Novel Coronavirus COVID-19

[sothereiwas]

Yeah, they introduced the paper by giving background on the similarity of the two viruses and why that mattered, and then gave some further background on how this specific treatment was effective against SARS v1, and then went on to their subject. It might have been on hydroxychloroquine but I've read so much recently I wouldn't swear to that. 

[SincereOnlineGuy]

Don't worry -  it's all been determined:  

(the link is at   healthing dot ca slash (all of the following, no spaces) diseases-and-conditions/coronavirus/men-length-could-determine-covid-risk )   (ca is canada - safe link)

The length of a man's ring finger was the telltale sign all along:

 

 

Length of ring finger may help determine COVID-19 risk. Stock/Getty

According to a new study to be published in the July issue of the Journal of Early Human Development, men with ring fingers that are longer in relation to their index finger may have a higher likelihood of developing milder COVID-19 symptoms and may have a lower chance of dying from the illness.

Researchers from Swansea University studied 200,000 people from 41 countries.

Those participants who had a smaller digit ratio — meaning the length of their ring finger was longer in relation to their index finger was lower — lived in countries with lower COVID-19 death rates.

Those with longer ring fingers had a death rate of 2.7 per 100,000 while those with shorter fingers had a death rate of 4.9 per 100,000. Canadian men had a lower score, meaning they had longer ring fingers, while men from Romania, Spain, the U.K. had significantly higher scores.

The scientists believe that if there is a strong positive correlation with disease severity in men, the measurement of the ring finger to index finger ratio “may be of prognostic use for the severity of COVID-19.”
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(now we know...)

 

 

[gaius]

China would probably put to death any scientist who had the nerve to waste time and resources on a ridiculous study like that. Which is one thing I like about them. 

[SincereOnlineGuy]

43 minutes ago, gaius said:

China would probably put to death any scientist

the rest was superfluous, as has already been established.

 

[schlumpy]

11 hours ago, SincereOnlineGuy said:

Length of ring finger may help determine COVID-19 risk. Stock/Getty

Finally!!!! Something I can believe in!

[schlumpy]

11 hours ago, gaius said:

China would probably put to death any scientist who had the nerve to waste time and resources on a ridiculous study like that. Which is one thing I like about them. 

We would lose may scientists if they were put to death because their "pursuit of the truth" was considered frivolous with String Theory advocates the first in line.

[gaius]

@nospam99 regarding infections in New York, here's a quote from the first article I found googling. From about 3 weeks ago.

"However, New York's infection rate has slowed overall, and Gov. Cuomo is shifting his focus to the new cases coming into hospitals as he looks to refine the state's containment strategy. Initial findings suggest most new cases are older people of color who have been sitting in their New York City homes -- and are still getting sick.

Preliminary data submitted by 113 hospitals over the last three days show most new admissions have mostly been staying home; they're predominantly from the downstate area (57 percent NYC, 18 percent Long Island) and people of color. Most of them are older and non-essential employees; 66 percent were admitted from their own residences.

Of the new New York City hospitalizations, 90 percent have not been traveling by car service, personal automobile, mass transit or even walking around. If they've been working, they've been doing it from home and apparently weren't going out much, the governor said."

Now granted, some of these people are full of crap and lying about not going out, but is it the subway they're using? Maybe. The subway is likely contributing to transmission. But just staying off it is not going to save people from infection.

[BC1980]

250 people were layed off from one of our local hospitals due to decreased revenue. This is our medical center in the state, and they have taken the brunt of COVID patients. Consequently, they haven't been able to open back up for elective procedures to the extent private hospitals have. Even some physicians were laid off, which surprised me. 

I'm not sure what's going to happen at my private hospital. We are pretty much completely opened back up for elective surgeries. We opened up an extra floor for COVID patients, so were down some staff. Because my floor is opened back up for surgeries and the like, I'm thinking my days of working on the COVID unit are over for now.

[lana-banana]

BC1980, I'm really glad to hear you're safe. My sister has been furloughed for at least 4 weeks and possibly as long as 10, because the lack of elective procedures has cost them so much money. For-profit healthcare is a joke.

Florida, Texas, and Georgia are fudging their COVID-19 numbers...or they just so happen to be having a massive spike in "pneumonia" cases. Even if many of them are legitimate pneumonia, there's still enough to suggest a 40-200% increase. Hm.

Now that the big cities have gotten their infections under control, COVID-19 cases are continuing to spike in rural areas, especially Arkansas, Kentucky, and Virginia. I have a feeling we're going to see some very bad numbers nationwide starting around mid-June. Things are beginning to open up again but we're not changing a damn thing in our schedules until at least July.

 

[sothereiwas]

5 minutes ago, lana-banana said:

For-profit healthcare is a joke.

The government shutting down elective procedures is not something one can reasonably blame on "for profit healthcare" is it?

[CaliforniaGirl]

5 hours ago, gaius said:

@nospam99 regarding infections in New York, here's a quote from the first article I found googling. From about 3 weeks ago.

"However, New York's infection rate has slowed overall, and Gov. Cuomo is shifting his focus to the new cases coming into hospitals as he looks to refine the state's containment strategy. Initial findings suggest most new cases are older people of color who have been sitting in their New York City homes -- and are still getting sick.

Preliminary data submitted by 113 hospitals over the last three days show most new admissions have mostly been staying home; they're predominantly from the downstate area (57 percent NYC, 18 percent Long Island) and people of color. Most of them are older and non-essential employees; 66 percent were admitted from their own residences.

Of the new New York City hospitalizations, 90 percent have not been traveling by car service, personal automobile, mass transit or even walking around. If they've been working, they've been doing it from home and apparently weren't going out much, the governor said."

Now granted, some of these people are full of crap and lying about not going out, but is it the subway they're using? Maybe. The subway is likely contributing to transmission. But just staying off it is not going to save people from infection.

Q - how are they getting the infection if they're sitting at home? Does this mean it's coming from people dropping off food to their homes or coming into their homes, or something like that?

[Redhead14]

23 minutes ago, CaliforniaGirl said:

Q - how are they getting the infection if they're sitting at home? Does this mean it's coming from people dropping off food to their homes or coming into their homes, or something like that?

The same way nursing home victims got it -- others brought it in -- i.e. friends, family, nurses, visitors, etc. 

[CaliforniaGirl]

4 minutes ago, Redhead14 said:

The same way nursing home victims got it -- others brought it in -- i.e. friends, family, nurses, visitors, etc. 

Oh, okay, that's what I thought. 

[Ruby Slippers]

Now that medical workers are feeling the brunt of the health insurance industry's eternal greed, I hope this expedites the move to a universal health care system that works for everyone.

[sothereiwas]

32 minutes ago, Redhead14 said:

The same way nursing home victims got it -- others brought it in -- i.e. friends, family, nurses, visitors, etc. 

In New York city, do you think those others might have used mass transit to get where they were going?

[Redhead14]

1 hour ago, sothereiwas said:

In New York city, do you think those others might have used mass transit to get where they were going?

I would imagine that some did.  Some took cabs, Ubers, their own cars too.  They also went to grocery stores, or other stores as well, especially, if the elders they visited needed anything.

[BC1980]

3 hours ago, lana-banana said:

BC1980, I'm really glad to hear you're safe. My sister has been furloughed for at least 4 weeks and possibly as long as 10, because the lack of elective procedures has cost them so much money. For-profit healthcare is a joke.

Florida, Texas, and Georgia are fudging their COVID-19 numbers...or they just so happen to be having a massive spike in "pneumonia" cases. Even if many of them are legitimate pneumonia, there's still enough to suggest a 40-200% increase. Hm.

Now that the big cities have gotten their infections under control, COVID-19 cases are continuing to spike in rural areas, especially Arkansas, Kentucky, and Virginia. I have a feeling we're going to see some very bad numbers nationwide starting around mid-June. Things are beginning to open up again but we're not changing a damn thing in our schedules until at least July.

 

I only ended up being called off for 1 day. I had the choice to either take vacation hours or go without pay for that day. I work on the weekends, so I wasn't as affected as some others. It's difficult to find weekend staff, so there is a chronic shortage. My state had a record high number of cases today, so I'm interested to see how many COVID patients we have in the hospital when I go in tomorrow.

[CaliforniaGirl]

So about three weeks ago Gov. Cuomo said subway ridership was down 91%. Is that still true?

[gaius]

3 hours ago, CaliforniaGirl said:

So about three weeks ago Gov. Cuomo said subway ridership was down 91%. Is that still true?

From what I've read it's been ticking upward in the last few weeks but is still mostly down overall.

Also, about in home transmission, there's been a million cases of people giving the virus to those they live with. But you have to be engaging in an activity like swapping spit, talking in close proximity, coughing around the other person, etc etc. So if you know someone who is in the same house but didn't get infected it doesn't mean the virus isn't what they say it is. It's telling you something about that household. That that kind of behavior isn't occuring. Or at least it isn't while the person is most contagious.

My wife and I were joking when this whole thing started that now we get to find out what couples aren't all that intimate, if one got it and the other didn't. It would be hilarious if Trump and Melania both got it at the same time. That would be quite the shocker.

 

[gaius]

7 hours ago, lana-banana said:

Florida, Texas, and Georgia are fudging their COVID-19 numbers...or they just so happen to be having a massive spike in "pneumonia" cases. Even if many of them are legitimate pneumonia, there's still enough to suggest a 40-200% increase. Hmm.

 

I didn't know what you were talking about so I googled it and apparently it's a Twitter conspiracy. The Tampa Bay times had a good article debunking it today.

I'm guessing Twitter didn't bother to slap it with the same alert they did Trump's post unfortunately.

[carhill]

With all the riots, the virus will likely have a field day. NYC, et al is a zoo. So much for social distancing.

[lana-banana]

57 minutes ago, gaius said:

I didn't know what you were talking about so I googled it and apparently it's a Twitter conspiracy. The Tampa Bay times had a good article debunking it today.

I'm guessing Twitter didn't bother to slap it with the same alert they did Trump's post unfortunately.

Thanks for the article! It's a good read, and I apologize for getting it wrong. However in that case that isn't a conspiracy, that's just people misinterpreting data. But it's also depressing that Florida has been pressuring data scientists to manipulate their statistics downward, and we won't even know how many deaths are actually due to COVID-19 because our country is so broken. 

There's a May 2nd article from the Statesman about Texas and pneumonia deaths that indicates there's almost certainly an undercount, but it's probably due to inadequate testing. Love to live in an embarrassing backwater of a country.

[sothereiwas]

11 hours ago, carhill said:

With all the riots, the virus will likely have a field day. NYC, et al is a zoo. So much for social distancing.

While every life has value, if a person engaged in rioting and looting gets sick, I'm a lot less worried about it than if it was someone who was say, a caregiver who got sick that way, or a person working some other job that requires person to person contact. We really don't need every looter do we?

Edited May 30, 2020 by sothereiwas
typo

[carhill]

Perhaps someone more educated in the nuances of sarcasm can provide me with a training course. I suck at it.

Good to see all those citizens in the MSP area running around, quite healthy they looked. Hannepin County did report 412 deaths from Covid-19. Let's see if there's a spike in cases and deaths in a few weeks. Currently the active case number is 3621.

[lana-banana]

Well, never mind:

"Bob Anderson, the chief of the Mortality Statistics Branch in CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics, told The Daily Beast that the increase of deaths in Florida where pneumonia and influenza were the underlying cause was “statistically significant” and that those mortalities were “probably COVID cases that weren’t reported as such.” The coronavirus can cause lung complications such as pneumonia.

The increase has sparked a conspiracy theory on the left, that Florida is deliberately trying to undercount coronavirus fatalities by labeling them as something else. There’s no evidence to suggest any such underhand efforts, or that the state is unique across the country. But officials, including Anderson, do believe that a portion of the pneumonia and influenza deaths in Florida involved patients who were infected with, but never tested for, COVID-19. In such scenarios, though the virus likely contributed to the death, it may not have been recorded as the cause of death by the physician, coroner or medical examiner. 

“We’re definitely experiencing an underreporting issue nationwide,” Anderson said, pointing to the CDC’s study of “excess deaths” during the coronavirus. “[In Florida] most likely what we’re seeing are folks dying without having been tested and the best evidence that the doctors or whoever is filling out the death certificate had pointed to the person dying of pneumonia.”

Anderson added that the numbers currently reflected on the CDC’s website for pneumonia and influenza deaths for 2020 are lower than reality because the death certificate reporting system lags by several weeks, especially in states that do not have digitized systems to process the papers."

We will probably see some pretty major spikes in the next 2-5 weeks, what with everyone going out for Memorial Day weekend and the ongoing protests. Everybody stay home as much as you can and keep washing your hands.

Edited May 31, 2020 by lana-banana