Coronavirus II

[T.Lex]

@smokingman and qwerty and anyone else who watches for live updates:

Is it just me or today's numbers seem to be lagging. That is, numbers aren't even being reported. I have 3 trackers bookmarked (probably the same as most everyone) and all of them either haven't updated in hours or are just reporting a trickle of numbers. Like, the biggest increase is only about +28 from the INGO official report from yesterday.

But, it isn't even the actual number. Its just that it seems like very little is actually being reported.

Did I miss something?

 

[Ingomike]

The big D is also very good too. At least my girlfriend always thought so.



No really... Vitamin D is a great one to help with your immune system and it's vital for stimulating and maintaining healthy [STRIKE]boner[/STRIKE] bone... (it helps you absorb calcium)

I recently had to stop taking vitamins for a few weeks and was pondering if I missed them, after two days taking them I realized I did. Big boost in energy and and drive.

Vitamin D is amazing, sometimes referred to as the poor mans antidepressant. The lack of natural sunlight, particularly directly on your skin results in low vitamin D and the winter blah's. There are also studies showing lower rates of some cancers in states closer to the equator that some researchers have correlated to increased vitamin D. I take it every day...

 

[rob63]

A friend on Facebook posted something about Event 201. It was a pandemic exercise held by Johns Hopkins in Oct, 2019. It's eerie how close their theoretical scenario predicted the current situation. Here is a link, and the scenario from the exercise. They have issued a statement saying that the pandemic they modeled was not the same disease, and thus the outcome should not be the same, but it does make you think!

About Event 201, a high-level pandemic exercise on October 18, 2019


Event 201 simulates an outbreak of a novel zoonotic coronavirus transmitted from bats to pigs to people that eventually becomes efficiently transmissible from person to person, leading to a severe pandemic. The pathogen and the disease it causes are modeled largely on SARS, but it is more transmissible in the community setting by people with mild symptoms.
The disease starts in pig farms in Brazil, quietly and slowly at first, but then it starts to spread more rapidly in healthcare settings. When it starts to spread efficiently from person to person in the low-income, densely packed neighborhoods of some of the megacities in South America, the epidemic explodes. It is first exported by air travel to Portugal, the United States, and China and then to many other countries. Although at first some countries are able to control it, it continues to spread and be reintroduced, and eventually no country can maintain control.
There is no possibility of a vaccine being available in the first year. There is a fictional antiviral drug that can help the sick but not significantly limit spread of the disease.
Since the whole human population is susceptible, during the initial months of the pandemic, the cumulative number of cases increases exponentially, doubling every week. And as the cases and deaths accumulate, the economic and societal consequences become increasingly severe.
The scenario ends at the 18-month point, with 65 million deaths. The pandemic is beginning to slow due to the decreasing number of susceptible people. The pandemic will continue at some rate until there is an effective vaccine or until 80-90 % of the global population has been exposed. From that point on, it is likely to be an endemic childhood disease.

 

[JettaKnight]

A friend on Facebook posted something about Event 201. It was a pandemic exercise held by Johns Hopkins in Oct, 2019. It's eerie how close their theoretical scenario predicted the current situation. Here is a link, and the scenario from the exercise. They have issued a statement saying that the pandemic they modeled was not the same disease, and thus the outcome should not be the same, but it does make you think!

About Event 201, a high-level pandemic exercise on October 18, 2019


Event 201 simulates an outbreak of a novel zoonotic coronavirus...

Well, that just paints a rosy picture, doesn't it?


It's not the same disease... but, really, really, close.

 

[Ziggidy]

I've felt exactly like that for the last 1.5 weeks. Allergy symptoms that get better some days, worse others, but have not at all progressed into anything flu like. No temp, no cough.

I'm pretty sure it's allergies (and I'm doing my social distancing and staying home as much as possible and all of that), but those kind of reports concern me...

I'm with you that; concerns me also.

 

[smokingman]

@smokingman and qwerty and anyone else who watches for live updates:

Is it just me or today's numbers seem to be lagging. That is, numbers aren't even being reported. I have 3 trackers bookmarked (probably the same as most everyone) and all of them either haven't updated in hours or are just reporting a trickle of numbers. Like, the biggest increase is only about +28 from the INGO official report from yesterday.

But, it isn't even the actual number. Its just that it seems like very little is actually being reported.

Did I miss something?

Nope. Wait until 4pm est for US markets to close. Happens often on "green" days now. They you will see reports come in until around 11pm est

 

[qwerty]

Ah, right - I missed that my first time through that FT article.

First, this is where my amateur status is revealed. The Oxford study gets into some variables and nomenclature I haven't seen, let alone used, for 30 years. I'd suspect theirs is pretty darn good.

Second, though, they are still reliant on Italy, at least for validation of the methodology. So, to the extent that is true, I still believe it is modeling something near the worst-case scenario. Granted, they use the "15 days after 1st reported death" in order to remove any variability based on precautionary measures. I find that fascinating, in part, because it is a bit of a tacit recognition that few countries recognized and addressed the severity of the issue in anything less than 2 weeks.

Finally, ultimately it supports the idea that a significant portion of the population has it and doesn't know it. I'm not sure we're far enough along to quantify how big that is, but it is significant.

Thanks for your input. It makes good and measured sense.

 

[Dead Duck]

**** CHINA!

 

[Bennettjh]

**** CHINA!

THAT'S RACIST!


Did I do that right?

 

[jamil]

Usually when I hear this argument it's from people who are too young to remember that Made in USA used to be the norm, not the exception. Not sure how old you are, but...

I vividly remember my Dad bemoaning the day when he couldn't buy a TV made in the US anymore. TVs didn't get cheaper when it happened (in fact, TV tube production was big business in IN specifically until about 15 years ago). Until 10 years ago you could still buy US made light bulbs. We sued the US gas can industry out of existence. And on and on...

Plus I said the environmental concerns were just one of the ways we're subsidizing them. We're handing our money to a communist regime who steals the profits of industry and their people and uses our money to ship their stuff right back to us for free. How do you think it's possible for me to order a $0.99 pack of paper clips from China, free shipping? That's how. Ever seen what it costs to ship something from the free world?

To top off this point, I also never insisted we bring everything back the US (though that would be great). I'm insisting we stop doing so much business with our single largest global enemy, who also happens to keep releasing death viruses on to the world. I have plenty of LG stuff that would made in South Korea. No complaints from me with the SK gov and the products are price competitive to their Chinese counterparts. Taiwanese products (particularly steel goods, like tools and castings, etc) are pretty damn good these days. There are plenty of minerals to mine in Africa too... We don't need the Chinese nearly as much as you or other people think we do. Somehow we got by for 40 years without much Russia had to offer too... Nukes work better than cash to defeat communism.

My age. Let's say my beard is way more salt than pepper. I'm old enough to have bemoaned the day when *I* couldn't find a TV made in the USA.

My complaint about what you were saying was that you said we're subsidizing China. We're not. We pay for merchandise that companies import from China. That's not a subsidy. That's us buying **** that comes from China. I'm not arguing that China doesn't take the profits from those Chinese manufacturers and use it for whatever schemes they have in mind. I'm just saying, we're not subsidizing China. And, if we want that to stop it's not just something a few people can decide to do.

But, I do think that this has created an event which will stick in US companies minds about risk and having China build their ****. Hopefully, they look elsewhere. As I said in that previous post, I'm not saying we have to bring it *all* back here. Frankly, I don't think that's even feasible because of NIMBA, and wage/compensation demands here. Hopefully though, we can find better business partners from non-communist countries who don't want to take over the world.

 

[maxwelhse]

My age. Let's say my beard is way more salt than pepper. I'm old enough to have bemoaned the day when *I* couldn't find a TV made in the USA.

My complaint about what you were saying was that you said we're subsidizing China. We're not. We pay for merchandise that companies import from China. That's not a subsidy. That's us buying **** that comes from China. I'm not arguing that China doesn't take the profits from those Chinese manufacturers and use it for whatever schemes they have in mind. I'm just saying, we're not subsidizing China. And, if we want that to stop it's not just something a few people can decide to do.

But, I do think that this has created an event which will stick in US companies minds about risk and having China build their ****. Hopefully, they look elsewhere. As I said in that previous post, I'm not saying we have to bring it *all* back here. Frankly, I don't think that's even feasible because of NIMBA, and wage/compensation demands here. Hopefully though, we can find better business partners from non-communist countries who don't want to take over the world.

I maintain that we are by way if even allowing them into the UN (with full veto power even) and by giving them most favored nation status at the WTO. MFN status gives them tariff breaks, loose or no quotas, etc. These are subsidies that we reserve for what are supposed to be our most favored nations. Those are subsidies that we would never give to any other brutal dictatorship and people spent 20 years bringing that point up over and over again in congress until Uncle Bill went ahead and slipped them a permanent pass on his way out the door. Thanks Clinton!

So... I maintain my point that we are subsidizing our largest global enemy (and this subsidy can come right from your pocket to their military if you want to think of it that way, without .gov in the middle) and we should stop doing that. Immediately.

 

[qwerty]

@smokingman and qwerty and anyone else who watches for live updates:

Is it just me or today's numbers seem to be lagging. That is, numbers aren't even being reported. I have 3 trackers bookmarked (probably the same as most everyone) and all of them either haven't updated in hours or are just reporting a trickle of numbers. Like, the biggest increase is only about +28 from the INGO official report from yesterday.

But, it isn't even the actual number. Its just that it seems like very little is actually being reported.

Did I miss something?

I am not seeing anything different. It seemed a bit delayed yesterday as well, but seemed to catch up pretty quickly by 3PM EST. Maybe it is due to the majority if deaths being in NY and they just don't have time to catch up or are reporting in groups rather than one at a time as previously done.

Just FYI, worldometer.info days are GMT+0, it is just what they chose to mark their day. The Johns Hopkins dashboard is using your local PC time.... that being said, worldometer day restarts and it is still 8PM EST. That may attribute to the difference that was mentioned earlier in the totals. It should not effect the grand totals at all, but watching and calculating the daily totals will be different.

 

[T.Lex]

Nope. Wait until 4pm est for US markets to close. Happens often on "green" days now. They you will see reports come in until around 11pm est

I took the dearth of reporting to look into the incubation periods - hadn't done that for awhile.

Looks like about 5 days from exposure is the average, with nearly all infected being symptomatic by 11 days (if they become symptomatic at all). Based on anecdotes I've read about the onset of this, it is pretty dramatic. I figure a lag of about 5 days for critical treatment and difficult decisions to be made, the timing of the spike in deaths (10-11 days after 3/13) makes sense. Another 5 days of really bad numbers should get us through the non-precaution time period for exposure.

The trend at month's-end is becoming more and more important.

That might also be the context for Trump's expectation of getting back to work in mid-April. That relies on the rosiest of predictions - and I hope he's right.

 

[chipbennett]

Hey chip! You know I'll always encourage you to go back and read.

Of course, I have no refutation of your observations, but I'll (re-)supply my own.

1) The numbers we have are the only numbers we have, basically. There are some assumptions built in to my amateur modeling, such as the idea that the mortality rate has the caveat "among those tested." In a sense, the actual mortality rate doesn't matter because we don't have the actual number of cases. (That ship sailed very early on.) Rather, using the numbers provided we can create a rudimentary prediction of how many deaths will be reported based on the prior reporting.

2) I tend to agree that this was present here before the deaths in China started getting reported. I have no faith in the Chinese numbers, response, or reporting. But, regardless when the actual "start date" was of this, when plotting the graph of the peak/inflection point, the starting point doesn't really matter either (as long as it is "in front of" the peak). By starting the tracking late, we just miss the part of the iceberg below the water line. We can still track the progression relative to the starting point.

(And I'll raise you one....)

3) Eventually, the statisticians and actuaries will figure out that the actual deaths from COVID-19 were way under-reported. Deaths from January-March that were attributed to pneumonia or underlying respiratory conditions were probably COVID-19.

Take care!

Agreed: the numbers we have are the numbers we have. We know X number of people have been tested, Y number of people have tested positive, and Z number of people who tested positive have died.

What changes, though, is the analysis of the significance of those numbers, based on context. And the assumptions that feed the model are the context. And changing the assumption about where we are on the bell curve absolutely changes the models, both in terms of infection rate, total infections, total deaths, and mortality rate. If we are at the zero-day tail of the bell curve, then all the numbers go much higher. If we are closer to the inflection point, then the curve is (to borrow a term) "flattened", and the numbers end up being much lower.

Unfortunately, "if it bleeds, it leads" - so the most morbid and sensational assumptions/models are going to be what gets reported/discussed. (There are obvious political motivations for that happening, as well; but this thread doesn't seem to be the place to discuss political implications.)

I also agree with having zero or near-zero faith in anything reported from China.

It is highly likely that deaths from COVID-19 will have been under-reported - perhaps a certainty, given when we actually started testing.

Now that there are reports of antibody tests, we may have a chance of finding out what the real numbers/context are, after the fact.

 

[jamil]

Unless Trump said it was in pool cleaner. If you are smart enough to read the label, then you should know better, if you are not smart enough to read the label, we are indirectly getting rid of the older unnecessary population.

My only points were about making the story accurate. It wasn't fake news that the people did it because of what Trump said. The part that's fake news was that Trump is responsible for it. He's not.

Part of the discussion has to be that it would be better if Trump didn't say **** about **** he knows nothing about. I mean, he has zero domain knowledge other than what he reads on distastefully bright-colored websites that peddle bull****. But then he expresses his confidence that it'll work. And maybe it will. But maybe it won't. Maybe that colloidal silver snake oil will work too. People are claiming that on the internet and searches for that particular snake oil are up 600%! People are claiming lots of stuff will work who don't know **** about it. I digress.

So anyway, more than one thing can be true. It's true enough that it's not Trump's fault that these idiots took downed fish tank cleaner because it had the chemical Trump orgasmed over in a presser. It's their fault. Trump claimed hydroxychloroquine would help people. But he didn't say to take it in the form OF FISH TANK CLEANER, for ****'s sake! The second thing that's true, is that Trump should STFU about things he knows nothing about, and let the experts talk.

 

[chipbennett]

And Chip, does your theory about Nov/Dec introduction into the US line up with the situation in Italy and other hard hit locations?

I honestly don't know. I haven't studied the numbers in general, or Italy in particular, that closely to make a determination. It doesn't help, though, that Italy was cooking the books with respect to COVID-19 deaths.

 

[chipbennett]

@hough - so sorry to hear about your friends. We'll pray for them.

@qwerty - I don't think the public at large understands how coding works. I've done some of that. If I had a problem that was very similar to the coding problem that I had 15 years ago, I'd start with the code I did 15 years ago. If I was any good at it back then (which I wasn't), I would only have to change some variables, some constants, and probably some output parameters and get it going.

There's literally nothing wrong with using old code.

Now, if his model is wrong/bad/poorly coded, that's a different issue. The code itself doesn't have an expiration date.

The problem here is that the code was clearly not validated against real-world data, if it was developed to model flu pandemics, was applied to a specific such pandemic (Swine Flu), and was proven not to model actual pandemic data accurately.

The model is demonstrated to be unreliable, if it is the same model. If the model was corrected based on its demonstrated failure, that would be another matter. But, based on what was presented here, it appears that he simply reused the (demonstrably unreliable) model again.

 

[chipbennett]

My Dad wrote the code for several laboratory blood and urine analyzing machines that are still in use. He retired in 2001, so...

People don't realize how much really old code, running on really old hardware, still runs so many commercial operations.

 

[smokingman]

No covid-19 emergency bill today. This time republicans.
Sens. Scott, Sasse and Graham "demand" a fix to the current version of the stimulus bill. "Unless this bill is fixed, there is a strong incentive for employees to be laid off instead of going to work."

[FONT=lucida_granderegular]"A massive drafting error in the current version of the coronavirus relief legislation could have devastating consequences: Unless this bill is fixed, there is a strong incentive for employees to be laid off instead of going to work. This isn't an abstract, philosophical point -- it's an immediate, real-world problem."[/FONT]

https://www.zerohedge.com/political...fter-gop-senators-demand-fix-massive-drafting

[FONT=lucida_granderegular]Of course many are leaving DC today,and they scheduled an extra recess for next week....so does not look good.
[/FONT]Also that remote voting,nothing ever even came from the idea much less got set up.


​

 

[T.Lex]

A mild refutation - really a review - of the Oxford Model. It is cast along similar lines to our discussion here.

https://reason.com/2020/03/25/half-...-infected-with-coronavirus-says-oxford-model/

This is basically a circular argument: If the disease is not particularly severe then that means a larger percentage of the population must have already have been infected to yield the observed number of deaths. On the other hand, if the disease risk is severe then the observed deaths suggest that very few people must currently be infected.