COVID-19 Megathread 3: Third time's a charm

[GP270watch]

 We're likely to pass China in deaths in the next 3-5 days. There are some encouraging trials with  convalescent plasma therapy, hopefully that pans out.

[Santander]

We're likely to pass China in deaths in the next 3-5 days. There are some encouraging trials with  convalescent plasma therapy, hopefully that pans out.

Back-to-back World War champs!!!

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/SusanKLivio/status/1243953460434866179

[💥💥 brandon bro (he/him/his)]

Survey shows that economists think that loosening lockdowns before the virus is contained will lead to more economic damage than the lockdowns themselves.

Question B: Abandoning severe lockdowns at a time when the likelihood of a resurgence in infections remains high will lead to greater total economic damage than sustaining the lockdowns to eliminate the resurgence risk.

Strongly agree: 41%
Agree: 39%
Uncertain: 14%
Disagree: 0%
Strongly disagree: 0%
No opinion: 0%

[It’s so Joever]

Survey shows that economists think that loosening lockdowns before the virus is contained will lead to more economic damage than the lockdowns themselves.

Question B: Abandoning severe lockdowns at a time when the likelihood of a resurgence in infections remains high will lead to greater total economic damage than sustaining the lockdowns to eliminate the resurgence risk.

Strongly agree: 41%
Agree: 39%
Uncertain: 14%
Disagree: 0%
Strongly disagree: 0%
No opinion: 0%

In other news, water is wet and the sky is blue.

[GeorgiaModerate]

Survey shows that economists think that loosening lockdowns before the virus is contained will lead to more economic damage than the lockdowns themselves.

Question B: Abandoning severe lockdowns at a time when the likelihood of a resurgence in infections remains high will lead to greater total economic damage than sustaining the lockdowns to eliminate the resurgence risk.

Strongly agree: 41%
Agree: 39%
Uncertain: 14%
Disagree: 0%
Strongly disagree: 0%
No opinion: 0%

In other news, water is wet and the sky is blue.

Trump doesn't like blue.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/jessemckinley/status/1243938618072354816

[GeorgiaModerate]

https://twitter.com/travisakers/status/1243990179557359616

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

Survey shows that economists think that loosening lockdowns before the virus is contained will lead to more economic damage than the lockdowns themselves.

Question B: Abandoning severe lockdowns at a time when the likelihood of a resurgence in infections remains high will lead to greater total economic damage than sustaining the lockdowns to eliminate the resurgence risk.

Strongly agree: 41%
Agree: 39%
Uncertain: 14%
Disagree: 0%
Strongly disagree: 0%
No opinion: 0%

Sigh. What a straw man.

How long will Democrats pretend that Trump wants to "sacrifice your Grandma to save Dow"? It starts to become dangerous.

[Torrain]

https://twitter.com/travisakers/status/1243990179557359616

This is absolutely surreal.

If DeSantis is devolving responsibility for social distancing rules down to the county level, then Florida is in deep trouble. Whatever this is, it ain't leadership, it's chaos.

[T'Chenka]

Florida, Georgia and I guess also Texas not being locked down / "stay at home" as America passes 100,000 cases is beyond disgusting.

[PSOL]

Read this twitter thread regarding that study that said there would be only 80k deaths in the USA. It explains the assumptions behind this, and shows why (IMO) it is unjustifiably over-optimistic. It is based on curve fitting assuming that the epidemic in the USA will be like in Wuhan, i.e. assuming that the US lockdown measures will be as effective as the Wuhan lockdown was. Based on what I have seen of how people are behaving in supposed "lockdown," I am pretty doubtful of that. I don't know what it is like where you all are, but when I look around my area (which is supposedly "shelter in place," I see lots of gatherings and contact still occurring. It is interesting as an "what if" if-then exercise, but should be interpreted with caution - interpret it as "what will happen if certain assumptions are true" rather than as a projection.

https://twitter.com/mlipsitch/status/1243853350984179713

Back to suicide then.

Dude, you need to get some help to chill out. You will make it, you are stronger then this event and your own perception of yourself. We all are gonna make it out, not cleanly no, but we all will survive this together.

[It’s so Joever]

Governor DeSantis is a mass-murderer and must be tried for crimes against humanity.

[Bismarck]

Governor DeSantis is a mass-murderer and must be tried for crimes against humanity.

These are the kinds of takes that keep atlas fun.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Governor DeSantis is a mass-murderer and must be tried for crimes against humanity.

These are the kinds of takes that keep atlas talk elections fun.

FTFY

[American2020]

Excellent article from the Guardian

“The US response will be studied for generations as a textbook example of a disastrous, failed effort,” Ron Klain, who spearheaded the fight against Ebola in 2014, told a Georgetown university panel recently. “What’s happened in Washington has been a fiasco of incredible proportions.”

Jeremy Konyndyk, who led the US government’s response to international disasters at USAid from 2013 to 2017, frames the past six weeks in strikingly similar terms. He told the Guardian: “We are witnessing in the United States one of the greatest failures of basic governance and basic leadership in modern times.”

In Konyndyk’s analysis, the White House had all the information it needed by the end of January to act decisively. Instead, Trump repeatedly played down the severity of the threat, blaming China for what he called the “Chinese virus” and insisting falsely that his partial travel bans on China and Europe were all it would take to contain the crisis.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/mar/28/trump-coronavirus-politics-us-health-disaster

[The Mikado]

Florida, Georgia and I guess also Texas not being locked down / "stay at home" as America passes 100,000 cases is beyond disgusting.

Dallas County (where I am) is locked down with a stay at home order, as are a bunch of the other big counties.

[Gass3268]

#TrumpGenocide is currently trending #4 on Twitter right now.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Our State AG has issued an advisory opinion that local governments have no authority to issue a stay at home order, only the governor can. He's also said he's not going to intervene to stop local governments from doing so, but he warned them that if they do, they might be vulnerable to lawsuits from private parties.

[GP270watch]

The United States passed 2,000 deaths today.

March 25th we were at 1,027.

[GoTfan]

Read this twitter thread regarding that study that said there would be only 80k deaths in the USA. It explains the assumptions behind this, and shows why (IMO) it is unjustifiably over-optimistic. It is based on curve fitting assuming that the epidemic in the USA will be like in Wuhan, i.e. assuming that the US lockdown measures will be as effective as the Wuhan lockdown was. Based on what I have seen of how people are behaving in supposed "lockdown," I am pretty doubtful of that. I don't know what it is like where you all are, but when I look around my area (which is supposedly "shelter in place," I see lots of gatherings and contact still occurring. It is interesting as an "what if" if-then exercise, but should be interpreted with caution - interpret it as "what will happen if certain assumptions are true" rather than as a projection.

https://twitter.com/mlipsitch/status/1243853350984179713

Back to suicide then.

Dude, you need to get some help to chill out. You will make it, you are stronger then this event and your own perception of yourself. We all are gonna make it out, not cleanly no, but we all will survive this together.

I doubt it.

[Hammy]

Governor DeSantis is a mass-murderer and must be tried for crimes against humanity.

Him and De Blasio (and I'll go so far as to say Cuomo as well). NYC should've issued a quarantine as soon as this started getting out of hand there instead of letting the schools stay open and Cuomo didn't do a thing to stop it until it was too late--he shares just as much responsibility on this as Trump no matter how much media posturing and as he does.

[GeorgiaModerate]

https://twitter.com/AshaRangappa_/status/1244017513702318080

[Calthrina950]

The private American medical system continues to work flawlessly, far better than any sort of "socialized medicine."

Another small business reeling from COVID-19: the doctor’s office
Primary care doctors are warning that if they have to close, more patients might end up in Texas hospitals at a time when those facilities don’t have the capacity to handle them.

Erica Swegler is not just worried about her patients during the coronavirus pandemic; she’s also worried about her business, which she says has fallen into the red.

...

Primary care doctors and specialists are warning that, as financial constraints lead them to consider laying off staff or even go out of business, a greater number of patients might end up in Texas hospitals at a time when those facilities don’t have the capacity to handle them.

Nurse practitioners in doctors’ offices or outpatient clinics are already losing jobs or being furloughed, said Christy Blanco, president of the Texas Nurse Practitioners professional association.

One Houston-area nurse practitioner, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because her employer does not allow her to talk to reporters, said she'd had her hours cut this week by one-fifth because of low patient volumes.

Now is obviously EXACTLY the time when we should want the health care sector to be laying off workers. It is not as though all these primary care doctors and nurses could be conceivably put to work on anything useful...

And yet someone who I talked to, and many people on here can probably guess who based upon my previous posts, said that doctor's offices are experiencing no diminution in business and are continuing on as before. Even though his own doctor's appointment was canceled because of the outbreak!

[Calthrina950]

Read this twitter thread regarding that study that said there would be only 80k deaths in the USA. It explains the assumptions behind this, and shows why (IMO) it is unjustifiably over-optimistic. It is based on curve fitting assuming that the epidemic in the USA will be like in Wuhan, i.e. assuming that the US lockdown measures will be as effective as the Wuhan lockdown was. Based on what I have seen of how people are behaving in supposed "lockdown," I am pretty doubtful of that. I don't know what it is like where you all are, but when I look around my area (which is supposedly "shelter in place," I see lots of gatherings and contact still occurring. It is interesting as an "what if" if-then exercise, but should be interpreted with caution - interpret it as "what will happen if certain assumptions are true" rather than as a projection.

https://twitter.com/mlipsitch/status/1243853350984179713

How many deaths do you think we are going to actually see? 500,000? A million? Two million? Or more?