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Coronavirus: How dangerous a threat?

Page 127 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
@230,000 is the death projection for the end of October,and near @300,000 by years end..
California health official steps down after math snafu that didn't have actuate case count. Significant in California because it is one metric that gets you on and off a watch list..watch list standing gets ability to open up or close businesses..
California governor says that the state doesn't have the supplemental funds to contribute to the Presidential proposed unemployment benefits..so food and health insurance coverage are in question for many thousands of families
Trump today threw shade on Europe,said that they had double digit increases in everything,some had triple digit increases.. The President also made proportional references to certain European economies. In his assessment, America is superior to all, deaths per capita,economic recovery based on a starting point,although that was not defined. Trump concluded our doctors are smarter,our procedures and equipment better,and our testing,better,faster and more abundant than everyone else. Also said that American Covid strategy is superior to all others,saying in a lose formula that the US lost less lives because of prudent action and that the precision of economic rebound also shows American dominance,world wide.
the press conference was held today and the first half is about domestic policing and politics and has no relevance to US Covid outlook
 
Putin is claiming that Russia's C19 vaccine is ready for use. They didn't even have phase 3 trials. For everyone out there worried about the safety and efficacy of a vaccine, this one might be one for which those fears are justified. I'm particularly interested in this, because Putin has offered to ship doses to the Philippines, where I am. Even if I'm not vaccinated, this is what Duterte has been waiting for. It should lead to opening the schools, and after more than four months in lockdown, I should be able to go out again. So I can't complain, though if the vaccine doesn't work, the virus will just spread further.

Here's the latest vaccine tracker:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html



It sounds like Putin is pushing this through fast as a PR move, to make it appear the Russia is ahead of the rest of the world. Actually, China has started administering a vaccine, too, but I think only to soldiers.
A month ago they were reportedly hacking research labs in the USA...............Russian know how as Putin keeps saying and the report that the vaccine has been trialed on his daughter is probably complete BS.
 
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I listened to a number of experts asked for comment on Putin's vaccine,none could say conclusively good things,but a couple stated without hesitation that introduction of a sub standard vaccine could have world wide consequence..and if an ineffective -to dangerous vaccination is used it could reinforce scepticism, that is already at historic highs,around the planet.
 
@230,000 is the death projection for the end of October,and near @300,000 by years end..
California health official steps down after math snafu that didn't have actuate case count. Significant in California because it is one metric that gets you on and off a watch list..watch list standing gets ability to open up or close businesses..
California governor says that the state doesn't have the supplemental funds to contribute to the Presidential proposed unemployment benefits..so food and health insurance coverage are in question for many thousands of families
Trump today threw shade on Europe,said that they had double digit increases in everything,some had triple digit increases.. The President also made proportional references to certain European economies. In his assessment, America is superior to all, deaths per capita,economic recovery based on a starting point,although that was not defined. Trump concluded our doctors are smarter,our procedures and equipment better,and our testing,better,faster and more abundant than everyone else. Also said that American Covid strategy is superior to all others,saying in a lose formula that the US lost less lives because of prudent action and that the precision of economic rebound also shows American dominance,world wide.
the press conference was held today and the first half is about domestic policing and politics and has no relevance to US Covid outlook
Trump doesn't even seem to be trying anymore not that he ever did. Some people think it's funny, others especially outside the USA just think it's pathetic and loopy.................
 
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I saw that Chris had posted,with a heavy dose of disappointment about College football. Yesterdays news conference,for lack of a better term, blew my F-ing mind listening to the President comment on college football and players. I shook my head at comments about children made over the last @30 about younger children. " immune to the virus " was widely dismissed but still astonishing to hear officially from the US government.
View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=9pD3lTvc0xI
 
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The college football debate is really subjective. There are no 'right' or 'wrong' answers. Even the consulting doctors have differing opinions. My feeling is that the bad scenarios are probable and outweigh the potential benefits by a wide margin. I hear people saying that the Big 10 will look foolish when the SEC is playing games in October. I remember similar arguments being made about how foolish the Northern states will look when Georgia and Florida are open for business in May and June. How did that turn out? According to the latest protocol, the SEC only plans to test 2 times a week and not within 72 hours of the game. With that plan, they are almost trying to just get by with the bare minimum approach. I don't see how that shoddy framework can prevent outbreaks. Do they plan on locking the players in their rooms on Thursday and Friday night?

More from Georgia.

View: https://twitter.com/GAFollowers/status/1293303961525661698
 
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The college football debate is really subjective. There are no 'right' or 'wrong' answers. Even the consulting doctors have differing opinions. My feeling is that the bad scenarios are probable and outweigh the potential benefits by a wide margin. I hear people saying that the Big 10 will look foolish when the SEC is playing games in October. I remember similar arguments being made about how foolish the Northern states will look when Georgia and Florida are open for business in May and June. How did that turn out? According to the latest protocol, the SEC only plans to test 2 times a week and not within 72 hours of the game. With that plan, they are almost trying to just get by with the bare minimum approach. I don't see how that shoddy framework can prevent outbreaks. Do they plan on locking the players in their rooms on Thursday and Friday night?
If the SEC/ACC/Big 12 are all playing games in October you better believe the Big 10 will look foolish with a capital "F." Thee Ohio St is ranked 2nd in the preseason polls with a legitimate shot at a National Championship. QB Justin Fields is likely going to declare for the draft next year and arguably could be the #2 OA pick behind Clemson's Trevor Lawrence. Penn St is also ranked pretty high at #8, so they also lose out on a potential shot at the championship.

And you're absolutely right there are experts with different opinions. A top infectious disease expert from Duke says college football can be played safely:


So, the SEC, ACC & Big 12 will playing and shooting it out this fall while the Big 10 is too apprehensive losing a chance to potentially field a championship team and a share of the television revenue. I think it's ridiculous - go back and look at the 2009 football season where the H1N1 influenza ravaged hell on the season. Major outbreaks at a lot of the Power 5 schools. Players sick as dogs missing several practices and still playing sick on Saturday. People forget about that year in college football because it was just the "flu." Covid, as it seems the majority of the time, is asymptomatic with athletes. If an athlete is asymptomatic then play. If guys back in 09 played sick with the flu then an asymptomatic case of Covid doesn't seem to be a big deal. Players play with far worse injuries many times having to be administered pain meds before games just to get through the game on two feet. And the vast majority of the players all want to play.

And before someone says this is "Covid" and not the "flu," I would like to remind people that the flu can be just as bad as Covid if not worse for younger people. Here's a very healthy physical fit 42 yr old who lost his legs from complications from a recent bout of the H1N9 influenza:

 
So, the SEC, ACC & Big 12 will playing and shooting it out this fall while the Big 10 is too apprehensive losing a chance to potentially field a championship team and a share of the television revenue.
As I suggested, that remains to be seen. Much easier said than done IMO. Like with schools where it is easy to open them up, but difficult keeping them open. Starting the season and finishing the season are two vastly different propositions.
Players sick as dogs missing several practices and still playing sick on Saturday. People forget about that year in college football because it was just the "flu." Covid, as it seems the majority of the time, is asymptomatic with athletes. If an athlete is asymptomatic then play. If guys back in 09 played sick with the flu then an asymptomatic case of Covid doesn't seem to be a big deal. Players play with far worse injuries many times having to be administered pain meds before games just to get through the game on two feet. And the vast majority of the players all want to play.
They will not play if they are positive. The question is whether you have to cancel games like MLB, quarantine individual players who were in contact, or quarantine the whole team. Either way, those are not easy choices and will have to be codified. But playing with COVID will not happen. The opposing team would not take the field if this were an option.
 
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If the SEC/ACC/Big 12 are all playing games in October you better believe the Big 10 will look foolish with a capital "F." Thee Ohio St is ranked 2nd in the preseason polls with a legitimate shot at a National Championship. QB Justin Fields is likely going to declare for the draft next year and arguably could be the #2 OA pick behind Clemson's Trevor Lawrence. Penn St is also ranked pretty high at #8, so they also lose out on a potential shot at the championship.

And you're absolutely right there are experts with different opinions. A top infectious disease expert from Duke says college football can be played safely:


So, the SEC, ACC & Big 12 will playing and shooting it out this fall while the Big 10 is too apprehensive losing a chance to potentially field a championship team and a share of the television revenue. I think it's ridiculous - go back and look at the 2009 football season where the H1N1 influenza ravaged hell on the season. Major outbreaks at a lot of the Power 5 schools. Players sick as dogs missing several practices and still playing sick on Saturday. People forget about that year in college football because it was just the "flu." Covid, as it seems the majority of the time, is asymptomatic with athletes. If an athlete is asymptomatic then play. If guys back in 09 played sick with the flu then an asymptomatic case of Covid doesn't seem to be a big deal. Players play with far worse injuries many times having to be administered pain meds before games just to get through the game on two feet. And the vast majority of the players all want to play.

And before someone says this is "Covid" and not the "flu," I would like to remind people that the flu can be just as bad as Covid if not worse for younger people. Here's a very healthy physical fit 42 yr old who lost his legs from complications from a recent bout of the H1N9 influenza:

“Can we safely have two teams meet on the field? I would say yes,” Wolfe told The Daily. “Will it be tough? Yes. Will it be expensive and hard and lots of work? For sure. But I do believe you can sufficiently mitigate the risk of bringing COVID onto the football field or into the training room at a level that’s no different than living as a student on campus.”

IMO, the universities won't meet the standard that Wolf is referring to so no, games can't be played safely.

165,000 people have never died from the flu in seven months. The long term neurological, cardiac, endocrine issues that are emerging with C19 have already surpassed the type of example that you shared.
 
I'm surprised how well the Rugby League season has done in Australia with the Covid restrictions. The players live and train in a bubble but still travel on game days and are getting tested as well. Hardly an infection so far and they don't use gloves and helmets like the NFL. Plus they are also on the ground for the majority of the game unlike the NFL where the players are getting constantly replaced. Keeping the crowd sizes down as well after initially having no fans, seems to be working. There have been a few bubble breaches and enforced quarantines for the bad boys.

So baseball in the USA should be doing much better with Covid, they obviously needed a much more rigid system to fit the times. The EPL season in England also seemed to work pretty smoothly albeit without any fans at all. Baseball officials seriously miscalculated it seems or maybe quite a few players were already infected before the season started and it didn't show till later and the general Covid situation in the USA is obviously different to many other countries.
 
Listened to a high school athletic director from Rio Grande valley in Texas, story was about the cancellation of football..he was surprised that he wasn't killed for his actions,I was also surprised. It sounds like he cares for the kids and although the interview was a couple of minutes,you could hear what a difficult decision it was for everyone involved.
 
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Jay Paterno, Joe Paterno's son and now a trustee at Penn State, said a professor came up to him and asked what he thought about sending 70 students to another school to listen to a seminar with 70 other students at that school, all in an auditorium for three hours. They would do this every week, sometimes at Penn State, sometimes at the other school.

Paterno replied, "Of course not. Seventy students traveling together, then in close proximity to seventy others for three hours? It would be far too dangerous."

To which the professor replied, "Then why do you think you can do it with a football team?"


The kind of UV that can destroy viruses is not good for humans:

UVC is really nasty stuff – you shouldn't be exposed to it,” says Arnold. “It can take hours to get sunburn from UVB, but with UVC it takes seconds. If your eyes are exposed… you know that gritty feeling you get if you look at the sun? It’s like that times 10, just after a few seconds.”

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200327-can-you-kill-coronavirus-with-uv-light

Maybe a shorter wavelength UV will work, but this is still experimental:

https://www.businessinsider.com/uv-light-kills-coronavirus-surfaces-safe-for-humans-2020-7

I'm not sure why S. Korea thinks those bus stops are safe. I wouldn't go into one. Maybe the UV only comes on during hours when the busses aren't running, and people are told not to go in? UV is sometimes used to disinfect subways in the U.S., but only during hours when no one is on them.
 
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“Can we safely have two teams meet on the field? I would say yes,” Wolfe told The Daily. “Will it be tough? Yes. Will it be expensive and hard and lots of work? For sure. But I do believe you can sufficiently mitigate the risk of bringing COVID onto the football field or into the training room at a level that’s no different than living as a student on campus.”

IMO, the universities won't meet the standard that Wolf is referring to so no, games can't be played safely.

165,000 people have never died from the flu in seven months. The long term neurological, cardiac, endocrine issues that are emerging with C19 have already surpassed the type of example that you shared.
Well...it looks like the Big 12 is set to play. No official word yet from the SEC or ACC but it's anticipated they will follow suit:


Now watch the influx of players from the Big 10 & Pac-12 want to jump ship and try to play this season - what a mess that could be.

And yes, 165,000 people have died from COVID-19 with that number still rising. But putting that number into context; 80% of the deaths are age 65 and older, 40% of deaths are linked to nursing home facilities and 93% of hospitalizations are involving people with at least one reported underlying medical condition.

The evidence for college athletes are mostly asymptomatic with some experiencing very mild conditions - no different than the flu. And there were outbreaks with football players already at several Power 5 universities including 30 cases this past June at LSU where all were asymptomatic or mild illness and no hospitalizations. Think of the immunity they already have.

And there's also long term "neurological, cardiac, endocrine" as well as hematological, hepatic, renal, ocular & musculoskeletal pathologies that have emerged from complications of influenza:

 
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It's far too early to anticipate what the BIG 12, SEC, & ACC will do. Even if they do start season play, they could cancel the remainder of the season in a moment's notice if covid flares up. IMO, right now they just have their heads stuck in the "sand", but the sand is boatloads of money and that's all they see.
 
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We can talk about how most young athletes fare when dealing with COVID-19. Then there was the story detailed below, featuring a trip to ER from a player at Indiana.
View: https://twitter.com/SamBlum3/status/1290372030085451776

Freddie Freeman of the Braves tells a pretty harrowing story of his fevers. And the Red Sox pitcher was healthy before getting infected and pulled from the rest of the season after developing severe heart issues. To my knowledge, I don't know any specific examples of young adult athletes having these responses to Flu. Maybe it all works out, but it is a risk. I tend to err on the side of risk mitigation when we are talking about things that are largely inessential activities. YMMV.
 
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I haven't been following this tread for a while but has there been any discussion of the 2nd wave of COVID-19 in the Australian state of Victoria? Take out Victoria's poor management of a hotel quarantine and Australia has still done a good job controlling the virus. But the entire debate should be framed around the balancing act of economy versus control of the virus. New Zealand now has spot fires and are talking about severe restrictions again. This isn't economically sustainable. Meanwhile reports I read from British epidemiologists that the UK has achieved herd immunity?
 
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93% of hospitalizations are involving people with at least one reported underlying medical condition.

About 40% of American adults have an underlying medical condition. This isn't some relatively small group such as those over 85 or in nursing homes.

With bike racing resumed, I keep wondering about asthma. One of the things I learned during the Froome case is that as many as one-third of athletes in endurance sports like cycling may have it (or so they claim). If i were a pro racer with asthma, I'd be very worried about getting infected. In the peloton, you're shoulder to shoulder with dozens, hundred of other riders for long periods of time. It helps being outdoors, and the high speeds should help disperse the virus. But think about the situation at the start, e.g., or on a climb where speeds are way down.
 
About 40% of American adults have an underlying medical condition. This isn't some relatively small group such as those over 85 or in nursing homes.

With bike racing resumed, I keep wondering about asthma. One of the things I learned during the Froome case is that as many as one-third of athletes in endurance sports like cycling may have it (or so they claim). If i were a pro racer with asthma, I'd be very worried about getting infected. In the peloton, you're shoulder to shoulder with dozens, hundred of other riders for long periods of time. It helps being outdoors, and the high speeds should help disperse the virus. But think about the situation at the start, e.g., or on a climb where speeds are way down.
Australia and New Zealand have the highest rates of asthma in the world something like one in four and no one really knows why,. Ventolin is one of those over prescribed drugs and nowadays you can even buy it over the counter without a script. Whoever manufactures it is doing very well ! As an asthmatic myself nothing irritates me more than to see smokers puffing on Ventolin..........in Australia's last bushfire season which was a bad one especially with months of lingering smoke in the big cities, asthma became a huge issue.

One third of athletes using Ventolin does not surprise me but many are probably not taking it under doctor's advice and probably are also not on a preventer although Froome said he is. With an effective preventer not sure why he needed so much Ventolin in the the infamous Vuelta maybe stress related or he had a cold as well who knows ? Only a chronic asthmatic would usually need that much and chronic asthmatics don't become elite athletes even in the 21st century.............they are generally in and out of hospital and lead relatively inactive lives. But with the right medication asthma is much better handled than fifty or 60 years ago when Ventolin and related drugs suddenly appeared. Surprised to see a lot of fans in France at the race televised yesterday, not wearing masks and getting close to the riders, the peloton itself would be a cloud of virus if it a carried a few infections !
 
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Putin is claiming that Russia's C19 vaccine is ready for use. They didn't even have phase 3 trials. For everyone out there worried about the safety and efficacy of a vaccine, this one might be one for which those fears are justified. I'm particularly interested in this, because Putin has offered to ship doses to the Philippines, where I am. Even if I'm not vaccinated, this is what Duterte has been waiting for. It should lead to opening the schools, and after more than four months in lockdown, I should be able to go out again. So I can't complain, though if the vaccine doesn't work, the virus will just spread further.

Here's the latest vaccine tracker:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html



It sounds like Putin is pushing this through fast as a PR move, to make it appear the Russia is ahead of the rest of the world. Actually, China has started administering a vaccine, too, but I think only to soldiers.
Putin and Duterte have history of sacrificing the innocent for their political ambitions (Putin's daughter?) which is why only Third World gangstas will sign up for this. Bolsonaro is probably killing his speed dial trying to call the cell number he thinks is Vladimir's. It was a fake number on a bar napkin. Jair.
The resources and time spent chasing ineffective treatment is just like the idea that "opening" economic activity has minimal consequences. The re-boot costs could be exponential on so many levels.

All said, the US situation will be politicized even through vaccine distribution. The Harley tools in Sturgis, swaying/praying crowds in mega-worship centers and public beaches and anti-vaxxers will see to that. The divide is getting biblical here although the Florida Governor dropped his suit against the Mayor.
To quote the great Mugatu: "I feel like I'm taking Crazy pills!"
 
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Putin and Duterte have history of sacrificing the innocent for their political ambitions (Putin's daughter?) which is why only Third World gangstas will sign up for this. Bolsonaro is probably killing his speed dial trying to call the cell number he thinks is Vladimir's. It was a fake number on a bar napkin. Jair.
The resources and time spent chasing ineffective treatment is just like the idea that "opening" economic activity has minimal consequences. The re-boot costs could be exponential on so many levels.

All said, the US situation will be politicized even through vaccine distribution. The Harley tools in Sturgis, swaying/praying crowds in mega-worship centers and public beaches and anti-vaxxers will see to that. The divide is getting biblical here although the Florida Governor dropped his suit against the Mayor.
To quote the great Mugatu: "I feel like I'm taking Crazy pills!"

Enjoy this one. NC Lt Governor (current Republican candidate for Governor) sued to have the mask mandate and closure of some businesses overturned that our current Gov and candidate for the Democrats for re election mandated. The Judge didn't go for it and he dropped the suit. I swear the entire thing is insane.
 

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