Author Topic: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread  (Read 440026 times)

RocketMan

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5050 on: March 22, 2021, 08:56:25 AM »
https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/data/mortality

It isn’t smallpox, but it’s also not the flu. And mortality ranges above 1 percent.

There are things not accounted for in the data you cited, the most glaring being deaths with comorbidities.  How many of those deaths listed had comorbidities?  The JHU numbers conveniently leave those out.  The CDC has stated that roughly six percent of COVID deaths in the US were due to the virus alone, no comorbidities being present.  That brings the true COVID death count down markedly.
Second, how much overreporting of COVID cases and deaths is occurring?  The federal government has been sending subsidies to hospitals for each COVID case they treat, regardless of outcome.  The amount of the subsidy per patient varies by region.
Do you remember one of the chief axioms of economics?  That's right, if you subsidize something, you get more of it.  COVID numbers in this country are almost certainly overinflated because of the federal subsidies.
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zahc

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5051 on: March 22, 2021, 10:01:32 AM »
And yet, some countries have completely eliminated covid and the best evidence about vaccines is that they’re capable of developing herd immunity if vaccination rates are high enough.

The resignation on this virus is bizarre. It seems like only in America can nothing be done, when significant parts of the rest of the world are controlling the spread and rolling out vaccines that will end it.

Which parts of the world? Only in the US? Wha?

Most of Europe are worse than the US. I'm only aware of Taiwan having made good progress in keeping the virus out, and keeping the virus out doesn't mean beating the virus, it means getting it later or managing to hold out until a vaccine. As I mentioned, this is not a sustainable strategy even for Taiwan, and besides, it was only possible for Taiwan because they had advanced intel on what was going on in China. By the time we knew what hit us in the US the virus was already circulating and you can't stop it by halting travel at that point. The death rate in the US is midpack, and our vaccination progress is world-leading. And there's relatively little differences in outcomes based on the strength of government interventions.

My point is that even if border lockdowns "work" to "slow the spread" (which is a pretty low bar in itself), they work for every virus. But we don't do those things for every virus because it's worse. COVID is bad but it's not an existential threat that changes the balance enough to justify the response that we saw, which in fairness was partly a result of ignorance. But now that we know more, it's become a religious thing because people don't like to admit they are/were wrong; this is the more ironic in light of the "the science!!!" accusations flying around.
« Last Edit: March 22, 2021, 10:24:28 AM by zahc »
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MechAg94

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5052 on: March 22, 2021, 10:36:02 AM »
Which parts of the world? Only in the US? Wha?

Most of Europe are worse than the US. I'm only aware of Taiwan having made good progress in keeping the virus out, and keeping the virus out doesn't mean beating the virus, it means getting it later or managing to hold out until a vaccine. As I mentioned, this is not a sustainable strategy even for Taiwan, and besides, it was only possible for Taiwan because they had advanced intel on what was going on in China. By the time we knew what hit us in the US the virus was already circulating and you can't stop it by halting travel at that point. The death rate in the US is midpack, and our vaccination progress is world-leading. And there's relatively little differences in outcomes based on the strength of government interventions.

My point is that even if border lockdowns "work" to "slow the spread" (which is a pretty low bar in itself), they work for every virus. But we don't do those things for every virus because it's worse. COVID is bad but it's not an existential threat that changes the balance enough to justify the response that we saw, which in fairness was partly a result of ignorance. But now that we know more, it's become a religious thing because people don't like to admit they are/were wrong; this is the more ironic in light of the "the science!!!" accusations flying around.
I seem to remember last year some countries were claiming to have no cases of COVID.  I don't think they were actually testing anyone, but that isn't important.
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K Frame

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5053 on: March 22, 2021, 10:37:15 AM »
I read an article a few days ago that indicates that there are currently 7 or so nations that haven't had a confirmed case of the Kung in quite some time...

Most of them have one thing in common.... they're isolated as hell and surrounded by thousands of miles of Pacific ocean, with few visitors in and out.

A couple are also extremely low population Asian nations (IIRC a couple  are former Soviet Republics) in very mountainous regions, which naturally promoted limited contact/exchange between population groups.

Then there's North Korea. Anyone believe that North Korea has had zero cases of the Kung? Anyone? Anyone? Well, apparently the WHO, does, but apparently WHO can't explain the Nork's dramatic and sudden rise in lead poisoning deaths of the last year...

Of course, the Norks were the first nation in the world to completely close their borders once things started hitting the fan, which our lovely left found to be heroic, justified, and prescient... Trump doing the same thing, however? It just shows what a racist xenophobe he is!
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Ben

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5054 on: March 22, 2021, 10:45:12 AM »
Which parts of the world? Only in the US? Wha?

Some cursory searching shows "the top ten" being mostly made up of low population island nations, like New Zealand. Besides their natural "border walls", they also don't have a million disease laden illegals coming in, and don't necessarily have the international responsibilities (whether you agree with them or not) that the US has. Essentially non-essential countries, so it's easier to lock them down. Or in the case of Mongolia - one of the countries that pops up as "solving" covid - you have the CCP connection, so suspect data.

It's somewhat unfair to lump the entire US into the same groupings as these small countries. Geography matters.

EDIT: Cross-posted with Mike.
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TommyGunn

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5055 on: March 22, 2021, 11:11:45 AM »
Okay, so you’re not disputing it kills over 1 percent - it’s just that because the 16.5 percent of the population 65 or over is hit much harder than younger years, you reckon it’s less of a problem. Again, doesn’t seem sane to compare it to the flu.

Then there’s that whole thing of it being possible to contain and eradicate covid transmission, which would handle the deaths and the long term medical consequences.

In the United States, mortality from THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN - - -ooops, I mean covid 19, is about .5%  I don't know where you get "over 1%" other than some  John Hopkins study listing other countries (one at @4%) but, with due respect for foreigners,  that's not really relavent to the U. S. A.

"Contain and eradicate covid transmission"? ? ?  Huh?    Yea,  that worked well.  Ok,  island countries like New Zealand are naturally isolated, and did better.  America is hardly the same. 

In case you haven't noticed,   we have three vaccines, soon to be four (although projections are by the time the forth is available,  every American will already be vaccinated) and covid case counts are in decline as well as hospitalizations. 

Things seem to be getting  better.   
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MillCreek

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5056 on: March 22, 2021, 11:24:09 AM »
At our Monday morning COVID briefing just now with the Snohomish Health District, case rates/100,000 and inpatient hospitalizations are continuing to drop, and have not been this low since last October.
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sumpnz

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5057 on: March 22, 2021, 11:49:57 AM »
At our Monday morning COVID briefing just now with the Snohomish Health District, case rates/100,000 and inpatient hospitalizations are continuing to drop, and have not been this low since last October.

My nurse neighbors have told me covid is basically a nothing-burger for Skagit county at the moment.  They didn’t even bother with a mask when we chatted yesterday.  No hand shaking but that’s ok.

ConstitutionCowboy

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5058 on: March 22, 2021, 11:51:06 AM »
Okay, so you’re not disputing it kills over 1 percent - it’s just that because the 16.5 percent of the population 65 or over is hit much harder than younger years, you reckon it’s less of a problem. Again, doesn’t seem sane to compare it to the flu.

Then there’s that whole thing of it being possible to contain and eradicate covid transmission, which would handle the deaths and the long term medical consequences.

What does your source of information say about those dying with comorbidities verses those who die by the Covid only?

Woody
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Hawkmoon

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5059 on: March 22, 2021, 11:55:35 AM »
But now that we know more, it's become a religious thing because people don't like to admit they are/were wrong; this is the more ironic in light of the "the science!!!" accusations flying around.

Science ==> religion ==> dogma
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Hawkmoon

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5060 on: March 22, 2021, 11:57:25 AM »
I seem to remember last year some countries were claiming to have no cases of COVID.  I don't think they were actually testing anyone, but that isn't important.

North Korea, IIRC, is the only country to have made that claim.
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K Frame

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5061 on: March 22, 2021, 12:00:31 PM »
OK, this is the article I read...

It's been updated as of today, it looks like.

https://koryogroup.com/blog/are-there-countries-without-coronavirus

It also calls into question the Nork claims, as well as those by Turkmenistan.
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MechAg94

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5062 on: March 22, 2021, 12:10:56 PM »
North Korea, IIRC, is the only country to have made that claim.
I thought one of the Mexican officials said that last year.  Maybe it was a South American country.  It was obviously not true when they said it. 
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Perd Hapley

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5063 on: March 22, 2021, 01:48:31 PM »
Would you send your children to a measles party if it killed upwards of 1 in 100, and maimed ten times that?

You know no one suggested that.
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De Selby

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5064 on: March 22, 2021, 07:02:02 PM »
What does your source of information say about those dying with comorbidities verses those who die by the Covid only?

Woody

Large swaths of the US population have comorbidities, and in any case that doesn’t change the overall fatality rates, it just means some groups are hit harder than others. Obesity for example affects tremendous numbers of Americans - that might explain why it’s so much more deadly than the flu. Maybe you don’t think overweight people are worthy of living, but that doesn’t change their proportion of the us population and the consequently high overall death toll from
Covid.

In terms of the parade saying only small islands stopped covid, well that’s demonstrably untrue. Highly densely populated Asian countries handled it far better than the USA. South Korea is an example.
https://ourworldindata.org/covid-exemplar-south-korea

What the developed countries that stopped COVID have in common are well developed public health systems and the ability to deploy health resources to control outbreaks.

The USA has by many accounts on this board the greatest medical system in the world. There’s no reason why all that technology and innovation should not have been able to achieve decent per capita results on covid, but it did not.


"Human existence being an hallucination containing in itself the secondary hallucinations of day and night (the latter an insanitary condition of the atmosphere due to accretions of black air) it ill becomes any man of sense to be concerned at the illusory approach of the supreme hallucination known as death."

De Selby

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5065 on: March 22, 2021, 07:04:10 PM »
There are things not accounted for in the data you cited, the most glaring being deaths with comorbidities.  How many of those deaths listed had comorbidities?  The JHU numbers conveniently leave those out.  The CDC has stated that roughly six percent of COVID deaths in the US were due to the virus alone, no comorbidities being present.  That brings the true COVID death count down markedly.
Second, how much overreporting of COVID cases and deaths is occurring?  The federal government has been sending subsidies to hospitals for each COVID case they treat, regardless of outcome.  The amount of the subsidy per patient varies by region.
Do you remember one of the chief axioms of economics?  That's right, if you subsidize something, you get more of it.  COVID numbers in this country are almost certainly overinflated because of the federal subsidies.

This is fundamentally flawed reasoning - listing a comorbidity doesn’t make that a cause of death.

COVID still causes death in people whose underlying health make them more susceptible - if you shoot someone with hemophilia and they die when a similarly wounded person without it would not, it’s still a gunshot homicide.

Your argument that hospitals are faking data and therefore the deaths by covid are overstated is great, but speculation - do you have any actual data to replace the numbers you allege are fake?
"Human existence being an hallucination containing in itself the secondary hallucinations of day and night (the latter an insanitary condition of the atmosphere due to accretions of black air) it ill becomes any man of sense to be concerned at the illusory approach of the supreme hallucination known as death."

ConstitutionCowboy

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5066 on: March 22, 2021, 07:32:13 PM »
...
The USA has by many accounts on this board the greatest medical system in the world. There’s no reason why all that technology and innovation should not have been able to achieve decent per capita results on covid, but it did not.

Maybe all that technology kept people alive who would have under different circumstances passed away before the Covid came along, and the Covid was the straw that broke the camel's back. Life expectancy and life style, etc., must be taken into consideration to be able to come to anything close to accuracy.

Woody
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Perd Hapley

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5067 on: March 22, 2021, 08:33:37 PM »
And yet, some countries have completely eliminated covid and the best evidence about vaccines is that they’re capable of developing herd immunity if vaccination rates are high enough.

The resignation on this virus is bizarre. It seems like only in America can nothing be done, when significant parts of the rest of the world are controlling the spread and rolling out vaccines that will end it.

Once again, you're ignoring what's happened in the last few months. We have, what 3 vaccines now? And it's been widely reported for a while now that we've controlled the spread.

https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2021/03/01/covid-summary-vaccine-cases-deaths/9591614597681/
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cordex

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5068 on: March 23, 2021, 10:01:18 AM »
Okay, so you’re not disputing it kills over 1 percent - it’s just that because the 16.5 percent of the population 65 or over is hit much harder than younger years, you reckon it’s less of a problem. Again, doesn’t seem sane to compare it to the flu.
I don't think we know the IFR and have seen estimates ranging from well under 1% to well over.  Most credible estimates I've seen are sub-1% overall with most age groups falling way, way under that.

I also don't recall saying it was the same thing as the flu.  What I said was that for most people it is not a particularly nasty virus.  Yes, for some people is is very nasty, but for most people symptoms are mild or nonexistent.  Because risk can be estimated based on age and health, there are options available to protect individuals at elevated risk while allowing society to operate.  Instead we've decided to pretend that everybody is the same, which has not resulted in particularly good outcomes across the board.

Then there’s that whole thing of it being possible to contain and eradicate covid transmission, which would handle the deaths and the long term medical consequences.
I'd love to hear the policies Emperor De Selby would prescribe.

RoadKingLarry

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5069 on: March 23, 2021, 10:10:19 AM »
Blather blather blather, liberal nonsense liberal nonsense liberal nonsense. Blather blather blather, liberal nonsense liberal nonsense liberal nonsense.
Blather blather blather, liberal nonsense liberal nonsense liberal nonsense. Blather blather blather, liberal nonsense liberal nonsense liberal nonsense.
Blather blather blather, liberal nonsense liberal nonsense liberal nonsense. Blather blather blather, liberal nonsense liberal nonsense liberal nonsense.
Ad infinitum, ad nauseum...

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MechAg94

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5070 on: March 23, 2021, 10:20:02 AM »
I understand there were at least 5 states that deliberately put known coronavirus patients in elderly care facilities that did not have the ability to separate them.  Aside from New York and Michigan, I don't know if anyone has been able to really investigate the full impact of decisions like that. 

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WLJ

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5071 on: March 23, 2021, 10:29:42 AM »

Your argument that hospitals are faking data and therefore the deaths by covid are overstated is great, but speculation - do you have any actual data to replace the numbers you allege are fake?

In my case not data but info straight from the horse's mouth. I regularly go in for therapy for my hand injury for about 1 1/2 years now. In discussions with various med personnel, many of whom I have come to know fairly well, many have told me they know the hospital is fudging numbers. Even told me examples of how that matches what many are saying here.
« Last Edit: March 23, 2021, 10:46:31 AM by WLJ »
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K Frame

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5072 on: March 23, 2021, 11:06:44 AM »
I understand there were at least 5 states that deliberately put known coronavirus patients in elderly care facilities that did not have the ability to separate them.  Aside from New York and Michigan, I don't know if anyone has been able to really investigate the full impact of decisions like that. 




Meh. That's just the liberals living the dream of getting rid of the useless elderly, whose only real purpose is to consume resources best consumed by those who know what's best for everyone.

In reality, it's just end-stage abortion, and as everyone knows, abortion is just fine and dandy.
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Ben

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5073 on: March 23, 2021, 12:15:14 PM »

In terms of the parade saying only small islands stopped covid, well that’s demonstrably untrue. Highly densely populated Asian countries handled it far better than the USA. South Korea is an example.
https://ourworldindata.org/covid-exemplar-south-korea

Not a single person here in the "parade" said ONLY island countries. South Korea is bordered by NK and ocean, making it effectively an island though. They also kept martial border controls in place. Visitors were assigned "monitors" to track them. When Trump tried to close / limit our border, he was labeled a xenophobe, and Pelosi went to party maskless in Chinatown. The US is ~9,700% larger than South Korea. Even if we accepted police state controls, where would they get the jackboots to monitor everyone?

Mongolia is another non-island country that reported it did well. What are the population, geographic, and governmental differences between Mongolia and the US?

Tanzania reported itself "virus free".

Quote
Tanzania's president on Sunday claimed that his country is free of the coronavirus because of the power of prayer. However, the claim came six weeks after the African nation stopped publicly updating virus data.

I would also note that the evil and crappy US put in upwards of $18 billion for Warp Speed. How much did awesome Australia chip in for vaccine research funding? I found this:

https://www.health.gov.au/news/further-funding-for-covid-19-vaccine-and-treatment-research

Sounds like it's less than for vegamite research.



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JTHunter

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Re: COVID-19/corona virus mega thread/prepping thread
« Reply #5074 on: March 23, 2021, 10:57:39 PM »
In many of the news reports about the Astra-Zeneca vaccine, they are making claims that it is 79% effective in suppressing symptoms.
Read that carefully and think about the wording.
The news stories say "suppressing symptoms" but carefully avoid saying ANYTHING about actually stopping the covid-19 disease itself.  This will let people think they are "cured" or don't have the virus and this will let them become the new "superspreaders".
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