The necessity of lockdowns during the pandemic

[Ellener]

1 hour ago, SumGuy said:

pretty damn responsible kids (they are also forming closed social circles).  None of them have been tested, so none of them show up in the statistics, and they clearly have it.

yes, and that's what lots of people are anyway, sensible about communicable diseases. Having to be told don't sneeze on people and stay home and wash your hands should be obvious.

 

[schlumpy]

I pulled this paragraph the CDC website estimating 2019 - 2020 hospitalizations for the flu.

"CDC estimates that the burden of illness during the 2018–2019 season included an estimated 35.5 million people getting sick with influenza, 16.5 million people going to a health care provider for their illness, 490,600 hospitalizations, and 34,200 deaths from influenza (Table 1). The number of influenza-associated illnesses that occurred last season was similar to the estimated number of influenza-associated illnesses during the 2012–2013 influenza season when an estimated 34 million people had symptomatic influenza illness6."

That's much more then Covid is providing. I realize that Covid deaths may be added to this total but isn't it odd that we destroy our economy over Covid but not the regular flu? The flu is taking a toll of ten times the amount of people this year and yet not a word is spoken about it.

 

[basil67]

No, @schlumpy it's not odd at all.    I can't look at the information you've sent in detail because you haven't provided a link, so please forgive me if I misinterpret anything.

The flu season is approximately six months long.   So, you're talking about 35k deaths across the US over about a six month period.   COVID on the other hand, has already killed 10,000 people in NY alone in a month or so.    Spread that degree of infection across the US and you'll have a situation where between 100,000 and 200,000 people die according to Trump and his administration.  Going on what's going on in NY, I have no reason to doubt this.

Also, we have immunisation for flu.  No, it doesn't catch every strain, and stats for effectiveness vary....but it helps.  COVID has no vaccine.   COVID is also far more infectious than the flu.   If someone goes to a party with the flu, it's not that likely that the rest of the party will get sick with it.  But we're seeing a very different picture here with COVID.  Bondi in Sydney is a huge hot spot now because of some partying backpackers a few weeks back.   A backpacker with the flu wouldn't have had this effect.

 

 

 

[schlumpy]

10 hours ago, basil67 said:

No, @schlumpy it's not odd at all.    I can't look at the information you've sent in detail because you haven't provided a link, so please forgive me if I misinterpret anything.

Although I can provide a link to the CDC (Center for Disease Control) I can not find the exact page I lifted the paragraph off of. The CDC page appeared when I was searching a specific phrase looking for the number of people with  the flu that required hospitalization. My purpose in using that paragraph was to provide a content rich summary that would outline my point without requiring extensive reading. Here's the link to the CDC.

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html

We will just have to disagree about this at least until I discover more facts that lean one way or the other. At the moment, in my mind, I see us burning down the house in the middle of winter to "save" ourselves without considering the long term effects which could exact the same price we were trying to avoid.

Regardless, I do appreciate your wisdom and insight on the matter.

 

 

 

 

[chillii]

 

Yeah well actually the virus expert l was talking about in the first post said very similar stuff and was pointing a lot of stuff out about flu and others . He basically said the price of paying for all this in the way they're doing it will be much higher than that of just letting it run it's course.

And in a way , not saying l'd agree hell l don't know , but it is just mind blowing what they're doing , the money they're spending and economies mess later . like l was even planning on finishing my house this year and selling late spring , market was looking good timing too just two mths ago for the end of the year ,  now they're talking the great depression all over the world. lt's just frkn mind boggling .

[nittygritty]

Only those that tested positive for Covid-19 and died from complications of it should be included in the Covid-19 death rate count. That is not how the Covid-19 death rate has been counted in the US.

[Ellener]

12 hours ago, basil67 said:

Spread that degree of infection across the US and you'll have a situation where between 100,000 and 200,000 people die according to Trump and his administration.  Going on what's going on in NY, I have no reason to doubt this.

Fortunately other areas do not seem to have the concentration of cases as NY.

Texas has very few cases so far, and California seems to be 'ahead of the curve'.

1 hour ago, chillii said:

lt's just frkn mind boggling .

It's unprecedented, best not to overthink it! I am thankful to be well. I've been through economic hardship, I'd rather that challenge, and be alive to fight another day than 'let things run their course' as your scientist proposed. Most of us just 'dodged a bullet'...

[chillii]

 

l'd imagine so myself too , l mean what would've happened in china, italy , if they just let it run, l'd hate to even think about that.

[schlumpy]

1 hour ago, schlumpy said:

 

Sorry Basil I goofed up the post. Looks I left cursor in the quote box, typed and sent without looking.

The first sentence is meant to be a quote from your post where the rest is my comment.

 

[elaine567]

22 minutes ago, chillii said:

 l mean what would've happened in china, italy , if they just let it run, l'd hate to even think about that.

I think by what is coming out in the UK, they have "let it run" in the care sector here.
No or sparse testing, no or little PPE, and a "rule" claimed by some that care home  residents with Covid symptoms should not go to hospital...
(13 deaths in one care home, two staff members in hospital... I guess these residents were never considered for hospital care.) 
Relatives reporting pressure to sign DNR forms...
Even now they are suggesting rationing the testing to only those showing symptoms. But we know that asymptomatic people can be positive and infectious and recovering patients can be positive for weeks after they are better... In other countries a positive patient needs to have 2 or 3 negative tests in a row before they can leave hospital.
The problem is that tests are like gold dust and so they do not want to "waste" a single one.
Meanwhile residents and staff are put at risk.

Edited April 16, 2020 by elaine567

[schlumpy]

11 minutes ago, elaine567 said:

Meanwhile residents and staff are put at risk.

That sounds pretty dire Elaine.

One very simple thing they could do is increase the amount of outside air they bring into the heating and ventilation system and how that is done depends on the type of heating system. I'm not saying that will make a major difference but it should help.

[SumGuy]

15 hours ago, basil67 said:

No, @schlumpy it's not odd at all.    I can't look at the information you've sent in detail because you haven't provided a link, so please forgive me if I misinterpret anything.

The flu season is approximately six months long.   So, you're talking about 35k deaths across the US over about a six month period.   COVID on the other hand, has already killed 10,000 people in NY alone in a month or so.    Spread that degree of infection across the US and you'll have a situation where between 100,000 and 200,000 people die according to Trump and his administration.  Going on what's going on in NY, I have no reason to doubt this.

Also, we have immunisation for flu.  No, it doesn't catch every strain, and stats for effectiveness vary....but it helps.  COVID has no vaccine.   COVID is also far more infectious than the flu.   If someone goes to a party with the flu, it's not that likely that the rest of the party will get sick with it.  But we're seeing a very different picture here with COVID.  Bondi in Sydney is a huge hot spot now because of some partying backpackers a few weeks back.   A backpacker with the flu wouldn't have had this effect.

Two other key points when comparing this data, the ~29,000 deaths so far are (1) with these extraordinary precautions, and (2) the CDC influenza death numbers are estimates based off of confirmed cases, the confirmed cases death due to influenza are lower (as it is the complications that arise which kill you mostly); with coronavirus it's just confirmed cases so far.

I am hoping this prepares us for a real destroyer, one where the fatality rate is not 1% but 10%.

[Redhead14]

Here's an interesting article from Newsweek:

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/exclusive-secret-military-task-force-prepares-to-secure-the-us-capital/ar-BB12IZtv?li=BBnb7Kz

 

[preraph]

16 hours ago, schlumpy said:

I pulled this paragraph the CDC website estimating 2019 - 2020 hospitalizations for the flu.

"CDC estimates that the burden of illness during the 2018–2019 season included an estimated 35.5 million people getting sick with influenza, 16.5 million people going to a health care provider for their illness, 490,600 hospitalizations, and 34,200 deaths from influenza (Table 1). The number of influenza-associated illnesses that occurred last season was similar to the estimated number of influenza-associated illnesses during the 2012–2013 influenza season when an estimated 34 million people had symptomatic influenza illness6."

That's much more then Covid is providing. I realize that Covid deaths may be added to this total but isn't it odd that we destroy our economy over Covid but not the regular flu? The flu is taking a toll of ten times the amount of people this year and yet not a word is spoken about it.

 

It's because it's an unknown and they just didn't know what it would do.  I mean steps had to be taken after Wuhan outbreak because it was really severe and fast.  And the death rate for old people is very high, much higher than the flu, so we have to protect that population (me) though I realize a lot of young folks don't give a crap about us.  

[preraph]

Elaine, it's running rampant in the nursing homes in Dallas as well.  Big spike once it started there.  My guess is they aren't moving them into hospitals -- and trust me, none of the people at those facilities are qualified to do respirators or anything.  One more reason to try not to go in one. 

[Redhead14]

Just now, preraph said:

And the death rate for old people is very high, much higher than the flu, so we have to protect that population (me) though I realize a lot of young folks don't give a crap about us.  

Yep, that is what I discovered also.  We are irrelevant and should just suck it up and "take one for the team" because they want to reopen everything since "they" aren't really that affected.  Who gives a crap if we can't spend time with children and grandchildren and friends or go out and enjoy our remaining years like we worked hard all our lives to be able to do.

[preraph]

Enough of us tough old birds are going to live through this to keep voting, so they shouldn't get too cocky!

[Redhead14]

1 minute ago, preraph said:

Enough of us tough old birds are going to live through this to keep voting, so they shouldn't get too cocky!

You betcha!  However, until there is a vaccine or a good curative remedy, you and I are going to be living pretty much like we are for a while.  Just because it's been contained to the point where the powers that be feel it's ok to open things back up, doesn't mean that the virus isn't still out there.  We still need to be careful for a while even after reopening.  I know I will be.

[preraph]

Yes, but it will help a lot once we can get tested to see if we have been exposed at least.  I can't imagine I've been exposed, though, because I've been pretty careful, oversanitizing things, picking them up with tongs.  I have gloves but all that does is keep it off your hands.  You still get it on surfaces that way.  I'm still afraid of running out of sanitizer.  I have no hand sanitizer at all.  I want Lysol Disinfectant and lots of it, but no one has had it at all listed all these weeks.  It's the best thing to have to spray on groceries because it's not slimy with cleaning agents and doesn't have bleach to mess things up.

[schlumpy]

31 minutes ago, preraph said:

It's because it's an unknown and they just didn't know what it would do.  I mean steps had to be taken after Wuhan outbreak because it was really severe and fast.  And the death rate for old people is very high, much higher than the flu, so we have to protect that population (me) though I realize a lot of young folks don't give a crap about us.  

I don't want to be tiresome but I can't rid of the nagging feeling that this was an overreaction and that the best way was to handle the outbreaks and isolate them. It certainly would have been a lot cheaper. What was done will have negative ramifications for the next five to ten years - in my opinion.

BTW, AARP quotes a figure of over 12,000 people over the age of 65 that died from the flu in 2018. 

[CAPSLOCK BANDIT]

Well for starters, in Italy, 50% of the people who were/are on ventilators were/are under 50 years old. Secondly, 80% of all the people that were forced to go onto ventilators, died. Third, many of the people who have COVID-19, some say as high as 60%, show next to no symptoms and are transmitting the virus... They are now saying that certain people can even be tested, their test will be negative, but they can still have it, because some peoples bodies just aren't producing the viral evidence that is needed to test positive for it.

Fact of the matter, is that going to the hospital during a pandemic for an extended period of time is a death sentence, due to the re-infecting that happens... You can sanitize every surface in the hospital, then 10 seconds later, a patient will simply BREATHE and the surface could easily be infected again. Due to the amount of asymptomatic people, which is seemingly a majority of the people who have COVID-19, based on what we have sampled so far, this virus is being unwittingly transmitted all over the place.

Everyone needs to wear a mask, because honestly, the more we learn about this virus, the more we begin to understand that there is a level of saturation happening here that was easily preventable... A bunch of asymptomatic people who have COVID-19 can walk around, breathe and infect the air and every potential surface around them, unwittingly! This could of been prevented had people just begun wearing masks in the first place, but due to all the misinformation of "A mask won't help!", nobody did.

Furthermore, some people who survive a bout against COVID-19 will have permanent lung damage... This virus can even infect your intestines, like half the people who have had COVID-19 have complained of digestive symptoms.... Hell, maybe even farting/passing gas can transmit COVID, we don't know.

There is just so much that we don't know and the virus has not even mutated yet... That is the biggest fear of all, that simply, the more people this virus infects, the more chances it has to mutate into something much more dangerous than its current iteration... Just based on the saturation we have saw so far, it seems to be an inevitability that this virus will mutate, hopefully benignly, but probably not.

We know next to nothing about COVID-19 and if we should take anything away from the last 3 months, its that any precaution that can be taken, should be.

 

[preraph]

40 minutes ago, schlumpy said:

I don't want to be tiresome but I can't rid of the nagging feeling that this was an overreaction and that the best way was to handle the outbreaks and isolate them. It certainly would have been a lot cheaper. What was done will have negative ramifications for the next five to ten years - in my opinion.

BTW, AARP quotes a figure of over 12,000 people over the age of 65 that died from the flu in 2018. 

Remember that this would be a whole lot worse if quarantines hadn't been mandated.  People travel, so there was no way to keep it isolated and China does things their own way and we have no control over that.  

[preraph]

Capslock, there are no masks available to the general public.  They are being used for medical and first responders.  There is nowhere to get a real mask that would do any good.  That's why people aren't wearing them.  We're told to make one and then not try to reuse it.  So until there's disposable masks available to everyone, that's how it is.  Reusing them isn't going to work.  People have to touch them to get them on and off to even wash them.

 

What I've heard so far is the virus shows no signs of mutating.  

Edited April 16, 2020 by preraph

[lana-banana]

1 hour ago, schlumpy said:

I don't want to be tiresome but I can't rid of the nagging feeling that this was an overreaction and that the best way was to handle the outbreaks and isolate them. It certainly would have been a lot cheaper. What was done will have negative ramifications for the next five to ten years - in my opinion.

BTW, AARP quotes a figure of over 12,000 people over the age of 65 that died from the flu in 2018. 

This is literally exactly what experts said at the beginning: that if we do this correctly, it will seem like an overreaction. That doesn't mean it was an overreaction, it means that the plan is working.

The virus has a confirmed death rate of 4.5% in the United States. Although there are likely many thousands of asymptomatic infections, there are also likely thousands of deaths that will never be tested. A 4.5% death rate and a massive spread even with almost everyone staying home and minimizing errands. That is staggering. And we need to be more vigilant, not yet. 

Large-scale group events may be off until 2021 depending on the area. In parts of Europe, Asia and Africa---areas with solid testing and tracing infrastructure---they can get back to normal sooner, isolating only the areas with active outbreaks. That's not an option here in the States. Lockdowns will continue to be necessary until simple, cheap, same-day tests are available to everyone who needs one.

[basil67]

5 hours ago, schlumpy said:

BTW, AARP quotes a figure of over 12,000 people over the age of 65 that died from the flu in 2018. 

And even with restrictions in place, more have died in one month of COVID than in six months of a flu season.   The stats you're quoting are working against your argument.