Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Let there be snark.

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

“Can i answer the question? No you can not!”

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

I wonder if trump will be tried as an adult.

I didn’t have alien invasion on my 2023 BINGO card.

Conservatism: there are some people the law protects but does not bind and others who the law binds but does not protect.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

Shallow, uninformed, and lacking identity

When do the post office & the dmv weigh in on the wuhan virus?

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

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

How can republicans represent us when they don’t trust women?

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

We still have time to mess this up!

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

You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 Coronavirus / COVID-19 Coronavirus Update – Tuesday/Wednesday, March 24/25

COVID-19 Coronavirus Update – Tuesday/Wednesday, March 24/25

by | 31 Comments

This post is in: , ,

Heartening thread:

Uganda:


Ghana:


Nigeria:

Reader Interactions

31Comments

  2. 2.

    eclare

    From the Alan White tweet, this coronavirus is so contagious, one person could infect 59,000 people. Wow. Thank you, AL.

  3. 3.

    La Nonna

    Finally, Italy is really enforcing shelter in place, we were stopped twice yesterday at 7.30 a.m. on our way to stand in line for entry to the supermarket. We showed our self-certification that we were not actively sick or had been tested as positive for the virus, (but without universal testing, how would we know?), carabinieri reminded us that the penalty for leaving home without a good reason is now fines of 1,000 eu and possible confiscation of the car. There is quite a feeling of impending doom here, and we know that until antibody testing, if we can even seroconvert against Covid-19, this will go on for many months or a year. Either antibody testing or a vaccine will be the key to unlocking us.

  4. 4.

    OzarkHillbilly

    I had to call in for refills on Woof’s meds. I was pleasantly surprised when the vet’s office told me I would have to pay by phone from the parking lot and they would bring it out to me. Knowing it is the vets, who are well versed in infectious diseases for animals after all, I shouldn’t have been surprised, but this is a small red town, in a very red county, in the reddest of states. It’s nice to see the fact that the stupid isn’t universal be demonstrated.

    A nice employer story from Redville too: As previously reported my wife’s employer asked all their employees to work from home if at all possible last week. Sadly, my wife was unable to make it work via our satellite internet. So she went back to working the evening shift at the office. The very empty office. In an employee chat room she made a comment about how “eerie” it was being alone in this building that she was used to having at least a dozen and a half other people inside when she was working, and when she walked out at 11:30 PM, her car was the only one in the lot. That was all she ever said about it. In fact, when she had told me of it I offered to drive up and meet her in the lot and she just pshawed the suggestion saying it wasn’t that big a deal.

    One of the bosses saw her comment tho. Monday she got a call and they told her her shift had been changed to day shift and her night shift had been given to someone who could work from home.

    As one who is extremely distrustful of all things corporate in America, and am always waiting for the shiv to slip between the ribs, it would appear that this is a company that really does care about their employees and are proving it every day with all the proactive measures they are taking now, up to and including a very generous paid leave program of, iirc up to 18 weeks.

  5. 5.

    Betty Cracker

    @La Nonna: Glad you are hanging in there. What a terrible situation. I’m afraid before too long, many of us will be in the same boat.

    I believe you’re right about the importance of antibody testing. With such a high infection rate and wide range of symptoms (from none to severe), it’s really important to develop that capacity so people who are immune can know their status and help protect those who are sick/not immune.

  7. 7.

    Mary G

    @OzarkHillbilly: Good to hear. Both the vet and your wife’s company.

    ETA: Just saw that Prince Charles has tested positive, but not Camilla. They are quarantined at home, so hopefully he just has a mild case.

  8. 8.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @MagdaInBlack: My wife started there 3 (?) months ago. It had been a local cable/communications provider, mostly family owned. Just before she got hired Cable One bought them. Part of me wonders how much of this is a hangover from the old days, but the work from home mandate required a considerable outlay of capitol to gear up for it, the leave policy was obviously instituted from the top (first 8 weeks at full pay, next 10 weeks at 3/4) so obviously those 2 come from the top.

    I have no idea how big Cable One is.

  9. 9.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    The #COVID19 numbers are skyrocketing — now >422,000.
    The USA ranks 3rd in the world with >55,000 #conoravirus cases — 7% of the global total. Look at the slope of the pandemic — the yellow graphic bottom right.

    Yes, and look at the charts for the SF Bay Area, being a pack of Liberards just saved my life, so suck on it you Red State anti science twats.

  11. 11.

    R-Jud

    Let’s hope he’s right (from the Guardian’s Liveblog of a science committee meeting in Parliament):

    Ferguson says that, under the policies that were in force earlier, the NHS would still have been overwhelmed – even with the extra critical beds available.

    Now, in the light of the new measures, he says he thinks in some areas intensive care units will get very close to capacity.

    But overall, across the nation as a whole, he says he is reasonably confident that the NHS will have the resources to cope.

  12. 12.

    MagdaInBlack

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    900,000 customers. You may be right: hangover from the old days.

    But, Im cynical, having had my smaller company bought out by BigMegaWeCouldGivaShite Corp. ?

    Stay safe.

  13. 13.

    Jeffro

    I think we’re gonna need to test the world if we want to beat this thing now.  Wild.

    “2020: the year we took EVERYONE’S temp and swabbed their noses.”

    That’s just a lot of swabs, is what I’m sayin’…

  15. 15.

    MaryL

    @OzarkHillbilly: I believe Cable One has somewhere around 700k-800k broadband subscribers and less than half that in video subscribers.  It’s a really interesting company and one of the first (and certainly the largest for a long time) to embrace the idea of phasing out their video services.  It’s seems to be a successful model so far, but the rest of the industry is watching them closely.

  16. 16.

    debbie

    Trump always appalls me, but I’m even more appalled after hearing a clip of him saying he doesn’t want to invoke the National Defense Act because he thinks it’s “socialist.” Money Over Lives: the new Christianity.

  17. 17.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Jeffro: I think we’re gonna need to test the world if we want to beat this thing now. Wild.

    The testing is for the leadership not the individuals. And if a country’s leadership wants to do a Trump and pretend there is no problem, they will find out the hard way their county has the pandemic like Russia just did when the death rates shoots up to catastrophic levels.

  21. 21.

    Kirk Spencer

    So a quick comment about Houston before I go to work. Houston – or more accurately Harris County – issued a ‘stay home’ order. Semantics, I know, but basically you’re supposed to stay home unless you’re an employee of an essential industry/business, in which case the company decides if you stay home.

    It’s a half step.

    It’s the 16 “essential” industries plus groceries and food (and alcohol). Take-out/delivery restaurants are exempt. Lawn workers are exempt. Construction is exempt. And the list goes on.

    The good is that based on traffic this morning it is affecting 3/4 of the area’s residents. The bad news it’s only 3/4.

    One thing worth keeping in mind, though, is that Houston is built on oil. And as an adjunct plus the really good port here we’re big on transportation. So anything short of ‘everyone lock down we don’t care unless you’re medical’ is going to leave 40% of the employers open – which implies that with only 1/4 of people on the roads a lot of the businesses are issuing stay-at-home for a lot of their people.

    Me, I run a shipping and receiving warehouse for a company, and the product moved is used all the time. Nope, not going further. Rules, etc. But the bottom line is that while I’m not on the medical front I’ve got to pay attention to infection risks and preventive measures for warehouse workers who come in contact with over the road drivers — and vice versa.

    Back to Houston. It’s going to have an impact, but it’s frustrating to know what it /could/ be. Oh, and frightening to know what it could be if some people’s  “protect the economy” stupidity sways it all.

  22. 22.

    PST

    I noticed discussion above of using bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) to stimulate the immune system. This is odd stuff — a weaken form of bovine tuberculosis (!?) that causes a general immune reaction, not a specific response to the coronavirus. I know about BCG because it is used in the treatment of bladder cancer to provoke harsh inflammation in the bladder to destroy tumor cells that get loose during surgery. I’ve never had it, but I hear it’s really unpleasant.

  23. 23.

    MagdaInBlack

    @PST:

    Well, that explains why I googled tb vaccine, and now I’m getting an ad for bladder cancer treatment.

    That was quick.

  24. 24.

    scribbler

    Thank you AL for these daily updates.  They must take a tremendous amount of time to compile, and I appreciate the wide range of information they bring to my attention.  I hope you can keep them coming!

  26. 26.

    Cameron

    It’s not like we don’t have a model of a successful non-authoritarian response, and that’s South Korea.  Of course, our national leadership will learn nothing from the SK experience, but it does show what’s possible.

  28. 28.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @R-Jud: Yeah I considered that, just felt like he might be giving old Boris some of the trump sycophant treatment. Not saying he is, just that I am waiting for confirmation from other sources.

  31. 31.

    SteverinoCT

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Just before she got hired Cable One bought them. Part of me wonders how much of this is a hangover from the old days,

    I work for a small telecommunications shop that was bought out by PrettyBigCorp. As a network engineer I can work from home, and did about once a week on average, doc appts and such. When the CoVirus came up, as a hypertensive diabetic I decided that WFH was the way to go, and notified my boss: previously all that was required. But now he kicked it upstairs, and I was required to open a claim with the insurance for FMLA/disability, which was a PITA and my case didn’t really fit their choices so I’m sure it was munged up. Just as that gets rolling, the next day the company issues their Policy, which let me WFH. Now I had to kill the claim, which wasn’t so hard, except I’m still getting automated haven’t-got-the-message stuff, like the paperwork in the mail today. OTOH, I’ve already lost about 12 lbs. just by virtue of eating at home rather than out (I never got the hang of brown-bagging it).

Comments are closed.