errrm, partially, Switzerland isn't excactly the biggest country on the block but quite diverse what with Italians, germans and french with some Rumantsch sprinkled in as native population. Size and the various differing localized types of economy do also allready matter for switzerland. A National system for a state like the USA would have to accomodate alot off differing infrastructure and economical types AND at the same time needed the legitimacy in the region which you can imagine to be a nightmare to achieve. However if you break that down to statelevel or even county level and internalise the costs there with the caveat that the people there locally can decide you can of course eliminate alot of these issues there.
If that's what you're saying, I can buy that as a difficulty against setting up a larger centralised structure. I would contend however, that it would be something limited by time. The longer the centralised system existed, the greater the odds of it smoothing out problems of that type. A more predominant language will be selected as the primary one (like it or not), procedures will aligned, and battles had to streamline things. New inefficiencies may well crop up, but I would argue historical example (and the development of professionalism and managerialism) clearly shows a tendency in large state run institutions to push to eliminate those sorts of problems.
So I think it's a valid point, but I would postulate it has more to do with the earlier days of such systems. It would require more time to study than I have to hand though!
Eehhh no. Swizerland at one point had 75% population that spoke german and yet german never managed to dominate federal and central institutions and never wanted to because that is how you get the people in arms over here, quite literally, simply because it would be seen as an attempt at illegitimate centralisation and thus be decried on all sides invovled. Also to my knowledge the NHS is also not all over the UK with scotland having a seperate run and supposedly bettter working system in place then england.Supposedly. Someone with better knowledge please step in now. (you can see that historically during the time of the helvetic republic, the french centralized puppet state that had a stability worse then most countries ever, heck it makes modern day irak or afghanistan look positively stable.)
3: A decentralised system leads to a more spread out system guaranteeing basic healthcare all over a state therefore increasing general supply due to having various stockpiles at differing points and in general leads to slight over capacity which can be an issue if you want to save money as a state but also can be a massive boon when you need over-capacity and have the solidarity required within a country to move and organise them. Secondly the later part beeing more in regards to national healthcare vs free market healthcare system is an ideological comment basically stating that there isn't just black and white in that debate.
Spreading resources out is inefficient. It isn't deploying them where they can do the most good, it restricts the ability to gather data on wider requirements/trends, in no way increases 'general supply' of services if the provision of those services is being accurately calculated, and actually tends (in the case of business led medical practice) to look to run exactly at capacity. Someone pointed out above how there are actually less intensive care beds as a result of the private healthcare system in the States; not more.
And yet look how france has medical deserts. Command economies work fine on paper, not in reality, same with the NHS. In switzerland any Kanton has multiple hospitals, that would be equal as if every bigger town in the UK that has over 10'000 inhabitants had it's own hostpital. Most of which are Kantonal, and then there are private clinics on top of that it's a mixture of state subsidised competing with privates.
Otherwise, I'm not claiming (if this isn't clear to anyone) that a centralised system is automatically more efficient at saving money. I don't think that for a moment. Private systems always keep a closer eye on the bottom line.
That being said, I think in healthcare systems they probably do purely on procurement grounds. Operations and drugs are doled out on the NHS at a far cheaper rate per unit than in the States.
Applying free market economics to a product with guaranteed demand which can't go anywhere else due to IP and quality restrictions is basically a ticket to monopoly/oligopoly and incessant price raising. That cost alone far outstrips the natural bureaucratic bloat resulting from a centralised system.
economies of mass can for certain lower cost of a medical system, however monopolisation leads to adverse effects in inovation and service. You could've achieved a similiar effect by subsidising production of generika. And the recent crisis also has perfectly shown that decentralized production is indeed a better model for stability of the system, allbeit a more costly one then importing everything out of china as we locally did.
The misinformation undoubtedly has made it worse for America. Heck, just yesterday we got the wonderfully mixed message from the President that we should wear masks in public- but he won't. What I'm worried about is the growing number of unemployed and suddenly uninsured people. When you have bad insurance, you ignore health issues- like say, a dry cough, until it becomes serious.
That's 3 million possible new disease vectors that will not seek testing independently, and possibly not even when things get bad because they fear things like this happening.
Someone who just lost their job does not want to saddle their family with a 35k dollar medical bill.
There have been reports and calls for it to be free treatment, which would be wonderful if it was true. In our country though, everyone has a story of how what their insurance said was covered wasn't, or the in network hospital had out of network specialists, and they ended up paying for it. My son ran out of his maintenance medication, which with our copay should be 12 dollars a bottle a week ago. I took the same script to the same pharmacy I filled it at last month- and was told I could either have half as much medicine, or my insurance wouldn't cover it and I would need to pay $400. Fortunately I was able to pay cash until I could call my insurance and get it straightened out- though I still haven't got the refund yet. Events like that erode our faith that when they say health coverage is free it's free, and makes us unlikely to seek testing or care.
I'm really worried that as bad as it is in the USA now, it really is going to continue to spread and proliferate for a very long time for us.
See its almost mind boggling to those of us in the UK, for example, that the USA isn't already making the Corona Virus treatment free at medical centres. It seems to be an ideal mix for a disaster to charge people for treatment at the same time you force-close their businesses/jobs so they can't afford insurance to pay for the treatment.
Making people either risk crippling debt or a deadly disease. Plus it surely leaves more people willing to work whilst infectious in order to try and afford treatment - which will only spread things further.
It seems the USA wants to have the public take on the debts directly whilst many other countries the government is paying out to the public whilst the country takes on the debt. Whilst the amount might end up the same, the perception to the population is very different. In one the population remains financially viable and has hope of recovery - which likely will jumpstart any economic restart at the end if isolation. Whilst it seems the USA isn't following that pattern and is almost trying to keep things running as normal.
r_squared wrote: I'd argue that having Nationalised health care, Im not going to debase the ideal by using the American perogative term "socialised" with its intrinsic negative connotations, actually helps situations exactly as we are seeing by the fact that population is willing to seek treatment earlier because they know that it is unlikely to cause them financial destitution.
Obviously every system has an upper limit before it is overwhelmed in times like these. No system can withstand such an onslaught without help, but I'll be damned if I'll concede that privatised health care is in any way the superior system to deal with a global pandemic.
Lets not forget the US healthcare system is designed to operate near capacity full-time, as its a for-profit system and excess capacity is financially inefficient. Thats whats really going to hurt us as we have significantly fewer hospital beds per capita than most other developed nations.
I know everyone is struggling to figure out what the best approach is (if we all knew, we'd have done it from the start and not been in quite the same mess) and that this was also greatly hindered by China's disinformation at the start, so that even the WHO was putting out incorrect information. However, with things like even rudimentary mask / mouth coverings helping contain the spread, this is just common sense. I wish public health sources would be a little more forthcoming on things like this, as obviously they've changed the advice they are giving now.
r_squared wrote: I'd argue that having Nationalised health care, Im not going to debase the ideal by using the American perogative term "socialised" with its intrinsic negative connotations, actually helps situations exactly as we are seeing by the fact that population is willing to seek treatment earlier because they know that it is unlikely to cause them financial destitution.
Obviously every system has an upper limit before it is overwhelmed in times like these. No system can withstand such an onslaught without help, but I'll be damned if I'll concede that privatised health care is in any way the superior system to deal with a global pandemic.
Lets not forget the US healthcare system is designed to operate near capacity full-time, as its a for-profit system and excess capacity is financially inefficient. Thats whats really going to hurt us as we have significantly fewer hospital beds per capita than most other developed nations.
And thats before you bring in the deployable capability.
Yet the US has overall few beds per 1000 available compared to most EU countries, that builds up quickly. US occupancy rates might be lower, but it starts off with more beds to begin with. And that climbs fast if you start calculating that the EU average is around 4.9 while the US has 2.8. On say 4000 people, the EU has 19.6 beds of which 14.1 are occupied and 5.5 free. The US has 11.2 beds and 7.2 occupied and only 4 free. So for every 1000 people the EU has about 25% more capacity even with that occupancy average of 72%.
How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
In the USA, "For Profit" medical care hurts a lot.
"Just in Time" inventory, a global supply chain, a toxic fear of holding inventory, beancounter rules, etc. - these things don't help out at all now either.
I hope that once Part 1 of the COVID-19 Pandemic is over we'll learn some lessons and be better prepared for Part 2.
Well, some good news. My dad’s friend’s dad is still going, and he’s been moved out of the ICU. There’s a decent chance he could actually make it! And after being given only 12 hours to live too.
Future War Cultist wrote: Well, some good news. My dad’s friend’s dad is still going, and he’s been moved out of the ICU. There’s a decent chance he could actually make it! And after being given only 12 hours to live too.
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. The drop in beds from 2014 to 2017 might account for a few percentages, but the WHO only lists acute care beds in your numbers, while long term for example is exluded, so while there is a slight 3 year gap, the numbers given in your EU-US matchup don't translate to a 1=1 basis either. This is a close approximation, in which it appears that on average the EU has 25% more beds free on a per 1000 basis. Of course this differs from country to country, averaging out has that issue. The EU might be lower than that 25%, but its hard to see it not hold on to a positive % when reducing it.
Your source of the WHO has the exact same issue in the differences across the EU though, this is all best estimates gathered by individual countries. It will never be a perfect 1=1 comparison, but is us close enough. As for the deployability. Every country is quickly rolling out extra beds, but this is far harder to make a comparison in, because that depends on calculations of required overflow. Deployables also only matter if there is staff to use it, so while you can get impressive numbers, what is the realistic limit you can staff?
As for SK, yes it has an exceptionally high amount in what is attributed to Sars. NK has a significant problem, but perhaps its authoritarian government might quarantine at a reasonably effective pace, big if though.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Future War Cultist wrote: Well, some good news. My dad’s friend’s dad is still going, and he’s been moved out of the ICU. There’s a decent chance he could actually make it! And after being given only 12 hours to live too.
That's a very surprising and positive turnaround. Was there any specific reason that he went from 12 hours to live to off the ICU in a day?
Future War Cultist wrote: Well, some good news. My dad’s friend’s dad is still going, and he’s been moved out of the ICU. There’s a decent chance he could actually make it! And after being given only 12 hours to live too.
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. .
This part is incorrect just too demonstrate and keep it simple by your method the average for S Korea and India is 6.4 but when you take into account population and you're somewhere under 1. I wouldn't expect it to be that dramatic but it doesnt need to be to change the comparison.
I'm not talking just beds and a building when I say deployables, I'm talking deployable capability. They're being manned by military personel most likely active duty and reserve.
Thanks guys. We’re not sure how he managed to hold on (I’m technically hearing all this third hand so I’m not 100%) but I should point out that he’s still in a serious condition. It seems that he has suffered permanent damage, but he’s no longer deteriorating and has levelled out...so far.
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. .
This part is incorrect just too demonstrate and keep it simple by your method the average for S Korea and India is 6.4 but when you take into account population and you're somewhere under 1. I wouldn't expect it to be that dramatic but it doesnt need to be to change the comparison.
I'm not talking just beds and a building when I say deployables, I'm talking deployable capability. They're being manned by military personel most likely active duty and reserve.
That is the exact same way the WHO calculates occupancy in your statistics though, pile on the countries and average it out, so occupancy average says nothing about empty beds except for the EU average not accounting for beds per 1000, say the NL is 10% under while another is 10% over average. Yet it is close enough to be a reasonably accurate average. I quickly averaged it because the large countries are about equally divided on either end in the EU (yes plus the UK) in regards to beds, here is the specific number then when taking population and beds per country into account when averaging: about 4.88 per 1000, so 0.02 under the average I quickly did. So that changes virtually nothing to the 25% average of extra beds.
As for the deployable capability, my argument is still the same. The EU has their armies too, but that capacity runs out. Sure they can triage the hotsposts, but when the whole country is affected it gets much harder. There is an effective limit on how much can be expanded upon. That number they can do in NY is not going to be reproducible once the whole country is suffering.
Future War Cultist wrote: Thanks guys. We’re not sure how he managed to hold on (I’m technically hearing all this third hand so I’m not 100%) but I should point out that he’s still in a serious condition. It seems that he has suffered permanent damage, but he’s no longer deteriorating and has levelled out...so far.
That is scary stuff, hopefully the permanent damage will not affect his life too much.
CA Governor Newsom has just announced a 3rd-party website. Mostly for jobs, bu grocery delivery as well (although I can't find it). : https://onwardca.org/
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. .
This part is incorrect just too demonstrate and keep it simple by your method the average for S Korea and India is 6.4 but when you take into account population and you're somewhere under 1. I wouldn't expect it to be that dramatic but it doesnt need to be to change the comparison.
I'm not talking just beds and a building when I say deployables, I'm talking deployable capability. They're being manned by military personel most likely active duty and reserve.
That is the exact same way the WHO calculates occupancy in your statistics though, pile on the countries and average it out, so occupancy average says nothing about empty beds except for the EU average not accounting for beds per 1000, say the NL is 10% under while another is 10% over average. Yet it is close enough to be a reasonably accurate average. I quickly averaged it because the large countries are about equally divided on either end in the EU (yes plus the UK) in regards to beds, here is the specific number then when taking population and beds per country into account when averaging: about 4.88 per 1000, so 0.02 under the average I quickly did. So that changes virtually nothing to the 25% average of extra beds.
Interesting and you've made a decent argument that the EU overall may have more available bed space, ( I'd need to know in more detail what and was'nt included, still too many questions) but doesn't change the original point that was addressing someone else. The US doesn't have a shortage of beds because private hospitals are evil and minimize all excess capacity, and the detailed data you averaged out supports that (look at some of the countries with fewer beds and higher utilization rates.
Disciple of Fate wrote: As for the deployable capability, my argument is still the same. The EU has their armies too, but that capacity runs out. Sure they can triage the hotsposts, but when the whole country is affected it gets much harder. There is an effective limit on how much can be expanded upon. That number they can do in NY is not going to be reproducible once the whole country is suffering.
The nation states that make up the EU have militaries yes but no they aren't even on the same planet when it comes to deployable capability, sure everything has an effective limit but its got a way to go as long as we don't burn everything out at once. Talking about the something the size of the entire US getting hammered at the same time is not something we've seen, that would be equivalent to the entire continent of Europe (Not EU, the entire continent) having its peak at once.
Just when you thought people couldn't get more stupid, some morons are setting fire to phone masts because they think 5g is linked to Covid-19 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-52164358
CA Governor Newsom has just announced a 3rd-party website. Mostly for jobs, bu grocery delivery as well (although I can't find it). : https://onwardca.org/
Always nice to see some good news and helpful advice in links in here - thanks for sharing!
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. .
This part is incorrect just too demonstrate and keep it simple by your method the average for S Korea and India is 6.4 but when you take into account population and you're somewhere under 1. I wouldn't expect it to be that dramatic but it doesnt need to be to change the comparison.
I'm not talking just beds and a building when I say deployables, I'm talking deployable capability. They're being manned by military personel most likely active duty and reserve.
That is the exact same way the WHO calculates occupancy in your statistics though, pile on the countries and average it out, so occupancy average says nothing about empty beds except for the EU average not accounting for beds per 1000, say the NL is 10% under while another is 10% over average. Yet it is close enough to be a reasonably accurate average. I quickly averaged it because the large countries are about equally divided on either end in the EU (yes plus the UK) in regards to beds, here is the specific number then when taking population and beds per country into account when averaging: about 4.88 per 1000, so 0.02 under the average I quickly did. So that changes virtually nothing to the 25% average of extra beds.
Interesting and you've made a decent argument that the EU overall may have more available bed space, ( I'd need to know in more detail what and was'nt included, still too many questions) but doesn't change the original point that was addressing someone else. The US doesn't have a shortage of beds because private hospitals are evil and minimize all excess capacity, and the detailed data you averaged out supports that (look at some of the countries with fewer beds and higher utilization rates.
Bed space is bigger, just to point out that occupancy matters not as much. But overall bed space is not a great metric anyway. Certain US states will have a better ratio than other, just as EU countries. That doesn't take into account labor laws regarding sick leave and public or private health insurance. Having the bed space versus avoiding using that bed space is much more important. The bigger questions will probably be, how easy is it for sick people to stay at home when thinking they might have the virus and how many people will think they can tough it out or avoid the doctor hoping it is a cold?
I think that is mostly where the private versus public healthcare debate has to fall, the system around it avoiding the usage of beds in the system. Both options can be great, but as Italy shows us, if you get surprised and overwhelmed then beds run out fast regardless.
Disciple of Fate wrote: As for the deployable capability, my argument is still the same. The EU has their armies too, but that capacity runs out. Sure they can triage the hotspots, but when the whole country is affected it gets much harder. There is an effective limit on how much can be expanded upon. That number they can do in NY is not going to be reproducible once the whole country is suffering.
The nation states that make up the EU have militaries yes but no they aren't even on the same planet when it comes to deployable capability, sure everything has an effective limit but its got a way to go as long as we don't burn everything out at once. Talking about the something the size of the entire US getting hammered at the same time is not something we've seen, that would be equivalent to the entire continent of Europe (Not EU, the entire continent) having its peak at once.
Of course the armies of the EU are not as capable, but the question is what defines capable enough? Yes the US military can do great work, but they are as limited by staff and equipment as any other army. Yes in absolute numbers they have vastly more than any individual force here, but they might be needed in more places.
As for the Europe having its peak all at once, of course not. But the US military is deploying a lot of force to NY and LA because of their peaks. But you can see peaks are starting to occur in Florida, Pennsylvania , Louisiana and Michigan, can they deploy there as forcefully at the same time as they are doing now in NY and LA? Even the Pentagon has pointed out that there are limits (from Joint Staff Surgeon Brigadier General P. Friedrichs):
Q: If I could follow up, how much slack is there in sort of the military health system that you can actually provide to the civilian authorities? You know, is -- there's obviously not doctors just lying around who are waiting to go to work, they would presumably come from civilian hospitals. You know, how many respirators do you have sort of lying around? I mean, how much can you actually support if you're asked?
FRIEDRICHS: Yeah, so the -- so those are great questions. And -- and those are the sorts of analyses that we're going through right now to identify what we can do. And -- and I want to emphasize the point that people have come up and said, you know, what about this idea, what about that idea?
We're trying to step through each of those questions that we receive and then say here's what's within the realm of possible. If we do this, then here's the consequence. A great one that's come up is why don't we mobilize the Guard and the Reserve? I think that's what you're talking about right now.
The challenge with that, as you alluded to, is if you mobilize the Guard and Reserve medical personnel from their civilian jobs, they're no longer in their civilian jobs and that directly impacts the community where they work.
And that's the tradeoff that -- you know, whether it's a natural disaster or the coronavirus or anything else, that's part of the tradeoff that we look at as we offer options going forward.
...
Q: And then may I -- sort of follow up, you've mentioned that there was a surge capability for building field hospitals. Can you give us a sense of what those numbers were? Could the military, put up a 500-bed hospital in one of these affected areas in a rapid amount of time?
FRIEDRICHS: So we have -- we have different deployable hospital capability ranging from 25 beds up to much larger than that. I think the largest capability that you've all seen is the hospital ship, which has hundreds of beds on it. And it -- then the question becomes what do they need? The challenge is, as we've mentioned before, if we build a 200-bed or a 25-bed trauma hospital to take care of people with coronavirus, that's not really a great solution to the coronavirus challenge.
And so what we're working through as we participate in discussions is here's what we have, here's what it does very well, which is trauma care and acute care and emergency care, and we have not been tasked to provide those to any specific location, but those are the types of medical capabilities that we have. We don't have any 500-bed hospitals designed for infectious disease outbreaks. That does not exist in the inventory.
Azreal13 wrote: It goes beyond that even. Staff that work for Openreach are getting abused in the street as well.
Openreach are responsible for maintaining the fixed line infrastructure for broadband etc and have nothing to do with mobile phone technology at all.
I don't know what to say, except after this whole crisis we ought to look at our education system and how governments / companies interact with the public....
It's nothing to do with education. Almost every human in the developed world has a device in their pocket that allows them access to the sum total of humanity's knowledge, they can check the facts in seconds. These people refuse to be educated, because an unfortunate side effect of being stupid is the total lack of comprehension of the fact you are stupid.
Azreal13 wrote: It's nothing to do with education. Almost every human in the developed world has a device in their pocket that allows them access to the sum total of humanity's knowledge, they can check the facts in seconds. These people refuse to be educated, because an unfortunate side effect of being stupid is the total lack of comprehension of the fact you are stupid.
Not really but then again what i mean is Bildung which translates badly into english because it isn't just education but also in regards to charachter and values.
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. .
This part is incorrect just too demonstrate and keep it simple by your method the average for S Korea and India is 6.4 but when you take into account population and you're somewhere under 1. I wouldn't expect it to be that dramatic but it doesnt need to be to change the comparison.
I'm not talking just beds and a building when I say deployables, I'm talking deployable capability. They're being manned by military personel most likely active duty and reserve.
That is the exact same way the WHO calculates occupancy in your statistics though, pile on the countries and average it out, so occupancy average says nothing about empty beds except for the EU average not accounting for beds per 1000, say the NL is 10% under while another is 10% over average. Yet it is close enough to be a reasonably accurate average. I quickly averaged it because the large countries are about equally divided on either end in the EU (yes plus the UK) in regards to beds, here is the specific number then when taking population and beds per country into account when averaging: about 4.88 per 1000, so 0.02 under the average I quickly did. So that changes virtually nothing to the 25% average of extra beds.
Interesting and you've made a decent argument that the EU overall may have more available bed space, ( I'd need to know in more detail what and was'nt included, still too many questions) but doesn't change the original point that was addressing someone else. The US doesn't have a shortage of beds because private hospitals are evil and minimize all excess capacity, and the detailed data you averaged out supports that (look at some of the countries with fewer beds and higher utilization rates.
Bed space is bigger, just to point out that occupancy matters not as much. But overall bed space is not a great metric anyway. Certain US states will have a better ratio than other, just as EU countries. That doesn't take into account labor laws regarding sick leave and public or private health insurance. Having the bed space versus avoiding using that bed space is much more important. The bigger questions will probably be, how easy is it for sick people to stay at home when thinking they might have the virus and how many people will think they can tough it out or avoid the doctor hoping it is a cold?
I think that is mostly where the private versus public healthcare debate has to fall, the system around it avoiding the usage of beds in the system. Both options can be great, but as Italy shows us, if you get surprised and overwhelmed then beds run out fast regardless.
Disciple of Fate wrote: As for the deployable capability, my argument is still the same. The EU has their armies too, but that capacity runs out. Sure they can triage the hotspots, but when the whole country is affected it gets much harder. There is an effective limit on how much can be expanded upon. That number they can do in NY is not going to be reproducible once the whole country is suffering.
The nation states that make up the EU have militaries yes but no they aren't even on the same planet when it comes to deployable capability, sure everything has an effective limit but its got a way to go as long as we don't burn everything out at once. Talking about the something the size of the entire US getting hammered at the same time is not something we've seen, that would be equivalent to the entire continent of Europe (Not EU, the entire continent) having its peak at once.
Of course the armies of the EU are not as capable, but the question is what defines capable enough? Yes the US military can do great work, but they are as limited by staff and equipment as any other army. Yes in absolute numbers they have vastly more than any individual force here, but they might be needed in more places.
As for the Europe having its peak all at once, of course not. But the US military is deploying a lot of force to NY and LA because of their peaks. But you can see peaks are starting to occur in Florida, Pennsylvania , Louisiana and Michigan, can they deploy there as forcefully at the same time as they are doing now in NY and LA? Even the Pentagon has pointed out that there are limits (from Joint Staff Surgeon Brigadier General P. Friedrichs):
Q: If I could follow up, how much slack is there in sort of the military health system that you can actually provide to the civilian authorities? You know, is -- there's obviously not doctors just lying around who are waiting to go to work, they would presumably come from civilian hospitals. You know, how many respirators do you have sort of lying around? I mean, how much can you actually support if you're asked?
FRIEDRICHS: Yeah, so the -- so those are great questions. And -- and those are the sorts of analyses that we're going through right now to identify what we can do. And -- and I want to emphasize the point that people have come up and said, you know, what about this idea, what about that idea?
We're trying to step through each of those questions that we receive and then say here's what's within the realm of possible. If we do this, then here's the consequence. A great one that's come up is why don't we mobilize the Guard and the Reserve? I think that's what you're talking about right now.
The challenge with that, as you alluded to, is if you mobilize the Guard and Reserve medical personnel from their civilian jobs, they're no longer in their civilian jobs and that directly impacts the community where they work.
And that's the tradeoff that -- you know, whether it's a natural disaster or the coronavirus or anything else, that's part of the tradeoff that we look at as we offer options going forward.
...
Q: And then may I -- sort of follow up, you've mentioned that there was a surge capability for building field hospitals. Can you give us a sense of what those numbers were? Could the military, put up a 500-bed hospital in one of these affected areas in a rapid amount of time?
FRIEDRICHS: So we have -- we have different deployable hospital capability ranging from 25 beds up to much larger than that. I think the largest capability that you've all seen is the hospital ship, which has hundreds of beds on it. And it -- then the question becomes what do they need? The challenge is, as we've mentioned before, if we build a 200-bed or a 25-bed trauma hospital to take care of people with coronavirus, that's not really a great solution to the coronavirus challenge.
And so what we're working through as we participate in discussions is here's what we have, here's what it does very well, which is trauma care and acute care and emergency care, and we have not been tasked to provide those to any specific location, but those are the types of medical capabilities that we have. We don't have any 500-bed hospitals designed for infectious disease outbreaks. That does not exist in the inventory.
That interview was like three weeks ago, that's a lifetime in this conversation, since then the military has provided an additional 2 expeditionary medical facilities and 15 army field hospitals including to some of the places you mentioned and isn't slowing down. Everything he says is true but none of it contradicts what I said. Yes there are challenges (how do you make sure you grab the right people) and it may not be a great solution but we dont need a great solution we need a good enough solution. You still don't get the vast gulf in capabilities and are just thinking of it as a small raw numbers advantage. You want to know when you can tell crap has really hit the fan. Its not when we activate large numbers of the guard and ready reserve. Its when they involuntarily recall large numbers of inactive reserve.
Future War Cultist wrote: Thanks guys. We’re not sure how he managed to hold on (I’m technically hearing all this third hand so I’m not 100%) but I should point out that he’s still in a serious condition. It seems that he has suffered permanent damage, but he’s no longer deteriorating and has levelled out...so far.
Fingers crossed from me. Hope he is past the worst of it and they can keep him stable and comfortable until he can get treatment for the permanent damage it has caused.
Azreal13 wrote: It's nothing to do with education. Almost every human in the developed world has a device in their pocket that allows them access to the sum total of humanity's knowledge, they can check the facts in seconds. These people refuse to be educated, because an unfortunate side effect of being stupid is the total lack of comprehension of the fact you are stupid.
Not really but then again what i mean is Bildung which translates badly into english because it isn't just education but also in regards to charachter and values.
Culture is probably closer. Trouble is, that can't be so easily addressed, and ground up reworking of educational systems is in no way easy. Simply easier than addressing the fundamentals of a society built on centuries of national identity.
Which is not to say I think the UK has a notably bigger problem with idiocy than other nations, I just think it manifests itself in different ways.
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. .
This part is incorrect just too demonstrate and keep it simple by your method the average for S Korea and India is 6.4 but when you take into account population and you're somewhere under 1. I wouldn't expect it to be that dramatic but it doesnt need to be to change the comparison.
I'm not talking just beds and a building when I say deployables, I'm talking deployable capability. They're being manned by military personel most likely active duty and reserve.
That is the exact same way the WHO calculates occupancy in your statistics though, pile on the countries and average it out, so occupancy average says nothing about empty beds except for the EU average not accounting for beds per 1000, say the NL is 10% under while another is 10% over average. Yet it is close enough to be a reasonably accurate average. I quickly averaged it because the large countries are about equally divided on either end in the EU (yes plus the UK) in regards to beds, here is the specific number then when taking population and beds per country into account when averaging: about 4.88 per 1000, so 0.02 under the average I quickly did. So that changes virtually nothing to the 25% average of extra beds.
Interesting and you've made a decent argument that the EU overall may have more available bed space, ( I'd need to know in more detail what and was'nt included, still too many questions) but doesn't change the original point that was addressing someone else. The US doesn't have a shortage of beds because private hospitals are evil and minimize all excess capacity, and the detailed data you averaged out supports that (look at some of the countries with fewer beds and higher utilization rates.
Bed space is bigger, just to point out that occupancy matters not as much. But overall bed space is not a great metric anyway. Certain US states will have a better ratio than other, just as EU countries. That doesn't take into account labor laws regarding sick leave and public or private health insurance. Having the bed space versus avoiding using that bed space is much more important. The bigger questions will probably be, how easy is it for sick people to stay at home when thinking they might have the virus and how many people will think they can tough it out or avoid the doctor hoping it is a cold?
I think that is mostly where the private versus public healthcare debate has to fall, the system around it avoiding the usage of beds in the system. Both options can be great, but as Italy shows us, if you get surprised and overwhelmed then beds run out fast regardless.
Disciple of Fate wrote: As for the deployable capability, my argument is still the same. The EU has their armies too, but that capacity runs out. Sure they can triage the hotspots, but when the whole country is affected it gets much harder. There is an effective limit on how much can be expanded upon. That number they can do in NY is not going to be reproducible once the whole country is suffering.
The nation states that make up the EU have militaries yes but no they aren't even on the same planet when it comes to deployable capability, sure everything has an effective limit but its got a way to go as long as we don't burn everything out at once. Talking about the something the size of the entire US getting hammered at the same time is not something we've seen, that would be equivalent to the entire continent of Europe (Not EU, the entire continent) having its peak at once.
Of course the armies of the EU are not as capable, but the question is what defines capable enough? Yes the US military can do great work, but they are as limited by staff and equipment as any other army. Yes in absolute numbers they have vastly more than any individual force here, but they might be needed in more places.
As for the Europe having its peak all at once, of course not. But the US military is deploying a lot of force to NY and LA because of their peaks. But you can see peaks are starting to occur in Florida, Pennsylvania , Louisiana and Michigan, can they deploy there as forcefully at the same time as they are doing now in NY and LA? Even the Pentagon has pointed out that there are limits (from Joint Staff Surgeon Brigadier General P. Friedrichs):
Q: If I could follow up, how much slack is there in sort of the military health system that you can actually provide to the civilian authorities? You know, is -- there's obviously not doctors just lying around who are waiting to go to work, they would presumably come from civilian hospitals. You know, how many respirators do you have sort of lying around? I mean, how much can you actually support if you're asked?
FRIEDRICHS: Yeah, so the -- so those are great questions. And -- and those are the sorts of analyses that we're going through right now to identify what we can do. And -- and I want to emphasize the point that people have come up and said, you know, what about this idea, what about that idea?
We're trying to step through each of those questions that we receive and then say here's what's within the realm of possible. If we do this, then here's the consequence. A great one that's come up is why don't we mobilize the Guard and the Reserve? I think that's what you're talking about right now.
The challenge with that, as you alluded to, is if you mobilize the Guard and Reserve medical personnel from their civilian jobs, they're no longer in their civilian jobs and that directly impacts the community where they work.
And that's the tradeoff that -- you know, whether it's a natural disaster or the coronavirus or anything else, that's part of the tradeoff that we look at as we offer options going forward.
...
Q: And then may I -- sort of follow up, you've mentioned that there was a surge capability for building field hospitals. Can you give us a sense of what those numbers were? Could the military, put up a 500-bed hospital in one of these affected areas in a rapid amount of time?
FRIEDRICHS: So we have -- we have different deployable hospital capability ranging from 25 beds up to much larger than that. I think the largest capability that you've all seen is the hospital ship, which has hundreds of beds on it. And it -- then the question becomes what do they need? The challenge is, as we've mentioned before, if we build a 200-bed or a 25-bed trauma hospital to take care of people with coronavirus, that's not really a great solution to the coronavirus challenge.
And so what we're working through as we participate in discussions is here's what we have, here's what it does very well, which is trauma care and acute care and emergency care, and we have not been tasked to provide those to any specific location, but those are the types of medical capabilities that we have. We don't have any 500-bed hospitals designed for infectious disease outbreaks. That does not exist in the inventory.
That interview was like three weeks ago, that's a lifetime in this conversation, since then the military has provided an additional 2 expeditionary medical facilities and 15 army field hospitals including to some of the places you mentioned and isn't slowing down. Everything he says is true but none of it contradicts what I said. Yes there are challenges (how do you make sure you grab the right people) and it may not be a great solution but we dont need a great solution we need a good enough solution. You still don't get the vast gulf in capabilities and are just thinking of it as a small raw numbers advantage. You want to know when you can tell crap has really hit the fan. Its not when we activate large numbers of the guard and ready reserve. Its when they involuntarily recall large numbers of inactive reserve.
I'm not sure why you're arguing with the words of the DoD itself, 3 weeks might be a lifetime, but you can't conjure up capability from thin air and these people are exactly the ones who would know. In there they even say they have the capabilities that were later deployed as you point out, that was already taken into account. Fact remains that yes, the military can help, but their is a limit to how much they can do with the personnel they have and the equipment available. The US military has several thousand doctors in service, any more and they need to start harvesting the national guard and reserve, but those will already be working in civilian hospitals and needed there during the pandemic. I get the capabilities, I also get that those capabilities adhere to logistical and personnel problems just as much as the civilian side when you're talking about something this massive. When services start getting overwhelmed, you're talking about a raw numbers approach, because in the end people are only able to do so much regardless of resources given.
Azreal13 wrote: It's nothing to do with education. Almost every human in the developed world has a device in their pocket that allows them access to the sum total of humanity's knowledge, they can check the facts in seconds. These people refuse to be educated, because an unfortunate side effect of being stupid is the total lack of comprehension of the fact you are stupid.
Not really but then again what i mean is Bildung which translates badly into english because it isn't just education but also in regards to charachter and values.
Culture is probably closer. Trouble is, that can't be so easily addressed, and ground up reworking of educational systems is in no way easy. Simply easier than addressing the fundamentals of a society built on centuries of national identity.
Which is not to say I think the UK has a notably bigger problem with idiocy than other nations, I just think it manifests itself in different ways.
Problem is that, some people, no matter how smart or educated can still be led astray so to speak. In the case of these people, we have no idea what their education level is. Having a degree sometimes means little for that person's grasp on reality or rationality. This sort of stupidity has always and likely will always exist.
Ima going to bet that people setting fire to phone masts aren't in the A,B or C socio economic demographics.
When your spokesperson is Amanda Holden (who, let us not forget, asked Tim Peake if he'd brought any moon rock back from the ISS) you can make certain assumptions pretty safely.
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. .
This part is incorrect just too demonstrate and keep it simple by your method the average for S Korea and India is 6.4 but when you take into account population and you're somewhere under 1. I wouldn't expect it to be that dramatic but it doesnt need to be to change the comparison.
I'm not talking just beds and a building when I say deployables, I'm talking deployable capability. They're being manned by military personel most likely active duty and reserve.
That is the exact same way the WHO calculates occupancy in your statistics though, pile on the countries and average it out, so occupancy average says nothing about empty beds except for the EU average not accounting for beds per 1000, say the NL is 10% under while another is 10% over average. Yet it is close enough to be a reasonably accurate average. I quickly averaged it because the large countries are about equally divided on either end in the EU (yes plus the UK) in regards to beds, here is the specific number then when taking population and beds per country into account when averaging: about 4.88 per 1000, so 0.02 under the average I quickly did. So that changes virtually nothing to the 25% average of extra beds.
Interesting and you've made a decent argument that the EU overall may have more available bed space, ( I'd need to know in more detail what and was'nt included, still too many questions) but doesn't change the original point that was addressing someone else. The US doesn't have a shortage of beds because private hospitals are evil and minimize all excess capacity, and the detailed data you averaged out supports that (look at some of the countries with fewer beds and higher utilization rates.
Bed space is bigger, just to point out that occupancy matters not as much. But overall bed space is not a great metric anyway. Certain US states will have a better ratio than other, just as EU countries. That doesn't take into account labor laws regarding sick leave and public or private health insurance. Having the bed space versus avoiding using that bed space is much more important. The bigger questions will probably be, how easy is it for sick people to stay at home when thinking they might have the virus and how many people will think they can tough it out or avoid the doctor hoping it is a cold?
I think that is mostly where the private versus public healthcare debate has to fall, the system around it avoiding the usage of beds in the system. Both options can be great, but as Italy shows us, if you get surprised and overwhelmed then beds run out fast regardless.
Disciple of Fate wrote: As for the deployable capability, my argument is still the same. The EU has their armies too, but that capacity runs out. Sure they can triage the hotspots, but when the whole country is affected it gets much harder. There is an effective limit on how much can be expanded upon. That number they can do in NY is not going to be reproducible once the whole country is suffering.
The nation states that make up the EU have militaries yes but no they aren't even on the same planet when it comes to deployable capability, sure everything has an effective limit but its got a way to go as long as we don't burn everything out at once. Talking about the something the size of the entire US getting hammered at the same time is not something we've seen, that would be equivalent to the entire continent of Europe (Not EU, the entire continent) having its peak at once.
Of course the armies of the EU are not as capable, but the question is what defines capable enough? Yes the US military can do great work, but they are as limited by staff and equipment as any other army. Yes in absolute numbers they have vastly more than any individual force here, but they might be needed in more places.
As for the Europe having its peak all at once, of course not. But the US military is deploying a lot of force to NY and LA because of their peaks. But you can see peaks are starting to occur in Florida, Pennsylvania , Louisiana and Michigan, can they deploy there as forcefully at the same time as they are doing now in NY and LA? Even the Pentagon has pointed out that there are limits (from Joint Staff Surgeon Brigadier General P. Friedrichs):
Q: If I could follow up, how much slack is there in sort of the military health system that you can actually provide to the civilian authorities? You know, is -- there's obviously not doctors just lying around who are waiting to go to work, they would presumably come from civilian hospitals. You know, how many respirators do you have sort of lying around? I mean, how much can you actually support if you're asked?
FRIEDRICHS: Yeah, so the -- so those are great questions. And -- and those are the sorts of analyses that we're going through right now to identify what we can do. And -- and I want to emphasize the point that people have come up and said, you know, what about this idea, what about that idea?
We're trying to step through each of those questions that we receive and then say here's what's within the realm of possible. If we do this, then here's the consequence. A great one that's come up is why don't we mobilize the Guard and the Reserve? I think that's what you're talking about right now.
The challenge with that, as you alluded to, is if you mobilize the Guard and Reserve medical personnel from their civilian jobs, they're no longer in their civilian jobs and that directly impacts the community where they work.
And that's the tradeoff that -- you know, whether it's a natural disaster or the coronavirus or anything else, that's part of the tradeoff that we look at as we offer options going forward.
...
Q: And then may I -- sort of follow up, you've mentioned that there was a surge capability for building field hospitals. Can you give us a sense of what those numbers were? Could the military, put up a 500-bed hospital in one of these affected areas in a rapid amount of time?
FRIEDRICHS: So we have -- we have different deployable hospital capability ranging from 25 beds up to much larger than that. I think the largest capability that you've all seen is the hospital ship, which has hundreds of beds on it. And it -- then the question becomes what do they need? The challenge is, as we've mentioned before, if we build a 200-bed or a 25-bed trauma hospital to take care of people with coronavirus, that's not really a great solution to the coronavirus challenge.
And so what we're working through as we participate in discussions is here's what we have, here's what it does very well, which is trauma care and acute care and emergency care, and we have not been tasked to provide those to any specific location, but those are the types of medical capabilities that we have. We don't have any 500-bed hospitals designed for infectious disease outbreaks. That does not exist in the inventory.
That interview was like three weeks ago, that's a lifetime in this conversation, since then the military has provided an additional 2 expeditionary medical facilities and 15 army field hospitals including to some of the places you mentioned and isn't slowing down. Everything he says is true but none of it contradicts what I said. Yes there are challenges (how do you make sure you grab the right people) and it may not be a great solution but we don't need a great solution we need a good enough solution. You still don't get the vast gulf in capabilities and are just thinking of it as a small raw numbers advantage. You want to know when you can tell crap has really hit the fan. Its not when we activate large numbers of the guard and ready reserve. Its when they involuntarily recall large numbers of inactive reserve.
I'm not sure why you're arguing with the words of the DoD itself, 3 weeks might be a lifetime, but you can't conjure up capability from thin air and these people are exactly the ones who would know. In there they even say they have the capabilities that were later deployed as you point out, that was already taken into account. Fact remains that yes, the military can help, but their is a limit to how much they can do with the personnel they have and the equipment available. The US military has several thousand doctors in service, any more and they need to start harvesting the national guard and reserve, but those will already be working in civilian hospitals and needed there during the pandemic. I get the capabilities, I also get that those capabilities adhere to logistical and personnel problems just as much as the civilian side when you're talking about something this massive. When services start getting overwhelmed, you're talking about a raw numbers approach, because in the end people are only able to do so much regardless of resources given.
I'm not arguing with the DoD, Im translating American Military to European Civilian, so what is your point, it doesn't matter what the capabilities are there will always be a breaking point, well no duh, but its a lot farther away than you think it to be.
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. .
This part is incorrect just too demonstrate and keep it simple by your method the average for S Korea and India is 6.4 but when you take into account population and you're somewhere under 1. I wouldn't expect it to be that dramatic but it doesnt need to be to change the comparison.
I'm not talking just beds and a building when I say deployables, I'm talking deployable capability. They're being manned by military personel most likely active duty and reserve.
That is the exact same way the WHO calculates occupancy in your statistics though, pile on the countries and average it out, so occupancy average says nothing about empty beds except for the EU average not accounting for beds per 1000, say the NL is 10% under while another is 10% over average. Yet it is close enough to be a reasonably accurate average. I quickly averaged it because the large countries are about equally divided on either end in the EU (yes plus the UK) in regards to beds, here is the specific number then when taking population and beds per country into account when averaging: about 4.88 per 1000, so 0.02 under the average I quickly did. So that changes virtually nothing to the 25% average of extra beds.
Interesting and you've made a decent argument that the EU overall may have more available bed space, ( I'd need to know in more detail what and was'nt included, still too many questions) but doesn't change the original point that was addressing someone else. The US doesn't have a shortage of beds because private hospitals are evil and minimize all excess capacity, and the detailed data you averaged out supports that (look at some of the countries with fewer beds and higher utilization rates.
Bed space is bigger, just to point out that occupancy matters not as much. But overall bed space is not a great metric anyway. Certain US states will have a better ratio than other, just as EU countries. That doesn't take into account labor laws regarding sick leave and public or private health insurance. Having the bed space versus avoiding using that bed space is much more important. The bigger questions will probably be, how easy is it for sick people to stay at home when thinking they might have the virus and how many people will think they can tough it out or avoid the doctor hoping it is a cold?
I think that is mostly where the private versus public healthcare debate has to fall, the system around it avoiding the usage of beds in the system. Both options can be great, but as Italy shows us, if you get surprised and overwhelmed then beds run out fast regardless.
Disciple of Fate wrote: As for the deployable capability, my argument is still the same. The EU has their armies too, but that capacity runs out. Sure they can triage the hotspots, but when the whole country is affected it gets much harder. There is an effective limit on how much can be expanded upon. That number they can do in NY is not going to be reproducible once the whole country is suffering.
The nation states that make up the EU have militaries yes but no they aren't even on the same planet when it comes to deployable capability, sure everything has an effective limit but its got a way to go as long as we don't burn everything out at once. Talking about the something the size of the entire US getting hammered at the same time is not something we've seen, that would be equivalent to the entire continent of Europe (Not EU, the entire continent) having its peak at once.
Of course the armies of the EU are not as capable, but the question is what defines capable enough? Yes the US military can do great work, but they are as limited by staff and equipment as any other army. Yes in absolute numbers they have vastly more than any individual force here, but they might be needed in more places.
As for the Europe having its peak all at once, of course not. But the US military is deploying a lot of force to NY and LA because of their peaks. But you can see peaks are starting to occur in Florida, Pennsylvania , Louisiana and Michigan, can they deploy there as forcefully at the same time as they are doing now in NY and LA? Even the Pentagon has pointed out that there are limits (from Joint Staff Surgeon Brigadier General P. Friedrichs):
Q: If I could follow up, how much slack is there in sort of the military health system that you can actually provide to the civilian authorities? You know, is -- there's obviously not doctors just lying around who are waiting to go to work, they would presumably come from civilian hospitals. You know, how many respirators do you have sort of lying around? I mean, how much can you actually support if you're asked?
FRIEDRICHS: Yeah, so the -- so those are great questions. And -- and those are the sorts of analyses that we're going through right now to identify what we can do. And -- and I want to emphasize the point that people have come up and said, you know, what about this idea, what about that idea?
We're trying to step through each of those questions that we receive and then say here's what's within the realm of possible. If we do this, then here's the consequence. A great one that's come up is why don't we mobilize the Guard and the Reserve? I think that's what you're talking about right now.
The challenge with that, as you alluded to, is if you mobilize the Guard and Reserve medical personnel from their civilian jobs, they're no longer in their civilian jobs and that directly impacts the community where they work.
And that's the tradeoff that -- you know, whether it's a natural disaster or the coronavirus or anything else, that's part of the tradeoff that we look at as we offer options going forward.
...
Q: And then may I -- sort of follow up, you've mentioned that there was a surge capability for building field hospitals. Can you give us a sense of what those numbers were? Could the military, put up a 500-bed hospital in one of these affected areas in a rapid amount of time?
FRIEDRICHS: So we have -- we have different deployable hospital capability ranging from 25 beds up to much larger than that. I think the largest capability that you've all seen is the hospital ship, which has hundreds of beds on it. And it -- then the question becomes what do they need? The challenge is, as we've mentioned before, if we build a 200-bed or a 25-bed trauma hospital to take care of people with coronavirus, that's not really a great solution to the coronavirus challenge.
And so what we're working through as we participate in discussions is here's what we have, here's what it does very well, which is trauma care and acute care and emergency care, and we have not been tasked to provide those to any specific location, but those are the types of medical capabilities that we have. We don't have any 500-bed hospitals designed for infectious disease outbreaks. That does not exist in the inventory.
That interview was like three weeks ago, that's a lifetime in this conversation, since then the military has provided an additional 2 expeditionary medical facilities and 15 army field hospitals including to some of the places you mentioned and isn't slowing down. Everything he says is true but none of it contradicts what I said. Yes there are challenges (how do you make sure you grab the right people) and it may not be a great solution but we don't need a great solution we need a good enough solution. You still don't get the vast gulf in capabilities and are just thinking of it as a small raw numbers advantage. You want to know when you can tell crap has really hit the fan. Its not when we activate large numbers of the guard and ready reserve. Its when they involuntarily recall large numbers of inactive reserve.
I'm not sure why you're arguing with the words of the DoD itself, 3 weeks might be a lifetime, but you can't conjure up capability from thin air and these people are exactly the ones who would know. In there they even say they have the capabilities that were later deployed as you point out, that was already taken into account. Fact remains that yes, the military can help, but their is a limit to how much they can do with the personnel they have and the equipment available. The US military has several thousand doctors in service, any more and they need to start harvesting the national guard and reserve, but those will already be working in civilian hospitals and needed there during the pandemic. I get the capabilities, I also get that those capabilities adhere to logistical and personnel problems just as much as the civilian side when you're talking about something this massive. When services start getting overwhelmed, you're talking about a raw numbers approach, because in the end people are only able to do so much regardless of resources given.
I'm not arguing with the DoD, Im translating American Military to European Civilian, so what is your point, it doesn't matter what the capabilities are there will always be a breaking point, well no duh, but its a lot farther away than you think it to be.
Because a European needs to have any knowledge about the US military translated to them by an American? You're pointing out things as a counterargument that the DoD source already considers, hence the appearance of you arguing with it. I'm not saying the US military is at its breaking point, I'm just saying that even for it, there is a breaking point if things go badly. Yes that breaking point is higher than that of European armies, but should not be overestimated on the scale of the current crisis. When you reach a point like Italy, where all you need is equipment and trained hands to operate it, there is a limit. Hopefully the US will never reach that point anywhere, but NY is looking dicey.
Azreal13 wrote: Ima going to bet that people setting fire to phone masts aren't in the A,B or C socio economic demographics.
When your spokesperson is Amanda Holden (who, let us not forget, asked Tim Peake if he'd brought any moon rock back from the ISS) you can make certain assumptions pretty safely.
True, but this isn't the only stupid thing, although it is exceptional in its stupidity.
Not much to say on the ever growing number of problems facing international society because of this virus, but I now long for one day when you don't wake up to the dreadful news of so many lives being ruthlessly snuffed out.
Yeah but don't feel bad Ive had to translate military to civilian for people who've worked with us. There's often underlying subtext and context to how we phrase things, just like any other profession. Yeah NY worries me.
Wait tell me that moon rock thing is a joke ? Although I guess she's an actress so pfftt, I was a little worried she was a politician when I first saw that.
Jerram wrote: Yeah but don't feel bad Ive had to translate military to civilian for people who've worked with us. There's often underlying subtext and context to how we phrase things, just like any other profession. Yeah NY worries me.
Wait tell me that moon rock thing is a joke ? Although I guess she's an actress so pfftt, I was a little worried she was a politician when I first saw that.
Apparently that moonrock Story wasn't Made up .
Altough why she even believed we got to the Moon is allready an success...
Wait tell me that moon rock thing is a joke ? Although I guess she's an actress so pfftt, I was a little worried she was a politician when I first saw that
Azreal13 wrote: It's nothing to do with education. Almost every human in the developed world has a device in their pocket that allows them access to the sum total of humanity's knowledge, they can check the facts in seconds. These people refuse to be educated, because an unfortunate side effect of being stupid is the total lack of comprehension of the fact you are stupid.
Not really but then again what i mean is Bildung which translates badly into english because it isn't just education but also in regards to charachter and values.
Culture is probably closer. Trouble is, that can't be so easily addressed, and ground up reworking of educational systems is in no way easy. Simply easier than addressing the fundamentals of a society built on centuries of national identity.
Which is not to say I think the UK has a notably bigger problem with idiocy than other nations, I just think it manifests itself in different ways.
Any chance we could shoot a couple of Youtube or wotnot tweeny influenza's see if that helps at all,? Back in my day we had to come up with our own stupid
Bran Dawri wrote: On a somewhat related note, the crystals and essential oils quacks are now selling anti-corona stones and other assorted "cures".
No money back if you do catch it despite shelling out $70 for a rock, of course. Then again, if you think a rock at whatever price will stop you from contracting a contagious disease...
Still, if I had my way, these -I don't want to call them people- pond scum would be publically flogged.
Who?
the people buying it? The people selling this junk?
The former are just as much at fault, unless of course you argue that the education system has failed.
The later? Beyond breaking for sure certain guarantee conditions and laws in certain countries one can also assume other laws applicable.
Frankly such people should be forced to publicaly appologize and forced to actually explain why this doesn't work.
I'm going to say the people selling it. Not only are they preying on gullibility, fear and despair which is reprehensible in and of itself, they're convincing their buyers they're "protected", which will lead to those idiots going out, ignoring the quarantines or whatever measures are in place, and endangering others because they've been led to believe they can't be sick.
This I would hold against both parties, but it started with a bunch of frauds trying to make a quick buck without regard for the consequences so the majority of the blame goes their way.
I feel the same way about churches that refused to close/hold online services.
Bran Dawri wrote: On a somewhat related note, the crystals and essential oils quacks are now selling anti-corona stones and other assorted "cures".
No money back if you do catch it despite shelling out $70 for a rock, of course. Then again, if you think a rock at whatever price will stop you from contracting a contagious disease...
Still, if I had my way, these -I don't want to call them people- pond scum would be publically flogged.
Who?
the people buying it? The people selling this junk?
The former are just as much at fault, unless of course you argue that the education system has failed.
The later? Beyond breaking for sure certain guarantee conditions and laws in certain countries one can also assume other laws applicable.
Frankly such people should be forced to publicaly appologize and forced to actually explain why this doesn't work.
I'm going to say the people selling it. Not only are they preying on gullibility, fear and despair which is reprehensible in and of itself, they're convincing their buyers they're "protected", which will lead to those idiots going out, ignoring the quarantines or whatever measures are in place, and endangering others because they've been led to believe they can't be sick.
This I would hold against both parties, but it started with a bunch of frauds trying to make a quick buck without regard for the consequences so the majority of the blame goes their way.
I feel the same way about churches that refused to close/hold online services.
Put another way, they are taking advantage of an opportunity to make money in a society which communicates to people that morality is a consideration but ultimately secondary to profit. They are only doing what their culture says is right to do. While I feel that it is wrong and ultimately pity those involved, I also find it difficult to put significant fault on them.
They also have the ready-made counter argument that the placebo effect is very real and their 'cures' could actually help people in a twisted sort of way. Though that is if they do not actually believe the cures work themselves.
I have much less of an issue with people selling the gullible tat they don't need than I do anyone making an excessive profit out of things that are addictive or things that it's difficult or impossible to live without.
People buy gak they don't need all the time, I might as well be the one selling it. I've always done my best to be conscientious, but I have had people standing in front of me that I've told "this thing is objectively better value/superior than this other thing" and been able to back that up with hard data, and still have them take the worst option.
Yeah, " all profit, all the time" is probably worse in that it's the underlying cause, but this is a particularly egregious excess. And it still doesn't excuse them setting people up to endanger others. If it was just the quacks and their customers at risk, it'd be far less of an issue to me. You play stupid games, you win stupid prizes. Except it might be someone else winning the stupid prize.
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. .
This part is incorrect just too demonstrate and keep it simple by your method the average for S Korea and India is 6.4 but when you take into account population and you're somewhere under 1. I wouldn't expect it to be that dramatic but it doesnt need to be to change the comparison.
I'm not talking just beds and a building when I say deployables, I'm talking deployable capability. They're being manned by military personel most likely active duty and reserve.
That is the exact same way the WHO calculates occupancy in your statistics though, pile on the countries and average it out, so occupancy average says nothing about empty beds except for the EU average not accounting for beds per 1000, say the NL is 10% under while another is 10% over average. Yet it is close enough to be a reasonably accurate average. I quickly averaged it because the large countries are about equally divided on either end in the EU (yes plus the UK) in regards to beds, here is the specific number then when taking population and beds per country into account when averaging: about 4.88 per 1000, so 0.02 under the average I quickly did. So that changes virtually nothing to the 25% average of extra beds.
Interesting and you've made a decent argument that the EU overall may have more available bed space, ( I'd need to know in more detail what and was'nt included, still too many questions) but doesn't change the original point that was addressing someone else. The US doesn't have a shortage of beds because private hospitals are evil and minimize all excess capacity, and the detailed data you averaged out supports that (look at some of the countries with fewer beds and higher utilization rates.
Actually it does. US hospital bed capacity (in both real and per 1000 terms) has been declining for decades:
in large part driven by hospital closures and mergers, as well as the implementation of HMO insurance plans which reduced hospital occupancy rates, all of which are driven by for-profit financial considerations:
"By the mid-1990s, Boston's hospitals were also becoming concerned about high HMO enrollment. In 1996, the HMOs' market share in Boston was 43.6 percent, compared with a national large metropolitan average of 27.8 percent. Boston's hospitals believed that the wide-scale use of global capitation was imminent and that selective contracting would steer more care away from the academic centers to traditional acute care hospitals in the community. The major hospital systems in Boston began to plan for hospital downsizing and service restructuring in their teaching and community hospitals. These plans included expanding certain core services at the teaching hospitals (e.g., cardiology, cardiac surgery, oncology, and orthopedics) and expanding traditional hospital services at system community hospitals (e.g., maternity care, elective orthopedic services, ophthalmology, psychiatric services, and postacute services).
Another event that strained Boston hospitals was cutbacks in Medicare payments that resulted from the 1997 Balanced Budget Act (BBA). Although the BBA affected hospitals nationwide, Boston with its five teaching hospitals was especially hard hit given their high cost of care. Subsequent refinements of the BBA relaxed its provisions, but through 2000, Boston's hospitals generally reported financial losses that they attributed to this legislation. The CareGroup hospital system was especially affected, with its flagship, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, incurring large financial losses. These losses stifled plans to restructure services at Beth Israel Deaconess, and CareGroup instead had to focus on cutting rather than converting hospital capacity.
Overall, the hospital downsizing during this period led to the elimination of many staffed beds at Boston's hospitals and health systems. By 2000, Partners HealthCare system had eliminated 200 to 250 staffed beds; CareGroup Healthcare System, 250 staffed beds; and Boston Medical Center, nearly 150. In total, these cuts represented a 15 percent reduction in these institutions' overall staffed bed stock."
"Throughout most of the 1990s, the perception of many Cleveland stakeholders was that the market had too much hospital capacity. Even though hospitals like the Cleveland Clinic Foundation Hospital attracted admissions from both around the United States and abroad, the marketwide hospital occupancy rate in the community was only 59.7 percent in 1996, compared with the large metropolitan average of 62.1 percent (table 1).
Beginning in 1999, some hospitals in the market closed. In that year, St. Luke's Medical Center shut its acute care hospital, and in March 2000, Mt. Sinai Medical Center–University Circle closed. Shortly afterward, the national hospital management company that closed Mt. Sinai Medical Center–University Circle announced plans to close two more Cleveland hospitals, but they remained open due to community outcry and the actions of two of the community's large hospital systems. In all, the two hospitals that closed had about 600 to 700 staffed beds, which was about 9 percent of the market's capacity.
The immediate effect of the closures was to shift hospital service demand to the remaining hospitals, especially those in downtown Cleveland that were located near the two closed hospitals. Hospital occupancy rates increased citywide from 58.7 percent in 1998 to 62.5 percent in 2001. The number of visits to the emergency departments of the remaining hospitals increased to absorb the 77,000 visits per year that the two closed hospitals had once provided. Hospital respondents reported that as a result, the frequency of ambulance diversions in 2001 rose by 400 percent over that in 1998."
"A major factor that affected Miami's hospital capacity in the mid-1990s was the dominance of HMOs in the market and their influence on the demand for hospital services. In 1996, the market share of Miami's HMOs was 52.9 percent, almost double the large metropolitan area average of 27.8 percent. Declines in inpatient admissions and lengths of stay as a result of HMO dominance eventually led hospitals to reduce the number of beds they staffed.
Then a series of events in the late 1990s made hospitals in the community realize that their capacity was being strained. First, the consumer backlash against HMOs was believed to have increased the demand for inpatient services as health plans relaxed utilization management controls and offered more open access. At the same time, some hospitals in the market were expanding their national and international marketing to attract patients in high-margin service lines. During this period too, the demand for charity care continued to grow, and problems in Florida's long-term care industry led to backups of patients in hospitals caused by the reduced availability of nursing home beds."
"In the early 1990s, the Phoenix market was perceived to have excess hospital capacity because the state lacked CON legislation to regulate hospital growth and expansion. As HMOs' market share grew, Phoenix's hospitals reacted to actual and anticipated reductions in the demand for their services by maintaining the same number of staffed beds even while the area's population continued to grow. As a result, the number of staffed hospital beds per 1,000 population in Phoenix was only 1.9 in 2001, compared with the large metropolitan average of 2.5.
As it did in other communities, the backlash against managed care in Phoenix led to greater demand for hospital services. Table 1 data indicate that increased hospital services use in Phoenix in fact exceeded its rate of population growth. Specifically, Phoenix's population grew by 25.2 percent from 1996 to 2003, whereas inpatient admissions grew by 43.2 percent and emergency visits by 54.9 percent.
Also keep in mind that for the most part the perception that ~35% of hospital beds are empty at any given time is in large part driven by an uneven distribution of capacity which results in more rural states having an excess of available beds, in turn driving down the average utilization rates even though hospitals in many states are operating at much higher utilization rates:
Generally it seems like the smaller states and high pop. states are in the neighborhood of ~70+% occupancy ( a quick look seems to indicate New York peaks at 78%), vs rural/flyover states like Idaho, Nebraska, Wyoming, etc. that are in the 50% range.
Another aspect that isn't really discussed often is that on a baseline level, the US has a higher rate of preventable hospitalizations than most the rest of the industrialized world, in large part driven by our largely unaffordable for-profit healthcare system disincentivizing large numbers of patients from seeking early and/or preventative treatment and winding up in a hospital bed when their health situation worsens to the point of treatment being unavoidable:
Meaning that a larger share of our hospital beds are being used to treat patients that would not have needed a hospital bed otherwise.
As for the Europe having its peak all at once, of course not. But the US military is deploying a lot of force to NY and LA because of their peaks. But you can see peaks are starting to occur in Florida, Pennsylvania , Louisiana and Michigan, can they deploy there as forcefully at the same time as they are doing now in NY and LA? Even the Pentagon has pointed out that there are limits (from Joint Staff Surgeon Brigadier General P. Friedrichs):
We only have 2 hospital ships, so no. Various other classes have various medical capabilites, but you're talking anywhere between 10 and 50 beds depending on the type of vessel/class, and those are mostly ships that are needed elsewhere for other operations. This isn't our total military healthcare capacity mind you, Army and Air Force have additional assets that they can deploy, but none of them can come close to touching the breadth and depth of what those two ships can offer. The supplemental deployable healthcare resources offered by the military won't be able to truly shore up the deficiencies in our healthcare system unless the pandemic turns out to be a good bit less severe than what we are now expecting. IIRC theres 14 national guard field hospitals and 8 active duty field hospitals, each unit has a max capacity of ~250 beds (?) for a grand total of ~5500 additional beds? Most of the guard hospitals are operated by civilian healthcare professionals, so they aren't really deployable as they are needed in civilian hospitals at the moment, so you're probably limited to the 8 active duty ones, total of 2,000 additional beds? Thats not even a 1% increase over our available civilian bed capacity - its helpful in a localized breakout, but not in a nationwide pandemic.
I've seen some discussion of the army corps of engineers establishing supplementary field hospitals that can be staffed by retired healthcare professionals, but that seems somewhat inadvisable given the risks posed to older people. Theoretically you would only send non-infected patients to those facilities, but how effectively can you screen out any and all potential patients that might be infected to safeguard against a breakout?
Yeah some lady just passed around a petition to stop them from being put up in the local town because of all the toxic waves they will pump through people's bodies. It's like a harmlessly funny microcosm of about half the citizens in this entire country and how they think about Covid-19.
Sheesh, Alpharius mention Phase two.....might as well start a thread and how and what to get to prepare for that.....remember the TWD dead thread we had so long ago
tneva82 wrote: Lol. In england there's sabotage against g5 masts due to theories g5 network masts spread corona virus.
Wtf? Under what logic that works??? People getting bored enough to invent conspiracy theories?
edit: aah linked above. Funny as hell. And unsurprisingly ignores the fact it spreads even where no G5 exists.
We know for a fact that a lot of the antivax movement was spearheaded/spread/sponsored by Russia (in addition to sponsoring soe European and Other political parties and movements), I do have to wonder if this latest bout of idiocy isn't just more of their truly superb online psychological warfare.
Started out with discredited Quack Andrew Wakefield, who published a single ropey study claiming a single vaccine (combined MMR) has a link to Autism.
British Gutter Press of course ran with it. I distinctly remember god awful comments about why wouldn’t Gordon Brown confirm his sons has been vaccinated etc, stirring up a right hornets nest of stupidity.
So in the U.K. at least, at it all spiralled from there.
tneva82 wrote: Lol. In england there's sabotage against g5 masts due to theories g5 network masts spread corona virus.
Wtf? Under what logic that works??? People getting bored enough to invent conspiracy theories?
edit: aah linked above. Funny as hell. And unsurprisingly ignores the fact it spreads even where no G5 exists.
We know for a fact that a lot of the antivax movement was spearheaded/spread/sponsored by Russia (in addition to sponsoring soe European and Other political parties and movements), I do have to wonder if this latest bout of idiocy isn't just more of their truly superb online psychological warfare.
Time to regionlock Russia Fething highpingers them all !
Started out with discredited Quack Andrew Wakefield, who published a single ropey study claiming a single vaccine (combined MMR) has a link to Autism.
British Gutter Press of course ran with it. I distinctly remember god awful comments about why wouldn’t Gordon Brown confirm his sons has been vaccinated etc, stirring up a right hornets nest of stupidity.
So in the U.K. at least, at it all spiralled from there.
Indeed, but he was also struck off here and now pedals his clown show in the US, where people seem to eat it up.
It will be interesting to see if this has any sort of ecmffect on the anti vax movements, as they were gaining traction in some areas.
Started out with discredited Quack Andrew Wakefield, who published a single ropey study claiming a single vaccine (combined MMR) has a link to Autism.
British Gutter Press of course ran with it. I distinctly remember god awful comments about why wouldn’t Gordon Brown confirm his sons has been vaccinated etc, stirring up a right hornets nest of stupidity.
So in the U.K. at least, at it all spiralled from there.
I'd also note that Gordon Brown's refusal to admit seemed to carry far more weight than the scientific study when it came to that whole mess. There was also a lot of noise about how it was only the combined drug and why couldn't individual versions be given out etc...
tneva82 wrote: Lol. In england there's sabotage against g5 masts due to theories g5 network masts spread corona virus.
Wtf? Under what logic that works??? People getting bored enough to invent conspiracy theories?
edit: aah linked above. Funny as hell. And unsurprisingly ignores the fact it spreads even where no G5 exists.
We know for a fact that a lot of the antivax movement was spearheaded/spread/sponsored by Russia (in addition to sponsoring soe European and Other political parties and movements), I do have to wonder if this latest bout of idiocy isn't just more of their truly superb online psychological warfare.
Doesn't explain how it is believed. Under what logic those fools link corona virus and G5 network? They think corona is computer virus spread electronically and then somehow...jump into human body?
Okay there's actual case of human being "infected" by computer virus but that was chip implanted into person getting infected. Somebody read that and ran with it?-)
Sadly the rabbit hole goes a lot deeper, and derpier.
I forget the exact term, but there is a known psychological issue which is prevalent in conspiracy theories.
Apologies for the paraphrasing and over simplification, but it boils down to believing You Know Better - about everything. And once you’ve chosen your truth, that’s it, you’re right, everyone else is wrong and lying.
Pretty sure I picked it up from a Scimandan YouTube video. But he’s so many, I couldn’t point you to it!
tneva82 wrote: Lol. In england there's sabotage against g5 masts due to theories g5 network masts spread corona virus.
Wtf? Under what logic that works??? People getting bored enough to invent conspiracy theories?
edit: aah linked above. Funny as hell. And unsurprisingly ignores the fact it spreads even where no G5 exists.
We know for a fact that a lot of the antivax movement was spearheaded/spread/sponsored by Russia (in addition to sponsoring soe European and Other political parties and movements), I do have to wonder if this latest bout of idiocy isn't just more of their truly superb online psychological warfare.
Doesn't explain how it is believed. Under what logic those fools link corona virus and G5 network? They think corona is computer virus spread electronically and then somehow...jump into human body?
Okay there's actual case of human being "infected" by computer virus but that was chip implanted into person getting infected. Somebody read that and ran with it?-)
No its radio waves. Basically the same idea as broadband causing headaches in people etc... Basically people know that these machines put out waves and radio and radiation waves etc.... and basically just build off the idea that if radiation is a wave which can cause cancers and harm then so too can huge masts putting out vast quantities into the air that they can't see. So its more mixing up basic understandings of radiation and its real negative impacts on the human body; with radio waves and waves in general along with relative power of those waves and the nature of the particles etc...
It's not helped by early claims of very early generation mobile phones putting out dangerous levels of radiation or potentially dangerous etc....
There is a train of logic in it all, often built upon a foundation of early school sciences understood at a not great level. Accepting that school science is already a lot of fabricated theories that often aren't "real" but are used to teach a foundation understanding. (which is often poorly understood by many because at school its rarely explained to students that what they are learning is factually incorrect, but useful as a foundation)
I forget the exact term, but there is a known psychological issue which is prevalent in conspiracy theories.
Apologies for the paraphrasing and over simplification, but it boils down to believing You Know Better - about everything. And once you’ve chosen your truth, that’s it, you’re right, everyone else is wrong and lying.
Pretty sure I picked it up from a Scimandan YouTube video. But he’s so many, I couldn’t point you to it!
It's basically the whole "you don't know what you don't know" aspect of learning. Ergo that when you don't know much about a subject you actually lack enough foundation to not realise that you don't know enough. Of course some people, often those who have learned the skill to self-learn subjects, are more aware of this aspect than others, but it can catch us all out in subjects we don't fully understand. Even the internet is not help because comprehensive and detailed articles are rare; the majority are small tid-bits of information which are easy to search, but where if you don't know to search for it you won't find it. Furthermore because sites like google rank on popularity and search terms they don't provide any curation - so false information can spread veyr easily just by having a high google ranking.
There's a high ranking website talking about halfbreed animals that's basically all fake science, but it ranks up really high and thus can mislead many people.
I remember reading somewhere that there’s a strong correlation between believing in conspiracy theories and being a narcissist. It’s a mixture of ‘I refuse to believe in what everyone else believes in because I am better and more important than them and I refuse to be another faceless nobody’ and ‘pay attention to me!’ Watch that Netflix documentary behind the curve; the guy is wearing a flat earth shirt that says ‘ask me about my shirt’, and is basically going around annoying complete strangers in public, using the flimsiest of pretences to start talking about flat earth to them. He’s more or less an overgrown toddler seeking attention.
Future War Cultist wrote: I remember reading somewhere that there’s a strong correlation between believing in conspiracy theories and being a narcissist. It’s a mixture of ‘I refuse to believe in what everyone else believes in because I am better and more important than them and I refuse to be another faceless nobody’ and ‘pay attention to me!’ Watch that Netflix documentary behind the curve; the guy is wearing a flat earth shirt that says ‘ask me about my shirt’, and is basically going around annoying complete strangers in public, using the flimsiest of pretences to start talking about flat earth to them. He’s more or less an overgrown toddler seeking attention.
I've seen a few youtube videos on flat-earthers and being as its a more benign belief (unlike health ones it doesn't hurt anyone if you believe the earth is round, flat, oblong or whatever) it tends to have a slightly more relaxed air. What I noticed was a lot of them were very much into it more for the social aspects than for the science. Indeed many were clearly just looking for a group to fit into where they could achieve a level of understanding and respect and connection within the group and where they can do activities together. You see some of the very same patterns in gang culture and suchlike as we. It's basically a few ring-leaders who guide the group with a larger majority who just want to be part of a group. The actual cause is often secondary, however once they are in the group the cause becomes their own and becomes part of their self identity.
Anyway I think we are perhaps getting off topic a bit
Future War Cultist wrote: I remember reading somewhere that there’s a strong correlation between believing in conspiracy theories and being a narcissist. It’s a mixture of ‘I refuse to believe in what everyone else believes in because I am better and more important than them and I refuse to be another faceless nobody’ and ‘pay attention to me!’ Watch that Netflix documentary behind the curve; the guy is wearing a flat earth shirt that says ‘ask me about my shirt’, and is basically going around annoying complete strangers in public, using the flimsiest of pretences to start talking about flat earth to them. He’s more or less an overgrown toddler seeking attention.
brilliant , ties in exactly with all the main conspiracy types I know
Jerram wrote: How'd you arrive at the average since I don't see it in the data ? Did you take into account the various counties populations when calculating that average ? Did you calculate pre brexit since the occupancy numbers are pre brexit ? How did you account for the fact that your data specifically calls out a decrease in the number of beds over time which would most likely result in a higher occupancy rate than the 72% from a different study done in an earlier timeframe. And if you read the comparability section in goes through a litany of differences in how those numbers are calculated in different countries rendering cross country comparison a hazardous activity.
What really jumps out at me about that data is how much S Korea increased in those 17 years, would be interesting to see that broken down by year and see how much of that was tied into the previous SARS outbreak and potential lessons learned.
The other thing that jumps out at me is our friends to the North could be F'd, low beds per capita and over 90% occupancy rate.
You left out the deployables I mentioned, the US basically just added another .5 beds per person (in NYC) which may not seem like much until you realize it was exactly where it was needed.
You average out the 2017 numbers of the EU countries displayed? In that way you don't need to account for population because the beds per 1000 already accounts for that in the average, with patients getting shared across borders. .
This part is incorrect just too demonstrate and keep it simple by your method the average for S Korea and India is 6.4 but when you take into account population and you're somewhere under 1. I wouldn't expect it to be that dramatic but it doesnt need to be to change the comparison.
I'm not talking just beds and a building when I say deployables, I'm talking deployable capability. They're being manned by military personel most likely active duty and reserve.
That is the exact same way the WHO calculates occupancy in your statistics though, pile on the countries and average it out, so occupancy average says nothing about empty beds except for the EU average not accounting for beds per 1000, say the NL is 10% under while another is 10% over average. Yet it is close enough to be a reasonably accurate average. I quickly averaged it because the large countries are about equally divided on either end in the EU (yes plus the UK) in regards to beds, here is the specific number then when taking population and beds per country into account when averaging: about 4.88 per 1000, so 0.02 under the average I quickly did. So that changes virtually nothing to the 25% average of extra beds.
Interesting and you've made a decent argument that the EU overall may have more available bed space, ( I'd need to know in more detail what and was'nt included, still too many questions) but doesn't change the original point that was addressing someone else. The US doesn't have a shortage of beds because private hospitals are evil and minimize all excess capacity, and the detailed data you averaged out supports that (look at some of the countries with fewer beds and higher utilization rates.
Actually it does. US hospital bed capacity (in both real and per 1000 terms) has been declining for decades:
in large part driven by hospital closures and mergers, as well as the implementation of HMO insurance plans which reduced hospital occupancy rates, all of which are driven by for-profit financial considerations:
"By the mid-1990s, Boston's hospitals were also becoming concerned about high HMO enrollment. In 1996, the HMOs' market share in Boston was 43.6 percent, compared with a national large metropolitan average of 27.8 percent. Boston's hospitals believed that the wide-scale use of global capitation was imminent and that selective contracting would steer more care away from the academic centers to traditional acute care hospitals in the community. The major hospital systems in Boston began to plan for hospital downsizing and service restructuring in their teaching and community hospitals. These plans included expanding certain core services at the teaching hospitals (e.g., cardiology, cardiac surgery, oncology, and orthopedics) and expanding traditional hospital services at system community hospitals (e.g., maternity care, elective orthopedic services, ophthalmology, psychiatric services, and postacute services).
Another event that strained Boston hospitals was cutbacks in Medicare payments that resulted from the 1997 Balanced Budget Act (BBA). Although the BBA affected hospitals nationwide, Boston with its five teaching hospitals was especially hard hit given their high cost of care. Subsequent refinements of the BBA relaxed its provisions, but through 2000, Boston's hospitals generally reported financial losses that they attributed to this legislation. The CareGroup hospital system was especially affected, with its flagship, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, incurring large financial losses. These losses stifled plans to restructure services at Beth Israel Deaconess, and CareGroup instead had to focus on cutting rather than converting hospital capacity.
Overall, the hospital downsizing during this period led to the elimination of many staffed beds at Boston's hospitals and health systems. By 2000, Partners HealthCare system had eliminated 200 to 250 staffed beds; CareGroup Healthcare System, 250 staffed beds; and Boston Medical Center, nearly 150. In total, these cuts represented a 15 percent reduction in these institutions' overall staffed bed stock."
"Throughout most of the 1990s, the perception of many Cleveland stakeholders was that the market had too much hospital capacity. Even though hospitals like the Cleveland Clinic Foundation Hospital attracted admissions from both around the United States and abroad, the marketwide hospital occupancy rate in the community was only 59.7 percent in 1996, compared with the large metropolitan average of 62.1 percent (table 1).
Beginning in 1999, some hospitals in the market closed. In that year, St. Luke's Medical Center shut its acute care hospital, and in March 2000, Mt. Sinai Medical Center–University Circle closed. Shortly afterward, the national hospital management company that closed Mt. Sinai Medical Center–University Circle announced plans to close two more Cleveland hospitals, but they remained open due to community outcry and the actions of two of the community's large hospital systems. In all, the two hospitals that closed had about 600 to 700 staffed beds, which was about 9 percent of the market's capacity.
The immediate effect of the closures was to shift hospital service demand to the remaining hospitals, especially those in downtown Cleveland that were located near the two closed hospitals. Hospital occupancy rates increased citywide from 58.7 percent in 1998 to 62.5 percent in 2001. The number of visits to the emergency departments of the remaining hospitals increased to absorb the 77,000 visits per year that the two closed hospitals had once provided. Hospital respondents reported that as a result, the frequency of ambulance diversions in 2001 rose by 400 percent over that in 1998."
"A major factor that affected Miami's hospital capacity in the mid-1990s was the dominance of HMOs in the market and their influence on the demand for hospital services. In 1996, the market share of Miami's HMOs was 52.9 percent, almost double the large metropolitan area average of 27.8 percent. Declines in inpatient admissions and lengths of stay as a result of HMO dominance eventually led hospitals to reduce the number of beds they staffed.
Then a series of events in the late 1990s made hospitals in the community realize that their capacity was being strained. First, the consumer backlash against HMOs was believed to have increased the demand for inpatient services as health plans relaxed utilization management controls and offered more open access. At the same time, some hospitals in the market were expanding their national and international marketing to attract patients in high-margin service lines. During this period too, the demand for charity care continued to grow, and problems in Florida's long-term care industry led to backups of patients in hospitals caused by the reduced availability of nursing home beds."
"In the early 1990s, the Phoenix market was perceived to have excess hospital capacity because the state lacked CON legislation to regulate hospital growth and expansion. As HMOs' market share grew, Phoenix's hospitals reacted to actual and anticipated reductions in the demand for their services by maintaining the same number of staffed beds even while the area's population continued to grow. As a result, the number of staffed hospital beds per 1,000 population in Phoenix was only 1.9 in 2001, compared with the large metropolitan average of 2.5.
As it did in other communities, the backlash against managed care in Phoenix led to greater demand for hospital services. Table 1 data indicate that increased hospital services use in Phoenix in fact exceeded its rate of population growth. Specifically, Phoenix's population grew by 25.2 percent from 1996 to 2003, whereas inpatient admissions grew by 43.2 percent and emergency visits by 54.9 percent.
Also keep in mind that for the most part the perception that ~35% of hospital beds are empty at any given time is in large part driven by an uneven distribution of capacity which results in more rural states having an excess of available beds, in turn driving down the average utilization rates even though hospitals in many states are operating at much higher utilization rates:
Generally it seems like the smaller states and high pop. states are in the neighborhood of ~70+% occupancy ( a quick look seems to indicate New York peaks at 78%), vs rural/flyover states like Idaho, Nebraska, Wyoming, etc. that are in the 50% range.
Another aspect that isn't really discussed often is that on a baseline level, the US has a higher rate of preventable hospitalizations than most the rest of the industrialized world, in large part driven by our largely unaffordable for-profit healthcare system disincentivizing large numbers of patients from seeking early and/or preventative treatment and winding up in a hospital bed when their health situation worsens to the point of treatment being unavoidable:
Meaning that a larger share of our hospital beds are being used to treat patients that would not have needed a hospital bed otherwise.
As for the Europe having its peak all at once, of course not. But the US military is deploying a lot of force to NY and LA because of their peaks. But you can see peaks are starting to occur in Florida, Pennsylvania , Louisiana and Michigan, can they deploy there as forcefully at the same time as they are doing now in NY and LA? Even the Pentagon has pointed out that there are limits (from Joint Staff Surgeon Brigadier General P. Friedrichs):
We only have 2 hospital ships, so no. Various other classes have various medical capabilites, but you're talking anywhere between 10 and 50 beds depending on the type of vessel/class, and those are mostly ships that are needed elsewhere for other operations. This isn't our total military healthcare capacity mind you, Army and Air Force have additional assets that they can deploy, but none of them can come close to touching the breadth and depth of what those two ships can offer. The supplemental deployable healthcare resources offered by the military won't be able to truly shore up the deficiencies in our healthcare system unless the pandemic turns out to be a good bit less severe than what we are now expecting. IIRC theres 14 national guard field hospitals and 8 active duty field hospitals, each unit has a max capacity of ~250 beds (?) for a grand total of ~5500 additional beds? Most of the guard hospitals are operated by civilian healthcare professionals, so they aren't really deployable as they are needed in civilian hospitals at the moment, so you're probably limited to the 8 active duty ones, total of 2,000 additional beds? Thats not even a 1% increase over our available civilian bed capacity - its helpful in a localized breakout, but not in a nationwide pandemic.
I've seen some discussion of the army corps of engineers establishing supplementary field hospitals that can be staffed by retired healthcare professionals, but that seems somewhat inadvisable given the risks posed to older people. Theoretically you would only send non-infected patients to those facilities, but how effectively can you screen out any and all potential patients that might be infected to safeguard against a breakout?
All that math you just did to come up with a lower number as max than already deployed capability....Thats before we get into all the shutdown clinics (not hospitals) on military bases, do we really need to keep them fully staffed when their not seeing most of their patients ?
Or how about the 9,000 plus medical personell who have expressed interest in returning to active duty and that's not including the hundreds of thousands available but that's gets in to the involuntary recall I said is when you know it hits the fan. And while you have to be careful who you grab you'd be suprised at how many changed careers. I know 4 former military nurses, 2 of them are still in the field.
Think of this like a military campaign. Right away the special forces go in to harass, then you send in the Marine expeditionary units that are rapidly deployable to hold the line and then you bring in the Army to start seizing ground, then you start mobilizing for sustainment (a little more challenging in the current environment but a deep well nonetheless). We're currently on step 2.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: Good thing it's not actually against the law then. What if it needed maintenance? What if there were items there that needed returning?
She went with her whole family two weekends in a row.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: Good thing it's not actually against the law then. What if it needed maintenance? What if there were items there that needed returning?
She went with her whole family two weekends in a row.
Better not to engage, he thinks personal liberty is more important than stopping the infection.
In theory if the family went from home A to home B and interacted with 0 people during that trip (ergo they remained within the car). And then at home B interacted with 0 people then the infection couldn't spread.
Justifiably one could argue it was a safe action. They could even argue that for the exercise per day it was safer to head out of town and walk the countryside than to remain within the urban setting.
That said clearly there's an increased risk of greater spread of any disease if people remain mobile like that and even if they did not intend to interact with anyone stuff happens. You get a flat now you've got to interact with a roadside repair person; you run out of food and make an essential food trip; postman visits; they encounter someone out on a walk etc... Lots of potential casual ways in which they could have interacted and increased any potential spread outside of a specific circle.
Increased potential risk since she's in healthcare at the political level so, just like the PM, she could have had increased potential exposure through her work. Placing her on a higher tier of potentially being infected and spreading.
In the end its an activity that could be conducted safe; but it wasn't "essential" and as someone in the government line of work and in the HEALTH line of work pushing for people NOT to do just what she did its a very bad move. It's not leading by example.
Azreal13 wrote: So Scotland's Chief Medical Officer had been caught making unnecessary journeys to her holiday home.
I wish I was making it up.
In finland boss of organization handling public health came into press conference sneezy and likely fever
As it turns out that was good PR though as it painted vividly "this is what you most def should not do"
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Overread wrote: In theory if the family went from home A to home B and interacted with 0 people during that trip (ergo they remained within the car). And then at home B interacted with 0 people then the infection couldn't spread.
Justifiably one could argue it was a safe action. They could even argue that for the exercise per day it was safer to head out of town and walk the countryside than to remain within the urban setting.
That said clearly there's an increased risk of greater spread of any disease if people remain mobile like that and even if they did not intend to interact with anyone stuff happens. You get a flat now you've got to interact with a roadside repair person; you run out of food and make an essential food trip; postman visits; they encounter someone out on a walk etc... Lots of potential casual ways in which they could have interacted and increased any potential spread outside of a specific circle.
Increased potential risk since she's in healthcare at the political level so, just like the PM, she could have had increased potential exposure through her work. Placing her on a higher tier of potentially being infected and spreading.
In the end its an activity that could be conducted safe; but it wasn't "essential" and as someone in the government line of work and in the HEALTH line of work pushing for people NOT to do just what she did its a very bad move. It's not leading by example.
Another is if he/she becomes sick on trip where is it handled? Here idea of going to summer cot to escape corona virus is heavily discouraged. On surface that's safe as you are alone with your family in middle of forest or around lake. Where's the harm? You are near lot fewer people than cities.
It also puts health services of smaller places(where those summer cottages tend to be) at risk of increased burden beyond what they can handle...
She has literally spent weeks telling people they absolutely should not travel for exercise (because the mountains have been really busy) or to their second home (because so many people have rural homes in Scotland).
good thing being a hypocrite isn't a crime either then. I dont get the point here? yeah shes a hypocrite. so what? if people minded their own business a little more maybe these things wouldnt cause so many melt downs. it just shows that even those pushing the 'lockdown' agenda are happy to bend the 'rules' whilst following some good old common sense.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: Good thing it's not actually against the law then. What if it needed maintenance? What if there were items there that needed returning?
She went with her whole family two weekends in a row.
Better not to engage, he thinks personal liberty is more important than stopping the infection.
maybe not more, but definitely not to be disregarded
queen_annes_revenge wrote: good thing being a hypocrite isn't a crime either then. I dont get the point here? yeah shes a hypocrite. so what? if people minded their own business a little more maybe these things wouldnt cause so many melt downs. it just shows that even those pushing the 'lockdown' agenda are happy to bend the 'rules' whilst following some good old common sense.
This feels pretty disingenuous because I simply don't think you're daft enough not to see why 'for everyone's safety it is absolutely essential that absolutely everyone ceases to do this thing I am doing' is problematic for a medical expert to say during a pandemic.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: Good thing it's not actually against the law then. What if it needed maintenance? What if there were items there that needed returning?
She went with her whole family two weekends in a row.
Better not to engage, he thinks personal liberty is more important than stopping the infection.
maybe not more, but definitely not to be disregarded
queen_annes_revenge wrote: good thing being a hypocrite isn't a crime either then. I dont get the point here? yeah shes a hypocrite. so what? if people minded their own business a little more maybe these things wouldnt cause so many melt downs. it just shows that even those pushing the 'lockdown' agenda are happy to bend the 'rules' whilst following some good old common sense.
You're really not grasping this are you?
She travels 50 miles to go to her holiday home. Half way there, a deer launches itself at the car and causes an accident. They're in the middle of nowhere and the car ends up in an awkward location.
We now have a family (let's say 4 people) requiring at least a crew of paramedics, perhaps a fire crew, maybe an air ambulance, at minimum.
That's now a bunch of people brought into proximity of her family and each other, all first responders who could be doing better things with their time, or simply not doing anything and saving the taxpayer cash.
Say a couple of the family need a hospital visit for injuries. That's now exposing them to an exponential number of risks, assuming none of them are currently carriers and exposing any number of other people in turn.
Now, thanks to that hospital visit one of them does indeed pick up Covid 19, and they get hit hard because it's one of the kids and he's got asthma. That kid is now taking up a bed and possibly a ventilator.
All because she didn't follow her own fething advice.
Before you come back with something trite like "yeah, but that didn't happen" I can guarantee that something like that would happen on a daily basis if the whole country were moving about like normal, because that's the fething point of staying at home.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: good thing being a hypocrite isn't a crime either then. I dont get the point here? yeah shes a hypocrite. so what? if people minded their own business a little more maybe these things wouldnt cause so many melt downs. it just shows that even those pushing the 'lockdown' agenda are happy to bend the 'rules' whilst following some good old common sense.
So what? Ah yes better for many lives and money lost. FREEEEDOM!
Bleargh. Some people have no sense of common good. Just me me me me me me me ME ME ME ME
queen_annes_revenge wrote: Good thing it's not actually against the law then. What if it needed maintenance? What if there were items there that needed returning?
My parents have a second holiday home. When it needs maintenance they call on of of the various local tradespeople and pay them to go and fix it.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: good thing being a hypocrite isn't a crime either then. I dont get the point here? yeah shes a hypocrite. so what? if people minded their own business a little more maybe these things wouldnt cause so many melt downs. it just shows that even those pushing the 'lockdown' agenda are happy to bend the 'rules' whilst following some good old common sense.
This feels pretty disingenuous because I simply don't think you're daft enough not to see why 'for everyone's safety it is absolutely essential that absolutely everyone ceases to do this thing I am doing' is problematic for a medical expert to say during a pandemic.
.
No, I dont believe that. I believe adults are able to make their own decisions informed by the relevant information, and applying common sense. If someone wants to go to another property they own, why shouldnt they be allowed to? plenty of people who work away from home are communting each weekend. whats the difference? theyre not coming into contact with anyone, theyre following the rules on distancing.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: good thing being a hypocrite isn't a crime either then. I dont get the point here? yeah shes a hypocrite. so what? if people minded their own business a little more maybe these things wouldnt cause so many melt downs. it just shows that even those pushing the 'lockdown' agenda are happy to bend the 'rules' whilst following some good old common sense.
So what? Ah yes better for many lives and money lost. FREEEEDOM!
Bleargh. Some people have no sense of common good. Just me me me me me me me ME ME ME ME
If you actually read my posts instead of peoples idiotic responses, maybe you'd realise what I am actually saying.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: good thing being a hypocrite isn't a crime either then. I dont get the point here? yeah shes a hypocrite. so what? if people minded their own business a little more maybe these things wouldnt cause so many melt downs. it just shows that even those pushing the 'lockdown' agenda are happy to bend the 'rules' whilst following some good old common sense.
This feels pretty disingenuous because I simply don't think you're daft enough not to see why 'for everyone's safety it is absolutely essential that absolutely everyone ceases to do this thing I am doing' is problematic for a medical expert to say during a pandemic.
.
No, I dont believe that. I believe adults are able to make their own decisions informed by the relevant information, and applying common sense. If someone wants to go to another property they own, why shouldnt they be allowed to? plenty of people who work away from home are communting each weekend. whats the difference? theyre not coming into contact with anyone, theyre following the rules on distancing.
And yet when the UK public was first told to isolate the first thing they did that VERY weekend was all head out to the same countryside spots. This is also after weeks of other countries showing how to isolate; media; TV etc.... the idea and theory if isolation was very clearly spelled out and yet many chose not to isolate and tried to continue as normal. Even if when they got to the destination they were trying to keep away its hard to impossible if your'e all using the same carpark; same toilets etc...
Also I think the key difference is that she took the risk of non-essential travel whilst at the same time telling others not to do it. She was telling the whole population to do X and she went and did X.
I agree, some people are dumb, and lots of people did disregard the initial guidance. so bring in the emergency bill. great, I dont have a problem with that. what I have a problem with is when those tasked with enforcing the 'guidelines' apply the mentality that everyone is at that same level of stupidity, and treat everyone as such.
And like I said, yeah shes a hypocrite, but shes telling people what shes supposed to, but obviously feels like she needed a break from that environment, I personally dont see that an an issue.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: I agree, some people are dumb, and lots of people did disregard the initial guidance. so bring in the emergency bill. great, I dont have a problem with that. what I have a problem with is when those tasked with enforcing the 'guidelines' apply the mentality that everyone is at that same level of stupidity, and treat everyone as such.
And like I said, yeah shes a hypocrite, but shes telling people what shes supposed to, but obviously feels like she needed a break from that environment, I personally dont see that an an issue.
Rules without enforcement fast become rules people don't follow all that well if at all.
And if she gets to have a break from the urban environment then - well - doesn't everyone else also deserve a break? At which point we are back to the problem of 70 million people all wanting to go to the countryside for a break at the same time and back to isolation no longer functioning.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: good thing being a hypocrite isn't a crime either then. I dont get the point here? yeah shes a hypocrite. so what? if people minded their own business a little more maybe these things wouldnt cause so many melt downs. it just shows that even those pushing the 'lockdown' agenda are happy to bend the 'rules' whilst following some good old common sense.
This feels pretty disingenuous because I simply don't think you're daft enough not to see why 'for everyone's safety it is absolutely essential that absolutely everyone ceases to do this thing I am doing' is problematic for a medical expert to say during a pandemic.
.
No, I dont believe that. I believe adults are able to make their own decisions informed by the relevant information, and applying common sense. If someone wants to go to another property they own, why shouldnt they be allowed to? plenty of people who work away from home are communting each weekend. whats the difference? theyre not coming into contact with anyone, theyre following the rules on distancing.
And yet when the UK public was first told to isolate the first thing they did that VERY weekend was all head out to the same countryside spots. This is also after weeks of other countries showing how to isolate; media; TV etc.... the idea and theory if isolation was very clearly spelled out and yet many chose not to isolate and tried to continue as normal. Even if when they got to the destination they were trying to keep away its hard to impossible if your'e all using the same carpark; same toilets etc...
Also I think the key difference is that she took the risk of non-essential travel whilst at the same time telling others not to do it. She was telling the whole population to do X and she went and did X.
also, no one was told to isolate (except those showing symptoms) we were told to social distance. in fact, we still are.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: I agree, some people are dumb, and lots of people did disregard the initial guidance. so bring in the emergency bill. great, I dont have a problem with that. what I have a problem with is when those tasked with enforcing the 'guidelines' apply the mentality that everyone is at that same level of stupidity, and treat everyone as such.
And like I said, yeah shes a hypocrite, but shes telling people what shes supposed to, but obviously feels like she needed a break from that environment, I personally dont see that an an issue.
Rules without enforcement fast become rules people don't follow all that well if at all.
And if she gets to have a break from the urban environment then - well - doesn't everyone else also deserve a break? At which point we are back to the problem of 70 million people all wanting to go to the countryside for a break at the same time and back to isolation no longer functioning.
but they arent rules, theyre guidelines and advice. the bill actually stated that it could not enforce making people give reasons for going out or travelling (although the actual act reneged on this somewhat) and yeah, they have enforcement powers, but the issue is that theyre using them irresponsibly, and often outright incorrectly. no one has even answered this point yet with anything other than...'well its an emergency, just follow the rules blah blah'
queen_annes_revenge wrote: I agree, some people are dumb, and lots of people did disregard the initial guidance. so bring in the emergency bill. great, I dont have a problem with that. what I have a problem with is when those tasked with enforcing the 'guidelines' apply the mentality that everyone is at that same level of stupidity, and treat everyone as such.
And like I said, yeah shes a hypocrite, but shes telling people what shes supposed to, but obviously feels like she needed a break from that environment, I personally dont see that an an issue.
It's not to do with people's stupidity in this context, I doubt the CMO of a country is exactly a moron. It's more to do with people's seeming inexhaustible ability to rationalise why the rules don't apply to them, of which you're an absolute fething paragon.
The fact that you have no issue with this is the issue.
Jihadin wrote: Sheesh, Alpharius mention Phase two.....might as well start a thread and how and what to get to prepare for that.....remember the TWD dead thread we had so long ago
Well, I was at least hopeful that we'll all be better prepared for Wave Two!
I know I will be, at least - and thankfully I already work from home, so I'm fortunate there...
queen_annes_revenge wrote: good thing being a hypocrite isn't a crime either then. I dont get the point here? yeah shes a hypocrite. so what? if people minded their own business a little more maybe these things wouldnt cause so many melt downs. it just shows that even those pushing the 'lockdown' agenda are happy to bend the 'rules' whilst following some good old common sense.
This feels pretty disingenuous because I simply don't think you're daft enough not to see why 'for everyone's safety it is absolutely essential that absolutely everyone ceases to do this thing I am doing' is problematic for a medical expert to say during a pandemic.
.
No, I dont believe that. I believe adults are able to make their own decisions informed by the relevant information, and applying common sense. If someone wants to go to another property they own, why shouldnt they be allowed to? plenty of people who work away from home are communting each weekend. whats the difference? theyre not coming into contact with anyone, theyre following the rules on distancing.
But that doesn't really have anything to do with why she's been getting hammered all day. You may believe adults can take the advice and make informed decisions - her position is that there is no informed decision to be made. People should be following instructions to the letter. In response, nobody is saying 'why are you doing this appalling thing?' They're saying 'why should we take you seriously if you're doing it?' The concern (being vocalised across the press, at least) does not revolve around whether her advice is sound, it's that she is obviously not the appropriate person to deliver the advisory campaign she has been fronting.
All that math you just did to come up with a lower number as max than already deployed capability....
You got a source for that? I didn't do very much math there, some simple multiplication was all.
You also have to be careful with how you're counting. Army field hospital units are a finite resource with a finite capacity and capability, they are being augmented by additional resources drawn from outside the military where they are being deployed. The Javits Center field hospital for example has about a 3000 bed capacity - but that didn't all come from the Army field hospital unit that is running it, the vast majority of the beds and the equipment used at the Javits center came from FEMA instead, and is being staffed by supplementary personnel pulled in from outside the field hospital units, including reservists and national guardsmen as well as civilian personnel. Theres like another 180 sites being setup nationwide by the army corps of engineers, predominantly using a mixture of FEMA, state, federal, civilian, and military equipment as triage facilties and are being staffed by a similar mixture of emergency first responders, retired healthcare pros, etc. I.E. not everything that you seem to be counting is actually the "military deployable" capability that you are so focused on, one can assume that EU member states and others would therefore have a similar disaster and reserve triage capability regardless of their smaller militaries. Also worth mentioning, per Esper, the military has already deployed or is in the process of delploying about half of its available active duty medical capability, and per his statements he does not believe that they can deploy much more than that as the remaining medical resources are needed to maintain warfighting readiness, as a result the military is creating additional ad-hoc teams and task forces that contain only 25% medical/healthcare pros being supplemented by personnel from across the various service branches who have basic lifesaving training and skills, or are military medical students, etc. in order to spread what resources are left around.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Before you come back with something trite like "yeah, but that didn't happen" I can guarantee that something like that would happen on a daily basis if the whole country were moving about like normal, because that's the fething point of staying at home.
Yep, thats been a big factor in this in the US. The USNS Comfort was mostly empty for the first few days it was in NYC because it was expected to handle non-COVID related medical emergencies (i.e. car accidents and other injuries), but with everyone staying home there was a major downturn in such events which meant the space was available to handle other things.
Future War Cultist wrote: So Boris Johnson has been admitted to hospital. I think more as a precaution because the symptoms aren’t going away.
In fairness to the man he's probably not just got Corona but a massive shedload of stress ontop of it; and stress can be a major factor in delaying or even preventing recovery.
chaos0xomega wrote: Oof. I know my previous response to his diagnosis was "shame", but I don't want the dude to get hurt or die either, hope he makes a recovery.
If only because his second in command these days appears to be Dominic Raab. And, well, bugger that...
I really only know Raab as a name and not much else, so such concerns don't really matter to me. I dont really wish harm on anyone in general (well... theres a few...), I mostly just want karmic justice - yknow, a reality check/slap across the face that triggers a re-evaluation of beliefs and behaviors.
Lots of people here in America are ignoring anything logical and still living their lives like nothing is going on, and it's showing in the lack of effect on the growth curve.
I go shopping as little as possible, but still see old folks hanging out and chatting with no social distancing. Or people walking side by side as they shop together (when one family member could easily do it all) so you can barely squeeze by them in the aisle, and they give you a sneer if you ask them to give way. A couple of the houses across from me have tons of cars that come and go.
So now that wearing masks is "strongly advised and not required" here in the US, is ok for me to go out and about looking like Darth Vader wearing my P95 respirator that i have for my airbrush?
The respirator effectiveness goes like N95, R95, P95.
AegisGrimm wrote: Lots of people here in America are ignoring anything logical and still living their lives like nothing is going on, and it's showing in the lack of effect on the growth curve.
I go shopping as little as possible, but still see old folks hanging out and chatting with no social distancing. Or people walking side by side as they shop together (when one family member could easily do it all) so you can barely squeeze by them in the aisle, and they give you a sneer if you ask them to give way. A couple of the houses across from me have tons of cars that come and go.
I see this same thing all the damn time, which is making me think that the death toll in the US may be over half a million by time it's done. All because Americans are too stubborn and think it'll never happen to them. Until it does. And I'm one of those "essential" types that has to work with the public during this thing...
Some difference indeed. Even less of a surprise US is getting hit harder.
In more positive news Italy daily death cases are dropping. Spain also showing some positive signs I think. Finland new daily cases are dropping despite testing being increased.
WHO got some fire from the NZZ one of the biggest papers we have.
Mostly because it didn't criticise the chinese government in it's handling however it is assumed that has to do with the fact that china has built out it's position within the UNO.
In other news over 20'000k valid cases and easter looks nice weather wise....
Will minds be changed? Or divides deepened? Will a reduced voting demographic lose their grip on the reigns of power?
I used to quite enjoy that program on Netflix, Doomsday Peppers. Those guys must be so happy right now.
I'd take anything the guardian say with a pinch of salt, they have a very overt agenda
So what in the article do you think is not supported by facts?
Well, most of it?
'Members of the national guard, emergency workers, rank-and-file Americans: all are exposed. Yet Trump appears incapable of emoting anything that comes close to heart-felt concern. Or just providing straight answers.'
and? its the exact same here, and everywhere thats in the same situation. The rest is just the usual bluster about things hes saying. it doesnt really add much in the way of evidence.
Not that I necessarily disagree with a lot of what's being said, but that is most definitely an opinion piece, not a journalistic article.
The entire piece is rife with what ifs, mays, may have tos, looks likes etc. with not a whole lot of numbers or sources.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: the WHO isnt going to criticise china, when its director general is essentially a paid patsy for the PRC.
Spoiler:
In the wash up, after all this has ended there will need to be some hard questions. However, it does demonstrate, if true (I haven't seen the interview myself, or the figures), the importance of funding and it's affect on decision making.
unlikely, in the US, which is much more divided down partisan lines than here in the UK, where the increasingly bitter political divide seems to have largely disappeared..or at least it seems that way due to recent circumstances.
queen_annes_revenge wrote: unlikely, in the US, which is much more divided down partisan lines than here in the UK, where the increasingly bitter political divide seems to have largely disappeared..or at least it seems that way due to recent circumstances.
It hasn't. The Covid coverage has just washed everything else off the media shows, sites and papers.
Nah, we still have a political (or maybe more accurate if it's called a media-driven??) mess slowing down response to the virus.
The latest claims (no specific party names to keep from being political) are that one of the groups (or sometimes even claimed by that blamed group to be the work of the OTHER group??) is artificially inflating the C19 death toll to get their interests forced across.
It's not as much political as it is anti-science. People claim it is false to consider every death of a person with C19 as a death from the virus, even if they died of something else.
It's utter stupidity. In the exact same way, there has never, ever been person who has died of AIDS, only from complications brought on by having AIDS (same as Leukemia). And yet anyone with common sense considers them as AIDS death statistics. Why not the same with this Coronavirus?
Two of the huge complications of C19 in my country is the utter distrust of science shown by a large portion of the populace (unfortunately driven by several key personalities in radio and tv media), and the intense pushback against anything we are "told to do" by authority figures, as if it somehow goes against our personal inherent freedoms. Which is insane, because sometimes both those views are held by the same people. They will eat up all the drivel being spouted by a non-expert media personality, but turn around and tell an expert, "don't try to tell me what I can and can't do- this is a free country!!!".
It's equal parts frigtening and frustrating to be stuck in the middle of it all, for sure.
Kilkrazy wrote: In other virus crisis news, the residents of Robin Hood's Bay, Yorkshire, are being ordered to stay in their home by a Dalek roaming the streets.
Lol I saw that video on FB but couldn't find it on youtube. Didn't know where it was though.
Very appropriate though
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Kilkrazy wrote: In other virus crisis news, the residents of Robin Hood's Bay, Yorkshire, are being ordered to stay in their home by a Dalek roaming the streets.
Lol I saw that video on FB but couldn't find it on youtube*. Didn't know where it was though.
Not sure if its the warm weather or people getting bored(maybe a bit of both), but we had a surprisingly busy day at work. A few enquiries for non essentials as always(abrasive paper, polisher heads ect). But mostly calls from joe public about basic service stuff like filters, brakes and battery's that cars wont run without. But can also be changed on your drive with fairly commonplace tools. Our van drivers said the roads were busier today then last week as well.
Spoke to my Mum who used to run a local school kitchen a few years back. Her friends who are still involved told her they have been making up food parcels for kids to take home. Not unexpected but depressing nonetheless.
BREAKING: A tiger at the Bronx Zoo has tested positive for Covid-19. 6 other tigers and lions at the zoo are also showing symptoms. Believed to have been infected by an asymptomatic zoo worker. All doing well. To my knowledge, this is the first animal to test positive in the U.S.
..would've thought if there was one thing you'd have kept more than 2 metres away from anyway then...
I vaguely recall there being some talk about cats being susceptible to the virus in the last week.
FOAF works.volunteers at a local animal shelter an d says they've had a lot more requests for collection/drop offs for pets that people no longer want from reasons from fear of contagion to family deaths to no longer being able to afford them.
I recall reading on one of the many tiger articles/posts that there's a strain of flu that tigers can catch which is similar and will test positive for Corona, but isn't the human strain.
Also a lot of zookeeping is still hands-on even with things like tigers. Basically if the animal isn't going to be re-introduced many of them are handled so that they can do basic checkups and such by hand. Rather than having to dart them every time they just want to do a basic check. It also helps with enrichment and other aspects. Of course with things like tigers its dangerous, but people work with cattle, bulls, horses and ferocious sheep all the time.
Of course not every zoo will do that and not every generation/individual cat will be suitable so there will be variation in policies and approaches from different sites.
tneva82 wrote: johnson now in intensive care. Wonder if he's starting to regret his cavalier herd immunity idea(that frankly might never have truly left)
Think that's a bit harsh, he followed his advisors , a better or bigger thing to do would be to wish him well.
tneva82 wrote: johnson now in intensive care. Wonder if he's starting to regret his cavalier herd immunity idea(that frankly might never have truly left)
tneva82 wrote: johnson now in intensive care. Wonder if he's starting to regret his cavalier herd immunity idea(that frankly might never have truly left)
You really have no tact or grace do you?
He will be the first screaming for help if his turn comes, I have seen it already.
Oh crap oh crap oh crap. A national crisis caused by a global pandemic and the country is gonna end up in the hands of a guy who didn't know how important Dover to Calai was until he became Brexit secretary
I don't mean to be flippant but based on his age his risk of dying is 1.3%. To be completely positive the care he's receiving and his place in the demographic means he should come out just fine. This is of course without taking any other underlying medical conditions into account.
If we can keep the pseudo deathwishes and the like out of the thread please.
Time and a place and this is neither.
I don't mean to be flippant but based on his age his risk of dying is 1.3%. To be completely positive the care he's receiving and his place in the demographic means he should come out just fine. This is of course without taking any other underlying medical conditions into account.
The fact he's had to go into the hospital rather than being treated at no 10/wherever means this is serious.
He's also obese, early 50s, with a history of drug and alcohol abuse , none of those are factors in his favour.
..Thought something was odd when Raab said he hadn't spoken to him since Saturday, but didn't think it'd be this bad.
I don't mean to be flippant but based on his age his risk of dying is 1.3%. To be completely positive the care he's receiving and his place in the demographic means he should come out just fine. This is of course without taking any other underlying medical conditions into account.
The fact he's had to go into the hospital rather than being treated at no 10/wherever means this is serious.
Right. And if he ends up on a ventilator...this will become a scary situation.
If we can keep the pseudo deathwishes and the like out of the thread please.
Time and a place and this is neither.
I don't mean to be flippant but based on his age his risk of dying is 1.3%. To be completely positive the care he's receiving and his place in the demographic means he should come out just fine. This is of course without taking any other underlying medical conditions into account.
The fact he's had to go into the hospital rather than being treated at no 10/wherever means this is serious.
He's also obese, early 50s, with a history of drug and alcohol abuse , none of those are factors in his favour.
..Thought something was odd when Raab said he hadn't spoken to him since Saturday, but didn't think it'd be this bad.
Hope his other half is alright too.
Yeah, she's pregnant too.
I'm no fan of Johnson, I think he's a colossal tosser who's done a great deal of harm to this country, but I wish him a speedy recovery.
I do wish that the people ostensibly in charge of the USA would take this a bit more seriously, and stop giving conflicting messages out on a daily basis...
I don't mean to be flippant but based on his age his risk of dying is 1.3%. To be completely positive the care he's receiving and his place in the demographic means he should come out just fine. This is of course without taking any other underlying medical conditions into account.
The fact he's had to go into the hospital rather than being treated at no 10/wherever means this is serious.
Well, yes and no. Speaking from personal experience, the NHS has some very strict procedures in place dictating what can be done by whom and where.
While I'd no way argue it's good that he's been taken to ICU, one has to allow for the fact that even simple procedures cannot be undertaken by unqualified staff. I've had many instances where a small adjustment to an IV required a nurse to go and fetch a colleague because they weren't trained on IVs, even when it just required a small movment, they won't touch them, even if they know exactly what needs to be done and have seen it done a thousand times.
I'd also be surprised if an apparently fit and healthy chap who's been fighting the disease for over a week, has been posting videos from the hospital earlier today and has still been staying in relative touch with the cabinet could take such a turn in such a short period of time.
..one hopes that regardless of whether you like the man or not, agree or disagree with their politics, actions, choices etc etc etc etc
than at the very least see how it might be less than ideal for a country to lose it's head of state -- and yes I know about the role of the monarch and etc etc etc -- when we are on something of a sticky wicket currently, to say the least.
and I say that's at the very least -- ignoring that whole it's another human being thing.
All the recriminations and finger pointing and he/she/who said what is best saved for another time.
Really odd thing if one stops and think is -- in theory, if you follow me -- it's about now we should have been dissolving Cameron's Parliament won in 2015 for the election schedules by the then fixed term parliaments act.
I think it fair to say we've been on quite a ride in that same time period all things considered.
I don't mean to be flippant but based on his age his risk of dying is 1.3%. To be completely positive the care he's receiving and his place in the demographic means he should come out just fine. This is of course without taking any other underlying medical conditions into account.
The fact he's had to go into the hospital rather than being treated at no 10/wherever means this is serious.
Right. And if he ends up on a ventilator...this will become a scary situation.
In ITU most patients are sedated on ventilators , although not all.
Thing is though, this virus seems to have a nasty habit of taking out people you wouldn’t expect it too at random. Maybe they had underlying conditions but it still worries me.
Also I work in the hospital with the covid patients and they generally are ok ish for 7 to 9 days then if not recovered they go down hill very quickly, they drop off the proverbial cliff.
Marxist artist wrote: Also I work in the hospital with the covid patients and they generally are ok ish for 7 to 9 days then if not recovered they go down hill very quickly, they drop off the proverbial cliff.
First, thank you for what you do, being in the thick of it. And I heard that too, the ‘false recovery’ that occurs before the real crash.
reds8n wrote: The fact he's had to go into the hospital rather than being treated at no 10/wherever means this is serious.
Well, yes and no. Speaking from personal experience, the NHS has some very strict procedures in place dictating what can be done by whom and where.
While I'd no way argue it's good that he's been taken to ICU, one has to allow for the fact that even simple procedures cannot be undertaken by unqualified staff. I've had many instances where a small adjustment to an IV required a nurse to go and fetch a colleague because they weren't trained on IVs, even when it just required a small movment, they won't touch them, even if they know exactly what needs to be done and have seen it done a thousand times.
I'd also be surprised if an apparently fit and healthy chap who's been fighting the disease for over a week, has been posting videos from the hospital earlier today and has still been staying in relative touch with the cabinet could take such a turn in such a short period of time.
But time will tell.
I am hopeful that due to the fact he's the leader of a major world power they would take precautions with his health and place him in a location that he can receive first class treatment very quickly. I agree with Azreal as well, my wife is a Licensed Vocational Nurse and while she is the main person most patients interact with at the hospital she is not allowed to do certain things. The IV is a perfect example- when she worked in a major hospital only someone who was a Registered Nurse or above could push medication through an IV. This may not be true everywhere but typically the ICU at her hospital only had RNs and those individuals required specific training. While trying to be optimistic they could be ensuring he receives the best care they have available.
reds8n wrote: ..it's about now we should have been dissolving Cameron's Parliament won in 2015 for the election schedules by the then fixed term parliaments act.
I think it fair to say we've been on quite a ride in that same time period all things considered.
That's quite the understatement. We've definitely slipped down the wrong leg of the trousers of time.
tneva82 wrote: johnson now in intensive care. Wonder if he's starting to regret his cavalier herd immunity idea(that frankly might never have truly left)
Yeah, she's pregnant too.
I'm no fan of Johnson, I think he's a colossal tosser who's done a great deal of harm to this country, but I wish him a speedy recovery.
This however, is the sort of response I can completely understand.
One does not have to agree with a man (or even like or respect him) to refrain from gloating in his potential death. Let alone a man who has a new child on the way and is the leader of a country in a crisis. I could just about half understand it when people were jumping for joy over Thatcher - I thought it was still tasteless but I could at least partially comprehend it - but Bojo has done nothing extreme enough to earn that sort of ire. Sure, he's a lying egomanaic, but that isn't reason enough to take pleasure in the concept of him painfully gasping out his last through a ventilator. Not if you're a decent human being yourself, anyway.
Oh, and r_squared, the extract on the WHO was from the latest Private Eye. I've no idea if it's accurate or not, but I doubt they'd be mistaken about the funding being late. I swear I remember reading something else about it before elsewhere.
That's the problem with the UN, League of Nations, EU, NATO, and all the other big international organisations. They desperately want the dictatorships and semi-oppressive regimes and the like inside them 'for dialogue and growth'; then when they start doing nasties, they look the other way. They're never willing to either deny them access, or if they spring up whilst inside, boot them out. So we get Saudia Arabia chairing things on human rights, Turkey ordering Russian missiles, and the nasty little facists electing themselves dictator for life in Hungary. Taiwan is no less worthy of attention by the WHO or UN than any other nation; but so long as those organisations value having China's money and membership more than they do common decency? Taiwan will be in the cold.
It is likely that due to his importance Johnson was hospitalised at the first signs he might need to be. Triage does not apply.
There is evidence for this because he was reported as admitted for monitoring in the press.
Hopefully Johnson recovers quickly and can actually be convinced to take proper time to recuperate.
One silver lining to Johnson's predicament: media scrutiny is about to leap in quality because Raab has none of Johnson's Teflon qualifies and don't fit the British born ruler stereotype.
That said I think it be unity government time soon.
What happens to Boris Johnson is a reminder the virus happens to all, no matter their importance, politics or human self delusions.
Still, he's the UK prime minister, he obviously has access to the finest medical treatments in his country. He'll be in good hands.
Wishes of recovery to all with Covid-19. Even to those who kept denying the virus dangerosity, spread misinformation with or without purpose and wish their opponents to be infected.
In the end, we're all humans and have to suffer this all together.
Sarouan wrote: What happens to Boris Johnson is a reminder the virus happens to all, no matter their importance, politics or human self delusions.
Still, he's the UK prime minister, he obviously has access to the finest medical treatments in his country. He'll be in good hands.
Wishes of recovery to all with Covid-19. Even to those who kept denying the virus dangerosity, spread misinformation with or without purpose and wish their opponents to be infected.
In the end, we're all humans and have to suffer this all together.
True. In many ways, celebrities and politicians getting it is a good thing. Diseases and epidemics getting passed off as 'poor people's problems' have happened too frequently, and every high profile case means more money and resources devoted to research.
So my wife is being tested tomorrow. Obviously a worrisome and awful time- but there was one piece of advice they gave which I thought was kind of strange, and wondered if there was validity in it.
They advised that she try to stay quarantined from us- 2 kids and me. Now as I understand it, with this thing's transmission rate and already several weeks deep in quarantine, my gut reaction is that we've already been thoroughly exposed.
I'm certainly planning to stay away from everyone outside of the house until we know for sure, but is isolating an individual who you've already been in close contact with reasonable?
I've heard of folks doing that, but it's not how we approached it when I was tested (which was an easy call, since we all felt sick at the same time, with what we now know wasn't COVID-19).
There have been some cases where a spouse has it and the other tests negative. But in many households I would imagine that might be next to impossible lol
If you're lucky and if you distance fast enough then, in theory, you could self isolate in the same house and manage to keep separate and not infect others. Though you really would have to block off part of the house entirely. Separate washroom, bedroom, a barrier of some kind between the two areas. Food would be an issue - in theory the uninfected could prepare meals, leave them for the infected to collect and then the infected cleans the plates/dishes before they are collected and cleaned a second time. etc...
It could be done, but you'd likely need a larger property to achieve it (or sacrifice one floor). It's also very unlikely that most would maintain such measures long term without a slip-up here and there.
Plus with how infectious it is it would be rare for one person to go down with it without having already interacted with others in the household enough to have exposed them to significant risk.
At the very best it might potentially delay infection of the others in the household.
How is this any excuse? Not only he is the one responsible for the final decisions, he specifically picked Andrew Wakefield grade quack who told him what he wanted to say - while all actual experts were screaming how criminally stupid and irresponsible (to the tune of six digit deaths) this nonsense is. All so he could avoid disturbing interests of his buddies from top 1%.
I find it amazing how democracy is supposed to be run by informed voters yet someone who bears all responsibility no matter from what angle you look can escape it with trivial ease by waving a little scapegoat sockpuppet in front of him shouting "I was just following him". Yup, he had totally nothing to do with it at all and doesn't deserve any blame, eh?
Ketara wrote: Let alone a man who has a new child on the way
That would be sad if he didn't already have 5 or 7 kids he doesn't give one toss about, including at least two from affairs (where he denied fatherhood and had to be dragged to court to confirm it). Not counting multiple abortions he forced to escape responsibility. So, yeah, I can empathize with and feel sad for the child - because he or she will most likely be abandoned soon no matter what. Feeling sorry for abusive man who doesn't really deserve to be called father (and that's his own deeds, not my opinion) is kind of harder, don't you think?
Bojo has done nothing extreme enough to earn that sort of ire
Well, if we ignore the fact he was the pillar of the campaign that cost his nation untold billions and caused explosion of racism and xenophobia, sure. Though that would also require ignoring he was OK with Covid killing hundreds of thousands, that he was OK with ruining millions of lives of people who came to UK heeding the call to work and paid taxes for decades, people from both EU and beyond (see Windrush). People he is now trying to forcibly deport, often to countries which they didn't see for 50 or 60 years, where they are easy targets for robbery or murder. People who by the way are one of the major NHS pillars, without which it would have collapsed long time ago. Also ignoring he was one of the architects of austerity and NHS cuts, something that killed ~120.000 people already and left NHS far weaker, drastically increasing chances Covid tally will be orders of magnitude larger than it should be:
We should also ignore that he wasted untold millions in the past on vanity projects, like the London bridge, millions that could go to so many better causes, and that's when he was small fry - now he is trying to waste untold billions (see Irish bridge) instead of fixing NHS mess. Let's also ignore him spreading racism, sexism, and islamophobia in the press he wrote for, and multiple other similar trivial details, yeah, he did absolutely nothing wrong.
How is this any excuse? Not only he is the one responsible for the final decisions, he specifically picked Andrew Wakefield grade quack who told him what he wanted to say - while all actual experts were screaming how criminally stupid and irresponsible (to the tune of six digit deaths) this nonsense is. All so he could avoid disturbing interests of his buddies from top 1%.
I find it amazing how democracy is supposed to be run by informed voters yet someone who bears all responsibility no matter from what angle you look can escape it with trivial ease by waving a little scapegoat sockpuppet in front of him shouting "I was just following him". Yup, he had totally nothing to do with it at all and doesn't deserve any blame, eh?
Agreed, the "he only followed his advisors" argument is the reverse side of the same coin as the "only following orders" argument - one which has been long established as morally, legally, and ethically invalid as a defense of ones actions. It is true that any leaders decisions are often only as good as their advisors, but we have to remember that in many cases, including BoJos, they *pick* their advisors, and in this case in paritcular the advisors he picked were decried as horrible well before coronavirus was a word in the popular lexicon.
As far as BoJo is concerned, I want to see him recover and resume his job... now that he has a patient's eye view of what CVOID does. To paraphrase a terrible Batman movie, "If he's dead, he won't learn nothin'!"
It can be tricky to keep politics out of a conversation when someone like Johnson is a main talking point though.
I wonder how this will effect the public perception of the virus and the social distancing measurers? Fingers crossed it will penetrate the thick skulls of those still not taking the situation seriously. But I also fear that some might take the opposite tack and decide that if even the PM can catch it, then there is no point in trying to mitigate the risks.
How is this any excuse? Not only he is the one responsible for the final decisions, he specifically picked Andrew Wakefield grade quack who told him what he wanted to say - while all actual experts were screaming how criminally stupid and irresponsible (to the tune of six digit deaths) this nonsense is. All so he could avoid disturbing interests of his buddies from top 1%.
I find it amazing how democracy is supposed to be run by informed voters yet someone who bears all responsibility no matter from what angle you look can escape it with trivial ease by waving a little scapegoat sockpuppet in front of him shouting "I was just following him". Yup, he had totally nothing to do with it at all and doesn't deserve any blame, eh?
Ketara wrote: Let alone a man who has a new child on the way
That would be sad if he didn't already have 5 or 7 kids he doesn't give one toss about, including at least two from affairs (where he denied fatherhood and had to be dragged to court to confirm it). Not counting multiple abortions he forced to escape responsibility. So, yeah, I can empathize with and feel sad for the child - because he or she will most likely be abandoned soon no matter what. Feeling sorry for abusive man who doesn't really deserve to be called father (and that's his own deeds, not my opinion) is kind of harder, don't you think?
Bojo has done nothing extreme enough to earn that sort of ire
Well, if we ignore the fact he was the pillar of the campaign that cost his nation untold billions and caused explosion of racism and xenophobia, sure. Though that would also require ignoring he was OK with Covid killing hundreds of thousands, that he was OK with ruining millions of lives of people who came to UK heeding the call to work and paid taxes for decades, people from both EU and beyond (see Windrush). People he is now trying to forcibly deport, often to countries which they didn't see for 50 or 60 years, where they are easy targets for robbery or murder. People who by the way are one of the major NHS pillars, without which it would have collapsed long time ago. Also ignoring he was one of the architects of austerity and NHS cuts, something that killed ~120.000 people already and left NHS far weaker, drastically increasing chances Covid tally will be orders of magnitude larger than it should be:
We should also ignore that he wasted untold millions in the past on vanity projects, like the London bridge, millions that could go to so many better causes, and that's when he was small fry - now he is trying to waste untold billions (see Irish bridge) instead of fixing NHS mess. Let's also ignore him spreading racism, sexism, and islamophobia in the press he wrote for, and multiple other similar trivial details, yeah, he did absolutely nothing wrong.
Dude all I meant was wishing harm on an individual who is unwell is callous, backing up that argument is pathetic ,
I wish him a speedy recovery and look forward when this is over to heavily criticising his political views anywhere but a little plastic men forum.
I have no love for him but would wish anyone in his situation good luck.
In brighter news was delighted to hear of the 104 year old Italian lady beating covid and the 98 year old d-day veteran in the uk doing the same.
.. so we might get another season of The league of Gentlemen after this then eh ?
so between things like this and the guy on 5Live yesterday who called in and said the army should be on the streets and should shoot people "not kill them, just shoot them in the hand or foot" for a variety of offences including but not limited to "disrespecting the Queen", "running around sunbathing".... ...... and wonderfully vague , "being outrageous"...
t'would seem the isolation is perhaps starting to take hold a tad.
.. so we might get another season of The league of Gentlemen after this then eh ?
so between things like this and the guy on 5Live yesterday who called in and said the army should be on the streets and should shoot people "not kill them, just shoot them in the hand or foot" for a variety of offences including but not limited to "disrespecting the Queen", "running around sunbathing".... ...... and wonderfully vague , "being outrageous"...
t'would seem the isolation is perhaps starting to take hold a tad.
yeah, I mean why wouldnt you want to have a reason to turn away paying customers? but thats only a small extension of what has been mentioned previously about people taking things too far due to their fear frenzy, perfectly personified by Peirs Morgans (whos views I often agree with, despite his terrible way of espousing them) frothing rage at anyone who dared to venture outside at the weekend as 'traitors to the NHS'. its absurd.
Gitzbitah wrote: So my wife is being tested tomorrow. Obviously a worrisome and awful time- but there was one piece of advice they gave which I thought was kind of strange, and wondered if there was validity in it.
They advised that she try to stay quarantined from us- 2 kids and me. Now as I understand it, with this thing's transmission rate and already several weeks deep in quarantine, my gut reaction is that we've already been thoroughly exposed.
I'm certainly planning to stay away from everyone outside of the house until we know for sure, but is isolating an individual who you've already been in close contact with reasonable?
There are two reasons, first even though you might have been exposed you might not have caught it yet (the immune system doesn't have any specific tools to deal with this virus but does have general tools),
and second it's becoming more and more clear that the severity of your eventual symptoms if you catch it can depend on how much virus you've been exposed to (one reason why doctors and nurses seem to be more badly effected than you might expect given their age/health) so while you may have been exposed already the more you continue to be exposed the worse your outlook may be
so do your best to keep her isolated, try not to sleep in the same bed/room, don't share dishes, towels etc
yeah, If youre in the house with someone whos had it, its pretty much a given that youre going to be exposed at some point, but you can reduce the exposure, and thus the viral load, the amount of which seems to be a contributing factor to the severity of symptoms. I guess you could compare it to a siege, the more attackers there is, the more likely the walls are to fall due to sheer numbers.
Also, I’m trying to decide if I’m doing the right thing by being outside working. Maybe I should be hiding indoors like the rest of you.
A silly observation.
26 March, the UK applauds the NHS. Boris Johnson confirmed to have tested positive.
3 April, the U.K. makes applauding the NHS a weekly thing. Boris Johnson’s condition worsens.
10 April, the U.K. is poised to applied the NHS Once again.......
Seriously? Whilst I’m about as far as a fan of the bloke as you can get, basic human compassion means I hope he recovers. And I hold out hope this episode teaches him compassion and respect for our frontline health workers.
Actually, hiding indoors is a bad way to phrase it. Taking shelter sensibly is probably better.
And yeah, hopefully this pandemic demonstrates that a properly functioning health system is as vital to protecting a country as much as it’s armed forces are, if that makes sense.
Being outside doesn't spread the virus, if you stay away from people.
France has banned people exercising between the hours of 10am and 7pm.... To stop people going out and spreading the virus, by ensuring they all go out en masse at the same time.. You literally couldn't make it up.
In positive news, petrol is almost back to £1 per litre. I can't even remember the last time I saw that.. Shame there's nothing you can use it on. I've used less than half a tank in 3 weeks.
France has banned people exercising between the hours of 10am and 7pm.... To stop people going out and spreading the virus, by ensuring they all go out en masse at the same time.. You literally couldn't make it up.
In positive news, petrol is almost back to £1 per litre. I can't even remember the last time I saw that.. Shame there's nothing you can use it on. I've used less than half a tank in 3 weeks.
I’d suggest peeps go fill up proper petrol cans, but I’ve no idea how safe that is, or the risk of the jungle juice evaporating before we get a chance to use it.
Future War Cultist wrote: Actually, hiding indoors is a bad way to phrase it. Taking shelter sensibly is probably better.
And yeah, hopefully this pandemic demonstrates that a properly functioning health system is as vital to protecting a country as much as it’s armed forces are, if that makes sense.
Possibly even more. An army that is ill can't fight.
Got home from my first time to the local supermarket in two weeks. At least they're taking it seriously, with assigned spots to queue to keep distance, plastic screens between the cashiers and customers, and people wiping down surfaces regularly. There was even an elderly man with a cane yelling at some kids for not respecting the social distancing.
France has banned people exercising between the hours of 10am and 7pm.... To stop people going out and spreading the virus, by ensuring they all go out en masse at the same time.. You literally couldn't make it up.
In positive news, petrol is almost back to £1 per litre. I can't even remember the last time I saw that.. Shame there's nothing you can use it on. I've used less than half a tank in 3 weeks.
I’d suggest peeps go fill up proper petrol cans, but I’ve no idea how safe that is, or the risk of the jungle juice evaporating before we get a chance to use it.
If you get a can with a decent lid and store it somewhere appropriate you'd be alright. we used to have tons of jerry cans at my old unit. I planned to requisition a few when I left but I totally forgot. shame.
No, but following an incident with 500 people being complete tosspots in one of our ski resorts we're pretty much bullying people into taking this seriously. Our public health authorities have used the strongest language they're legally allowed to, telling people to stay the feth at home if possible and to take this seriously, it's just that some people are too stupid to realize that when a Swedish authority says "ought" or "should" it should be read as "shall", it's just that "shall" is only allowed to legally be used in laws, decrees and such.
I like watching the TV news reporters. They've been given microphones on long poles, which are good for pushing away or whacking people who get too close.
No, but following an incident with 500 people being complete tosspots in one of our ski resorts we're pretty much bullying people into taking this seriously. Our public health authorities have used the strongest language they're legally allowed to, telling people to stay the feth at home if possible and to take this seriously, it's just that some people are too stupid to realize that when a Swedish authority says "ought" or "should" it should be read as "shall", it's just that "shall" is only allowed to legally be used in laws, decrees and such.
I'd be interested to see a numbers comparison with the UK which has a mostly consensual semi 'lockdown' and with france and their draconian enforced lockdown.
My company just furloughed all hourly retail and warehouse workers. They do not get pay, but they keep their health Care benefits until they are called back to work.
I hope you're okay, Easy E. I suppose a furlough with medical insurance at least is better than being kicked out of the medical scheme too.
@Martial artist, you're right. One reason why the UK death rate is high is because we aren't testing enough, so we are missing identification of lots of people who get only a mild case.
When looking at US media one needs to also look at what a given outlet is reporting on. Even the more dubious channels can be quite reliable on certain subjects. Going into specifics would deviate into politics, but I would say CNN is not a bad source for coronavirus info.
Kilkrazy wrote: I hope you're okay, Easy E. I suppose a furlough with medical insurance at least is better than being kicked out of the medical scheme too.
@Martial artist, you're right. One reason why the UK death rate is high is because we aren't testing enough, so we are missing identification of lots of people who get only a mild case.
I am fine as I am a member of the "Evil Overlord" class and can therefore WFH and still get pay and benefits.
Well, here's a brief walkthru of my day in the world of covid I just had.
I got up and took some zinc and vitamin c, which i do twice daily even when the zinc makes my stomach queasy. Milk helps.
I got my respirator, a big rubber one with side mounted filters, and went to my local dollar tree looking for some soup for my mom.
While I was in the store i saw a guy with a black surgical mask. It covered his mouth but he had it pulled down to expose his nose. For a moment i felt like i was the lead in a new horror movie "The last intelligent man on earth."
After coming out shaking my head in bewilderment at the level of stupidity I'd just been assaulted by, I went to my local evilmart (You might call it walmart) and, mask firmly in place, went shopping.
A week ago I'd been there and looked for some black primer paint, not a bottle in sight. Today, hallelujah!, there was a bottle of flat black apple barrel paint! A big one too! Yay!
A couple people actually complimented me for my mask, saying it was a good one. Wow, people saying nice stuff to me, and all it took was a pandemic to make it happen.
In turn I nodded at people wearing masks to acknowledge their intelligence, a commodity I am coming to value and respect more with each passing day now.
Coming home I saw my home town welcome sign, and noted that covid has killed far more americans than live in my home town already, with no end in sight.
I sit here now home, hopefully safe for the moment, typing this while a huge mass of blubber that's stuffed itself into a large sack of black and white fur with a pink nose lays on my desk, covering my mousepad and making typing as difficult as possible. I'm really wanting to get cracking on my DDA but am not sure I'll survive the massive doses of sugar and caffeine, blessed be thy name, it will take to give me the energy to pick up a brush and put my cat in the other room so I can try to get more done on it.
Waaagh_Gonads wrote: Australia has curbstomped the curve and from the predicted 50,000 -150,000 deaths we are at 50 after 3 months....
Also despite all of the hospital beds supposed to be filled by Sunday just been we have 90 people in ICU in all of Australia. 8 here in Queensland.
The total number who have recovered in Australia will surpass active sufferers in a few days.
We are doing very well illness wise.
Modeling hopelessly incorrect for us and we appear to have done better in terms of speed to recovery quicker than any other developed country.
I'm not actually surprised. Australia was not in the good climate zones for COVID IIRC. COVID seems to thrive specifically in temperate zones. Sub-tropical and desert environments seemed to be its worst areas.
Waaagh_Gonads wrote: Australia has curbstomped the curve and from the predicted 50,000 -150,000 deaths we are at 50 after 3 months....
Also despite all of the hospital beds supposed to be filled by Sunday just been we have 90 people in ICU in all of Australia. 8 here in Queensland.
The total number who have recovered in Australia will surpass active sufferers in a few days.
We are doing very well illness wise.
Modeling hopelessly incorrect for us and we appear to have done better in terms of speed to recovery quicker than any other developed country.
I'm not actually surprised. Australia was not in the good climate zones for COVID IIRC. COVID seems to thrive specifically in temperate zones. Sub-tropical and desert environments seemed to be its worst areas.
Well, Iran has had a rough time with it, despite the climate.
But on a similar vein, I've been wondering if the moderate Mediterranean climate of Italy and Spain tied into their infection and death rates.
It's something I'd hope that researchers are looking into, though its the type of analysis that doesn't make it into the media cycle at all these days.
The low rate in Australia might be informing the theories about a summer drop, though... which may actually mean a rise in cases down there as their autumn rolls on. This will turn into a extended bear if it turns out to be seasonal and the northern and southern hemispheres act as havens for the virus in its off months.
So today I put on one of the new fabric masks my mom has made (she' a seamstress and my parents live next door) to give them a test run for comfort, and went to the two stores near me, as each has things the other doesn't. Things I saw in my rural community in the US:
-The two stores I went to were just as full as I have ever seen them from before all this started.
-On the way to the second store, as I passed my house (each store is about three miles to either side of my house on the same road) one of the neighbors down the street had probably 15+ people at their house playing yard games. Six cars in their driveway.
-A few miles down the street, half a dozen people were at the local park playing half-court basketball.
-Other than me, exactly one other person I saw the whole evening had a mask on. Boy, all the others gave me wierd looks, as they shopped like it was any other day, standing around in groups like social distancing wasn't even a thing and shopping in groups of two or three for one cart.
Shelter in place and social distancing my ass, here's a reason things aren't improving here in the US yet.
Matt Swain wrote: Well, here's a brief walkthru of my day in the world of covid I just had.
I got up and took some zinc and vitamin c, which i do twice daily even when the zinc makes my stomach queasy. Milk helps.
I got my respirator, a big rubber one with side mounted filters, and went to my local dollar tree looking for some soup for my mom.
While I was in the store i saw a guy with a black surgical mask. It covered his mouth but he had it pulled down to expose his nose. For a moment i felt like i was the lead in a new horror movie "The last intelligent man on earth."
After coming out shaking my head in bewilderment at the level of stupidity I'd just been assaulted by, I went to my local evilmart (You might call it walmart) and, mask firmly in place, went shopping.
A week ago I'd been there and looked for some black primer paint, not a bottle in sight. Today, hallelujah!, there was a bottle of flat black apple barrel paint! A big one too! Yay!
A couple people actually complimented me for my mask, saying it was a good one. Wow, people saying nice stuff to me, and all it took was a pandemic to make it happen.
In turn I nodded at people wearing masks to acknowledge their intelligence, a commodity I am coming to value and respect more with each passing day now.
Coming home I saw my home town welcome sign, and noted that covid has killed far more americans than live in my home town already, with no end in sight.
I sit here now home, hopefully safe for the moment, typing this while a huge mass of blubber that's stuffed itself into a large sack of black and white fur with a pink nose lays on my desk, covering my mousepad and making typing as difficult as possible. I'm really wanting to get cracking on my DDA but am not sure I'll survive the massive doses of sugar and caffeine, blessed be thy name, it will take to give me the energy to pick up a brush and put my cat in the other room so I can try to get more done on it.
And that was my day with corona, how was yours?
Don't you guys have to fill out an application to leave your house? Also, you realise that not wearing masks doesn't automatically spread the virus right? So not wearing one doesn't make you stupid.
No, but it keeps people's coughs to themselves. Here in the US it's entirely voluntary, and basically no one is bothering in many areas. I still watch people sneeze and cough right into the open, with no effort to cover their mouths. At least a mask does that for them.
Yes I have had unhealthy looking specimens come waaay too close to be despite guidelines, I wear a mask to protect myself from the few, not the majority.
Not wearing a mask may not be stupid, but wearing one in an obviously ineffective way, well that is, in my book.
And there are people, a very sick minority, who seem to want to spread this around intentionally.
AegisGrimm wrote: No, but it keeps people's coughs to themselves. Here in the US it's entirely voluntary, and basically no one is bothering in many areas. I still watch people sneeze and cough right into the open, with no effort to cover their mouths. At least a mask does that for them.
Depends on where you are. LA county is starting to roll out mandatory masks. Businesses need to mask their employees and they can refuse customers without one.
'The World Health Organization (WHO) has looked at the latest evidence about how this virus spreads, including whether it can be projected further than previously thought.
It wanted to re-examine whether the general public might benefit from wearing masks.
Its experts decided that medical masks should be reserved for healthcare workers, not the general public.
Only two groups of people should wear protective masks, those who are:
sick and showing symptoms
caring for people suspected to have the coronavirus.'
And whilst I'm skeptical of the WHO due to their funding and political affiliations, I dont see any reason for them to lie on a scientific matter like that.
The main problem is that those "suspected to have the coronavirus" don't know they've got it for around a week. You could have it right now and not be aware of it for quite a while. So you could go out without a mask in all good faith that you're safe and end up spreading it.
I can appreciate their desire to preserve stocks and focus on emergency workers who are most at risk. Especially since we all saw how stocks got totally stripped for food and toilet roll and neither of those items was in short supply. Masks are a much more finite resource and if there was a mass panic buy you can bet they'd vanish within hours.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Cronch wrote: Why, you were ready to declare them terrorists 10 pages ago? Is it just their findings confirm your bias now?
We've blasted past the 50K deaths world wide. So I guess the WHO aren't terrorists any more.
Cronch wrote: Why, you were ready to declare them terrorists 10 pages ago? Is it just their findings confirm your bias now?
Maybe don't jump to conclusions. that wasnt me. I posted before about the director general of the WHO having possible financial interests with the PRC, in relation to the Taiwanese handling of the CV crisis. That doesnt mean that I discount all their advice.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Overread wrote: The main problem is that those "suspected to have the coronavirus" don't know they've got it for around a week. You could have it right now and not be aware of it for quite a while. So you could go out without a mask in all good faith that you're safe and end up spreading it.
I can appreciate their desire to preserve stocks and focus on emergency workers who are most at risk. Especially since we all saw how stocks got totally stripped for food and toilet roll and neither of those items was in short supply. Masks are a much more finite resource and if there was a mass panic buy you can bet they'd vanish within hours.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
Cronch wrote: Why, you were ready to declare them terrorists 10 pages ago? Is it just their findings confirm your bias now?
We've blasted past the 50K deaths world wide. So I guess the WHO aren't terrorists any more.
Thats the main issue. I think there would be panic buying of all kinds of masks were that to be implemented. there have also been calls to impose punishments on those who ARE wearing masks in the UK, which I disagree with, for hopefully obvious reasons.
climate is definitely a factor, thats undeniable. I think that it will drop off massively in summer in the UK. things that can offset it are other factors like social behaviours..the physical contact of continental europeans for example, smoking and respiratory health, which I'd suggest is a big factor in iran that might offset the slightly warmer climate.
Overread wrote: The main problem is that those "suspected to have the coronavirus" don't know they've got it for around a week. You could have it right now and not be aware of it for quite a while. So you could go out without a mask in all good faith that you're safe and end up spreading it.
I have been hearing it is even possible to get coronavirus, have it for multiple weeks, then recover, and be asymptomatic the entire time.
Overread wrote: The main problem is that those "suspected to have the coronavirus" don't know they've got it for around a week. You could have it right now and not be aware of it for quite a while. So you could go out without a mask in all good faith that you're safe and end up spreading it.
I have been hearing it is even possible to get coronavirus, have it for multiple weeks, then recover, and be asymptomatic the entire time.
It wouldn't surprise me in the least. Just like with the regular flu strains we get some people really suffer and others hardly notice it. Plus even when two people have similar symptoms some have a higher tolerance. So for a more mild case with aches and some trouble breathing some might simply push through and not "notice" whilst others might be laying on their back ready for the end. Even though both suffer the same degree of infection, their reaction to it is very different. So even if you show some symptoms some people might simply overlook them entirely, especially since aches and coughs are not uncommon things.
Cronch wrote: Why, you were ready to declare them terrorists 10 pages ago? Is it just their findings confirm your bias now?
Maybe don't jump to conclusions. that wasnt me. I posted before about the director general of the WHO having possible financial interests with the PRC, in relation to the Taiwanese handling of the CV crisis. That doesnt mean that I discount all their advice.
Correct, that was Sqorgar. I was about to post just that. As I understand your objections, they're not against taking measures to slow the spread perse, but the way they're being implemented and how much personal freedom you hae to sacrifice (plus concerns about if you'll get those feedoms back afterwards). A point of view I can at least understand and even sympathize with, even if I don't agree with your priorities right now.
Cronch wrote: Why, you were ready to declare them terrorists 10 pages ago? Is it just their findings confirm your bias now?
I was one of the first people on this thread to call out WHO for being CCP puppets. Would you like some sources? Here's the interview with a WHO senior official actively dodging praising Taiwan. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlCYFh8U2xM Terrorist isn't really the term since they aren't using terror tactics to control people. They are simply corrupt and willing to fudge data on behalf of their CCP overlords. Please don't forget the brave doctors who disappeared trying to blow the whistle on this contradicting official WHO/CCP data. People literally died and were possibly tortured to expose CCP corruption. The least you could do is listen.
Cronch wrote: Why, you were ready to declare them terrorists 10 pages ago? Is it just their findings confirm your bias now?
I was one of the first people on this thread to call out WHO for being CCP puppets. Would you like some sources? Here's the interview with a WHO senior official actively dodging praising Taiwan. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlCYFh8U2xM Terrorist isn't really the term since they aren't using terror tactics to control people. They are simply corrupt and willing to fudge data on behalf of their CCP overlords. Please don't forget the brave doctors who disappeared trying to blow the whistle on this contradicting official WHO/CCP data. People literally died and were possibly tortured to expose CCP corruption. The least you could do is listen.
Money money money.
It's an organisation which needs it, and atm China is one of the biggest beneficiaries.
Time for some other countries to step up or completely abandon the UNO and form a seperate actual organisation that doesn't rely on superpowers for agreements.
Overread wrote: The main problem is that those "suspected to have the coronavirus" don't know they've got it for around a week. You could have it right now and not be aware of it for quite a while. So you could go out without a mask in all good faith that you're safe and end up spreading it.
I have been hearing it is even possible to get coronavirus, have it for multiple weeks, then recover, and be asymptomatic the entire time.
That's true, but what's the solution? Other than testing the entire population, there's no way of getting around that issue there's never a way of eliminating 100% of the risk, that's just life.
Overread wrote: The main problem is that those "suspected to have the coronavirus" don't know they've got it for around a week. You could have it right now and not be aware of it for quite a while. So you could go out without a mask in all good faith that you're safe and end up spreading it.
I have been hearing it is even possible to get coronavirus, have it for multiple weeks, then recover, and be asymptomatic the entire time.
That's true, but what's the solution? Other than testing the entire population, there's no way of getting around that issue there's never a way of eliminating 100% of the risk, that's just life.
Exactly and that's why I think the UK went for the whole Herd Immunity approach. Containment of the infected and isolation until they are no longer infectious doesn't seem to be on the cards in a lot of nations. Plus its an approach that only works provided everyone else plays ball otherwise one person in a plane can kickstart the whole infection all over again.
Otherwise you're basically going to have to shut down the majority of the world for 3 or so years.
I think its important people realise that right now countries doing isolation aren't stopping the spread. They are smoothing the curve and rate of infections to values that medical services can better cope with, whilst also using reduced infection rates to buy time to buy testing kits ,ventilators, build new hospital setups, train staff etc... Ergo to prepare for bigger volumes of infected. Mass population testing can be a major contributing factor in that of course; it helps to keep those identified as infected isolated and China is showing that you can have dramatic results. They've even got apps which tell you if you have to isolate or not based on if you've come near others with the infection.
However many western nations just aren't socially setup for such measures. Plus they've not had a major outbreak like this in so long that the population is untrained in how to deal with it. China is, whilst also telling lies, also showing how containment can be done using modern technology.
Of course it also sacrifices personal privacy in order to achieve this end goal. So there's a huge question over how much of our private lives we want monitored. My gut feeling is that western nations will approach similar levels of monitoring, but that its a much slower and steadier process. People don't really mind CCTV in cities now like they did years ago; its become a background thing, plus retailers and such encourage cameras. Heck on the TV now there's adverts for cameras for your own home that you stream through your phone - so clearly people are more accepting of camera monitoring.
Yeah, well obviously I object to the level of surveillance that we have in our cities. I may be wrong but I dont think the amount, compared to how much crime it helps prevent justifies it in any way.
and the whole, lets monitor peoples phones and see if they're going near other people thing, is a very dangerous route to go down in my opinion. especially when its used to punish those deemed as breaking the rules. if that comes in I will be disabling mobile data on my phone and only using home wi fi.
Time for some other countries to step up or completely abandon the UNO and form a seperate actual organisation that doesn't rely on superpowers for agreements.
Time for some other countries to step up or completely abandon the UNO and form a seperate actual organisation that doesn't rely on superpowers for agreements.
OK, how? Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Basic confederational structure, in a dual chamber system and with basic general oversight (aka initiative and referendums right of the general population with day to day buisness left to a parliament) in a qualified majority vote the qualifyer beeing majority of overall votes and majority of regional (in this case country) votes in a political system that has a degree of artificial delay in order to further structure the system so that demagogues have massive disadvantages.
And if the rest of the world is not convinced that the Swiss system is superior? For that matter, how are you going to enforce compliance on those that defect rather than cooperate in your collective action problem?
Cronch wrote: Why, you were ready to declare them terrorists 10 pages ago? Is it just their findings confirm your bias now?
Maybe don't jump to conclusions. that wasnt me. I posted before about the director general of the WHO having possible financial interests with the PRC, in relation to the Taiwanese handling of the CV crisis. That doesnt mean that I discount all their advice.
Correct, that was Sqorgar. I was about to post just that. As I understand your objections, they're not against taking measures to slow the spread perse, but the way they're being implemented and how much personal freedom you hae to sacrifice (plus concerns about if you'll get those feedoms back afterwards). A point of view I can at least understand and even sympathize with, even if I don't agree with your priorities right now.
I'm not opposed to losing some freedoms (temporarily) but it MUST be the MINIMUM necessary to achieve the goal, which, due to a combination of the government U-turning on their propositions in the original CV bill, and overzealous elements of the police force enacting (whether through incompetence or malice) overly draconian measures on members of the public just trying to go about their business, has not happened here.
They also need to be reviewed regularly and contain a sunset clause. this bill does have a sunset clause I believe, but it was originally 2 years, which is far too long. I'm not sure what it is now. they also promised to review it in 3 weeks, and I've heard whisperings about that being chinned off. so we'll see.
Time for some other countries to step up or completely abandon the UNO and form a seperate actual organisation that doesn't rely on superpowers for agreements.
OK, how? Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Basic confederational structure, in a dual chamber system and with basic general oversight (aka initiative and referendums right of the general population with day to day buisness left to a parliament) in a qualified majority vote the qualifyer beeing majority of overall votes and majority of regional (in this case country) votes in a political system that has a degree of artificial delay in order to further structure the system so that demagogues have massive disadvantages.
That sounds suspiciously like something that Britain just decided they wanted no part of...
Interestingly, a friend reached out to me today who had an extremely similar experience to what I had (father of young kids, experienced "severe shortness of breath plus total exhaustion", and was tested but came up negative). It also affected the father much worse than the rest of the family, just like we experienced.
Kind of reassures me that I'm not crazy / wasn't imagining the symptoms . But I'd really like to know what this is, since it's obviously not COVID-19, but not identified...
AlmightyWalrus wrote: And if the rest of the world is not convinced that the Swiss system is superior? For that matter, how are you going to enforce compliance on those that defect rather than cooperate in your collective action problem?
Now you are asking the real question.
Is the system superior?. Highly debatable. It has chronic issues with reaction times in crisis situations and doesn't know a reglemented emergency lawset. Making it possible unstable and easily turned dictatorship so long it's executive has the majority support / is deemed legitimate enough, hence why switzerland had a Vollmachtenregime for 12 years during and after WW2 and only after the military and parties aswell as Kantons started to really get fed up the system broke down. On the other hand it also naturally if internalized proofs itself from extremist ideology (allbeit you can argue that the adherence to direct democratic institutions is in itself a radical ideology) due to them getting delegitimised and local regions , especially rural regions profit more due to self governance and actual investments made into them.
On the other hand the same system managed get what is in essence the Afghanistan of Europe to actually stop shanking each other or beating each other up with diffrent forms off crosses (or davidstars) for more then 5 minutes and is made up off the "problem" Nationalities e.g. those with a history of wanting to become local bigboy hegemon. ( on the other hand who didn't want to become).
Further it requires a high ammount of education baseline. And a healthy news mixture.
As for compliance enforcement, basically, if the federal level is percived as legitimate by the population a Kanton or in this case state vehemently doesn't want to bow down, that can mean 2 things, A local elites get curbed by local population. B it goes over federal law.
if neither is the case then you have a crisis of federal structures and generally that means long standing systemic discussions and due to the direct democratic element a blockade can at any point be breached or enforced. In the end it is a case of will of the governed. Which is incidentally why such states are more on the weak side letting local authorities decide on most things beyond armed forces and foreign policy. However due to the expanded rights of it's citizens it also can call upon more duties torwards said state.E.g. Mandatory service for militia/ military or social service infrastructure. It basically follows Rousseau in it's setup. So quite alot of criticisms leveled against rousseau hit the system aswell.
Further the slowing down of the decision process whilest also a disadvantage is preciscly for such situations an advantage due to all participants of the state be they States, NGO's, unions, and other organisations beeing able to participate in the decision making, allowing for a higher chance of a comprimise and therefore reaches a baseline consensus lowering overall implmentationc cost.
Automatically Appended Next Post:
That sounds suspiciously like something that Britain just decided they wanted no part of...
No not really, the EU is a long shot from legitimizing it's structures via institutionalized direct democratic possibilities of it's citizens which IS the big equalizer between inner swiss divides.
But it does share some of the hallmarks of a proto federational states. You can however argue about the structure of it beeing failed or wrong in their inception.
RiTides wrote: Interestingly, a friend reached out to me today who had an extremely similar experience to what I had (father of young kids, experienced "severe shortness of breath plus total exhaustion", and was tested but came up negative). It also affected the father much worse than the rest of the family, just like we experienced.
Kind of reassures me that I'm not crazy / wasn't imagining the symptoms . But I'd really like to know what this is, since it's obviously not COVID-19, but not identified...
While I can see why you'd like to come to that conclusion, you might just both be stressed out/psychosomatics/situational hypochondriacs/seasonal allergics/etc.!
I wish the USA did have as effective and readily available testing as some are claiming we have - it would be very, very helpful if true and when it actually gets to that point.
Found out earlier someone I know, a good friend of my Dad, has died from this. He and his wife were both hospitalised - she made it back out, he didn't. He was a nice guy.
Just in case your faith in humanity had a few sparks dancing around during all this.
But why!?!
It happens. I don't understand the logic behind it, but its a thing that's happened consistently (not often, but there are a few every time) during every Ebola flare-up.
Some communities treat the doctors and health care workers as the cause of the problems. It might be xenophobia or something else, but... it happens.
And while its inexcusable, it isn't entirely baseless. A healthcare worker does have a higher than average chance of infection, simply because they are around the infected.
As an aside though, this bothers me.
Scattered attacks have occurred in many parts of the world, including the United States. A nurse in Chicago told the local ABC7 TV channel last week that she had been punched in the eye on a public bus by a man who accused her of spreading the virus.
“Going to and from work in my scrubs, I often watch people take two steps back away from me” — and not just because of social distancing, she told the station, speaking on the condition that she not be identified. “I think the concern is that any health care provider is contagious themselves.”
I get it, and there's no reason to punch someone in the face. But I really dislike seeing nurses & etc in scrubs on public transportation. I at least want the illusion that the scrubs are clean, and they're not going to be after a bus/metro ride. I saw it a lot in Boston (and a lot of smoking nurses on the sidewalks outside hospitals, which just... ) Do the hospitals not provide staff lockers anymore?
Because things like this not only bring out the regular cretins, but also often brings out the idiot in people who are usually quite rational. The media doesn't help with their sensationalist fear mongering. It makes people crazy. That's why you get idiots shouting out of car windows at people who are out and about.
Just in case your faith in humanity had a few sparks dancing around during all this.
Old news in uk where ambulances were vandalized and nhs workers were told to hide id badges as they were targeted to get free food certain companies offered for nhs workers. Pathetic. Get paid pittances(health service workers rarely get decent pay compared to what they do), risk health and even life and are in enchanced danger of robbery. And getting abused b? daily mail readers in uk for added fun.
. Stay safe and healthy everybody 
no.
