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ray_parkhurst
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Leaked US Gov COVID19 plan

Post by ray_parkhurst »


ray_parkhurst
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Post by ray_parkhurst »

Well, we're not alone anymore in the state...the Governor has declared a state-wide "shelter in place". There is no document to read yet, but supposedly the order is modeled after the Santa Clara order from Monday. 40 million people, the entire state of California. Only folks working are service industries supporting a basic existence. The tech companies are working from home AMAP but productivity is going to be pretty low for all but the most connected. An economic disaster for California.

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Post by ChrisR »

Chris R

Olympusman
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Grocery shelves

Post by Olympusman »

Socilogists will be writing about this period for years. One pointed out (very preceptibly) that the reason grocery store shelves are decimated is because people must eat at home. All of the restaurants are closed, the kids don't have school lunches and nobody can "go to lunch", even if they can go to work. I noticed the other day that the frozen pizza section in my grocery looked like it had been ravaged by hyenas.
The windows in the state liquor stores are now being boarded up as if a hurricane were coming when the actual fear is looting.
Got a call yesterday that an elective skin surgery was called off.
Is martial law looming on the horizon?

Hunkered down on the mountain.
Mike
Michael Reese Much FRMS EMS Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, USA

abpho
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Post by abpho »

ray_parkhurst wrote:An economic disaster for California.
A world wide economic disaster is more appropriate. :(
I'm in Canada! Isn't that weird?

abpho
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Re: Grocery shelves

Post by abpho »

Olympusman wrote:Is martial law looming on the horizon?
I have a feeling things could do south in a hurry. We are only on the cusp of this pandemic, until we see a world wide decline in cases.
I'm in Canada! Isn't that weird?

ray_parkhurst
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Post by ray_parkhurst »

abpho wrote:
ray_parkhurst wrote:An economic disaster for California.
A world wide economic disaster is more appropriate. :(

I doubt California's shutting down would cause a worldwide economic disaster, given it is only responsible for 20% of the US economy. That doesn't mean other states and countries won't follow, and as usual California's action has probably opened up those floodgates.

ray_parkhurst
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Re: Grocery shelves

Post by ray_parkhurst »

abpho wrote:
Olympusman wrote:Is martial law looming on the horizon?
I have a feeling things could do south in a hurry. We are only on the cusp of this pandemic, until we see a world wide decline in cases.
Yes, and that took a couple months in China, then a couple months (partially overlapping) in SKorea, so we're probably looking at the same in the US. Let's hope in the meantime the authorities can keep from declaring martial law, but if the case load exceeds hospital capacity like it did in Italy, we too may react similarly.

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Re: Grocery shelves

Post by dhmiller »

If the "government" would start to tell the truth about the shortages of PPEs, swabs, masks and ventilators, not to mention hospital beds, support staff and the rest, we would see more compliance to the directives. It would also be nice to be truthful about the <actual> efficacy of the drugs that are in the very earliest trial stages.
ray_parkhurst wrote:
abpho wrote:
Olympusman wrote:Is martial law looming on the horizon?
I have a feeling things could do south in a hurry. We are only on the cusp of this pandemic, until we see a world wide decline in cases.
Yes, and that took a couple months in China, then a couple months (partially overlapping) in SKorea, so we're probably looking at the same in the US. Let's hope in the meantime the authorities can keep from declaring martial law, but if the case load exceeds hospital capacity like it did in Italy, we too may react similarly.

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Re: Grocery shelves

Post by JKT »

ray_parkhurst wrote:Let's hope in the meantime the authorities can keep from declaring martial law, but if the case load exceeds hospital capacity like it did in Italy, we too may react similarly.
If you do it then, you are about a week or two too late.

ray_parkhurst
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Re: Grocery shelves

Post by ray_parkhurst »

JKT wrote:
ray_parkhurst wrote:Let's hope in the meantime the authorities can keep from declaring martial law, but if the case load exceeds hospital capacity like it did in Italy, we too may react similarly.
If you do it then, you are about a week or two too late.
That is true, but humans are not naturally proactive when faced with new threats. That said, The "time phased" nature of this pandemic, with China first, then SKorea and Japan, then Italy and Iran, then Spain, France, Germany and the US etc, is giving a bit of education and indirect experience to the later folks. Let's hope it helps in "flattening the curve", but ultimately I concur with the folks who believe "everyone" will eventually catch this thing.

This page has a nice graphical tool to track the infections by country vs time:

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/ ... d-19-curve

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Re: Grocery shelves

Post by rjlittlefield »

JKT wrote:If you do it then, you are about a week or two too late.
Yes, exactly. Khan Academy has a nice video that discusses the problem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mCa0JXEwDEk .

Their video is based on an analysis by Tomas Pueyo, HERE, whose essential points are summarized in his Chart 7, at https://miro.medium.com/max/6272/1%2Ar-ddYhoUtP_se6x-NOEinA.png .

Most of that chart comes from the Chinese CDC as a retrospective analysis of what must have actually been happening on Day N, based on what was observed later, on day N+12 or so.

As I wrote to a friend a few days ago,
For the analyst in you, let me offer [Pueyo's article] . Skip ahead to Chart 7, "Timeline of Events in Hubei" to see what I think is the most interesting part. Bear in mind, the very stringent Chinese lockdown succeeded in dropping the transmission rate well below 1 new infection per case so the epidemic died down. I'm a bit skeptical that ours will be nearly that effective. But even so, they called lockdown with well under 1,000 confirmed cases, and ended up with almost 45,000 of them, due largely to as-yet-unknown infections already in the pipeline. As of Monday afternoon, Washington was already approaching 1000 confirmed. The analogy is not encouraging.
So yes, I expect that things are going to get painful.

In the end, most of us will have gotten through it OK. As noted in the excellent slideset at https://www.slideshare.net/MichaelLin14 ... se-covid19 , "This is not the zombie apocalypse."

But some people won't, and for the rest of us -- as a society -- there will be significant costs.

My local newspaper reported today that Washington state health officials are developing common guidelines for triage "so individual doctors and hospitals will not be left to make such decisions" (like, who does not get the ventilator when there aren't enough for everybody). The New York Times' origin of the article is at https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/20/us/c ... state.html .

Just personally, I would much prefer that my friends who work in the hospital are never faced with following those guidelines, so I'm doing my level best to be part of the solution by not becoming part of the problem. I figure some checks to the local food bank and other charities won't hurt either. But the big thing is just to keep the peak burden on the hospitals as low as possible: don't get infected, and if you do, don't infect anybody else.

--Rik

ray_parkhurst
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Post by ray_parkhurst »

Excellent slide set!

I don't personally trust any of the data that came out of China, so I question any statistical analysis made from it. Neither the numbers of infections nor deaths.

The US data so far for infections is also completely useless since so few tests were done until recently. I do somewhat trust the death statistics though.

I don't know what to make of the SKorea data. It may be a very reliable data set, but my gut says that the data from Italy and Spain is the most reliable. Their testing systems were up early enough to test people soon as they started showing typical symptoms, and my sense is they have little reason either politically or economically to lie about the statistics one way or the other. My belief is that both China and the US have massaged their data to achieve their political and economic goals, though in completely different ways. A similar thing happened in 1918, when Spain was the only country giving a true account of the enormity of the problem, at least publicly. This is why we call it the "Spanish Flu", not because it started there, but because we learned more about it because of the forthright nature of the Spanish press at the time.

There will probably never be reliable data on the actual infection rate, since the tests are onerous enough that only folks with telltale symptoms can get tested (and of course rightly so).

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Post by Lou Jost »

Ray, I think the South Koreans have one of the most thorough testing programs. Far better per capita than the US, and earlier in the curve.

ray_parkhurst
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Post by ray_parkhurst »

Lou Jost wrote:Ray, I think the South Koreans have one of the most thorough testing programs. Far better per capita than the US, and earlier in the curve.
Yes, it may be that the SKorea data is overall the most reliable. I think it all comes down to the accuracy of their test method. I'm not sure if it has been published. They certainly did the highest per capita testing, including many asymptomatic folks. Of course the Emerald Princess gives the best overall data on asymptomatic vs symptomatic, assuming the infection rate is constant across all passengers and crew, which is quite a stretch. Each of the different outbreaks is unique in virtually every aspect and perspective, making it hard to predict, but upon integration I still believe a 2-3 week social distancing period is a really, really good idea.

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