COVID-19 Megathread 4: Grandma Got Run Over by the Dow Jones

[Skill and Chance]

When are we going to be willing to have a conversation about whether we have massively overreacted without people saying that anyone who doesn't repeat the #StayAtHomeFor18Months #FlattenTheCurve mantra is wanting people to die?

https://twitter.com/ClayTravis/status/1246491967841882112

Places that have done (somewhat) randomized population testing have not found this.  San Miguel County, Colorado did randomized testing and found found 1% of their population tested positive, with another 2% ambiguous.  Iceland has tested 5% of their country's population, some of it random, and some of it directed at obviously sick people.  They had 1319 positives out of over 20,000 tests, and they said only 50% of those tested positive did not have symptoms when they were tested. Some of them later got sick enough to seek care, so that points to <50% being truly asymptomatic.  This also matches a study in Wuhan that tested for antibodies and found 43% of the people who tested positive for coronavirus antibodies never got sick enough to seek care.  

Castiglione d'Adda was one of the earliest and hardest hit towns in Northern Italy.  There was a report that 70% of people who showed up to donate blood last week had antibodies, so that town may have herd immunity now if that is verified.  But, crucially, they have already lost about 2% of their total 2017 population to coronavirus.  Many other people there are still very sick and at risk of dying from it.  That's what any jurisdiction that goes for herd immunity is risking.

[Skill and Chance]

When are we going to be willing to have a conversation about whether we have massively overreacted without people saying that anyone who doesn't repeat the #StayAtHomeFor18Months #FlattenTheCurve mantra is wanting people to die?

https://twitter.com/ClayTravis/status/1246491967841882112

Maybe when we have evidence (not self-reported speculation) from actual scientists along the lines of what is listed in the tweet. The 50x number you're quoting is drawn out of thin air. Your confirmation bias is showing.

San Miguel County, CO (Telluride) is trying to test everyone in the county (giving a much better idea of what asymptomatic infection rates are). They're only about 15% of the way there but preliminary results show, at most, 4% infection, with only 1% absolute positives.

This.  There is absolutely no evidence for these theories that half the population already got it as a mild cold.  It's also unclear if people who survive it are conclusively safe from future reinfection to begin with.  

[Skill and Chance]

When are we going to be willing to have a conversation about whether we have massively overreacted without people saying that anyone who doesn't repeat the #StayAtHomeFor18Months #FlattenTheCurve mantra is wanting people to die?

https://twitter.com/ClayTravis/status/1246491967841882112

Maybe when we have evidence (not self-reported speculation) from actual scientists along the lines of what is listed in the tweet. The 50x number you're quoting is drawn out of thin air. Your confirmation bias is showing.

Mina is also saying that's the upper bound of what he would consider an unsurprising result — if you scroll up two tweets he says it could be 2 million, 4 million, somewhere in that range. Travis is cherry-picking the highest figure he threw out and treating it like he's making a much more specific claim than he is.

I recognize that it's a high estimate, and I don't agree that it's less deadly than influenza.  My argument for weeks has been that it's slightly more deadly than the flu (probably 0.25-0.5% vs. 0.1%), but that it's not deadly enough to justify drastic changes to daily life, except perhaps for the most vulnerable.

Does anyone know if the widely reported 0.1% normal influenza death rate includes some estimate of people who get mildly sick and recover at home?  Or is the denominator just the number of people who get sick enough to seek formal care and test positive?

[Skill and Chance]

When are we going to be willing to have a conversation about whether we have massively overreacted without people saying that anyone who doesn't repeat the #StayAtHomeFor18Months #FlattenTheCurve mantra is wanting people to die?

https://twitter.com/ClayTravis/status/1246491967841882112

Hopefully soon.  I'm a 63 year old in an essential occupation.  I have come to believe that this is an overreaction that has arisen out of good and bad motives.

The medical and scientific "experts" (and I'm not denying their expertise) have, indeed, been repeatedly wrong about this issue, and that includes the now Iconic Dr. Fauci.  John Kerry was for the Iraq war before he was against it and Anthony Fauci thought this would be a minor deal before it came the Bubonic Plague Lite.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/health/2020/02/17/nih-disease-official-anthony-fauci-risk-of-coronavirus-in-u-s-is-minuscule-skip-mask-and-wash-hands/4787209002/

If that testing shows the virus has slipped into the country in places federal officials don't know about, "we've got a problem," Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told USA TODAY's Editorial Board Monday.

Short of that, Fauci says skip the masks unless you are contagious, don't worry about catching anything from Chinese products and certainly don't avoid Chinese people or restaurants.

That was February 19, 2020.  Here's what he said April 2:

https://www.yahoo.com/huffpost/fauci-national-lockdown-stay-at-home-orders-152802623.html

As more U.S. states issue stay-at-home orders and the federal government recommends a 30-day period of social distancing, Dr. Anthony Fauci on Thursday suggested the need for a national lockdown, while acknowledging he does not have the authority to order one.

Fauci has lectured Americans about how people will die and how we need to stay at home longer, or "people will die".  And I get that.  I get it about "lowering the curve".  But will people not die if we tank the economy and they cannot maintain basic necessities?  Tucker Carlson stated last night in pondering the issue that we can go on like this long enough to where we become a poorer nation going forward.  Is he wrong?  Is that an outcome that can happen.  Carlson also suggested that poorer nations are less healthy than richer nations.  Is he wrong?

Our system of government is not an "expertocracy".  There's a place for experts, and Fauci is indeed that, but it's easy for him to talk how others need to hang in there because he's not losing his job and he's got the means to ride out whatever comes.  The same can't be said for millions of Americans' their entire future can be altered for the worse, and permanently so, if they have to do without doing business for 3-4 months (or even longer).  Business "experts" predict all sorts of 1929 scenarios should this go on for 5-6 months; are they to just be blown off?

There does become a point where the cure is worse than the disease.  That needs to be honestly discussed.  I'm not convinced that locking down America to the extreme degree we have is a solution that is smaller than the problem.  Perhaps it IS necessary.  But I'm not willing to blindly listen to "experts" uncritically.  It was the foreign policy Anthony Faucis that advised LBJ prior to the Gulf of Tonkin resolution all the way up through the Tet Offensive.  

Well, it depends on whether it's a hard or soft shutdown and for how long.  A soft shutdown until summer 2021 is probably more manageable than a hard shutdown for 3 months, so we need to be thinking about what intermediate measures will look like and how to prepare for them.  

But I think there is too much economic doomsaying in general.  The market crash is less severe than 2000 or 2008 so far.  There is evidence that the most aggressively responding local governments in 1918 had the most V-shaped recoveries afterward.  The healthcare and manufacturing innovation that is needed to get out of this will attract displaced workers and capital and drive some new growth in its own right.  The jobs that have been lost are disproportionately the least specialized.  Retraining is eminently viable.  

I also think many are overstating the impact of the government mandates.  Knowing everything we do about the risks of the virus, how many people would go out to eat or to the movies tomorrow, let alone get on a flight to go to a convention even if everything was still legally open?  Virtually no one vs. how many did those things in December!  The formal regulations are about getting the last ~20% of the population in line.  The great majority already altered their behavior voluntarily.  There may be a permanent decline in the share of US GDP occupied by restaurants, 3rd party childcare, and international meetings, but relax, the US was one of the most prosperous countries in the world for nearly a century before any of those were even a blip on our cultural map.  

[Skill and Chance]

You know, GOP posters.

You belong to one of the only political parties in the western world that denies the existence of climate change as a real and man-made threat. Your party has overruled doctors, nurses and healthcare experts to impose bizarre restrictions on abortion. Your party has demeaned and belittled the scientific community as shills and liars for decades, in an astonishing display of projection.

Now, we're seeing, in frustrating detail what happens when a party indoctrinates its voters to ignore the experts on a range of scientific issues and instead trust the Trumps and DeSantis types of the world.

It doesn't surprise me that Extreme Republican and Fuzzy Bear believe they know more about epidemiology than Dr Fauci, or a suite of European doctors.

I just wish there was a way to prove them wrong that didn't involve the loss of further life.

I've never said to blow the "experts" off.  But "experts" often disagree, and the "expert" that is currently front and center was pretty much wrong 2 months ago.

Do we just leave the military to the "experts" (the Generals)?  Do we just leave Law Enforcement to the "experts" (the Police)?  We don't do that any more than we just leave everything to business "experts".  Experts see life through THEIR area of expertise, but their expertise is only one area of life.  Our civilian government's job is to balance these competing worldviews as much as possible.

I'm not anti-science, by the way.  I do live in the real world, however, and that real world is a world where there are alternatives for fossil fuels, but no substitute for fossil fuels.  Without fossil fuels, our way of life would be drastically impacted if we stopped using them all now.  That's another issue, but it illustrates the fact that this problem, as well as the climate problem, involves choices that have negative impacts that are significant, whichever way we choose.

I never claimed to know more about this than Fauci (although, I do think I have a decent understanding of epidemics for a lay man with no formal training).  Obviously, he knows a lot more about viruses than I do.  But, the epidemic itself is just one portion of the issue here.  We need to also listen to economists and mental health experts to come up with the best solution for as many people as possible.  We need to be more holistic than just saying that the only goal is to completely stop a virus.  By that logic, we should live in lockdown forever.  We would almost never get sick if we did that, but it would also be no life to lead.

A majority of the population is afraid to leave their homes right now and a majority of employers don't want them in the office anyway.  This legally voluntary behavior is driving most of the economic changes and it will not recede until people are convinced the virus is under control and/or easily treatable.  Formal government restrictions are not the cause of the downturn.  They are just icing on the cake.  

[Skill and Chance]

Castiglione d'Adda was one of the earliest and hardest hit towns in Northern Italy.  There was a report that 70% of people who showed up to donate blood last week had antibodies, so that town may have herd immunity now if that is verified.  But, crucially, they have already lost about 2% of their total 2017 population to coronavirus.  Many other people there are still very sick and at risk of dying from it.  That's what any jurisdiction that goes for herd immunity is risking.

It there more data about Castiglione? In Kirkland's nursing home ~50% died. With other words, if a nursing homes with 100 people in Castiglione would get infected, it'd be enough to get 2% of whole population. 5k town can become anecdotal evidence. Italy has also 4-6 times less ventilators per capita then US I think.

The bad news is that recent news show that Western World keep failing protecting places like nursing homes, so we can, indeed, follow Castiglione...

That I don't know.

If it turns out to be Italy's version of The Villages, that would be somewhat reassuring.  If it's a college town, that would be terrifying. 

[Skill and Chance]

Do we know when things will be back to normal? (meaning: large gatherings, multiple people shopping, non-essential businessis open, no National Gaurd at state boarders, not having to wear masks, etc)?

Businesses/Schools open: mid-late may.
Large gatherings: Late June

I really don't envision insurers going along with international conferences or full stadiums until there is mandatory vaccination next year.

[Skill and Chance]

NYC vs. the rest of the country (including SF which also has high public transit commuting, dense housing, and a large homeless population and is rather amazingly doing fine) makes me wonder if closing schools might be the single most important intervention?  Japan closed schools very early and while they are having some issues now (2nd wave?), they seem to be doing very well vs. the free world average. 

[Skill and Chance]

Is there anyone here who still maintains that the US is on an Italy-type disease trajectory?  Or can we all reasonably agree that the United States looks like it will be one of the "success stories" of the global pandemic?  If so, can we talk about what factors have influenced the U.S. emerging relatively unscathed from this?  Better testing, more docs/ventilators, lower population density, younger demographics, warm weather, etc.

I don't think that we are going to see the "worst-case" scenarios, that have been proposed, at this point. However, that doesn't mean that our approach to this has been "flawless". Not by any means. If Trump had not denounced coronavirus as a "hoax" and had taken more serious measures from earlier on, we could have reduced the impact of this even further.

We messed up by letting it spread much farther and deeper than it should have at the beginning, but we do seem to be doing a standout job of keeping people who have it alive.  Only Germany looks better on that front and there method of attributing deaths to COVID-19 is very restrictive compared to our method.  Our counting method is closer to Italy's method, so our baseline fatality rate would be higher than Germany's.  It's important to keep this in mind when considering reports of the low IFR in Germany.  I'm optimistic it could be lower than 1.5% or even lower than 1% after accounting for asymptomatics and the quality of US ICU care, but the sub-0.5% reports out of Germany need an asterisk because they don't count it as a COVID death there if the patient has any other serious medical condition.

[Skill and Chance]

I dont think Australia, Germany, USA and South Korea got the lesser version compared to Italy, France, UK and Spain.

Clearly testing rates in the latter countries are much lower as Dr Birx hinted yesterday.

test per million

Australia 12,946
Germany 15,730
USA 6,872
South Korea 9,310
Italy 14,114
France 3,436
UK 4,155
Spain 7,593


We have town with 2-3% of mortality, it's not possible a fatality rate of 0.37%

Italy has been testing since February, so they'll have tested the most just by virtue of doing it longer than anyone else has.  Reporting tests/million doesn't capture changes in testing capacity, which have a deterministic effect on the "new case" curve. 

The issue here is that Germany is very restrictive in assigning deaths to COVID-19.  The US and Italy use a method that appears to cover all deaths of patients who tested positive.  Germany does not and appears to only count patients who were otherwise healthy with no/minimal underlying conditions before getting COVID-19.  The numbers are not simply not comparable.

[Skill and Chance]

I dont think Australia, Germany, USA and South Korea got the lesser version compared to Italy, France, UK and Spain.

Clearly testing rates in the latter countries are much lower as Dr Birx hinted yesterday.

test per million

Australia 12,946
Germany 15,730
USA 6,872
South Korea 9,310
Italy 14,114
France 3,436
UK 4,155
Spain 7,593


We have town with 2-3% of mortality, it's not possible a fatality rate of 0.37%

Italy has been testing since February, so they'll have tested the most just by virtue of doing it longer than anyone else has.  Reporting tests/million doesn't capture changes in testing capacity, which have a deterministic effect on the "new case" curve. 

The issue here is that Germany is very restrictive in assigning deaths to COVID-19.  The US and Italy use a method that appears to cover all deaths of patients who tested positive.  Germany does not and appears to only count patients who were otherwise healthy with no/minimal underlying conditions before getting COVID-19.  The numbers are not simply not comparable.

From an epidemiological standpoint, I'd just like to point out there's no "correct" way to attribute deaths in the midst of a pandemic that is particularly hard on older, sicker people.  If an 87-year old New Yorker with CHF develops severe pneumonia and dies is it COVID-19?  Even without positive tests, the CDC is recommending that it might be.  We won't know the true story until several years from now, when we can look at the all-cause mortality figures in confidence.  The media's fixation on deaths counts is understandable, but these numbers are likely to be significantly off (in either direction).  The CDC typically doesn't report mortality from recent seasonal flu pandemics with a high-degree of precision, but it looks like they're making an effort to do exactly that with COVID-19. 

Germany's method is defensible, but it means that comparing their numbers to our numbers is apples and oranges.

[Skill and Chance]

https://twitter.com/jacobbogage/status/1248323451196248071

What percentage of Americans go to games anyway?  Plus, people are viewing it from the prism of today, not the prism of the coronavirus landscape when these events happen.

But, regardless, I'm in the minority of people who will have no hesitation about doing anything I normally would.  I'm not scared of this virus.

I don't understand how you square that view with your username?  Would you at least have the opposite view if the virus was most dangerous to children and particularly newborns instead of the elderly?

[Skill and Chance]

Excessive corona panic is more dangerous than coronavirus itself.

How many people have been killed by "corona panic"?

Suicide hotline calls are reportedly way up over spring baselines, so it unfortunately isn't 0.  There will also be people afraid to go to the ER for something unrelated to COVID-19 that seems like a moderate emergency but turns fatal the next day.  

However, I highly doubt this adds up to 10's of thousands of people, and even if it did, given how nonlinear the COVID transmission process is, it almost surely was net benefit to overreact to it.  If we did substantially less (say 50% reduction in activity), we would probably have 100's of thousands of COVID deaths, and with complete business as usual (treating it like we treat seasonal flu), plausibly millions of COVID deaths.  Think of it as causing a recession to avoid a World War.        

[Skill and Chance]

I feel like if the virus is as contagious as it now appears, it won't really matter how long we keep the lockdown going; we're not going to be able to eradicate to a sufficient degree that it won't just pop back up as soon as the lockdown ends.  If this is true, a universal lockdown really has no benefit, because most people are going to get the virus.  It's would be much better to enforce selective social distancing to control when people get the virus rather than if.  We can protect the most vulnerable until we reach herd immunity.

I don't follow on this.  If ~15% of the population in the hardest hit parts of Europe has it, how is it so contagious that it's inevitable a supermajority of the population gets it by the end of the year?

It's very true there is a limit to lockdowns.  I agree that we need a prompt transition to intermediate distancing measure that are socially and economically sustainable until universal vaccination in areas where this is under control (sports for TV with empty stadiums, restaurants with tables 6+ ft apart and masked servers, middle seats blocked off on aircraft,  every other pew in churches, etc.).

[Skill and Chance]

Some observations from the per capita maps:

1. Tech-oriented areas have fared remarkably well, even if they had other factors going against them (large homeless populations, substantial density and public transit, etc).  Compare the Bay Area, Seattle, Denver, and Austin to any of the large NE/Midwest cities.  Pittsburgh, with substantial high tech influence, also stands out in a happy way compared to the rest of the Rust Belt.  

2. Most rural areas have so far escaped with a single digit or barely double digit # of cases, but a handful got nailed worse than NYC per capita and have hundreds.  There are very few in between outcomes.    

3. The South has fared surprisingly well given that they were later to take precautions and in some states, more reluctant.  Florida has a problem, particularly in Miami, but it thus far did not see explosive NY style growth as feared.  Atlanta has thus far avoided the fate of New Orleans.

4. Something went very wrong in New Orleans vs. the rest of the South.  Orleans and Jefferson parishes are comparable to NYC per capita, and there are all kinds of suburban and rural parishes in eastern Louisiana that have ~1/2 the confirmed infection rate of NYC.  The only other place in the South we see anything like this is around Albany, GA, one of the worst hit rural areas in the country.  Mardi Gras is something (nearly) unique to NOLA and it could be a significant factor.  The parts of Texas with the most Louisiana cultural influence also have a worse problem than statewide.

5. Ski resorts fared very poorly per capita.  This may be something peculiar to skiing/mountains, because other types of resorty areas (Vegas, Orlando, most beaches) don't seem to have fared any worse than the nationwide average.  

6.  Smaller cities didn't necessarily help.  Detroit has a worse problem than Chicago and NEPA has a worse problem than Philadelphia.

7.  Kentucky has fared significantly better than Tennessee and Ohio than any of PA/MI/IN/IL.

[Skill and Chance]

Some observations from the per capita maps:

3. The South has fared surprisingly well given that they were later to take precautions and in some states, more reluctant.  Florida has a problem, particularly in Miami, but it thus far did not see explosive NY style growth as feared.  Atlanta has thus far avoided the fate of New Orleans.

Part of it is weather.  While warmer weather isn't going to make the virus go away by itself, it does tend to spread slightly less effectively in warmer weather.  Much of the South has been in the 80s over the last few weeks, so that has probably slowed it a little bit.  I will say that cooler weather is forecasted for the next week or two, but probably still warmer than other parts of the country.

I am hesitant about the weather explanation because of New Orleans and looking internationally, Singapore.  New Orleans was 68 degrees on Mardi Gras and had many days above 80 in March.  Granted, Mardi Gras can have an exceptional level of physical contact and crowding vs. US norms.

[Skill and Chance]

The problem with people who presume that the restrictions are killing the economy is that they fail to understand that absent these restrictions, large number of people would not be attending or participating in risky economic activity.

Furthermore from a liability standpoint. How can you hold a concert, or a business conference in a world without the stay at home orders? You couldn't even begin to cover that liability, no insurance company on earth would cover that risk. No business would want to risk being sued into oblivion by people once they get infected.

With or without the stay at home orders and mitigation, the economy was going to get wrecked and until you get the virus under control and gone, you cannot conduct business. Not because the government won't allow you to, but because you literally cannot afford conduct business in this environment. Either you won't have any customers or you get sued into oblivion, or both.

I don't understand why the critics of the mitigation strategy don't account for this aspect of the economic effects of the virus.

This is all very true.  Tech companies on the West Coast went work-from-home in late February.  At least 2/3rds of the population was already reducing their activity in early March.  Insurers will balk at letting unvaccinated people into stadiums and convention centers. 

Where the restrictions had the most impact was 1. closing schools and 2. activities that involve 10's of people in a building rather than 100's or 1000's. 

[Skill and Chance]

The problem with people who presume that the restrictions are killing the economy is that they fail to understand that absent these restrictions, large number of people would not be attending or participating in risky economic activity.

Furthermore from a liability standpoint. How can you hold a concert, or a business conference in a world without the stay at home orders? You couldn't even begin to cover that liability, no insurance company on earth would cover that risk. No business would want to risk being sued into oblivion by people once they get infected.

With or without the stay at home orders and mitigation, the economy was going to get wrecked and until you get the virus under control and gone, you cannot conduct business. Not because the government won't allow you to, but because you literally cannot afford conduct business in this environment. Either you won't have any customers or you get sued into oblivion, or both.

I don't understand why the critics of the mitigation strategy don't account for this aspect of the economic effects of the virus.

That's why most of critique of Trump rings hollow and just lame attacking a straw man. Anyone understands you can't just magically re-start economy until it's under control. You have though to start to think about it.

"Grandma Got Run Over by the Dow Jones" straw man are so sweet. In US that is. In Europe the discussion on when and how you'll re-start economy has already started. But they don't have CNN, either.

Good thing is that Trump gave US 2 weeks. US will be able to see what and how well Europe is doing. That's among other things why I think US will handle it (much?) better than Europe.

We are doing significantly better than the average of Europe so far.  The free East Asian countries are doing the best of all and we should think carefully about what we can learn from them.

[Skill and Chance]

https://twitter.com/kellyswails/status/1248606674195230720

Here's the thing, though: it could be either case (or somewhere in between), and we won't know with any degree of certainty until well after this is all over, which is a terrible position for a policymaker to be in.

You have to overreact to things that scale exponentially.   I'll bet Blockbuster wishes it had "overreacted" to Netflix when Netflix was a tiny startup.

[Skill and Chance]

All over the country, there are portions of stores that people are prohibited from buying from. In Michigan, by Gov Whitmer's executive order, this includes home improvement and gardening.

https://twitter.com/joesichspach/status/1248653376931258370?s=20

https://www.bridgemi.com/michigan-government/what-michigans-new-coronavirus-stay-home-executive-order-means

Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s latest stay-home order to battle the coronavirus pandemic allows home improvement stores to stay open, but only to sell “products necessary to maintain the safety, sanitation and basic operations of residences.”

The new regulations required Home Depot to close its paint section, flooring section and outdoor gardening center by Friday morning.

Tillery, a Lansing resident who already lost his job as a floor layer, has been “trying to make ends meet” during the pandemic by picking up side jobs as a handyman, providing what he said are emergency repairs in a time of crisis.

Paint was supposed to be one of the last steps in his current project: fixing a home after a tree crashed through the roof, damaging the ceiling and causing water damage.

Now, he’s not sure he can finish the job, so he planned to snap a photo of the closed paint section to show his client as proof.

Not sure how I feel about this. Outdoor gardening is a way for people to keep themselves in good mental health while having to stay home for such a long period of time.

I do question the severity of the restrictions on outdoor activities in some states.  Particularly as it gets hot, people will need to be able to go outside or there will be a spike in deaths from heat stroke.

[Skill and Chance]

https://twitter.com/AP/status/1249007008264663042

America first?

Okay, Hillary.

Population size....what a stupid comparison.

We would've had a 110% more competent response with Hillary & you know it.

I mean, I only wonder how many states would have already seceded if thrice-impeached President Hillary Clinton’s CDC has told the red state yokels not to go to church on Easter. 

This is a good point.  Many mistakes have been made, but Trump is undoubtedly a better messenger to red state governors (where the formal shutdown power lies) that Clinton and blue states were culturally more likely to support aggressive economic action regardless of what the federal government recommended.  Under a President Clinton, there would be ~15 governors denouncing the federal "conspiracy" and calling for Sweden-style business as usual in their states right now.

If Clinton tried to take matters into her own hands, an inevitable 5/4 or 6/3 (depending on what happened in the Senate in 2017-18) SCOTUS ruling on a national guard enforced federal lockdown would probably lead to Bleeding Kansas 2.0.     

[Skill and Chance]

https://twitter.com/NewsGuyGreg/status/1250141163912380421

WWE as essential sounds frivolous, but if there is no one in the stands (there won't be), what is the practical concern here?  Getting some sports going for TV audiences will do a great deal to boost morale and tolerance of the various intermediate rules that will be needed until we have a vaccine.

[Skill and Chance]

Washington State's latest update has only 89 new cases over 24 hours. That's down from over 600 per day at our peak.

https://twitter.com/seattletimes/status/1250573126884360193

89 cases per day is fine for reopening the economy and schools. The west coast pact should release the measures on Washington and see how things go.

After they have already announced schools are closed for the academic year?

[Skill and Chance]

Midwest Governors Announce Partnership to Reopen Regional Economy

- Illinois
- Indiana
- Kentucky
- Michigan
- Minnesota
- Ohio
- Wisconsin

https://twitter.com/MollyBeck/status/1250856108807221248?s=20

They clearly are not on the same page, since Evers just extended the shutdown to May 26th, while DeWine is trying to open up on May 1. DeWine was doing so well, and now he's just doing Trump's dirty work once again. It's simply idiotic to open up such a big state again in 2 weeks, especially when Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and nearby states, are still not doing well.

Flattening the curve is not about keeping everyone locked inside forever. It's about making sure hospitals don't get overloaded like they have in Italy or NYC, and clearly DeWine's actions have flattened the curve in Ohio. He's also putting in specific rules about how things can open, and still isn't allowing big gatherings like concerts or sports games. Everyone else will need to open back up at some point, and Ohio can show us how it's done.

I actually agree; if I were a governor I wouldn't be considering opening things back up, but it seems like DeWine's contemplating doing so in a relatively restrained and cautious manner. And it needs to be remembered that Beshear, whose response has garnered universal praise, technically never imposed a lockdown.

I am starting to think this entire controversy has been overblown.  These are state/local decisions being left to state/local officials with a set of recommendations to reference.  There's no indication Trump is scheduling a rally in Queens on May 2nd or any Dem governor is ordering a 2021 Thanksgiving parade shut down.

I am concerned that some rural areas have gotten overconfident given what went down in Albany, GA and Sioux Falls, SD and on the Navajo reservation.  But to the extent there is a policy problem it's because of slow-walking on the front end of this.   

[Skill and Chance]

Important data points here:

Sweeping testing of the entire crew of the coronavirus-stricken U.S. aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt may have revealed a clue about the pandemic: The majority of the positive cases so far are among sailors who are asymptomatic, officials say.
...
The Navy’s testing of the entire 4,800-member crew of the aircraft carrier - which is about 94% complete - was an extraordinary move in a headline-grabbing case that has already led to the firing of the carrier’s captain and the resignation of the Navy’s top civilian official.

Roughly 60 percent of the over 600 sailors who tested positive so far have not shown symptoms of COVID-19, the potentially lethal respiratory disease caused by the coronavirus, the Navy says. The service did not speculate about how many might later develop symptoms or remain asymptomatic.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-usa-military-sympt-idUSKCN21Y2GB

this is around the same % that we got in the italian town of Vo'

I'm not sure if the insane asymptomatic rate on this thing is a good or bad thing. On one hand it's good because it means the mortality rate is extremely inflated and it's probably actually more like the flu than SARS in regards to danger, on the other hand it makes the virus harder to control and record.

IDK whether halfish asymptomatic cases (showing up pretty consistently now between Italy, Iceland, the Diamond Princess and now the Theodore Roosevelt) is a good thing or a bad thing?  It would lower the fatality rate of course,  but only by about 1/2, which if true takes from perhaps 10X more dangerous than seasonal flu to perhaps 5X.  Still quite scary. The flip side is that it makes this thing extremely hard to contain.  If it was 10X more dangerous than flu but only people who already had a high fever were contagious, it could be a lot easier to contain with health screenings.

IMO you either want to hope there are 10 or 100 contagious asymptomatic cases per person who gets sick (to massively drive down the fatality rate and quickly achieve herd immunity) massively or none (so that you can control it with fever screenings).  Halfish doesn't seem to help.