International COVID-19 Megathread

[Mike88]

Portugal update: Worst day since May in terms of new cases.

5 September update: (compared with yesterday)

Total cases: 59,943 (+486)
Active cases: 15,312 (+264)
Deaths: 1,838 (+5)
Recoveries: 42,576 (+217)
Patients in ICU: 41 (+1)
Patients hospitalized: 345 (+6)

2,092,057 tests conducted since March 1st.

[Meclazine for Israel]

We are getting a second spike in Europe, but the deaths curve is no match? It's almost minimal in comparison to the 2 week trailing death curve of the first wave.

Why is that?

[Pericles]

We are getting a second spike in Europe, but the deaths curve is no match? It's almost minimal in comparison to the 2 week trailing death curve of the first wave.

Why is that?

Since the spread is among the young, it may be a delayed death curve as the deaths won't come 2 weeks after the initial spike in cases but around two weeks after the new community transmission infects the old and vulnerable. Just as Florida's new cases were peaking for instance, deaths barely started to rise. It is also harder to see because Spain's death reporting system has been screwed up for months. Still, their death toll yesterday of 184 deaths was the highest since May 8.

[Silent Hunter]

You will see a rise in hospital admissions first of course. We're not seeing that in the UK.

UK Coronavirus official data

[CumbrianLefty]

Our government now seems more concerned with hectoring people "back to work" (of course, many of them have actually been working through the last 6 months)

What they actually mean, of course, is "prop up our mates in the commercial property game NOW!"

[Silent Hunter]

Commercial landlords do employ a lot of people in maintaining their buildings and many small inner-city businesses are dependent on office workers, especially in the food business.

I've been going into the office twice a week at the moment and it's definitely more pleasant than sitting at home all day.

[CumbrianLefty]

Yes of course, but the fact is for *some* people (and, it would seem, a significant number) the past six months have shown they don't HAVE to go into the office every day.

And maybe even more importantly, their employers often agree.

To me, trying to forcibly revert things to EXACTLY how they were in March 2020 is Canute-like. Much better to accept that certain things *will* change, and manage that as painlessly as possible.

[Meclazine for Israel]

"Canute-like"

What does that mean?

I think there is a race of people in Indonesia called Canutes.

https://youtu.be/85ubtVs5n6A

[Silent Hunter]

He's referring to a pre-Norman King of England who, legend has it, either tried to stop the tide coming in or was demonstrating that he couldn't.

The story

[CumbrianLefty]

Its generally accepted that the story was about Canute issuing a symbolic rebuke to his flattering courtiers and/or demonstrating even a king's powerlessness compared with the workings of God. Despite this, the metaphor is most commonly used in the way that I did.

[afleitch]

Glasgow is likely to be the next UK hotspot.

Unlike in other instances where specific businesses or patterns of indivudual behaviour have been identified, here it's household visits which have now been curtailed as they are more likely to be cross generational. That also gives it a potential to infect at risk groups.

[CumbrianLefty]

Glasgow is of course mostly white, which goes against certain "narratives".

[Silent Hunter]

It is more Asian than the Scottish average, with major concentrations in some wards, but not hugely so.

Demography of Glasgow

One Scottish author's most violent Glaswegian is a petite South Asian woman...

[Battista Minola 1616]

Speaking of racially related things, my city has just had a COVID outbreak and it is apparently centered on the Dominican community.*

I don't know who's more stupid between those who think that mentioning this at all is xenophobic and those who have actual xenophobic takes about it.

*for reference it's the largest immigrant community present in La Spezia.

[Silent Hunter]

Do they live in multigenerational households?

[Battista Minola 1616]

Do they live in multigenerational households?

Are you asking me?

Presumably yes, given that it is a somewhat common thing in Italy anyway, but the outbreak is not really related to that, but more to parties and gatherings etc.

[palandio]

Today school begins in Söder's Bavaria, the Land of Germany that comes second in population.

And just in time Bavaria's COVID-19 numbers are seeing a spike. The seven-day rolling sum is now 18.6 new cases per 100,000 inhabitants and will likely continue to rise a bit further. Bavaria's alert limit of 35 new cases per 100k inhabitants (which is lower than the national alert limit of 50) has been exceeded in Munich, Nuremberg and four minor independent cities. One of these cities, Weiden, has managed to exceed the alert limit with a mere 16 cases.

This leaves Baden-Württemberg as the only Land where school is yet to begin (on September 14). If we go by the experiences from other densely-populated Länder like Nordrhein-Westfalen and Hessen, numbers in Bayern and Baden-Württemberg will see a peak due to all the people returning getting tested and then numbers will again decrease.

We should of course remain cautious that the situation doesn't spiral out of control, particularly when autumn is coming, but so far there seems to be no need to panic and everything is following an almost predictable pattern.

[CumbrianLefty]

It is more Asian than the Scottish average, with major concentrations in some wards, but not hugely so.

Demography of Glasgow

One Scottish author's most violent Glaswegian is a petite South Asian woman...

I know Glasgow has the highest Asian population in Scotland, but it is still *mostly* white.

(in contrast to several other "hotspot" areas)

[afleitch]

It is more Asian than the Scottish average, with major concentrations in some wards, but not hugely so.

Demography of Glasgow

One Scottish author's most violent Glaswegian is a petite South Asian woman...

I know Glasgow has the highest Asian population in Scotland, but it is still *mostly* white.

(in contrast to several other "hotspot" areas)

Pouring over the data, recent infections across different deprivation levels in Scotland show little difference. Sturgeon reiterated today that house gatherings are the root cause which to me suggests it's not linked to deprivation and by extension, ethnicity being inferred from that.

Having said that it won't be helpful if hotspots constantly overlap with Asian populations. Nothing is wilful; it's geography, poverty and household size. It's the same reason why 20 somethings are more susceptible. It is however dangerous for authorities in letting people make assumptions about the data and geography rather than take time to explain it.

[Mike88]

Portugal: Mass volunteering, to conduct serologic tests for Covid-19, crashes website and telephone lines:

https://twitter.com/JornalNoticias/status/1303351667228778496

Race for registration for serological study blocks website

The website created so that the Portuguese can enroll in the largest national serological study of covid-19 has not endured the thousands of visits and has been down for several hours.

The race for registration at the National Serological Panel of the João Lobo Antunes Institute of Molecular Medicine (iMM), which opened at 0:00 on Tuesday, blocked the website.

The helpline provided for additional information also did not support the high number of calls.

Contacted by JN, a source linked to the project's communication guaranteed that every effort is being made to resolve the site's problems, so that it is up and running on Wednesday.

As for the support line "is being reinforced" to respond to the volume of calls.

The iMM project is recruiting 12,000 volunteers in 102 municipalities to take free serological tests. The objective is to assess the prevalence of covid-19 infection and, consequently, the population's immunity to the virus in a "critical" post-vacation phase and the beginning of the new school year.

The results are expected to be released in late October.

The Covid-19 National Serological Panel is a project developed by iMM, in partnership with the Germano de Sousa laboratories, and fully financed by Sociedade Francisco Manuel dos Santos and Jerónimo Martins Group.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Glasgow is of course mostly white, which goes against certain "narratives".

More notable is that it isn't an area with much in the way of process manufacturing nowadays, which has been the biggest factor in most of the other hotspots (including Caerphilly CB).

[CumbrianLefty]

It is more Asian than the Scottish average, with major concentrations in some wards, but not hugely so.

Demography of Glasgow

One Scottish author's most violent Glaswegian is a petite South Asian woman...

I know Glasgow has the highest Asian population in Scotland, but it is still *mostly* white.

(in contrast to several other "hotspot" areas)

Pouring over the data

Tbf wouldn't that make it rather hard to read?

(soz about picking up on the typo but this was a good one - its actually "poring")

[DaWN]

The government here having been making themselves look like tools (as usual) but does anyone here feel that the anti-lockdown people undermine their own arguments? They have some good points but its ruined by either a) Ridiculous hyperbole that this is the greatest invasion of civil liberties and human rights in recorded history or b) Responding to people's legitimate concerns about the safety of their loved ones with "Better start digging granny's grave! Here's the shovel!" No wonder that the general population is also in favour of whatever 'we need to do something, this is something, therefore we shall do this' crap the government have pulled out of their arse this time if the only other argument being given is that.

[Silent Hunter]

A thought that immediately occurred to me is that the "don't kill your granny" message can lead to an immediate response from many people in the 20-39 category of "she's already dead".

[Alcibiades]

The government here having been making themselves look like tools (as usual) but does anyone here feel that the anti-lockdown people undermine their own arguments? They have some good points but its ruined by either a) Ridiculous hyperbole that this is the greatest invasion of civil liberties and human rights in recorded history or b) Responding to people's legitimate concerns about the safety of their loved ones with "Better start digging granny's grave! Here's the shovel!" No wonder that the general population is also in favour of whatever 'we need to do something, this is something, therefore we shall do this' crap the government have pulled out of their arse this time if the only other argument being given is that.

Exactly. There is a compelling case to be made that at this time more restrictions is not the way to go, and a more nuanced approach is needed, but most of the anti-lockdown folks are have zero nuance to their ideas and would oppose minor restrictions even if necessary.