Austria opened up a little today, but initial reports are that people stayed at home regardless. There will definitely be a lag between relaxation and normality

New York City.

NYC is closing in on 11,000 deaths. About 8 million live in the city. THATS IN A LITTLE OVER ONE MONTH!

I wonder how corporations are going to handle business travel when things start to open up again. I suspect it will be different for each one, will just be interesting to see.

One thing I've noticed is that the anti-shutdown crowd has real blinders on when it comes to that return to normalcy. A meme going around recently has been about how when we open up, there'll be a 2-hour wait at every restaurant and blah blah blah …

No. It will take months of a widespread, safe vaccine for that to happen, if it ever does. I'm not certain there won't be semi-permanent hangover from this. People's patterns will be broken and some of them will find they like a different way of life better than the one they had. The economy is never going back to like it was, for both good and ill.

With how bad they bungled small business relief, how many small restaurants are even going to be open when people feel safe to eat out?

To put in in even more mindboggling terms: about 54k deaths were recorded in 2016 (Most recent i found) total from all causes. That is about 4,5 thousand a month.

NYCdata: Population Characteristics: Births, Marriages, Deaths and Infant Mortality

So you're telling me it isn't all a hoax?

Might just be. Of course, maybe this is the biggest fake event since the moonlanding, you never know ! I mean, hospitals elsewhere are empty so how come this is so different ? (This is the single most infuriating 'argument' the conspiracy nuts in Germany use)

My brother works from home 3 weeks out of the month, and travels via airplane one week. But he's been working full-time from home since the beginning of March. So I have a vested interest in how this plays out as well. I suspect he personally will not choose to be on a flight anytime soon. Because along with air travel comes rental car, hotel, restaurants, clients, etc. He figures as long as he maintains his deliverables and continued productivity, he should be able to keep working from home. Indeed it will be interesting how quickly Senior Management starts pressuring their direct reports to come in, and then it filters down from there. I hope he won't have to make a "choice" anytime soon.

I think the authorities are hoping that there is some level of changed behavior. Maybe we don't stand six feet away but you do stand three feet. Maybe me and my three closest friends decided to visit a beer garden that has spaced out tables as opposed to ten of you heading to the 100 square foot bar that already has 200 people in it. To use your example of work, maybe we decide that we can get away with some working from home options a couple days a week. Maybe Zoom into a meeting from our offices instead of piling into the conference room. People will definitely fall back into normalcy at some point. However, I also think there will be enough of the awkwardness of the guy sticking out his hand out for a handshake and the other guy just looking at it variety to at least make people think.

One thing that can not be forgotten is how much the virus has spread from us just being ignorant and/or defiant about it. We are probably not going to have as many incidents similar to Rudy Gobert jokingly touching and breathing all over his teammates' and reporters' stuff. How many incidents like that contributed to the spread I don't know. I do think it is more than zero.

I think there is zero chance that we do restrictions a second time. That is why I really hope we get this one right.

I don't - I think there's a pretty high chance, esp. in the fall - just hoping to avoid it until then. If people start dying in large enough numbers, there won't be a real choice.

Let's ballpark some numbers... There's less than a 1 in 200 chance of me dying from this and probably 50% or more of me being completely asymptomatic? A vaccine is probably 2 years away and not even a sure thing? And you're asking me to completely give up any social life including things like hiking that don't pose any risk as long as you stay 5+ feet away from people, but still work in a 3000 person warehouse so I'm over 50% likely to get it anyways?

Yeah... I hope the antigen tests come down in cost quickly and I can take one that shows I've already been exposed (and offers everyone else who has been exposed the chance to going back to living semi-normally again), and I wouldn't want to do it now when we're worried about hospital bed shortages (though that appears overstated) but if you offered me the chance to knowingly get this and self quarantine for 2 weeks vs giving up two years of my life? I'd probably take the former, and while I'm more willing to be honest in a forum like this than many are in general, I wonder how many other (unmarried & childless) people under the age of 40 would say the same thing.

This seems incredibly short-sighted. Once a vaccine is discovered, things will return to normal.

You think everyone who rides the subway in NYC to go to work just isn't going to do it anymore?

I am in an exact same situation as your brother.

The stories I'm reading of people traveling through the airports now sound fascinating. I kind of wish I could go somewhere.

My sense of acceptable risk is impacted by the fact that I live with someone who has contact with hundreds of people a day at her job. There's not much I can do to increase my risk at this point. It probably would be safer for me to get on a sanitized plane and quarantine on a beach somewhere. Which I threaten to do daily, in jest. But I'm definitely getting antsy. I'll be the first in line hunting for travel deals when it's legal and ethical to do so.

I'm content to wait until the end of April and see where we are at. Supposedly two weeks is when Arizona will be at the high point, but we really haven't seen much impact so far. My bet is we roll back to shelter in place in May (and start re-opening restaurants for smaller capacity some time in late June). But, we will see

I don't think I said that or implied it. With this specific example, a lot of people will still ride the subway. Some of the jobs people used to ride the subway to go to won't exist anymore. Other jobs will eventually replace them, and some of them will be different jobs than the ones that existed before. I think it's likely, for example, that there will be at least some permanent shift towards more people working remotely; a lot of companies that never did that before have had to figure out how out of necessity. Some will want to keep doing it. The balance of employment between industries won't got back to exactly what it was, ditto for some personal behaviors, etc.

A disruption of this scale never goes back to what it was before. It's highly debatable what will change and what won't, but I think it's simply inevitable that some things will.

It's so frustrating that we know what needs to happen to reopen, aggressive testing, tracing, and isolation for those exposed, we just aren't preparing to do any of that at a national level. Some states will be able to do that and some won't and we'll be stuck hoping it turns out okay.

Seeing our testing numbers drop from last week to this week certainly gives me no confidence that we're preparing for the next phase. I don't want to spend a year seeing stories like the one out of NJ where they found 17 bodies at a nursing home.

I am in an exact same situation as your brother.

Perhaps I'm risk averse (though I -- probably like a good portion of this board -- am 1. over 40 and 2. have kids and OH RIGHT 3. married). Or just, you know, fairly content with being a homebody.

But if I'm under house arrest with 2,999 of my closest friends*, and am given the choice of a) staying under house arrest for two years, or b) leaving but upon leaving, 150 of the 3000 (and you don't know which ones) are instantly drowned? I stay under house arrest.


* in blocks of four, but with good internet connectivity

The family is doing fine. My son's going stir-crazy being stuck at home though.

Just have to weather the storm and hope that the world's governments figure out a response to the recession.

Hope you have a karaoke machine at home ! :)

Eh, that's a little misleading then. NYC is really closer to 20M (List of metropolitan statistical areas) - Wikipedia. Just like Chicago is 9M not 2.7M.

That said, 11K deaths in that time anywhere is staggering.

SI

Why can't you go hiking right now? Is it because of park closure? I only ask because I've been outside now more than normal (mainly because the weather is about the best it will be) and I just maintain distance from other people walking.

SI

Yeah the numbers are wrong
They aren't counting people they find dead. They aren't testing dead people at all.
So we're already at 50K dead, probably 1 Million US people have it/had it

Thanks for the reminder that sometimes these are used as a coping mechanism as opposed to them truly believing it. My wife came back from walking the dog and our neighbor told her the "latest" news that Dr Fauci worked with the Chinese to create the virus. My wife didn't engage and moved on with the dog.

My first reaction was incredulous. But then I remembered your post and it at least gave me a pause to try and understand where she's coming from. We'll see whether she broaches the subject with me or not. Usually it's her husband who is much more openly political/conspiratorial. But I'd love to be able to ask a couple follow-up questions in a sincere manner to dig a little deeper.

His insight was fantastic, and to be able to process that on the fly, and come up with that answer is great. I don't think I would have or could have done that. Typically, if someone wants to engage face to face, and I have to see them pretty regularly, I'm just going to avoid the conversation. Living next to someone is a very different animal. I much prefer the casual hello and small talk, now leave me alone, to the deep socializing and let's get to know one another level of communication. My neighbor right now is pretty much my polar opposite politically, but we can at least have nice conversations about work, family, grilling, and whatever without me feeling like I really know him too well.

So true. My neighbor is the head security guard at my kids school. Retired cop. Great guy. Loves the kids and I truly believe would take a bullet for any one of them.

The other day he was telling me that we have to protect the at risk population then get everyone else back out. He had been to 4 different stores that day, etc...

I was like, ugh, this is the guy responsible for assessing a threat that could keep my kids alive. Great.

Yes, this matches our situation as well. We know our lanes and typically stay in the casual conversation mode. And usually his wife "apologizes" for him when we see her separately. So it was that much more surprising that she initiated the conversation with my wife.

37-year-old Brandon COVID-19 victim chronicled disease on Facebook up until death | WFLA

This is what i was trying to post the other day but it was too long. This is a friend of a friend (I'm now 2 degrees of Kevin Bacon away from someone that died of it).

WIthin the article is a link to their facebook account and the first post has a very long, very deatailed account of everything they went through in her 21 day fight with the disease
worth a read

Thanks for linking, but... I don’t think I can do it. Maybe someday.

How exactly do you know the death totals are indeed for the metropolitan area and not the core city/5 buroughs ? :confused:
The Metropolitan Area after all is not an organisational 'entity' (as far as bureaucracy goes) but merely a 'geographical' one. Here it also includes a lot of territory in New Jersey which is counted seperately. The deaths for Newark for example are counted as happening in New Jersey, not the metropolitan area of New York.

If you read any stat (like deaths or births) and it says "New York" this will not include the metropolitan area unless someone goes to the trouble and adds it all up.

it's basically just her giving an account of each day and how she feels and especially the bureaucracy of the florida hospital system.

Yeah, both the numerator and denominator are wrong. I'm thinking we're closer to the 10-20M range for who has had it but I'm just spitballing now.

SI

The all-cause mortality rates paint an interesting picture, they point to only 30-50% of the coronavirus related deaths being picked up in the official statistics. With the rest being missed because they have died at home, or at nursing homes/long term care facilities, had it attributed to an underlying conditions, etc, etc.

But I suspect that people do go to hospitals in other boroughs if they're closer than the nearest hospital to them and I suspect that NYC proper has a much higher density of hospitals than the other areas.

SI

Sorry...not being clear. It’s my mental bandwidth, not a technical issue. I just find myself getting even further depressed every time I read some insider account, particularly focusing on healthcare workers.

Our Church's Synod had it's Covid 19 taskforce meeting last evening. We are suggesting not doing in person worship through May. One epidemiologist on the team is a bit more dramatic (but I guess you want one of those in a team like this) who is telling her fellow congregants that she hopes we can have in person worship by Christmas - with how things have been changing on this, I don't think projecting out 8 months or so is all that wise, but maybe it's her way of getting her folks mentally prepared for how serious it is?

My job (federal government) is doing work from home until May 1 - I hope that gets extended, but considering what the President wants, I'm a bit worried.

This. I almost lost it when I heard about the bus driver in Detroit. All of these lives and all of this suffering is easier to handle from a bit of a distance.

Based on the article, I think that poll was taken before the shift in public opinion really started taking hold. In Michigan at least, the extension & strengthening of the stay-at-home order less than a week ago really lit a fire under a lot of people and started cracking the consensus. I'm curious to see what the polls say once we get some that were taken more recently.

The above poll notwithstanding, it does seem that a significant portion of the population is getting....restless...with stay-at-home.

I do think that as this settles into another MAGA/Blue State thing, you will see more people line up with their team and the numbers will get closer to 50/50.

For a short while. And then 100K people will descend upon Auburn or Athens or Tuscaloosa or Clemson or some other small Southern town that swells to near-bursting seams on a Sat'dy afternoon...

...and then a few weeks later, red states will take it more seriously.

Just checked the schedule. Games on 9/5 in Auburn, Columbia, Fayetteville, Gainesville, and Oxford. If those games happen with crowds and school starts as well for kids, late September is a new tipping point.

I don’t trust that we will look after our most vulnerable.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/16/us/bo...ome/index.html

I don’t trust that we will look after our most vulnerable.

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/sta...241966186.html

Might be that some good news re:kids is close, according to our leading Virologist a couple studies now with indication (not proof !) that their immune system might not only react differently to the virus but have at least some immunity or have low reproduction of viral RNA making them less likely to be big spreaders.
The spread within households is aparently lower than thought, which might point to this.

Holland tested antibodies from blood donations and came up with 3% spread. Of course, blood donations generally come from a less than perfect 'spread' of the population due to rules attached and who does it, but data is data.

I think you will start seeing a crossover to the "red" side by lower class unemployed. It's easy for many of us to say "wait until the fall" to re-open when many can work from home. It's harder to sell that to someone unemployed who isn't making ends meet.

Outside of hotspots in the NE, Michigan and Louisiana, things seem to be pointing to a slowdown by the end of the month. It will be interesting to see how the governors/Trump start handling May. You may have places like Utah, Arizona and New Mexico with very little remaining impact looking to roll back the shelter in place - while places like New York and New Jersey are still in a fight with this thing.

I think you meant the Netherlands? As far as I can find, it was a nationwide research, not just in Holland. (too much nitpicking?)

But there are a lot of caveats here, the biggest one to me: tabulating of test results is barely over 50% done.

At the very least, as we open things back up, the medical community is going to be better prepared to deal with new cases. We certainly won't be able to keep new cases from happening, but the fact that cities are going to be much more prepared gives me hope that maybe there's a window for opportunities on the horizon. Everyone knows what were up against, and what the potential is. You can't live off of the "it won't happen here" mantra with this. That much mental and physical preparation goes a long way to dealing with the expectations of the populace.

Another factor in all this is the duration of sickness. I'm talking about people who recover at home. This seems like it can be a 3-week illness. It's not the flu where you're sick for a few days and back on your feet.

So say your business opens back up. Half the staff comes down with this. What do you do now? You've got a bunch of people out for 3 weeks (maybe more if their family members get sick).

Then you have liability. How many businesses are going to be sued for unsafe working conditions if someone dies?

I do think from a legal standpoint it would be hard to prove that they got it at work, because of the prevalence of the virus everywhere. I doubt very many lawsuits would hold up. Just my thoughts.

It lit a fire because she way overstepped her bounds and her ridiculousness is stoking fear and despair instead of inspiring confidence. How can you tell people they cannot go to a second home they own in the state (yet if you somehow live in another state you could travel to our state and go to that vacation home). How does it make sense to rope off half of Home Depot yet people are fine if they're packed in a Costco? Being able to play the lotto is essential during this time but people cannot go to a small business greenhouse and get some plants? You can go on a boat...unless it has a motor. You can go for a walk...but not on a golf course to play golf.

Even in her press conference last night she lied about ambulances being blocked from the hospital due to the protest - both the hospital and police confirmed that was not true.

She started this thing ok but now she's doing a terrible job and really seems clueless and not fit for the job. She's not leading the state in this - she's grandstanding and auditioning for VP. The more recognition she receives the more she seems to care about being a national name on the political stage instead of doing what is best for this state. People need some hope in this thing and a plan for how they're going to be ok on the other side and she offers none of that - only draconian and stupid new measures which each forthcoming EO.

Curious what hope should she be bringing. It's a deadly virus that spreads easily and we have no immunity to and no vaccine. How do you spin that?

I know my dad is mad because he can't golf in Michigan and the city of Toledo won't allow people from Michigan on its golf courses.

I just heard from a doctor in my church's Synod who lives in Atlanta. He mentioned that was driving by the golf course, which are open in Georgia, and people were acting like there was no pandemic at all. Walking together, not keeping 6 ft apart, etc.

I think banning things like that are fine when it becomes apparent that people aren't social distancing while doing them.

Drinking alcohol may increase risk of getting coronavirus, World Health Organization says - mlive.com

Well fudge

Smithfield announces closures of two more meat plants.

dola

In good news, remdisivir outcomes from a Chicago hospital look positive, but there was no control to the study.

Multiple Chiefs of Medicine from participating hospitals in Germany and Austria have also said it is looking promising :)

Problem would be that there won't be a big stock lying about since it was/is not actually in widespread use (unlike the malaria/lupus drug hydro ... Which hospitals over here stopped using due to the observed side effects to the clearly outweighing the pretty non-existent clinical benefit)
And it is not yet aproved anywhere, so it won't suddenly be available in a month ...

How is that different than the 200+ people currently working in the manufacturing plant I work at (we support medical devices)? Or the people currently working at Costco, Sam's Club, grocery stores or places like Walgreens? I'm guessing if someone begins running their business again, they will take steps to be as safe as they can be - but there are no guarantees. We seem to be fine with that for hundreds of businesses right now...

Because stuff like this happens.


If you open things up, a higher percent of the population will contract the virus. That means that a person working at Walgreens has a higher chance to encounter someone who is sick or bring the virus to work themselves. Right now with social distancing and everyone staying at home, there is a lower chance of spread in the community for those workers.

Look at Smithfield. They are in South Dakota which has opposed social distancing and shelter-in-place orders. So it likely became easier for one of their employees to acquire the virus in the community. Now 700 people at the factory have tested positive and forced its closure.

So what is your solution? We all just say screw it and lock ourselves in home and hope we don't die of something else because we don't know when or if this will go away, we don't know how or if it will affect us if we get it and we don't know that there won't be another virus that does the same thing when this is done?

The social distancing was meant to not overwhelm the hospitals - not to shelter us in homes forever while everything but the largest of corporations die off.

There does have to be a real discussion about what happens on the other side and that is the hope she and anyone else in charge should be bringing.

Lets say you own a small family store, restaurant, landscaping company...you are presently shuttered, watching what supports your family, what you put years into die because of nothing you did wrong and you've accepted that hit now because you were doing your part to flatten the curve as you were asked.

But what now? You sit at home each day passing by making things worse and worse for you and millions of others who own or work in these businesses and do you hear a plan on how you get back to your life? No. These people are worried and growing depressed - actions which lead to addictions, mental illness and suicide - because there is no hope. There is no plan. There is nothing for them to hold onto. They just get more and more restrictions.

What are we going to do with all of these people when and if this is over. You really think mortgage and rent payments will be delayed indefinitely? You think the government can and will continue to provide checks every month? I don't care if we can't have concerts or sporting events for a year or two or go on cruises or vacation but I care that there are a LOT of people who will have their lives destroyed by this.

The cure cannot be worse than the disease. That does not mean hey everyone go pack into arenas, restaurants, schools and everything else tomorrow and pretend nothing ever happened or that the virus is a hoax. But you cannot just leave all these people hanging and wondering without a plan.

What is the reason a landscape business cannot operate? They don't have to come into contact with anyone. What is the reason we cannot say ok the curve has been flattened in this area so in 2 weeks a business can open up with less than 5 customers at a time and then in 2 more weeks 10 customers or whatever. Why can't you play golf even if its just one person at a time? Why can't you go to your own vacation home a few hours drive away to give yourself a change of quarantine scenery? That is the hope I am talking about - something for all of these people to be able to hold onto for their own lives. So that everyone can see how they get a little bit of normal back. I think that would go a long way to not only quelling people's desire to just be done with this whole thing but to also giving them incentive to stick with it so that they can get to those milestones.

What if they're from the same household? What does it matter if I'm next to my son playing video games or we're out golfing?

People can fish in a boat where you have no choice but to be next to someone for hours - at least in golf you might walk together for a minute or two but then have to go hit your next shot.

The point I was trying to make are her restrictions are all over the map - you can go out on a boat here...as long as it doesn't have a motor. So if you go out in a rowboat you can't catch COVID-19? That's why it appears she has no plan and no control of this - she just haphazardly makes up things instead of being consistent. Like I said - what difference does it make if you're in Home Depot to get something to fix your leaky sink or you're going to buy paint (buying paint is not allowed now). Has the paint aisle suddenly been known to spread COVID-19?

When things are logical and make sense they're easier to understand and abide by and see the reason for. When there's nonsense like that you start to question if the person in charge has any clue at all and wonder why you should listen to anything she says.

And to add on to all this the unemployment system in Michigan has been a disaster (like other states probably) so you really can't blame people for starting to get antsy and wonder just how they are going to take care of themselves when the people forcing them out of work aren't doing it.

Gary, I know where you're coming from, but your stack of strawmen are the same things that everyone is thinking about. None of us have any control, or idea on what the next few days, weeks are going to bring. We don't really know where the line in the sand has to be drawn. I do think that the popular phrase that I hear, "the cure can't be worse than the disease" is rather unscrupulous to the dangers of the current disease and a willful understatement in regard to the potential of it. This virus has now claimed more lives in 90 days than an entire season of the flu, yet it's still being characterized as just as dangerous as the flu by many people. When the current situation is boiled to the cure can't be worse, then that's telling people that this isn't that dangerous of an illness. And it did all that, despite us closing up shop, putting over 22 million people out of work and killing the economy in the process. Now, if that's the cure, how bad do you think the disease is, in order to force that sort of a response?

This wasn't some kind of monolithic, single party, government overreach response like many are portraying. This is a response that has been seen in country after country around the world and yet we still have this reaction. I would love it if there were a plan right now. But we can't have an arbitrary date without an understanding of where the data is taking it, and we can't have any sort of plan without knowing if we can handle an increased influx of sick patients or knowing if we've even hit peak infections, at least for this first go around anyway.

It's a stupidly complex question and situation. All the pieces are linked together and you move one piece and 32 other pieces move. All those questions you ask are completely valid and I don't disagree with any of them. We (in KY) have landscapers still open, we still have parks open, but not playgrounds. Golf courses are still open, but some disc golf courses have been removed completely, which has really pissed some people off.

Of course things are awful. I just took a trip to a second house knowing that we weren't going to be taking any greater risks than we have here. There is a point where it goes into the silly season with some of these restrictions. I'm a pretty anti-religion when it comes to special treatment of some and not others, but I didn't support the state confronting people on Easter and telling them they needed to quarantine because they gathered together more than 10 people.

The economy is hosed right now. There's no coming back anytime this year. Even if it's opened up right now, it's not coming back. Too many people have lost wages, and too much money is gone. We're going to see businesses close, but losing a couple million people just in this country alone, if we didn't do those things would have created an economic impact of a decade or more. Not just a year and a half or so. The long game here is critical, and while we want to get things moving again, and I think that we will sooner than later, we can't risk too much.

Mark my words, this country is going to see 1,000 dead in a day, and go ok, this is good enough. Let's get back out there and get going again. That number might be a couple weeks away from where we are right now, but the population will have developed a stomach for it. And we're going to be ok with losing 1,000 people a day in order to open it back up again. That is both a positive to the testament of the human condition to get going again in the face of tragedy an appalling statistic of acceptance and indifference to the suffering of those who are dying.

I mean, it's too bad the Michigan legislature couldn't have worked on a better system!

Hydrochlorqiune < Remdesivir

It is not a stack of strawmen arguments - it is real. People are being devastated financially from this and some of them will never recover. People will begin or relapse into addictions from this, they will develop or worsen their mental illness from this and people will die from this whether it is fear of going to get some other problem treated in a hospital or whether it is from suicide. Those are not strawmen - they are as real as people dying from COVID-19.

There is a world of difference between this is a hoax/it's just the flu/pretend nothing is happening and saying there has to be some common sense approaches to moving towards the future and wanting to give people the hope of those things.

Saying "the cure can't be worse than the disease" is not unscrupulous - it's pragmatic. It is also not saying lets get 100,000 people in Michigan Stadium and get a football game going tomorrow. We have to learn how to live with this disease because there is no guarantee there will be a cure or a vaccine and certainly no timeline on when that may happen.

It may turn out that for some people this is a fatal disease whether you get it today, tomorrow or five years from now. We cannot simply stop the world until we figure it out. We have to begin working to a new normal - one where we are aware and conscious of the disease, we do our best to minimize the spread of it but we are not paralyzed in fear of it. That doesn't mean those things happen tomorrow but they do need to happen.

I have no idea what you're getting after but it doesn't change the fact that the government here is forcing people to stay at home and yet failing miserably (as usual) to do anything to support them when they can't even get on the website for unemployment. That is a today problem - has nothing to do with whoever was in charge in years past.

This isn't a R or D problem - the same problem exists in other states and its exactly why people are getting tired of being told to stay at home. Stay at home is fine if the government is paying your bills - its paid vacation for everyone. However when you haven't had a check in six weeks and can't even log on to the unemployment website can't say I'm surprised people are getting restless and tired of waiting on the government.

I think there's middle ground between you can't reopen your gardening business and saying "F-U" to social distancing and taking no precautions in a 700-person meat packing plant. My point is we are OK with certain industries having hundreds of people in a plant/office together right now. In our plant, we have a fever screening system, but more importantly a clean room environment where everyone has PPE on at all times. When they exit, we have processes to protect them and everyone who can work from home is working from home.

For smaller businesses, I think they can operate in a similar "safe" manner if given guidelines and even some regulations. It's just weird to me that Home Depot and Lowe's can be open in some areas, but a greenhouse or landscaping company can't. In Arizona, the only businesses really shut down are salons, massage places, restaurants/bars and some retail places. We have landscapers, Home Depot, Costco, manufacturing plants, grocery stores, a ton of places open for carry out, pool cleaning guys, golf courses and even realtors still working. We haven't noticed any spread as people are still social distancing and taking the proper precautions. Honestly, rolling back the shelter in place would just mean people can get their hair cut again - not much else. But it seems like in some sections of the US (ie, Michigan) this is looked as extremely dangerous behavior. So that's where I don't understand the difference between having a manufacturing plant or Costco open but keeping a landscaper or pool company shut down.

There's a massive difference to many small businesses between opening in mid-May and waiting until the fall.

Here's my question: Why is it OK for us to ask a couple in their 20s with two kids who work for a shut down company to stay unemployed for 2-3 more months? But it's not OK to ask the higher risk (elderly, immune compromised, etc) to protect themselves with masks and stay inside another 2-3 months while the non-high risk go back to work in a "socially conscious/social distancing when possible" way? There has to be a discussion in May about how to restart this (esp in areas not hit as hard). We can't just be like "Well, the economy is f'd, small businesses are f'd but that's just the way it is because we can't test 100% of the population or have a vaccine". There is a way to start letting people go back to work that doesn't involve 700 people going out drinking and partying in pick-up trucks before they go into a plant.

(You're carrying an extra 0 there... 150/3000 would be 5% mortality, not .5.)

I'm also not really sure where this analogy conflated the number of people I work with the number of people I socialize with... suffice it to say most of my closest friends do not work with me, and I certainly do not think I have 3000 close friends ;)

But this also isn't a choice I want to force on others. I have friends who are young & single & are quarantining hardcore, we've all seen plenty of people who are older and more at risk and very cavalier about this, all the polls & common sense say that many people will still choose and be able to maintain extreme social distancing if that's their choice. (Especially if they have a job they can work remotely, which is pretty common among white collar people at this point.) Tests that show how wide spread exposure actually has been could change my point of view (if it's only 5% of people, obviously more extreme measures are good, but if it's anything like the higher estimates - and Charlotte's person in charge said exposure could already be as high as 25-75% (which seems wildly high to me, but I guess I'm rooting for it) - then yeah we should definitely be relaxing restrictions on many things while still keeping the sensible ones like letting as many people as possible work from home, drastically cutting back travel, holding off on tightly packed concerts, sporting events, or things that bring together people from many different parts of the country so outbreaks stay localized. But to get back to Ben's hypothetical, as long as we're not at risk of overwhelming the health care system (and there's no miracle vaccine timeline), more people having been exposed is actually a good thing, and at some point shouldn't those people who have antibodies at least be allowed to walk around without a mask on in public? It's back to my theory that a positive anti-gen test could be a reverse Scarlet Letter ("No, see, I can't be infected, you can actually talk to meeeeee ;) )

I don't think people are taking into account how much of the population is in the vulnerable category. High blood pressure alone is roughly 1/3 of the population. If you add in all the other vulnerable groups, you're looking at half or more of the population. How do you isolate them without isolating everyone?

The only answer that I see is aggressive testing and tracing, but we aren't doing the things necessary to make that work. Instead, you've got Trump saying large portions of the country have seen the virus eradicated.

Think that this is paywalled, but some good news:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world...NIRBVCMNSQKA44

No placebo group, small sample size, etc., but remdesivir seems to have done really well in a clinical trial. The University of Chicago was involved, so it seems legit.

Remdesivir sounds like a Swedish black metal band name.

The people who want the economy opened up are likely not the people who are going to be risking their lives. Sean Hannitty isn't going to be in a warehouse with 500 people close by.

Here's the CNN report on remdesivir. Let's hope its the real thing.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/16/healt...ial/index.html

They were testing the drug in China and some early reports it did well. But China has so few new cases now that they halted further trials.

Hopefully it works. There are some other drugs I see being tested too.

I don't think this a fair assessment. I'm not going to get into the Whitmer stuff here because it's a non-political thread, other than to say that some of your criticism on that front is valid though not all. I think the only hope in terms of exactly what's going to happen would be false hope and that would be irresponsible. You can't say what day certain activities can resume; we don't know. You have to get over the hump before you make those decisions, and we're not quite there yet. All the statements have described the shutdown as temporary and necessary to get through the worst period, etc. The uncertainty is just part of the process. It's painful and it sucks, but I don't see how it can be avoided.

It'd be one thing if we were well on the downside of the statistical curve and still getting no guidance on this, but that's not where we are. It's sensible that while we are somewhere near the peak, we're not going to now the what and when of that.


Yep, this in response to the point Arles made. I do agree with him that the discussion about how to gradually loosen up needs to happen - that's been talked about around here a lot. But if the high-risk population were small enough to be isolated, we wouldn't be in this situation in the first place.


Can't speak for other states, but you really can do this in Michigan. I know because I've done it and explained to others how. You can't always get on in the middle of the day, but it's not like the whole thing is shut down/inaccessible.

No one is forcing anyone to socialize. I hope businesses that can have employees work from home continue to do so. I hope we maintain a decent fiscal safety net for people who don't have jobs that allow them to but are at a higher risk. Etc.

I also don't understand why the impetus is on the people least likely to be affected to sacrifice the most, and I don't understand why people are so against letting people judge their own risk thresholds (as long as we're not at the point it can overwhelm the whole health care system) for a short term risk but seem much more willing to overlook people making bad/risky long term decisions. Yes, there are plenty of people with underlying conditions through genetics or bad luck, but what are the leading causes of high blood pressure? Obesity, smoking, poor diet, lack of exercise, alcohol, caffeine? I don't judge everyone since I check 3 boxes (lots of salt & red meat, beer, and excessive caffeine!), even knowing that that could very well cost me a few years off my life eventually.

Shucks, heart disease is the leading cause of death and kills about 750,000 American every year, should we be mandating more to protect these people from themselves?
What? Obviously politicians and national news commentators aren't working with us hoi polloi, but there are plenty of people without economics degrees or ulterior motives who would like to "open the economy" so they can have a beer with their friends, or watch a sporting event (even if just on TV), or go to the park and play some basketball (ok, that's not really economic!)

And there are a fuckton of people who will want the economy opened up because they don't have a fiscal safety net, now they don't have a job, and the government handouts and foreclosure forgiveness etc will only last for a little while longer.

No talking heads are working in a warehouse on either side of the discussion. That's as transparent a red herring as there is. I personally know a lot of people who want it opened back up who work in close-quarters businesses. This whole line of argument simply isn't true.


Good post. I'm with you on most of this stuff. I would only quibble that I don't think it's indifference to the suffering, but acceptance that there's a certain level of it that cannot reasonably be prevented.


The issue with this once more is that, as you referenced, overwhelming the health care system. I don't see a point here where we can do one without the other. If you don't isolate, you do overwhelm it. If you do, you kill the economy with how many productive people you are taking out of it.

That's basically acknowledging my point that there's no way to isolate the vulnerable without isolating everyone. We're either making some level of sacrifice to protect the vulnerable or we're willing to take our chances and live with the consequences. Selective isolation is impossible.

That doesn't mean there's no way to get things closer to normal, but that requires a much different approach than letting people decide what they want to do. An aggressive test, trace, isolate plan is going to be intrusive, but it's worked pretty well in other countries.

I'm not sure what to say about this, either, because we're looking at re-opening right after the peak. Not after we're back down to where we were 1 month ago, after it's started to die down a little after the peak. Doesn't that just put us 2-3 weeks away from... another peak?

SI

Food insecurity will be an issue before long in the poorer states, they've already called in the Idaho National guard to help with the overwhelmed food banks here. Evictions are stalled for the moment with the courts closed, but renters will still be on the hook for missed payments, and once the courts start up, we're going to have mass evictions as well. The amount of people living in poverty is going to grow dramatically. That is going to change so much about the U.S.

The initial wave of unemployment hit people in the service industry first, and a lot of them just don't have a way to survive indefinitely without a paycheck. And the state unemployment benefits are not coming through in a timely manner because they're overwhelmed as well. There will probably be a second wave eliminating white collar jobs whose role didn't disappear overnight like the service industry workers' did, but who just aren't needed in a country with a much smaller economy and with millions more in poverty who aren't consumers in the economy the same way they were before.

And there were will be no moment where we wake up and it's just safe now. There will have to be some risk we're willing to take at some point, there's just a million different opinions about when and where and how fast. There have been many pandemics throughout history but the economic impact of this one is going to be so different than anything that came before. We take way more precautions, we have a much smaller tolerance for risk and exposure to danger, and we have so much more luxury and technology that allows us to hide away for longer. That means that a lot less of us will die, which is great, but we are really going into uncharted waters regarding the economy. And I always think "economy" is a cold term to use in this context- what we're really talking about is food, housing, livelihoods, reduced public services, and physical and mental health.

What really hurts the service industry is that they rely so much on tips. So unemployment really doesn't help as much as other professions. Also, because there are normally so many service industry jobs, decent servers/bartenders are rarely out of a job (they just tend to have a higher turnover). We've never seen anything like this where an entire workforce who made decent money, but close to minimum wage officially, now has no way to make a living (regardless of ability). We really don't know the impact of this but the longer we stay completely shut down, the bigger chance what Molson describes above starts to happen.

It's already going to happen. That isn't an argument for staying shut down either. I generally agree with you about needing to look for ways to remedy the situation, but it's much bigger than I think people realize. The ripple will be profound. There has been some good news though, that has shown that economies before have been able to bounce back fairly well following pandemics, once the illness has been remedied. The big question then, is just how far away are we from that remedy, and how aggressive can we be before we get there? It's going to be a balancing act, no doubt.

In other state developments, we have non-profit in the state that's popped up, started by a millionaire Republican doctor who ran for governor unsuccessfully, that acquired thousands of the antibodies tests. Nobody is sure where they got them, it's a bit shady. But they have got a ton of positive press and support from local and state politicians and businesses. (It's called "Crush the Curve")

They're offering to test anyone in the state that wants to be tested, starting this weekend. It costs money ("less than $100"), but they say there's funding for people who can't afford it and, and that they are working with insurance companies. They say they will report all currently-positive tests through proper channels - which you have to agree to let them do. The test has not yet been approved by the FDA, but is being used widely and is in line for approval. It's supposed to take a day or two to get results. They're also doing regular testing for those with symptoms, and using a lower threshold than the hospitals to determine when you're eligible for that.

I'd certainly love to know if I've had it. I'm a bit skeptical of how it's setup at the moment - you register online and then show up to a tent setup in a parking lot somewhere without a scheduled time. But I'm keeping an eye on it, and may just give it a shot if parking lot doesn't look like carnage from afar. But it seems like an eccentric millionaire doctor just wants to do thousands more tests than are currently available in Idaho. People are behind it, and they sure have a snappy website. And I'm sure there is a commercial component/motive to it as well. The website already has a page setup for merchandise, and I think the doctor is also looking for goodwill that he can parlay into politics and business opportunities. But, if thousands more people get real tests, great.

Latest Pew poll says, among other things, Americans are more concerned about lifting restrictions too early than too late by a 2:1 margin. I'm surprised by that - seems the pocket of the world I live in isn't representative in this case.

I think Gary, and by proxy all those protesters in Michigan are really panicky and want their hand held.

Their businesses will not die. They can and will return.

People Die and they can't be brought back.

Yes some of the restrictions may seem frivolous, but you know what? no matter how frivolous they SEEM, they are still keeping people from infecting other people. And thats all that this is about. Slowing this virus down until we can SAFELY get ours lives back.

No one is overstepping in this country. other countries are literally jailing people for walking the streets without very specific reasons (groceries are not specific enough in say, Italy)

I've done a grocery run and a painting supply run in the last 2 weeks. I can god damned guarentee you that Buffalo is going to look very much like NYC before we're done because people seem to believe the shut down doesn't mean "them" or shouldn't stop "them" from doing what they want to do.

Shut up, stay home and stop assuming YOUR life or a business is more important than PEOPLE. (royal Your)

"The cure can't be worse than the disease" is literally a worthless Right side pissing point, it is not VALID in this situation.

You don't get to barter with a disease. You don't get to play "balance the scales" with a pandemic. You take every possible precaution and you SURVIVE IT. You don't "learn to live with acceptable losses" it isn't a war, it isn't a sprint, this is a marathon to get the MOST people through it alive.

Fuck the economy in the short term.

Long term it WILL revive on its own.

Sorry I'm not showing confidence or giving hope (aka blowing smoke up your ass), I'm trying to be honest without using a lot of terms I feel are more fitting to describe this lunacy of re-opening anything anytime soon.

They aren't really protesters anyway. They are pretender posers.

Nihilists perhaps. They will cut off your johnson

I just hope we can all come together in some way to support those in Michigan who are only allowed to reside in one of their multiple homes right now. Truly the greatest example of the devastating effect this pandemic is having on the most unfortunate among us.

I am a bit dubious about the setuo too but I agree. If you guys can get more people tested, to know their status to use a term from another realm, that would be AWESOME!

Going to do more research this weekend but hoping someone here can give me a quick answer.

Have a HS senior daughter with asthma that was working in one of the bread places. Maybe 10-12 hours a week. She was not laid off but think "furloughed" because of her underlying condition (and also it seems it's only managers working there now).

• Can she (1) collect regular unemployment and (2) also benefit from the additional $600 (?) week benefit?

I enjoy how the narrative is "we can't stay shut down forever!" We've been shut down a month, and in a lot of places, a lot less than that.

I think we can make it 2 months. I know it's tough for those without an income. And there will be hardships. But you can't really have a higher crisis than public health and safety. Keeping people alive seems to be the A-number-1 job of a functioning society, so I really don't know what the endgame is here. We should open back up when its safe, when we mostly agree it is safe, and not a second before, and certainly not because a small minority throws a shit fit.

You won't be able to save everyone, but when we can reasonably be sure that we aren't spreading this thing like wildfire, we can reopen. No one knows exactly when that's going to be, but it is surely not when you are in the middle of the peak or just past it.

Yes. Actually that's the only way it works, because if you don't qualify for regular unemployment you don't get the $600 either. In Michigan though and some other places, that amount of hours doesn't qualify you for unemployment in the first place which would mean neither. So the big question is probably does she qualify for unemployment itself.

Some already have, both in Michigan and elsewhere.


This happens due to economic issues as well. It's not helpful to pretend it's totally a one-way street.


Most of them, yes. Some of them, no. Another case where it simply isn't helpful to pretend all of this stuff is being done perfectly, instead of making room for legitimate criticism within the actions that governments are trying to make in this difficult time.


There is a point at which it becomes reality. I.e., a whole lot of people died of malnutrition and related conditions in the Great Depression. Projections are right now that our unemployment will become considerably worse than that did. Thankfully it's easier to get people their basic needs now than in the 1930s, and as I've said I don't think we're nearly to the point yet where the cure is worse. The idea of dismissing the concept entirely though is more Ostrich Brigade stuff, just in a different direction.

We need to be reasonable about this on all sides, and remember there are no good answers - just least-bad ones.

Thanks I'll find out about qualifying for unemployment.

This doesn't surprise me. I am in NJ and almost everyone is taking this seriously. People just got some money, and they are settling in.

Give it another month though and I think it flips. I live about 5 minutes from the beach. A friend was texting me last night, she loves the beach, and she was saying she doesn't know what she will do if the beaches close. I think as we get closer to summer and kids are done with school people will get way more restless.

Are those the one-time variety or reusable 'machine tests' ? And really said "antibody tests" ? Because those will not register positive on people with currently mild symptoms. There is a bit of overlap, but those antibodies develop at best very late during the symptomatic phase. Those are not helpfull in diagnosing current cases.

An if it is one-time, that seems a tremendous waste of ressources. Rather than testing "anybody who wants it" only to have it come up negative in 95+% of the cases those tests should be used in a targeted manner, specifically for medical personnel and retirement homes to identify workers with immunity that did not get tested or had it without many symptoms.

If it is sth like the Abbott test, you'd still achieve more with targeted testing rather than a free-for-all ...