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On 4/5/2020 at 9:01 PM, Ashoka said:

Seems that we're UNDERCOUNTING the ACTUAL # of Coronavirus DEATHS because not everyone can even get tested to confirm they have it.

The only way to really get an estimate of the increased mortality rate due to Covid19 (and related deaths, i.e. cardiac arrest patients not revived in NYC because of order not to transport to hospital). will be to compare the average mortality rate for a given period of time (ie March 201x-August 201x), and compare that to the actual mortality rate from March 1, 2020 through Aug 1, 2020.  The difference between the historical average plus the Covid19 identified mortalities and the actual deaths from all causes, known and unknown, will identify the actual increased mortality due to this epidemic.  They have done this in a couple of northern Italian towns, and have found the undercount to be as much as 40-50%.  In addition, and I'm not trying to start an argument, in my country (USA), there are strong political reasons why certain regions will want to under count the number of fatalities.  Consequently, we will never have a true count in the west. In places like India, Indonesia, Central and South America, and most of Africa, due to lack of resources and inadequate reporting, we will never know the actual toll. Sadly, pictures like some I have seen coming out of Iran of people expiring on the streets will happen all over the third world, but in the west people will just expire in their homes, alone, and unreported.

Be safe everyone. Praying for us all.

Randi.

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7 hours ago, Quietguy said:

Screenshot 2020-04-10 at 10.07.28 - Edited.png

 

Trump ‘Playing Politics’ With Lives As FEMA Grabs Ventilators

The Federal Emergency Management Agency hijacked 500 ventilators ordered by the state for COVID-19 patients, but Trump restored 100 as a special favor to Gardner in a move that will help the vulnerable lawmaker’s reelection, complained Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.).

“President Trump says we will get 100 as a courtesy to Senator Gardner. That means, because the president is playing politics with public health, we’re still 400 ventilators short from what we should have received,” DeGette said in a statement Wednesday. Trump’s “mismanagement of this crisis is costing lives and livelihoods.”

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer — a Democrat who Trump has frequently targeted because of what he calls her “complaints” — revealed last month that vendors with whom her state had contracted for desperately needed medical equipment were told “not to send stuff,” on orders from the Trump administration. Other states were facing similar problems, she said.

While Michigan has received only a fraction of its requests from the national stockpile, Florida, led by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, last month received 100% of two major requests within three days, The Washington Post reported.

Several hospitals in seven states surveyed by the Los Angeles Times complained that FEMA officials were showing up unannounced and seizing their supplies, leaving them desperately short and uncertain where to turn for more equipment.



How is this not a war against some states?

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I should add there is something to be very weary off.

Viruses MUTATE!

And in the case of the 1918-20 pandemic.. what started off as mild, mutated into a deadly form for a second wave. The people who had the mild version were immune to the deadly form as they already had anti-bodies.

And judging from where most of New York's cases have come from - Europe (not China directly), it is very likely the disease is mutating into a lethal disease over time.

It doesn't have anything else to do except to try and spread copies of itself. It is a virus after all.

So be careful out there.

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Roll on September! I refuse the doom and gloom.

Coronavirus vaccine could be ready by September

Leading scientist ‘80 per cent’ sure drug will work

A vaccine against coronavirus could be ready as soon as September, the British scientist leading one of the world’s most advanced efforts has said.

Sarah Gilbert, professor of vaccinology at Oxford University, told The Times she was “80 per cent confident” that the vaccine being developed by her team would work, with human trials due to begin in the next fortnight.

The government signalled that it would be willing to fund the manufacture of millions of doses in advance if results looked promising. This would allow it to be available immediately to the public if it were proven to work.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/coronavirus-vaccine-could-be-ready-by-september-flmwl257x

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51 minutes ago, seven said:

Roll on September! I refuse the doom and gloom.

Coronavirus vaccine could be ready by September

Leading scientist ‘80 per cent’ sure drug will work

A vaccine against coronavirus could be ready as soon as September, the British scientist leading one of the world’s most advanced efforts has said.

Sarah Gilbert, professor of vaccinology at Oxford University, told The Times she was “80 per cent confident” that the vaccine being developed by her team would work, with human trials due to begin in the next fortnight.

The government signalled that it would be willing to fund the manufacture of millions of doses in advance if results looked promising. This would allow it to be available immediately to the public if it were proven to work.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/coronavirus-vaccine-could-be-ready-by-september-flmwl257x

Could be ready but will it be available to the masses? How will it be distributed?

That's a big question.

Not everyone has patience. Wouldn't surprise me if superpowers tried to get first in line for vaccine and even then how would they distribute it.

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3 hours ago, sydneyjohn57 said:

This is an interesting graph (as at 9pm 11th April) of the age spread of the virus in Australia, specially the numbers of young people in their 20's:

image.png.c72dd877f1b874b24c77de210bc1c2f6.png

You could explain the 20's number by the fact that they think they are bullet proof and they wont get serious symptoms, so mix more. The rest I dont know, except maybe the 50's and over are those going on cruise ships etc..

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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8210951/Beijing-authorities-hushed-findings-Chinese-scientist.html

How China muzzled its Bat Woman: Beijing authorities hushed up the findings of a scientist who unlocked the genetic make-up of the corona virus within days of the outbreak - which is vital for tests and vaccines.

  • Shi Zhengli, a virologist known as China's 'Bat Woman', sequenced the genes of the novel corona virus in three days but her findings were supressed  
  • Their findings showed it was similar to SARS, a respiratory disease that sparked an epidemic in 33 countries after emerging from China in 2002
  • Yanyi Wang, director of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, sent an email to staff and key officials ordering them not to disclose information on the disease.
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A very interesting study published on April 9, 2020 by The University of Cambridge has raised some very interesting questions about the origins and spread of COVID-19.

Quote

Researchers from Cambridge, UK, and Germany have reconstructed the early “evolutionary paths” of COVID-19 in humans – as infection spread from Wuhan out to Europe and North America – using genetic network techniques.

By analysing the first 160 complete virus genomes to be sequenced from human patients, the scientists have mapped some of the original spread of the new coronavirus through its mutations, which creates different viral lineages.

“There are too many rapid mutations to neatly trace a COVID-19 family tree. We used a mathematical network algorithm to visualise all the plausible trees simultaneously,” said geneticist Dr Peter Forster, lead author from the University of Cambridge.  

“These techniques are mostly known for mapping the movements of prehistoric human populations through DNA. We think this is one of the first times they have been used to trace the infection routes of a coronavirus like COVID-19.” 

The team used data from virus genomes sampled from across the world between 24 December 2019 and 4 March 2020. The research revealed three distinct “variants” of COVID-19, consisting of clusters of closely related lineages, which they label ‘A’, ‘B’ and ‘C’.

Forster and colleagues found that the closest type of COVID-19 to the one discovered in bats – type ‘A’, the “original human virus genome” – was present in Wuhan, but surprisingly was not the city’s predominant virus type.

Mutated versions of ‘A’ were seen in Americans reported to have lived in Wuhan, and a large number of A-type viruses were found in patients from the US and Australia.

Wuhan’s major virus type, ‘B’, was prevalent in patients from across East Asia. However, the variant didn’t travel much beyond the region without further mutations – implying a "founder event" in Wuhan, or “resistance” against this type of COVID-19 outside East Asia, say researchers.

The ‘C’ variant is the major European type, found in early patients from France, Italy, Sweden and England. It is absent from the study’s Chinese mainland sample, but seen in Singapore, Hong Kong and South Korea.

The new analysis also suggests that one of the earliest introductions of the virus into Italy came via the first documented German infection on January 27, and that another early Italian infection route was related to a “Singapore cluster”.

Importantly, the researchers say that their genetic networking techniques accurately traced established infection routes: the mutations and viral lineages joined the dots between known cases.

As such, the scientists argue that these “phylogenetic” methods could be applied to the very latest coronavirus genome sequencing to help predict future global hot spots of disease transmission and surge.

“Phylogenetic network analysis has the potential to help identify undocumented COVID-19 infection sources, which can then be quarantined to contain further spread of the disease worldwide,” said Forster, a fellow of the McDonald Institute of Archaeological Research at Cambridge, as well as the University’s Institute of Continuing Education.

The findings are published today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The software used in the study, as well as classifications for over 1,000 coronavirus genomes and counting, is available free at www.fluxus-technology.com.   

Variant ‘A’, most closely related to the virus found in both bats and pangolins, is described as “the root of the outbreak” by researchers. Type ‘B’ is derived from ‘A’, separated by two mutations, then ‘C’ is in turn a “daughter” of ‘B’.

Researchers say the localisation of the ‘B’ variant to East Asia could result from a “founder effect”: a genetic bottleneck that occurs when, in the case of a virus, a new type is established from a small, isolated group of infections.

Forster argues that there is another explanation worth considering. “The Wuhan B-type virus could be immunologically or environmentally adapted to a large section of the East Asian population. It may need to mutate to overcome resistance outside East Asia. We seem to see a slower mutation rate in East Asia than elsewhere, in this initial phase.”

He added: “The viral network we have detailed is a snapshot of the early stages of an epidemic, before the evolutionary paths of COVID-19 become obscured by vast numbers of mutations. It’s like catching an incipient supernova in the act.”

Since today’s PNAS study was conducted, the research team has extended its analysis to 1,001 viral genomes. While yet to be peer-reviewed, Forster says the latest work suggests that the first infection and spread among humans of COVID-19 occurred between mid-September and early December. 

The phylogenetic network methods used by researchers – allowing the visualisation of hundreds of evolutionary trees simultaneously in one simple graph – were pioneered in New Zealand in 1979, then developed by German mathematicians in the 1990s.

These techniques came to the attention of archaeologist Professor Colin Renfrew, a co-author of the new PNAS study, in 1998. Renfrew went on to establish one of the first archaeogenetics research groups in the world at the University of Cambridge.  

Read this paper carefully and there are more questions about where COVID-19 originated, and how it spread. It also makes clear that the only way to combat pandemics is world wide cooperation - especially if the next one is more lethal than COVID-19.

 

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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8217299/Four-residents-test-positive-coronavirus-leaving-Hubei-despite-declared-virus-free.html

Four Hubei residents test positive for corona virus after leaving the former epicenter despite being declared virus-free by health authorities

  • Four people from Hubei were diagnosed after using virus-free codes to travel
  • People are assigned to a green barcode if they claim they don't have symptoms
  • Residents are required to show their health status when entering public places
  • Officials said the health code system is flawed but no one is yet held responsible
  • Chinese cities have offered free tests for Hubei residents to detect infections
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Here's an excellent question and answer interview with Professor Kim, from Korea University Guro Hospital with Asian Boss.

For those guys that want answers from China - yes, but don't forget you need answers to questions from the leaders of your own countries why they wasted the 2 months of warning they did have, because if they did prepare then the situation would be more like Taiwan and South Korea who did prepare as soon as they found out.

 

 

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1 hour ago, rxpharm said:

For those guys that want answers from China - yes, but don't forget you need answers to questions from the leaders of your own countries why they wasted the 2 months of warning they did have, because if they did prepare then the situation would be more like Taiwan and South Korea who did prepare as soon as they found out.

You are correct that the leaders of our own countries wasted the 2 months of warning that they had,  yet this does not nullify that China is responsible for this Virus.

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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8218817/State-Department-warned-2018-Wuhan-lab-cause-new-SARS-like-pandemic.html

State Department warned in 2018 that Wuhan lab testing bats for corona virus had sloppy safety precautions and had the potential to cause a 'new SARS-like pandemic'

 

In 2018 a US diplomat and science diplomat from the Beijing embassy visited the Wuhan Institute of Virology multiple times from January to March

They sent two 'sensitive but unclassified cables' back to Washington, DC 

They reported of a lack of proper safety procedures and concern over its study of coronavirus in animals including bats

They warned that the lab 'represented a risk of a new SARS-like pandemic'

After those cables, the US government failed to provide extra assistance 

The WIV shared data on corona virus in bats in the past and in February 2020 it was the first lab to connect COVID-19 to bats  

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6 hours ago, rxpharm said:

For those guys that want answers from China - yes, but don't forget you need answers to questions from the leaders of your own countries why they wasted the 2 months of warning they did have,

Not sure this is correct. At least not for Europe. Remember Asia was ahead of Europe transmitting the virus with  at least 2-3 weeks. I think Europe handled this as swift as possible, with maybe a few exceptions. Now USA is a different sad story.

5 hours ago, BigTel said:

You are correct that the leaders of our own countries wasted the 2 months of warning that they had,  yet this does not nullify that China is responsible for this Virus.

Well said, Tel. They even have the nerve to blame others for this now too.

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If governments cared so much about the welfare and lives of their citizens ..

Why have they never lowered the speed limits on their roads to avoid the many deaths which will inevitably occur?
Why allow people to live in towns and villages at the foot of live volcanoes?
Why allow people to live in areas with natural fault lines and regular earthquakes?
Why does Thailand care so much about corona but not the deaths during Songkran? - 297 people die in five days of Songkran festival (reported 16th April 2019)

Risks occur daily in all of our lives, even simply crossing the road. To reduce risk to almost zero, stay at home. Allow me my own choices.

I think Sweden are very brave (when compared to the rest of the world) and should be applauded for going a different way.  Swedes are still living a pretty close to normal existence while the rest of the world hunkers down and denies basic freedoms by law enforcement which will likely cause future damage for potentially a generation.

I couldn't find a youtube video to say what I wanted, so I said it myself.

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44 minutes ago, dixon cox said:

Risks occur daily in all of our lives, even simply crossing the road. To reduce risk to almost zero, stay at home. Allow me my own choices.

That's true, but what about when individual choices affects other people? What is going on is not some world wide conspiracy as some would like to think. The same procedures were used in the past for smaller scale epidemics, going as far back as Bubonic plague, the Spanish Flu, and look up the case of Typhoid Mary who affected about 51 people, 3 of whom died as she was unwilling to believe she was an asymptomatic carrier. Do your rights and choice carry supremacy if they affect other people?

This is similar to the freedom of speech argument - but you don't have the freedom to shout fire in a crowded theatre.

Thankfully the mortality rate of COVID-19 is somewhere around 1-3%, and not higher, and my initial projections of between 1-3 million dead in the USA are likely wrong (I am happy about that), but there will still be several thousands dead, maybe into the hundreds of thousands.

This pandemic is not only dangerous because it can kill people, but the other problem is that it can overload the medical system - as seen in New York, Italy, Spain, Iran, and now even Russia. The story in Sweden is not complete yet - their death rate is higher than their Scandinavian neighbors who did a lockdown. There is concern their medical system may get overloaded too. Their statistics also show a higher percentage of the dead are elderly - more so than neighboring countries. So did they ask their elderly if it was okay to go with their strategy? Or do we simply say it doesn't matter and they lived a full life so they can die now, and not cause economic hardship?

These are questions governments have to weigh - and I am glad I don't have to make them, but I don't complain about my freedom impinged, or worry about economic damage as those are recoverable, life is not.

 

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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8220177/China-didnt-warn-public-likely-pandemic-6-key-days.html

China didn't warn the public for SIX KEY DAYS after realising they were facing a corona virus pandemic, investigation reveals

Officials held the information of a likely pandemic for almost a week in January 

A mass banquet was held in Wuhan and millions began travelling in the six days

More than 3,000 people were believed to be infected during the critical period 

President Xi warned the public on the seventh day, Jan. 20, documents revealed 

Ex-MI6 chief said China concealed the virus from the West and is 'evading' blame

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56 minutes ago, rxpharm said:

The story in Sweden is not complete yet - their death rate is higher than their Scandinavian neighbors who did a lockdown. There is concern their medical system may get overloaded too. Their statistics also show a higher percentage of the dead are elderly - more so than neighboring countries. So did they ask their elderly if it was okay to go with their strategy? Or do we simply say it doesn't matter and they lived a full life so they can die now, and not cause economic hardship?

Very true. Our main problem now is the elderly care and  heavily segregated areas where people live as many as up to 12 people in a small apartments and haven't taken part of the information of the importance of hygiene and social distancing. Unfortunately the covid transmission is steep now in nursery homes, as the staff there and those who make home visits are very poor educated about this whole thing and often don't speak  Swedish. Stockholm is heavily affected  compared to the rest of the country.  I'm not read to review our strategy as I'm no expert on infectious diseases ( god knows we have enough of those now), but the gut feeling is we are doing the right thing. You obviously disagree.

I'm sure you understand  the statistics depends on how you want to interpret them. In Italy for example all accounted fatalities are from hospitals, not people who died in their homes, did  they die because of  Covid or/and did they die of something else but were infected with Corona.  The numbers and stats are too unreliable yet to make any judgement calls.

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3 hours ago, rxpharm said:

 but I don't complain about my freedom impinged, or worry about economic damage as those are recoverable, life is not.

 

yes but the trouble is that if GDP falls below around 6% more people will be killed by the fallout from this than the virus... this is what the modelers have been telling us for a long time. 

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