Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

Republicans are radicals, not conservatives.

The GOP is a fucking disgrace.

An almost top 10,000 blog!

Impressively dumb. Congratulations.

Consistently wrong since 2002

Just because you believe it, that doesn’t make it true.

I’d try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

Not all heroes wear capes.

Republicans don’t trust women.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

Within six months Twitter will be fully self-driving.

“Jesus paying for the sins of everyone is an insult to those who paid for their own sins.”

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

White supremacy is terrorism.

It’s time for the GOP to dust off that post-2012 autopsy, completely ignore it, and light the party on fire again.

I was promised a recession.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 Coronavirus / COVID-19 Update (International / Informational Edition) – Thursday/Friday, March 4/5

COVID-19 Update (International / Informational Edition) – Thursday/Friday, March 4/5

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COVID-19 Update (International / Informational Edition) - Thursday/Friday, March 4/5

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36Comments

  2. 2.

    Chyron HR

    You need to wipe clean your phone too.

    At this point I’ll just take my chances with the virus.

  4. 4.

    Suzanne

    @WereBear: Also, take care of your skin! I had a boss who is a deplorable, and he contracted MRSA on his hand while at a client meeting. His doctor said that he had microscopic cuts and tears in his skin that were exposed because he didn’t moisturize basically ever, and lots of hand washing probably damages the moisture barrier. I have no idea if keeping your skin moisturized will be helpful for Covid-19, but it is good health practice anyway. I also tend to wear lots of clothes…. pants and sleeves even in summer to protect my skin.

  5. 5.

    Skepticat

    “We have been preparing for the novel coronavirus since mid-December,” Shah said. “We did not wait for the U.S. CDC to tell us to get working on it.”

    I was encouraged to read this from the head of the Maine CDC in the Portland paper this morning.

  11. 11.

    MomSense

    @Skepticat:

    The governor’s sister was our CDC Director through two administrations. Janet knows the value of public health.  Dora Mills has been on tv and radio with Shah all the time.  It’s night and day the difference serious people who believe in good governance can make.

  12. 12.

    satby

    @Suzanne: lots of hand washing and general activities dry out the skin on hands especially, and washing also diminishes the skin’s natural acid mantle, since even mild soap and most tap water is slightly alkaline. The acid mantle restores quickly by itself, lotions (especially handmade ones) are made of oils and water and an emulsifier to keep them mixed, oils are fatty acids, so they help the acid mantle on your skin recover.

  14. 14.

    satby

    @WereBear: I’m just going to say here (and this is not a plug) but sanitizer and many lotions using chemical ingredients can be high triggers for skin conditions like eczema. It might be smarter for people to get their own guest size soap to keep in their desk (because no matter how often you tell people germs don’t live on a shared soap bar they don’t believe it anyway) for washing with. Generally no one uses sanitizer properly for complete germ removal, it’s a stopgap. And get antibacterial wipes for wiping down phones, because clean hands, dirty phones spread a lot of contagious diseases.

  15. 15.

    Betty

    My nephew lives in Singapore and they are seeing cases, including one of his Board members. Folks there are getting nervous.

  16. 16.

    mali muso

    Send some positive vibes to those of us working in international ed (eg. international students and study abroad).  This week has been very stressful and full of uncertainty.  On Monday, the CDC issued some vaguely worded “guidance” for higher ed asking them to “consider” putting a halt to all exchange programming.  Trying to figure out the best way to support students who are abroad (stay put? come home now? how do they finish their coursework? what about the costs?) not to mention figuring out what to do with all of the planned group trips in May and later in the summer…it’s been quite an experience.

  17. 17.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    Trump abruptly canceled a visit he was supposed to do in with CDC in Atlanta.  It’s hard to not think Trump did it because he’s worried about getting ill. they study diseases there after all.  That’s the real offensive part of Trump’s CONVID-19 just go to work nonsense, Trump is such a coward about disease himself he won’t even share cell phones.

  18. 18.

    EmbraceYourInnerCrone

    @satby: I work in a lab and I keep a tube of lotion on my desk and another in my bag.  also a small one in my car.  I must wash my hands a couple dozen times a day in normal times.  I just stocked up on extra hand lotion yesterday.

    I don’t worry too much about me because I seem to be boringly healthy, I worry a lot about my husband as he developed congestive heart failure about a dozen years ago after a bout of mono.  He also has 3 stents… he works for a University IT department and is all over campus working on peoples computers… at least it is a union job with a really good health plan.  Downside, it’s a huge university with thousands of faculty, students and staff.

  19. 19.

    Roger Moore

    Not to be a downer, but I trust those Chinese numbers about as much as I trust Trump’s numbers.  Chairman Xi has made it clear what the numbers are supposed to say, and I fully expect his subordinates to provide him numbers to match, no matter what the truth is.  The Chinese government may be smart enough to have accurate numbers for internal use, but I don’t believe for a minute what they’re saying in public.

  20. 20.

    opiejeanne

    @mali muso: Gonzaga in eastern WA called home a group of students in Italy. I guess they decided that the studies can wait. The problem I see is that it’s likely at least one will bring the virus back.

    The virus has been concentrated in the western part of the state until now, in only three counties: King, Snohomish, and Grant. Eastern WA hasn’t reported any cases, which yes, I know means nothing and it could be everywhere there by now because people don’t stay put until they know they really need to.

  21. 21.

    Jon Marcus

    FP article is from January and seems quite China-centric. (e.g. recommendations for not using personal chopsticks to help yourself to a communal dish.) Interesting as a cultural/historical document, but maybe not so much as a current “how to”?

  22. 22.

    ziggy

    Finally checking in from the West coast…hope all other coasties are doing okay. Apparently locally we are running out of canned vegetables! toilet paper I can understand, but canned vegetables?

    Haven’t heard from YY Sima Qian for a couple of days, hope he and his family are doing okay?

    Thanks for all your hard work rounding this up Anne Laurie, lots of info to digest!

  23. 23.

    Oklahomo

    I love that in the middle of all the tweets there was an advertisement for face masks.

  24. 24.

    Skepticat

    @MomSense: It’s night and day the difference serious people who believe in good governance can make.

    This is true at every level, but I’m so pleased with Maine’s current serious people (no, I am NOT looking at you, Susan). MomSense, I assume you don’t miss LeRage any more than I do.

  25. 25.

    opiejeanne

    For GOKU:

    I’m working on a list of things to have on hand. We walked through the bathrooms and kitchen, checked supplies, and made lists before we went shopping, and it took several trips to three stores: Target, Costco, and the local supermarket. We went to a permanent open-air fruit stand and got things like apples and fresh garlic for a third of the supermarket price, but I know not everyone has one of these near their home. We had to wait until March 4th for them to re-open for the year. They close down after Hallowe’en and are usually back by March 1.

    My husband pushed back last Friday when we went to Costco, when I told him to get a big package of toilet paper and one of paper towels, but we will use all of these things, eventually. He came around when he witnessed the frenzied buying of these items while we watched. We just got one big pack of each, but people were buying massive amounts of these.

    Not knowing your preferences in food or skill at cooking, nor that of your parents, this will just be about what we did. For yourself, think about what you like to eat that you know you can fix for yourself or your family, like, can you open a can of soup, add water (if the instructions on the can say to do so), put it all in a pot and warm it up? Some people lack this basic skill*.

    There was some great advice on that thread last night. Think about what you like to eat when you shop. Now is probably not the best time to experiment with unfamiliar foods. All of the things in my pantry are things that we will eat. We just won’t need to go to the store as often.

    Dry Goods:

    Dry beans, rice, and pasta are pretty cheap items. With the dry beans and some ground beef I will make chili, which will last the two of us about 3 days, maybe 4. I have marinara in the freezer that we made last summer from our tomatoes, but also a jar or two from the store. It’s meatless, but cooked ground beef can be added.

    Also, packages of lentils (Cost Plus World Market), spices included for soup but not as cheap as just a bag of lentils. There are  bean soup mixes, which range from cheap to Holy Cow!. There are some fancy, overpriced dry soup mixes but if you have herbs and spices already, you don’t need the fancy stuff.

    Cereal and granola bars. Canned nuts.

    Flour, sugar, dehydrated milk, and cornmeal on hand, but not everyone wants to mess around with baking. There are 3 or 4 boxes of cake mixes in the pantry at any given time. If you have eggs and vegetable oil, you can turn out a decent cake, but there are some mixes that just require water. I made a cake yesterday for mr opiejeanne’s birthday.  a couple of packages of crackers and cookies reside in the pantry, and it is Girl Scout Cookie time right now. We have 5 boxes and haven’t opened a single one yet, but they are calling my name. Maybe after the cake is gone. (My diabetes is so well controlled now that I can have a small cookie, or a 2″ X 2″ piece of cake, without icing, maybe once a day following a meal)

    Canned and jarred goods:

    soups and baked beans, black beans, garbanzo beans, tahini paste, tomato sauce, tomato paste, coconut milk, evaporated milk, cans of tuna, pears and peaches, mayo, mustard, and olives. I even bought two small jars of mushrooms, because I lost my mind for a moment. We didn’t grab everything off the shelf like some shoppers are doing, we just added 2 or 3 cans of soup or other things every trip to the store for a week. We don’t have cases of canned goods, I don’t like any one thing enough to buy 24 cans of it, but we do have a variety and maybe a total of 30 cans, aside from the 22 cans of tuna. We had tuna salad sandwiches on marbled rye yesterday for lunch.

    Freezer items:

    meat, bacon, seafood, frozen veggies, and fruit, and bread. One of my kids left us a huge bag of frozen peaches and I guess now might be a good time to use them.  There’s also a carton of Breyer’s ice cream.

    Fresh food:

    fresh produce, butter, margarine, eggs (I have about 18 eggs right now), and milk as needed but being over 60 I just learned that I’m supposed to stay home indefinitely.  We picked up a small bag of red potatoes and another small bag of small yellow onions, and they’re stored in a dark place. We have several cheeses in our fridge right now, dry ones like Romano or Parmesan keep almost indefinitely and can be grated over various foods, and soft ones that need to be eaten, like a lovely triple cream Brie.

    Non-food items:

    Extra bars of soap and/or refill for liquid soap dispensers,  basic cleaning supplies like bath cleanser, bleach, laundry detergent, dishwasher soap, dish washing liquid for things that don’t go into the dishwasher. Toilet paper and paper towels, if you can find them.

    Some things you might already have on hand, like Band Aids, toothpaste, a package of new toothbrushes, dental floss, rubbing alcohol, hydrogen peroxide, antiseptics in case of cuts or scratches, pain killers like Acetaminophen (Tylenol), Ibuprofen, or aspirin, anti-fungal ointment for athlete’s foot, extra solution for contact lenses, etc.  Walk through your house, look in the medicine cabinets and think about what you use and might need if the current supply is low. If you get sick you won’t be able to go out to get these things. A friend might buy them for you if you run out and can’t get out, but you probably shouldn’t count on it. They could be sick too.

    If you have pets, pick up extra supplies for them because they can’t do their own shopping if you get sick.

     

    *Sorry, I’ve been watching Worst Cooks.

  27. 27.

    opiejeanne

    @ziggy: And cabbages and onions and sweet potatoes, but especially the Kole-related items. What is up with the cabbage hoarding?

    It wasn’t me, I didn’t buy any canned veggies.

  28. 28.

    Philbert

    Our local Costco in Issaquah east of Seattle will deliver for free if the order is over $75. Likely some limits, but saves pushing a 100-lb cart!

  29. 29.

    eachother

    Thanks to all you all for sharing your experiences and guidance.  Not knowing the future is a blessing.  Preparing for it is a necessity.

  30. 30.

    opiejeanne

    @opiejeanne: More for GOKU:

    microwave popcorn, oatmeal, frozen toaster waffles, syrup, dry salami (cheaper at Cost Plus), dried fruit, individual yogurts, and shelf-stable milk. This last item I ordered from Amazon, and they’ve just pushed delivery back a week. I only intend to use it for baking.

    Baking powder, baking soda, cooking oils. Oatmeal packets.

    And now I think I’m getting sick. I hope it’s just a cold, but the lady who cut my hair two weeks ago was sick and coughing, before anyone knew it was here, and my youngest and her husband were  getting over a nasty cold (??!!) came to visit on Friday.

  31. 31.

    ziggy

    @opiejeanne: oh no! hope it’s just a garden-variety cold. Cabbages do last a long time in the fridge. I don’t do very well trying to keep onions and potatoes!  What is the trick? I detest canned veggies other than tomatoes. I should probably start thinking of what I would need in a quarantine situation.

  32. 32.

    opiejeanne

    @ziggy: So far I can’t tell if it’s allergies or a cold, but my sinuses announced themselves yesterday afternoon. It’s almost like someone snapped a little rubber band against the inside of my nose , but not as painful. A “twang!” moment. I’ve noticed this before. There’s also a slight headache.

    I decided to treat it as if it’s an allergy, snuffling up that nasal inhaler stuff that you can now buy over the counter.

  33. 33.

    opiejeanne

    @ziggy: Potatoes like to be kept in the dark, in a dry cool place. Onions like that too. The back wall of our pantry is fairly dark, and we have some produce racks that stack on the shelf.  We also have used a flat cardboard box in the garage with a piece of burlap over the top for our homegrown potatoes. The garage is cooler than the house, about 55 degrees right now.

  34. 34.

    opiejeanne

    When I was at the Costco pharmacy yesterday, the man ahead of me was asked if he’d had the flu shot. He answered that he was waiting to see the efficacy of the current one. It’s only been out since *checks the calendar* late August? Six months, and he’s still waiting to see if it works?

    This was not a young man, he was probably in his late 60s, but his wife wasn’t with him. If he has a wife.

  35. 35.

    Another Scott

    https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/03/why-airport-screening-wont-stop-spread-coronavirus

    Why airport screening won’t stop the spread of coronavirus
    By Dennis NormileMar. 6, 2020 , 12:35 PM

    If you have traveled internationally the past 2 months, you may have encountered them: health officers briefly pointing a thermometer gun at your forehead or watching as you go by to check for signs of a cough or difficulty breathing. Many countries are now watching arriving and departing air passengers who might suffer from the viral disease COVID-19; some require passengers to fill out health declarations. (Some also simply ban or quarantine those who have recently been in outbreak hot spots.)

    Exit and entry screening may look reassuring, but experience with other diseases shows it’s exceedingly rare for screeners to detect infected passengers. Just last week, eight passengers who later tested positive for COVID-19 arrived in Shanghai from Italy and passed the airport screeners unnoticed, for example. And even if screeners do find the occasional case, it has almost no impact on the course of an outbreak.

    “Ultimately, measures aimed at catching infections in travelers will only delay a local epidemic and not prevent it,” says Ben Cowling, an epidemiologist at the University of Hong Kong. He and others say screening is often instituted to show that a government is taking action, even if the impact is marginal.

    Still, researchers say, there can be benefits. Evaluating and quizzing passengers before they board planes—exit screening—may prevent some who are sick or were exposed to a virus from traveling. Entry screening, done on arrival at the destination airport, can be an opportunity to gather contact information that is useful if it turns out an infection did spread during a flight and to give travelers guidance on what to do if they become ill.

    […]

    Cheers,
    Scott.

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