The Wuhan Corona virus continues to spread. The exact mode is still in some debate. While droplet transmission is not in question, there is disagreement about transmission via aerosolization. More recently doctors like Marc Siegel on Fox opine that the virus is spread by symptomatic patients coughing or sneezing upon others. So how do we fight this other than accommodating the obvious steps?
There are divergent paths to be considered: the ones in which countries are seeing fewer cases and deaths and those which continue to see them rising.
Forget China and pay no attention to anything happening there. They lie about everything. China stopped reporting mild cases in February and are under-reporting cases now.
Japan and Korea seem to have a relatively good handle on the disease.
In Japan masks for all seems to be a very good policy
Masks seems to be why Tokyo is business as usual without lockdowns or quarantines: “An 80% compliance rate [in wearing face masks] essentially eliminated the influenza outbreak.” https://t.co/xvdXGs9fJg pic.twitter.com/QsYnuOL8en
— Wrath Of Gnon (@wrathofgnon) March 22, 2020
From the study cited:
It was found that a 50% compliance in donning the device resulted in a significant (at least 50% prevalence and 20% cumulative incidence) reduction in risk for fitted and unfitted N95 respirators, high-filtration surgical masks, and both low-filtration and high-filtration pediatric masks. An 80% compliance rate essentially eliminated the influenza outbreak. The results of the present study, as well as the application of the model to related influenza scenarios, are potentially useful to public health officials in decisions involving resource allocation or education strategies.
Here is the link to the study and others.
The fastest growing venue for COVID 19 in the US is New York City. IMO, it is because of one thing- mass transit.
People are jammed together in trains, subways and buses and are at high risk for contracting the virus should an infected individual be on board. Realistically, mass transit can’t be halted but there are measures which can and should be taken.
-
N95 masks for everyone
I know there is a shortage of masks but at some point this will be resolved. The earliest supplies should first be sent to NYC and other urban areas which see continued increase in viral loads and then on to rural areas. Everybody should get one. They can be reused if properly decontaminated.
2. Take the temperature of all trying to board mass transit
Won’t be easy, but even if done on a revolving basis can limit exposures.
3. Limit the number of riders on any train, bus or subway to ensure “social distancing”
Again, a real inconvenience but necessary.
4. Refuse boarding to symptomatic people
This should be completely unnecessary but unfortunately it is.
In the meantime people should continue to observe all of the CDC recommendations.
And frankly, isolate Bill DeBlasio and keep him quarantined and keep him in isolation and out of public contact until this crisis is past. Andrew Cuomo is doing a good job. DeBlasio need to get out of the way.
DrJohn has been a health care professional for more than 30 years. In addition to clinical practice he has done extensive research and has published widely with over 70 original articles and abstracts in the peer-reviewed literature. DrJohn is well known in his field and has lectured on every continent except for Antarctica. He has been married to the same wonderful lady for over 30 years and has three kids- two sons, both of whom are attorneys and one daughter on her way into the field of education.
DrJohn was brought up with the concept that one can do well if one is prepared to work hard but nothing in life is guaranteed.
Except for liberals being foolish.
@Ronald J. Ward: You’ve passed the point of being a serious person worth acknowledging.
Ah, those Freudian slips. Like a cult member, a Mormon or even Jim Jones , you’re here to spread your vitriolic message like a bad 80s televangelist.
Too many free-thinkers here, bub.
You can’t even have an actual conversation, because you don’t actually have a point of view.
Either crazy, or a paid troll.
Ignored.
@Deplorable Me:
“What he CAN do is make it worse, however, by lightening up on containment efforts in favor of sending people back to work prematurely.
True. Good thing there is NO indication that might happen.”
Ummm… Today Trump explained that the USA is not MADE to be shut down, that the cure of shutting down was worse than the disease, and that HE would be soon “reevaluating” his “social distancing” recommendations. Crap! “Social distancing” was just a recommendation, not a law, and it works more than those dust masks. If he retracts that recommendation, we’ll be screwed, and him with us when the numbers just keep getting worse.
As for harsh criticism, that’s politics, and every president gets it from his opponents. Politics is humanity at its ugliest, and no political party has an exclusive hook in that swamp.
And yes, massive economic stimulus is called for. A money-printing free-for-all is worth trying, as what we did after the 1929 stock market crash didn’t work – people were selling pencils on street corners until WW2 put them back to work. Never mind that it hurts retirees on fixed incomes in the long run, as inflation will be the eventual result. I bought 250K of gold when it was at $1200/oz. last year, figuring that the Don wasn’t going to come close to a balanced budget, and now that is off the table for good. Like I said, not his fault. I’m just glad I didn’t trust him when he said his tax break to the rich would fire up the economy so much that the treasury would have to open its windows to let the cash overflow escape.
What I don’t like about the stimulus that so far isn’t happening is that BOTH sides are treating it as “Your side gets THIS and our side gets THAT,” and we have to agree to the whole package all at once because none of these give-aways are worth doing on their merit alone. That’s BS. First, it doesn’t have to be done all at once. And I disagree with the Dems that the cash give-away is bad. It puts money in the pockets of the NOT-rich and it will definitely trickle into the economy more than monster gifts to large corporations that will share the bounty with their top execs or use it to finance stock buy-backs. I think Dem’s are objecting because it benefits THEIR constituents, potentially buying their political allegiance, and THEY didn’t think of it first. But they risk the allegiance of those same constituents if they succeed in stopping the payments. The payments are a good idea, and that should be voted on ALONE. Same for any corporate bale-out. If it is a good idea, it should stand on its own merit, not need to be bargained for against some other pork. And why can’t congress agree on funding an increase in the strategic stockpile of medical supplies? By itself! This isn’t going to be the last bug we face. Instead of working so hard on stockpiling upgraded strategic nukes, why not put some REAL money into our health system. So far, Health in the USA is just a commercial venture, intentionally designed to just barely meet our baseline needs… effectively, economically, but with no excess capacity. That isn’t helping us a whole lot right now, and the fact that our capitalist economy can’t afford to be shut down like the Chinese economy can means that we can’t even come close to stopping this bug, never mind the next one. No, not Trump’s fault. But the cheapskate shouldn’t have shut down the pandemic response team. It couldn’t have stopped this bug, and it probably wouldn’t have even helped, but the optics are terrible for Trump, and politics being the ugly thing it is, that could be what sinks Trump in November.
One other thing: what is with “Chinese Virus”? In 1345, it wasn’t the “French Plague” and when Cook brought syphilis to Polynesia, it wasn’t “English syphilis”. HIV isn’t “Ugandan Monkey Aids,” malaria isn’t “shithole country mosquito disease,” and when the Conquistadors brought diseases that decimated the indigenous populations of Central and South America, it wasn’t “Spanish smallpox” that did them in. COVID-19 is a scientifically, medically appropriate name, and “Bat Virus #26″ would be a reasonable colloquial moniker, but pray tell, why is your hero bent on insulting the people who buy more treasury bonds than any other group in the World? The virus is no more their fault than it is Trump’s. I would no more insult the Chinese by calling COVID-19 THEIR virus than I would insult Americans by calling Trump THEIR president.” The majority of Americans DIDN’T vote for him, so calling him the “Electoral College’s President” would be the correct title. Right?
@Nathan Blue:
Thanks for the welcome.
I’m shuttered – 70, with diabetes and a pretty aggressive arrhythmia. I’m laying low for as long as it takes. An organization I was scheduled to address in late April has cancelled, as has another I was giving a presentation to in July. Both conventions cancelled, and probably both hotel’s cancellation fees will be forgiven because of government action… Hilton will probably be shuttered by then anyway. Never mind Trump’s DESIRE to get his precious economy rolling again before November. The people won’t come. They won’t shop, won’t spend, won’t meet, won’t eat out until they BELIEVE that it’s safe. And for all the “You’re FIRED!” that Trump likes to growl at his hirees, when it comes to making people feel good, his bed-side manner leaves something to be desired. I get the distinct feeling that if he was strapped to a lie-detector every time he addresses people, the red lights would be blinking like a Christmas tree on steroids.
One last point. Your:
“Respectfully, do you have any statements or proof to back that up?”
I get that Trump’s base thinks he’s an angel, never lies or even exaggerates, and has done nothing but GREAT stuff for the USA. Well, my take is that until Feb 20, he HAD done a lot of good stuff for people who owned stock. But in the last month, ALL of those gains have evaporated. ALL OF THEM! Your 401K sits today below where it was in 2016 unless you’ve been adding more money to it, and even then it’s been pounded pretty bad. The economy is Trump’s Ace in the hold, so to speak, and it has magically turned into a deuce… and it’s not “wild.” That’s my take, and there are a WHOLE lot of voters out there who feel the same way. After four years of Trump’s constant drama, I’m ready for a senile geezer who will sleep through the next four. Simple as that. No “proof” needed.
@George Wells:
it isn’t.,
That’s not what he said. Why don’t you quote him correctly?
No president in modern history has been so vilified, and misquoted, as you just did. Remember Hillary was supposed to win and when she didn’t, the Hate Trump insanity began.
Well, goody, goody for you. And that is important to us why?
Because it started in China and because the Chinese government kept it hidden until it was too late. Why didn’t you list the “Spanish” flu; the “German” measles, MERS, and other viruses named after their origin? Perhaps you would be happier if I called it the Chi-Com flu since it was the CCP that withheld information from the world?
I can say one thing for you, George; you haven’t changed. You’re still a know-it-all braggart and still full of crap.
@retire05:
Look at what I wrote again. I didn’t quote the president. Neither did I misrepresent what he said.
Science has a protocol for naming diseases. It works. Trump has a protocol for insulting adversaries. He must think it works for him, because his flock of parrots mimic his every idiosyncrasy. And I guess we’ll see in November, since the winner always gets to write the history.
And you’re still breathing. Pity.
@George Wells:
How kind of you to say its a pity I’m still breathing, i.e. NOT DEAD.
You are a really piece of work, Wells, and just as hateful as ever. Thanks for showing your true colors so early in your resurrection here at FA.
@George Wells: It is difficult to take you seriously when you use debunked lies as part of your analysis. The current virus like the Black Plague is simply a description, We know know area of origin in the 1300s is was simply another plague, maybe they would have called it the Flea plague if they would have known. It was called the ‘Black Death’ because of the swollen lymph nodes that appeared on people’s bodies that turned the skin black as you may know, and the Black death wasnt racist.
You may be ready for the geezer , we prefer to know whos in charge. Not just someone in the back telling Joe Dementia what to sign. Hell we might just as well have the drooler Justin Trudeau.
@retire05: Those aren’t just goals; they are poison pills. Pelosi wants deliberately to destroy this package.
@George Wells:
Trump is in the “hope” business. While Democrats are trying to incite fear and panic, Trump has to lay out the brutal facts without spreading despair and hopelessness. In case there is any confusion, the goal is to defeat this epidemic and return to normal as soon as possible.
I don’t see lying and intentional fear mongering as “criticism”. Hopefully, neither do you. Hopefully.
Yes, going back to work and not handouts of newly minted money is the desired path to recovery. That’s what brought about the Depression recovery, not Roosevelt’s handouts. Bad economic policies did not bring about this downturn. A strong, solid economy existed before this epidemic; it just has to be put on life support to survive until the epidemic is defeated.
What I don’t like about the stimulus is that it is intended to help the economy, which helps the people, which helps the country, which helps the people. It’s not about massaging one side or the other. However, Democrats look at it as an opportunity to cash in on a crisis. Failing that, they crash the entire recovery which they would blame on Trump, with the media’s help.
Trump didn’t shut down the pandemic team.
There’s nothing wrong with calling it the “Chinese” or “Wutan” virus unless one is essentially racist themselves and can only think along those lines. Note that before the Chinese threatened the media with a spanking, they were all referring to it as the Wutan or Chinese virus… because that’s where it originated. Trump emphasizes it to push back on China accusing the US of starting the virus in China. I always find it odd how every expects Trump to be the “polite gentleman” as those having that expectation trash him relentlessly.
No, his actual title is President of the United States of America and he IS proving to be one of the best.
It’s rather clear why George has been gone. He didn’t know where he was and he still is apparently at a loss. It’s clear that the only thing the dimocrats are interested in is sinking Trump and greasing the skids for themselves in November. It’s a hopeless cause for them as they are flailing without a life preserver. When they have no one but Nancy and Chuckie to depend on, that’s like tying an anchor around their leg. It’s absolutely amazing to me that just because someone feels a loyalty to a party that they will buy into or believe any lie in an attempt to destroy the other party, regardless of how well that party and it’s leader is doing in leading the free world. Is the stock market down? Sure, will it be back in the 20 thous within the next two weeks, absolutely. Now would be a good time to put your money into your 401 funds.
@George Wells: But do they blame Trump for the market drop, which is clearly do to a global pandemic?
There’s no proof that Trump has suddenly lost support, actually there seems to be the opposite. the voters who will not vote for him we’re not going to vote for him before the coronavirus.
I know the left and Democrats are trying so hard to build the new hoax the Trump is to blame for the coronavirus, but it’s really weak.
This isn’t the silver bullet the Democrats hope for.
And go easy on the so-called Trump supporters. We both remember how infallible Obama was with his legions of pop culture and Saturday night live induced followers. Nothing he did was ever questioned.
@Deplorable Me:
A bit much, in my opinion. For that, I HOPE Trump opens up the economy tomorrow – or next week, the difference won’t matter – and the virus will positively explode. Fauci will be proven right and Trump will take an extra half-million deaths deposited to his account. That should be enough to seal his fate in November. I wonder if his position isn’t motivated by his desire to thin the ranks of citizens on Social Security and Medicare, leaving more room for another tax-break-for-the-rich. Trump HOPES the stock market recovers quickly, and is willing to rob the next generation of its financial security to make it so. After that, I think his hopes center on how well the grass grows on the Mar-a-Lago golf course greens.
Well, then who did? It was shut down in 2018. His presidency. The buck stops where? His war-mongering lad dog didn’t do his business on the White House lawn without his master’s consent, so don’t blame it on Bolton. “I didn’t know anything about that” isn’t an acceptable excuse, even if it ISN’T a lie.
No, Nathan Blue, I DON’T blame Trump for COVID-19. I AM worried that he is on the verge of making it worse. There is a difference.
And Redteam, I wouldn’t worry about Trump’s reelection. Democrats have a long history of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Trump has succeeded in unprecedented measure stacking the judiciary conservative for the next half-century, and that legacy will be his lasting fame. History may or may not vilify him for his handling of COVID-19 – that remains to be determined. Similarly, “his” economy may or may not recover to his credit – again an open question. But his impact on the courts is a done deal, and conservatives may celebrate that without remorse.
@retire05:
My pleasure.
A well-placed thorn in the side can resurrect the dead.
@Redteam: The left WANTS to believe all the lies that they can find and help spread them in order to hurt Trump and boost Democrats. I have very few liberal “friends” on Facebook (they tend to “unfriend” when they read things they don’t like) but those I see all propagate any lie they see. My own nephew was recently ranting about how Trump promoted the hydroxychloroquine as a miracle cure and how stupid he is for it. Of course, while there is EVIDENCE and DATA (aka “science”) backing up the expectation it will help, he never claimed it was a cure. Just the latest in a long series of lies the left has promoted and their hungry willingness to accept and spread them.
@George Wells:
Well, who else is? Biden? He has a whole list of industries (JOBS) he promises to kill off if President. Bernie? See Venezuela. Just as the markets exploded almost the moment Trump was declared the winner (the opposite of what Democrats predicted) so would that crash if either of these idiots got elected.
So, your anticipation would be that suddenly, without justification and regardless of current conditions, Trump would suddenly order everyone to go out and lick each other? I don’t know where you live, but where I live, there are very, very few cases. Dallas is a hot spot, locked down to control spread, but in outlying areas, not much risk. After a few weeks of sheltering, the viral spread will be mostly shut down. Symptoms will be surfacing. The HAVES and HAVE NOT’S will be clear. Why not open areas that CAN be opened?
Or not. Trump offered light at the end of the tunnel, not a scheduled promise. But, you knew that, didn’t you? Imagining what’s the worst thing he might do, then imagining he’s doing it, THEN eviscerating him for “doing” it is what you on the left do, isn’t it?
Yeah, since those are his electoral bread and butter, that’s probably his plan. I think you caught him orange-handed. Good boy, Sherlock. And, by the way, thanks for validating the point I made above.
Well, actually, no he didn’t.
Media LIES about Trump dissolving the CDC unit to deal with epidemics
http://minx.cc:1080/?post=386361
No, Trump did not fire CDC pandemic specialist or defund CDC
https://www.analyzingamerica.org/fact-check-no-trump-did-not-fire-pandemic-specialist-or-defund-cdc/?utm_source=palin&fbclid=IwAR3wPqE0X2tnxI083ghOm-hoUpdiYSMaZx-y6TNaIJb-UvkyF-Z3smMAJD0
https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/tim-graham/2020/03/17/ex-trump-official-pushes-back-pbs-reporters-argument-trump
Some would call them “Constitutionalists”, as in those who judge based on what the Constitution say rather than what liberal dogma directs. And, true, Trump has turned the left’s campaign to turn the courts into simply another of their political weapons around. Hopefully, Ginsburg will stop clinging to relevancy soon and Trump can appoint ANOTHER Supreme Court Justice, which is why I voted for him in the first place (to keep that power out of the criminal Hillary’s hands). Game, set, match. No remorse, no shame, no guilt. It’s what is best for the country.
@Deplorable Me:
Did you notice the light-speed in which the Democratic Party shed the Sanders yoke? After Biden DIDN’T stumble in South Carolina, all the rest of the contenders fell on their own swords for the good of the NOT SOCIALIST Democrats without whom non-Republicans cannot win so much as a NOT VERMONT local election. Yes, there is a contingent of socialists who occasionally gather around the Democratic party like moths that are attracted to a bright light. Democrats have their communists, too, just like the GOP has its White Supremacists and its Nazis. Funny at times how each party panders to its irrelevant extremists during the primaries, only to tack toward the center for the general. All the same, the Sanders dump was in record time. That shows that socialism doesn’t have the heart of the Democratic party. Oh, Sanders is still clinging, but only in the hope that he’ll be given a voice when the platform gets negotiated. I know it is more difficult for the GOP to vilify Democrats if they reject the Sanders brand of Socialism, but you’ll make do just fine without him.
As for the pandemic unit, I never said it was the CDC. Your Breitbart link confirmed that it was Bolton that shut down the NSC pandemic unit, saying that it was formed to address Ebola, and that purpose was satisfied when Ebola faded. But the unit wasn’t an Ebola unit, it was a pandemic unit, and the threat of pandemic obviously remains. Leaving the NSC unit in place may not have made a lick of difference, but like I said, shuttering it looks like a bad move in retrospect.
Ginsburg did more than any other jurist to alter the landscape of human rights – particularly women’s – in this country. Her elevation to the SCOTUS was her reward for the significance of her work, and her Senate confirmation was almost unanimous. Care to explain Kavanaugh’s work that earned him his split confirmation?
The screaming about Trump’s stated impatience with the “shutdown” is coming as much from Republicans as it is from Dems. Lindsey Graham weighed in exactly where I did. We’re raising the hubbub because we don’t believe that Trump is smart enough to make the right decision on his own. Already he is marginalizing Fauci, as he does everyone who does not confirm his “hunches.” Great way to do science. Oh, right. Trump doesn’t BELIEVE in science. He only drags in a few scientists to give his “team” the illusion of competence, but then only keeps them as long as they pass his “Yes-Men” test.
@George Wells: How are you going to explain away Biden’s scramble to the far, far left in order to try to out-socialism Bernie and Betsy? “Just kidding!”?
Just like the LEFT has their white supremacists and violent fascists… who are NOT going to be happy with the DNC delivering the shaft to Bernie… AGAIN. If only they would stand behind their rule to only allow Democrats to run as Democrats, they wouldn’t find themselves in such a rut. But, they have some aversion to honesty.
What Bernie’s decline shows, actually, is what we already knew about socialists; they are lazy. They like to go out, march, yell, riot and trash but somehow casting a vote is too much trouble. Just as reliably, they AREN’T going to vote for Biden or anyone else. In fact, they have threatened violence against the Democrat convention. Well, you reap what you sow, I suppose. Just like the German social democrats found out, you can’t always control the violent thugs you employ to try and silence the opposition.
But, in summary, the pandemic unit was never disbanded. It still exists, is functioning and contributing to the resolution of this crisis. It just is no longer a fat, bloated, over-staffed backwater for loafers.
Kavanaugh was a proven jurists… THAT’S what he did. The bigger question is, what did he do to deserve the lies the left heaped upon him? Still looking for the answer to that one, other than the glaring, flashing neon answer that Democrats are liars.
The only screaming I see is from the left, screaming lies.
@George Wells: Gingsberg, Ginsburg had recommended legislative changes that would reduce the age of consent for statutory rape under federal law from 16 to 12. Old enough to bleed old enough to breed? Barbie dolls to baby carriage. She is just an old leftist who lied about retirement if Trump elected. A pedophiles favorite judge.
Still lying about the NSC pandemic people I see. How many departments and task forces do we need to pay for that do the exact same thing?
Placing the experts under a new boss didnt change their function a jot or a tiddle.
Even politifact rates it as a half truth.
Peddling your half lies poison isnt working.
@Deplorable Me:
So why do you keep on about Bernie? Dems aren’t giving him the nomination, and no matter what the so-called “Platform” ends up promising, that whole exercise is just lip-service to various factions of the coalition. Not to mention the rather unlikely prospect of Biden actually defeating Trump. Like you said, Dems are lazy. The young didn’t get out and vote for Bernie, so they sure as heck won’t bother to vote for a snoozer like Biden. And the Blacks who didn’t get out and vote for Hillary will only marginally increase their support for Joe. He’s not Black. So what are you worried about? Dems are screaming… Yeah, they ALWAYS scream. But bother to vote? On the likely chance that the economy recovers IN SPITE of Trump’s efforts to fool the public about the virus (remember when he said that there were only a few cases of the virus and then it would be gone), any Dem with a significant 401K, if not vote for him outright, will at least stay home and hope he gets back to his upward redistribution of wealth to their benefit. You have nothing to worry about.
@George Wells:
It’s clear you are wordsmithing a lie to make it more believable. So let’s look at facts, not your hyperbole, shall we?
From the very media outlet that started the whole bro-haha:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/03/20/was-white-house-office-global-pandemics-eliminated/
Read THE FACTS It was Obama who shut down the White House Health and Security office. in 2009. In 2016, TWO YEARS AFTER THE EBOLA OUTBREAK, he created the Directorate for Global Health Security and Biodefense. Got that Wells? For seven years there was no White House organization to do the task that you’re claiming Trump demolished.
Read the entire damn article, Wells, and then never come back here with your left wing media lies.
IOW, Ginsburg supported your favorite agenda, helping to totally remake social structure.
You’re correct. Ginburg had been a strong advocate FOR abortion, which is the Democrat sacred cow.
That is not due to her judicial stance. It is due to the fact that Republicans believe elections do have consequences and were not going to put the President’s choice through was Democrats due to Originalist jurists.
He was borked. End of story. No different than what the racist Democrats did to Clarence Thomas. A high tech lynching describes the Democrats actions perfectly.
@George Wells: In case you missed it, YOU brought up Bernie. I merely laid out for you what is likely to happen after the raw screwing with hot Mentholatum the DNC applied.
Might want to re-read what I wrote. Unless that was some sort of Feudian slip where you believe all Democrats are socialists. Which may be largely true.
@Deplorable Me:
I was agreeing with you. Because your indictment of Democratic voters is essentially correct. Or are you giving them more credit than they deserve? Because I am not. They shredded their candidates before the nominating convention and then picked a loser anyway, and then didn’t bother to vote for her enough to overcome the Electoral College’s interference with popular choice. That wasn’t Republicans’ fault – they played by the rules. It was the Democrats’ fault, plain and simple. Maybe if Hillary had been Black, the outcome would have been different. No matter, it’s water under the bridge, a lesson not learned, an opportunity squandered. America always gets what it deserves, and it clearly deserved Donald Trump. So where is my Freudian slip? I’m just agreeing with you. So are you belatedly defending the Democratic Party that I clearly have some serious issues with, or are you simply disagreeing with everything I say because that’s all you know how to do?
@George Wells: You’ve accused, by implication, all Democrats of being socialists. You would know better than I, I suppose.
@Deplorable Me:
I accused Dems, as a group, of being lazy. I’ll happily add to that: that as a group, they are too diverse to often unite behind one cause with enough enthusiasm to win a general election. That doesn’t address whether or not their various agendas would be a net benefit to the country, or the opposite. But what I have never done is implied that Dems are all socialists. The vigor with which they rejected Bernie Sanders – which I called you attention to – must surely NOT suggest that even a majority of Dems are socialists, much less all of them. What do you suppose all of Trump’s economic “stimulus” amounts to? It surely isn’t “free-market capitalism”. So what is it?
@George Wells: I wrote:
You wrote:
I didn’t say “Dems”… I said socialists. You appeared to equate Democrats with socialists, which is GETTING to be the case, but not quite there yet.
THAT’S you’ve done to imply Democrats are all lazy socialists.
There was no “vigor” in rejecting Bernie; his support stopped showing up and Biden was getting all of the support from the drop-outs. Same effect, different implications for the party. The DNC still makes the selections.
@Deplorable Me:
Well, when you consider the experience of European socialisms, with their ever-increasing burdens of lazy, free-loading home-grown sponges sapping the vitality of their respective economies (never mind the constant infusion of non-assimilating immigrants) and mix that together with the general indifference of many self-identifying Democrats toward their often-unexercised PRIVILEGE to vote, I can see how an undiscerning mind might confuse the two. But they are not at all the same, and I do not equate them. Neither do I confuse rightwing political parties in the countries where they periodically wrest control of their respective governments through elections. We do that here, and we also hear about the see-saw politics of Israel, France and England (and a lesser extent Germany) because these countries are our significant allies, but the lesser NATO countries also have governments that flip between political extremes, and while the individual parties are wildly different than ours, in their more or less routine flipping they are indeed us. It would appear that excepting totalitarian regimes, people who have a degree of legitimate self-determination all reach the subconscious conclusion that, no matter how disruptive, two parties are better than one, and that the most equitable arrangement is to give each in turn a swing at the ball. Most presidents are given two terms to prove themselves, after which their accumulated failures compel voters to give the opposing party its turn at the plate. Seems fair enough to me.
March 25, 2020 – Florida coronavirus update for Wednesday: DeSantis won’t issue stay-home order as cases surpass 1,600, Orange stay-home order begins Thursday
As of this morning, there are 1,682 confirmed coronavirus cases in Florida. 20.5 percent of Florida’s resident population is over age 65. They’ve already allowed a Spring Break petri-dish party to proceed uninterrupted, with participants and possible hitch-hiking viruses dispersing back to their countless points of origin.
What is this guy thinking?
@Greg:
What are New Yorkers thinking by fleeing New York and taking the possibility they have been infected to Florida? On Monday alone, there were 190 flights originating from New York, Connecticut and New Jersey. What the hell is wrong with those people?
Then there is this:
https://nypost.com/2020/03/19/we-should-blow-up-the-bridges-coronavirus-leads-to-class-warfare-in-hamptons/
@Greg:
I’m not sure he is
@retire05: New Yorkers feel as if they don’t need to follow any stinkin rules.
The Gov of FLA ordered them to self-quarantine for 2 weeks upon arrival in FLA from both NY and NJ.
Do they obey?
Hell no.
Rules, apparently, are for flyover country.
As to optimism, there are a few official reports that the infection/death rates of Covid-19 are overblown by orders of magnitude.
That fact, combined with whatever reports we start to get about that quinine/antibiotic treatment, might be what the nation (even the world) needs to feel optimistic enough to go back out from their social distancing.
If you look at the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus stat page you’ll note an interesting thing.
Lots of countries list recovered patients, but the USA has none listed.
It will also help our optimism when we begin testing people to see how many have had the virus and gotten over it..…recovered from it. These numbers will assist in getting Americans back to work and shopping and eating out.*
So, there are things to look forward to.
PS, George Wells, welcome back, missed you.
*The site has just today listed US recovered persons for the 1st time.
Over 360 of them. https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html
@Nan G:
Sorry… My 93-year-old Mom (who I care for in my home) started hemorrhaging internally last week, so I took her to the ER for a two-day “evaluation”. The bleeding stopped on its own and they released her without looking for the cause, figuring doing so might finish her. Then, four days later she came down with a dry cough and a fever, so I’ve been busy. Good news, though. Now her nose is running and the fever broke – evidently she picked up a rhinovirus (the common cold) not COVID-19 (the Chink Virus).
As for Virus Rebels, they are everywhere. You couldn’t have missed that Louisiana Church that held a service for 1200 last Sunday in direct defiance of the Louisiana Governor’s order limiting crowd sizes to 50 or less. GOD will protect them… yeah, that’s the ticket! Just ask my wife… Morgan Fairchild! I was glad to see that tonight, NBC refrained from giving that nutcase the publicity he obviously wanted. He’ll be on a ventilator in about three weeks, and if there is a GOD, well, Satan will be putting him to work sewing asbestos fiber breathing masks for the rest of his congregation.
I don’t find the virus rebels the least bit surprising, though, as respect for authority of any kind has fallen to just about absolute zero. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Despicable Me, I know that it is 100% the Democrats’ fault because idiots like me vote for traitors like Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer and their fellow criminal conspirators whose sole raison d’etre is to oversee the destruction of America.
I’d rather think that extremism begets extremism, that once Islamic or Muslim extremism rears its ugly head, Christian and Jewish extremism answers the call, and once far right (OR left) extremism proliferates, the other springs into existence just as It’s been said that when GOD… happened, then the Devil also… happened to restore balance. What does good mean in the absence of bad? Either way, the agreement to work out differences civilly has fallen out of fashion, compromise has become an ugly word, and reason has been eclipsed by emotion. Pointless drama produces more adrenalin and occupies fewer brain cells than scholarly debate. The duality in Nature is preserved – intelligence is counterbalanced by stupidity. Or Nature unconsciously thins the herd. Take your pick.
@George Wells: Hope your mother stays safe.
@Nan G:
So far, my state with almost 29 million residents, has seen 974 cases and 12 deaths. Nothing even close to NY, at least not yet, even though we have two major international airline hubs.
Everyone I know is self quarantining, except those friends who are essential workers (PD, FD, linemen, et al)
@George Wells:
Profound………………………..and boring although I hope your mother does well. I don’t think it is a pity she is still breathing.
March 25, 2020 – Hospitals consider universal do-not-resuscitate orders for coronavirus patients
It’s hard to imagine the stresses that medical caregivers must presently be under.
@Deplorable Me:
Thanks.
@retire05:
Boring as it should be. We are by now be more than adequately familiar with the indiscriminate loss of life that is the consequence of life’s need to feed on itself in order to survive. The more any population concentrates its numbers in confined spaces, the more exposed it is to violent death. The COVID-19 should be viewed in this light.
Why any group is “targeted” is as much a measure of the defensive measures it collectively takes as it is a matter of luck. A mass gathering takes an unforced risk but is lucky or not depending on whether a COVID-19-infected person attends. NO surprise that, as tightly as NYC residents are packed, the disease spread quickly and flourishes there.
The problem with taking credit for having a below-median infection rate is that, once community-spread, the virus won’t stop out of political or moral respect. As the profoundly infected areas have discovered, containment works only as an early-inning strategy. Once a state’s immediate need for ventilators exceeds the supply, there is no moral solution.
As for your “pity” remarks, your unsolicited #54 insults addressed to me were answered in kind. You started it.
@George Wells:
Oh, I see; saying you are a braggart (you are) and full of crap (you are) was so insulting it warranted you responding by saying it is a shame I am not dead. And no, I didn’t start the feud. You did, a long time ago with your arrogant attitude that you are so much smarter than the rest of us peons and your One Agenda Politics.
It will not take those who don’t know you to learn you speak out of both sides of your mouth.
@retire05:
Personal attack, warranted or not, has no place in legitimate debate.
I decline your invitation to mud-wrestle.
As you do not dispute my discussion of Dr. John’s subject matter, you evidently agree with the points that I made, and I accept that graciously.
@George Wells:
If you think wishing death on someone is not “mud-wrestling” you are mentally deranged. Never, ever, in my life have I considered an insult to be worthy of wishing death on someone. But obviously you do and you were already covered in mud when you resurfaced here at FA.
And your response to Dr. John has not one damn thing to do with the fact that you think it is a pity I am still breathing.
@Greg:
This issue will peal back the foreskin of our self-professed civilized – and particularly MORAL – approach to healthcare like few before it. There were both family members and healthcare professionals who refused to come in contact with AIDS patients before the routes of transmission for that affliction were known, and you can go back to the plagues of the middle ages to see how well cared for victims can be when nothing about the killer is known. Sad thing now is that, while we understand the disease fairly well, we’re just not prepared for anything like it. Bad little Boy Scouts we.
With the numbers of healthcare providers being infected with COVID-19 being as widely publicized as they are, the easy answer to the question of whether a nurse or a doctor not given adequate PPE should attend infected patients is ABSOLUTELY NOT. The Hypocritic Oath is self-applicable: Do no harm to yourself… FIRST. That leaves you alive to attend to the next, more difficult question: “Who lives and who dies?” “First-come, first-serve” has already been judged invalid – it kills indiscriminately, and in the case of inadequate organ donations, that rule was tossed long ago in favor of RATIONAL choice. LOL! “Rational” choice, as in organs are rationally RATIONED!”
Well, here we are again – this time with ventilators, tests and PPE being rationed. Bravo, commercial healthcare, for letting economic expedience place profits ahead of lives. Maybe now, once the true cost of this pandemic is understood and the systemic flaws in our healthcare philosophy revealed, the minds that matter will realize that preparing for the baseline means that you are never prepared for the exception. Think anyone will pick up on that? I don’t.
@George Wells:
And what did Gov. Cuomo put ahead of lives? Solar panels.
NO ONE anywhere stockpiled ventilators or medical supplies or beds or doctors or nurses to meet the scope of this crisis. It had nothing to do with economics (though spending billions on stuff to just sit in warehouses and deteriorate is a tough sell). It simply had to do with not seeing it coming.
We also saw where health care was heading under Obamacare. Costs were cut simply by gutting what doctors and hospitals were paid. The healthy that were supposed to carry the burden of the elderly sick were not doing their patriotic duty and spending their money on insurance they neither wanted or needed; thanks to “pre-existing conditions” they could wait until they needed it to buy it. Doctors and nurses were retiring to avoid low earnings and new doctors and nurses were not in the pipeline to replace them… because of low earnings. In Europe, we see how socialized medicine led to deterioration and failure in the face of crisis.
Like 9/11 sure, it could happen. But not likely enough to upturn the economy (or civil liberties) to face without it being more certain. Hindsight won’t save lives.
@Deplorable Me:
You made a point that I ALMOST included in my last piece, but didn’t in the hopes that someone would pick up the omission and keep the thread alive. And that point was that NO style of medicine was prepared for a pandemic. Not socialized, not nationalized, not capitalized, not communized. The reason for that is that no matter WHO is ultimately paying for healthcare, it costs a great deal of money, and the costs are increasing faster than salaries because technology doubles every few years while nothing else does.
So, like I MENTIONED, everybody prepares for the baseline. Well, with this under our belt at a cost of what, 4 trillion and counting, how much longer can we afford to just prepare for the baseline case? Either we spend what it takes to quadruple our capacity, or we bale out our collapsing economy every time this happens. Because it will happen again.
This isn’t the worst that Mother Nature will ever throw at us. With our population increasing and us packing ourselves more and more tightly together as a result, this sort of thing will happen more and more frequently. The regularity with which the flu in its various iterations flies through the World population (every year without fail) should prove that we haven’t seen nothin’ yet!
Trump is teaching the government how to get out of its own way and how to ask not demand. No, the powers act in effect is not being used widely if needed it is a tool that has never before been used outside of war.
Stepping up GM, Ford, GE and other evil capitalists such as that my Pillow guy.
We need to find a treatment, to buy time til the vaccine is developed.
@George Wells: One way to prepare for something above and beyond our baseline is to fully protect our borders to keep that stuff that exceeds the baseline out as much as possible. This pandemic is growing worse in Mexico and our enforcement of our southern border is about to come into play; something, along with controlling who flies and ships in and from where, the left considers improper. If countries like China are going be so irresponsible and dishonest, protecting our borders is as important as spending billions of dollars for equipment and supplies that deteriorate and is wasted.
It is far too expensive to prepare for the irresponsibility of others.
@Deplorable Me:
The first flare-up of COVID-19 was in Washington State, the result of community transmission that almost certainly came from OUR tourists returning at least indirectly from Wuhan China. The spread wasn’t caught soon enough to contain, and that was that. More or less the same thing happened in New York, but that time the spread was explosive, fueled by the unparalleled tight-packing of humans in confined places. Don’t ever think that people in a crowded subway car don’t breath the contents of each other’s lungs many times over during the course of riding from 16th to 42nd Street. Neither of those instances would have benefitted from the extermination of every Mexican on the planet. So much more mobile are USA citizens than Mexican ones that by the time the first Mexican case of COVID was discovered, half of our states already had rampant community transmission vectors in play. I will concede that closing ALL of our borders would largely eliminate “baseline” spikes, but that would require OUR citizens to not travel abroad, as it is WE who bring most of these bugs into our country. Remember that AIDS was most likely brought here by a gay American man who had picked it up in Africa, where it had been spreading for many years among both heterosexual and homosexual humans after it at some point and GOD knows how jumping to humans from monkeys. Again, WE brought it in, not immigrants, legal or otherwise. The most mobile elements of the population are the most likely vectors in any communicable infection. I have no argument with building Trump’s wall, but if it is porous enough to allow Americans to travel through it, don’t expect it to stop viruses.
@Deplorable Me:
And PS: We all share the whole planet. Irresponsibility is borderless. There is no way to isolate one country from the effect of others. The air above us circulates around the globe, carrying radiation from whatever nuclear testing gets into the atmosphere. Any bio-engineered germ-warfare products that managed to escape containment would spread by whatever vectors they were designed to take advantage of, and the air is a convenient route. The pollutants issuing from Chinese factories are readily measurable in New England states. Trump’s wall is not the answer. The isolation you seek would best be achieved by sending out colonial spaceships to distant stars in search of habitable worlds, and they in turn would have to keep their location secret from us… like any of that’s going to happen.
@George Wells: It should be pretty clear that open borders and unrestricted travel from infectious hot spots is paramount stupidity in times such as these.
No one has EVER suggested killing all of anyone. However, expecting people to stay in their own country until legally allowed to enter ours is not too much to ask.
@Deplorable Me:
Your entire argument depends exclusively on disease transmission via immigration. That’s not how AIDS got here, and its not how COVID-19 got here. Open borders had nothing to do with either of those diseases. As for your “unrestricted” travel, what exactly does that mean? Americans are still coming and going across borders, and none of them are having their blood tested for COVID-19. At this stage of the virus’ spread, community transmission is the primary vector, and our borders, closed or not, are irrelevant.
@George Wells: It does have a lot to do with TB, measles, and whooping cough as well as other diseases. Illegals from south of the border where Dengue, malaria and other mosquito borne diseases also act as a reservoir where the mosquito is present but the reservoir has been eliminated over the years. Isn’t illegal immigration without adequate medical evaluations a good potential for germ warfare?
@Randy:
Well, Despicable Me was making an argument that implied that closing the borders to illegal aliens would have prevented the COVID-19 pandemic, and that simply is not the case. Neither is the argument true that illegals represent the most frequent route of infection for the other afflictions that you mention. Certainly, health screening and quarantine practices reduce border-crossing infections, but to be effective, such measures must be applied equally to both legal and illegal travelers, of both foreign and domestic nationality. This presents a particular problem to Americans used to instantaneous freedom of movement. The fact that neither border-crossing infections nor germ warfare practitioners make a distinction between legal and illegal activity is an inescapable problem with anything other than a complete closing of the borders. COMPLETE. NO EXCEPTIONS. Anything less is nothing.
@George Wells: No, it is but one aspect of the spread. First and beyond any possible doubt, this infection came from abroad. Perhaps by a foreign national, perhaps from a citizen infected abroad and returning; it makes little difference at this point. However, it came from outside.
We’ve been trying to emphasize the importance of controlling our borders for decades. While economics is a major issue, infected illegal immigrants violating our borders and spread diseases here has been a constant problem. Unfortunately, we can’t count on subsequent administrations to enforce the law as Trump has been (hell, the left even files injunctions against him following the law), so a permanent, physical barrier has to be erected so that we can monitor everyone coming in.
Then, we see the sanctuary cities that purposely lure illegal immigrants to them and then protect them from law enforcement having massive issues with the spread of the virus. Do illegal immigrants understand the rules? Do THEY self-isolate when the are getting NO government relief? Are they even responsible enough to follow such rules if they are willing to violate other US laws to get and stay here?
Had China not LIED about the transmissibility of this between humans, perhaps more thorough screening of common travelers would have been initiated sooner.
But, again, that’s just a PART of the problem.
AIDS got here by accident; it was spread relentlessly by mass irresponsibility of the gay community that could not abide by a few simple rules to prevent its transmission. Then it got into the blood supply and the race was on.
I made no such argument and if I give you credit for being as intelligent as you appear to be, you must be lying, and I don’t appreciate it; THAT is the entire problem with Democrats and the media. We have enough liberal liars that weigh in here; why don’t you be the liberal that DOESN’T lie?