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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.

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.

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:

 r_squared wrote:

 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.

 queen_annes_revenge wrote:
Maybe some common sense might begin to return to the general public.

You will find the correct subforum for that here.

 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....)



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:



You will find the correct subforum for that here.

Whilest funny i don't quite get the whole pesimistic outlook on our societies or species as a whole.
Still, quite funny

Not Online!!! wrote:

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.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grey Templar wrote:

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.

 Ketara wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

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.

Not Online!!! wrote:

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.

 Ketara wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

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.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/obamacare-enrollment-closed-qualify-lost-health-insurance/story?id=69934326

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.

https://time.com/5806312/coronavirus-treatment-cost/

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.

chaos0xomega wrote:

 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.

Not exactly, so from the data I can find EU runs about 72% occupancy and their on the lower end internationally. https://gateway.euro.who.int/en/indicators/hfa_542-6210-bed-occupancy-rate-acute-care-hospitals-only/
Us was running about 65% as of 2014 https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/2016/089.pdf

And thats before you bring in the deployable capability.

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.

Here’s some wholesome content everyone can enjoy.

A professional football commentator doing his thing on kid’s garden kick abouts.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-52152335/coronavirus-garden-goals-getting-pro-commentary

That brought a huge smile to my face, thank you . Really well done!

Jerram wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:

 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.

Not exactly, so from the data I can find EU runs about 72% occupancy and their on the lower end internationally. https://gateway.euro.who.int/en/indicators/hfa_542-6210-bed-occupancy-rate-acute-care-hospitals-only/
Us was running about 65% as of 2014 https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/2016/089.pdf

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%.

https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/0d67e02a-en/index.html?itemId=/content/component/0d67e02a-en

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.

That is bleeping awesome news.

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.


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 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.

That's great. Really hoping for him.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

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:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

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.

Sent off a few links to my CA USA friend. Maybe you'll find some useful:

Tax and estimated tax payments extended: Payment Deadline Extended to July 15, 2020 | Internal Revenue Service

Federal CARE act : Federal CARE act : https://www.troweprice.com/personal-investing/planning-and-research/t-rowe-price-insights/retirement-and-planning/personal-finance/coronavirus-relief-what-you-need-to-know.html?cid=PI_Single_Topic_CARES_Act_EM_NonSubscriber_202004&bid=385426380&PlacementGUID=em_PI_PI_Single_Topic_Coronavirus_Relief_EM_NonSubscriber_202004-PI_Single_Topic_CARES_Act_EM_NonSubscriber_202004_20200403

CDC may advice "face coverings". His twitter has the latest CoVid news. : Matt McCarthy on Twitter : https://twitter.com/DrMattMcCarthy

If you are a CA landlord or tenant : https://patch.com/california/losgatos/amp/28672930/sc-co-sj-leaders-address-eviction-ban-misinformation

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/

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

Jerram wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

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

 ced1106 wrote:
Sent off a few links to my CA USA friend. Maybe you'll find some useful:

Tax and estimated tax payments extended: Payment Deadline Extended to July 15, 2020 | Internal Revenue Service

Federal CARE act : Federal CARE act : https://www.troweprice.com/personal-investing/planning-and-research/t-rowe-price-insights/retirement-and-planning/personal-finance/coronavirus-relief-what-you-need-to-know.html?cid=PI_Single_Topic_CARES_Act_EM_NonSubscriber_202004&bid=385426380&PlacementGUID=em_PI_PI_Single_Topic_Coronavirus_Relief_EM_NonSubscriber_202004-PI_Single_Topic_CARES_Act_EM_NonSubscriber_202004_20200403

CDC may advice "face coverings". His twitter has the latest CoVid news. : Matt McCarthy on Twitter : https://twitter.com/DrMattMcCarthy

If you are a CA landlord or tenant : https://patch.com/california/losgatos/amp/28672930/sc-co-sj-leaders-address-eviction-ban-misinformation

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:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

Jerram wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

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.

Jerram wrote:

 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.

https://www.defense.gov/Newsroom/Transcripts/Transcript/Article/2114598/department-of-defense-press-briefing-on-covid-19-response/source/GovDelivery/