International COVID-19 Megathread

[Velasco]

Catalonia is right now the second Spanish region with the highest number of positive COVID-19 cases. The regional government has released an interactive map with a great level of detail (cases by neighbourhood, age, sex...)

http://aquas.gencat.cat/.content/IntegradorServeis/mapa_covid/atlas.html

There is a zone around the regional centre of Igualada (Conca de Odena, Barcelona province), with many recorded cases and a high mortality rate. Aside from that, the low income areas of Barcelona and its metropolitan region are hit hardest

[palandio]

I found a very interesting website that shows a phylogenetic tree of all Covid-19 samples sequenced so far:

https://nextstrain.org/ncov/2020-03-27

Quite complicated to read, and the geographic assignment often comes with a lack of certainty, but it still can shed some light on many questions like:
- Did Covid-19 arrive in Italy in 2019 already? (No, very unlikely.)
- Did it come from a single source? (No, multiple.)
- Did it come to Italy via the early German outbreak? (No, probably not.)

[FrancoAgo]

I found a very interesting website that shows a phylogenetic tree of all Covid-19 samples sequenced so far:

https://nextstrain.org/ncov/2020-03-27

Quite complicated to read, and the geographic assignment often comes with a lack of certainty, but it still can shed some light on many questions like:
- Did Covid-19 arrive in Italy in 2019 already? (No, very unlikely.)
- Did it come from a single source? (No, multiple.)
- Did it come to Italy via the early German outbreak? (No, probably not.)

that website give no info on yours points,
the website show the appear of Codogno cluster from nowhere, show a early cluster in Friuli and i never heard of this

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Dead: 21

Apparently someone came back from the dead, because now the figure is 20.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

Merkel's speech has been translated into English, side-by-side with the original German text for any others who are learning German: https://singdeutsch.com/angela-merkels-corona-speech-with-english-translation/

[palandio]

I found a very interesting website that shows a phylogenetic tree of all Covid-19 samples sequenced so far:

https://nextstrain.org/ncov/2020-03-27

Quite complicated to read, and the geographic assignment often comes with a lack of certainty, but it still can shed some light on many questions like:
- Did Covid-19 arrive in Italy in 2019 already? (No, very unlikely.)
- Did it come from a single source? (No, multiple.)
- Did it come to Italy via the early German outbreak? (No, probably not.)

that website give no info on yours points,
the website show the appear of Codogno cluster from nowhere, show a early cluster in Friuli and i never heard of this

You are right that the info on the website does not prove my second and third point. In fact I took the conclusion from an article on Neue Zürcher Zeitung and after re-evaluating them using the data on the website I am less confident about my statements.

The phylogenetic tree seems more useful to me than the maps. A good idea is to set "Filter by Country" to Italy and Germany. Then you can click on the samples and the clades (branches) they are assigned to. What is shown is that the Italian samples (Italy/CDG1/2020 etc.) are from several branches that all go back to about the time of the early German outbreak. The first German sample (Germany/BavPat1/2020) is closely related to this branching event, but it is not clear if it is really the ancestor. By the way I would not give a lot about the country confidences because they are heavily skewed by the number of samples. No way the virus came from Rejkjavik.

The Friuli sample is only from 01 March, so not that early.

[Middle-aged Europe]

As I already mentioned in the German state politics thread, the finance minister of the state of Hesse, Thomas Schäfer, has committed suicide yesterday. Minister-president Volker Bouffier has confirmed today that Schäfer had been troubled with the development of the Corona crisis lately and therefore Bouffier assumes that Schäfer took his life for that reason.

In other news, the long-term partner of former Berlin mayor Klaus Wowereit, Jörn Kubicki, died of Coronavirus complications, aged 54. He had previously suffered from other health issues (COPD).

[CumbrianLefty]

UK's death number today is significantly down, but this may be the "weekend effect".

[Tender Branson]

How the tourists at Ischgl ski resort spread the virus throughout Central Europe (based on mobile phone data):



Scandinavia, where also many infected tourists returned to, is sadly not shown in this picture.

[FrancoAgo]

The Friuli sample is only from 01 March, so not that early.

Now i see it from 16th February, just some hours ago from 26th February, at this point i suspect a bug

[parochial boy]

Italy down to 5'200 cases today. Hope...

[palandio]

The Friuli sample is only from 01 March, so not that early.

Now i see it from 16th February, just some hours ago from 26th February, at this point i suspect a bug

Actually there seem to be four samples from Friuli, all from 01 March.
Their labels are Italy/FVG-ICGEB_S1/2020, Italy/FVG-ICGEB_S5/2020, Italy/FVG-ICGEB_S8/2020, Italy/FVG-ICGEB_S9/2020.

What is the label of the Friuli sample that you can see? Or is 16th/26th February just the date when the Friuli bubble appears on the map? In that case the date is probably only infered probabilistically from the known data and the map can change dynamically after new samples are added.

I'm sticking with the small bubbles on the phylogenetic trees. This is the safe information. The map on the other hand seems to be built on a lot of assumptions, so I would treat it very cautiously.

[Tirnam]

Some sources of hope in France.
For the past few days the numbers seem to have stabilized.
- around 300 dead in hospital per day
- 2300 new hospitalizations 4 days ago, down to 1800-1700 since
- 548 people placed in intensive care 4 days ago, down the following days, 319 today.

In addition, France will change its method of counting cases and deaths by moving to an estimate based on observations on the ground by GPs.

[It’s so Joever]

It’s almost as if lockdown measures work....
Who would have guessed?

[rob in cal]

  Todays numbers seem better in most of the heavily hit areas. Hopefully not a Sunday blip. So far nowhere in the US do we see a scary looking spike in deaths like in NYC area.

[Former Dean Phillips Supporters for Haley (I guess???!?) 👁️]

Italy down to 5'200 cases today. Hope...

Italy also down 10k tests from yesterday...

[FrancoAgo]

 Or is 16th/26th February just the date when the Friuli bubble appears on the map? In that case the date is probably only infered probabilistically from the known data and the map can change dynamically after new samples are added.

was just the date

now the bubble is show at 19th february

[palandio]

[...]
was just the date

now the bubble is show at 19th february

Yes, that it because the map is the result of a statistical algorithm that is calculated from scratch every time a new sample is added. The outcome can change every time.

I keep with the tree and particularly the small bubbles in the tree. This is the reliable data.

[#TheShadowyAbyss]

https://www.dw.com/en/german-state-finance-minister-thomas-sch%C3%A4fer-found-dead/a-52948976

The body of a man identified as Thomas Schäfer, the finance minister of the German state of Hesse, was found on a high-speed train line in the town of Hochheim between Frankfurt and Mainz, police confirmed Saturday.

The presence of a body on the tracks was first reported by witnesses to paramedics, who were unable to initially identify the remains due to the extent of the injuries.

Investigators said an investigation on the scene confirmed the identity of the man as Schäfer and that the death was likely a suicide. Police did not immediately release further details of the case.

The politician apparently left a note before taking his own life, German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung reported, citing sources close to the investigation. The note, according to the report, referenced Schäfer's reasons for taking the step.

According to media in the state of Hesse, the 54-year-old regularly appeared in public in recent days, for example, to inform the public about financial assistance during the coronavirus crisis.

Schäfer had "considerable worries" over COVID-19

[Peanut]

An interesting fact about Costa Rica's patients in critical care (whose numbers have been increasing) is that none of them are senior citizens: they're all in their 30s and 40s. Costa Rica's elderly showing their incredible resiliency (yuge life expectancy and excellent senior care, after all).

[Pulaski]

Encouraging signs in Australia: it seems the curve might be showing signs of flattening just a little bit:
(https://theconversation.com/government-says-australias-coronavirus-curve-may-be-flattening-134997)

These results coming in are still before NSW announced stage 2 restrictions, and we just announced stage 3 last night.

Every day we don't see explosions in new cases is positive - it's another day we have to prepare our hospitals for increased capacity and research gets closer to providing tangible results to aid us in the fight.

As of right now, it also seems like around 1% of confirmed cases are needing ICU care, with a death rate of approx. 0.4%.

Our high testing rate also means we probably have a much higher number of cases confirmed as a percentage of total cases - around 41%, according to one model (https://benflips.shinyapps.io/nCovForecast/)

I'm optimistic about Australia's chances.

[afleitch]

Scotland too may have flattened. Cases yesterday were as low as those 4 days ago.

In terms of cases per 100k, it's the Scottish Borders and Dumfries and Galloway that have the highest cases perhaps due to cross border travel. The Islands have very few cases for the opposite reason.

Only 3% of UK fatalities and our trajectory is quite slow which is helpful.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

Number of cases in Sweden continues to rise in a linear, not exponential way, but most importantly is that ICU admittance numbers remain very, very low, lending evidence that the social-distancing-but-no-lockdown is working (so far):

[Tender Branson]

Austrians need to wear masks when grocery shopping, starting Wednesday.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Austrians need to wear masks when grocery shopping, starting Wednesday.

Does it mean you guys have no problems with obtaining them?

Asking cuz we sure have.