Coronavirus: How dangerous a threat?

[Unchained]

I have for 1 can't find facts. How long is the virus viable to infect humans on..fabric..plastic, a pay phone,cardboard?
how about food? Did the temp in the pizza oven destroy the infectious part of Covid-19?
Does the ATM,gas pump or pick up counter hold a lasting deadly force? Does everything need high level sterilization before another person,another transaction can safely take place?
I certainly don't know the answer to any one thing specifically.
I have been purchasing Arby's fish sandwiches..getting coffee and cheese danish at Starbucks,@2 days a week..ordering a medium pizza..to half consume and freeze the remaining pieces. I am starting to fear more the drive up window.
Have no idea if I am eating or touching viral surfaces.
I am thinking masks , gloves,disinfectant wipes and spray,along with neurotic levels of hand washing are my best defense but hard facts are not easy to come by.
I am wearing a mask almost always to protect others..just because of possibly my misplaced instincts..
And for the record..2,5,7,ft oxygen cannula sales are up @21% in the first 10 days of April from our company numbers. Other products that were shipped @12 of every 30 days a month have zero-0 orders in @40 days.
there's nothing predictable about anything,anywhere..
I can make 1 completely accurate prediction..when my new road shoes arrive I will not use them.

 

[jmdirt]

I have for 1 can't find facts. How long is the virus viable to infect humans on..fabric..plastic, a pay phone,cardboard?
how about food? Did the temp in the pizza oven destroy the infectious part of Covid-19?
Does the ATM,gas pump or pick up counter hold a lasting deadly force? Does everything need high level sterilization before another person,another transaction can safely take place?
I certainly don't know the answer to any one thing specifically.
I have been purchasing Arby's fish sandwiches..getting coffee and cheese danish at Starbucks,@2 days a week..ordering a medium pizza..to half consume and freeze the remaining pieces. I am starting to fear more the drive up window.
Have no idea if I am eating or touching viral surfaces.
I am thinking masks , gloves,disinfectant wipes and spray,along with neurotic levels of hand washing are my best defense but hard facts are not easy to come by.
I am wearing a mask almost always to protect others..just because of possibly my misplaced instincts..
And for the record..2,5,7,ft oxygen cannula sales are up @21% in the first 10 days of April from our company numbers. Other products that were shipped @12 of every 30 days a month have zero-0 orders in @40 days.
there's nothing predictable about anything,anywhere..
I can make 1 completely accurate prediction..when my new road shoes arrive I will not use them.

There is some research out there about how long C19 lasts on a variety of surfaces.
https://www.webmd.com/lung/how-long-covid-19-lives-on-surfaces
Anything that enters my house either gets disinfected or gets at least four days quarantine first. I think generally 150 degrees F will kill most virus and bacteria (the food would have to reach 150 deg).

As as for a pay phone, the virus would have to be 20 years old now!

And now for yet another episode of "All About Me": My wife and I are both craving a pizza from Idaho Pizza Co. but can't quite bring ourselves to do it. We could order it and pay for it online, have it delivered (no contact drop off), take it out of the box outside, put it on a pizza pan, put it in the oven at 200 deg., wash our hands thoroughly, and we should be good...right?!

 

[Cookster15]

Wow, you are certainly very thorough and I applaud your efforts. I'm too lazy to do all that, but I do at least wash my hands a lot anyway just out of habit.

I think at the very least masks certainly can't hurt, I always wear one on my very rare trips to the grocery stores. I have seen some shoppers who looked like they had the sniffles and not wearing anything, they might just have seasonal allergies, I do not know that and I'm not going to ask them. But what I do know is shoppers tend to pick through products (especially produce), so if they are unknowingly spreading something through hand contact I don't want to pick it up with my own hands and then inadvertently rub it into my eyes or nose.

If nothing else masks remind people to not touch their faces until they thoroughly wash their hands, doctors/experts have been stressing this for a while now. So I don't think wearing masks (as cumbersome as they are) are hurting anything when absolutely having to mingle out in the public.

I have no problem with people wearing masks and there is a story from medico in Australia today imploring us to do this. My objection was to the "I don't care about anyone else" attitude. That wasn't necessary. Thank you for your respectful and well reasoned post.

 

[BlueRoads]

And now for yet another episode of "All About Me": My wife and I are both craving a pizza from Idaho Pizza Co. but can't quite bring ourselves to do it. We could order it and pay for it online, have it delivered (no contact drop off), take it out of the box outside, put it on a pizza pan, put it in the oven at 200 deg., wash our hands thoroughly, and we should be good...right?!

jm... as someone who can't eat a milk product once it has been open in my fridge for two days... someone who has to force herself to not check whether the oven's out for the third time... I advise you to order that pizza. It's none of my business, but you can't shut the possibility of death out of your life. You can be sensible and careful and diligent, but at some point you have to let loose and live. End of sermon.

 

[Cookster15]

That is absolutely necessary.....Let's do another episode of "All About Me"...….
I only share that because maybe you think that I see face covering as a way to protect myself, I don't. I take a lot of measures to protect myself (stay home, avoid other people, hygiene, quarantine...), but I also want to protect others when I do have to go out. Maybe you think that I see face covering as the main way to control the spread of C19, I don't.

For the record your attitude isn't necessary no matter what your point is, if I was you I'd review how you responded and how there might have been a more effective way to make your point. Also for the record I am wearing a mask to shops - plus wearing plastic disposable gloves, and maintaining social distancing where possible. I am also staying at home indoors as instructed by my government. A good way to get people to ignore whatever valid your points of view you might have is to be rude rather than respectful of differing opinions. During very testing times for all of us up to you if you take this on board.

I note Australia just recorded another fall in new cases yesterday - 65 new cases yesterday compared to a peak of 537 on March 22 prior to the current lockdown being implemented. This despite masks optional. That means the virus will die out on current trajectory assuming new sources of infection can be controlled. Impressive knowing Australia's source of infection was some cruise ships and our large Chinese university student population who brought back the virus after Chinese New Year and before incoming flights from China and other seriously affected nations were stopped by our government.

 

[MartinGT]

Australia acted very quickly. Shame the US and UK didn't.

 

[BlueRoads]

For the record your attitude isn't necessary no matter what your point is, if I was you I'd review how you responded and how there might have been a more effective way to make your point. Also for the record I am wearing a mask to shops - plus wearing plastic disposable gloves, and maintaining social distancing where possible. I am also staying at home indoors as instructed by my government. A good way to get people to ignore whatever valid your points of view you might have is to be rude rather than respectful of differing opinions. During very testing times for all of us up to you if you take this on board.

I note Australia just recorded another fall in new cases yesterday - 65 new cases yesterday compared to a peak of 537 on March 22 prior to the current lockdown being implemented. This despite masks optional. That means the virus will die out on current trajectory assuming new sources of infection can be controlled. Impressive knowing Australia's source of infection was some cruise ships and our large Chinese university student population who brought back the virus after Chinese New Year.

Cookster, I'm not sure, it's possible to bring this virus to an absolute end any time soon. Australia will have to reopen its borders at one point? I don't know about Australian economy, but in our times of globalisation... new cases can't be controlled at a 100% rate, can they?

 

[Cookster15]

Cookster, I'm not sure, it's possible to bring this virus to an absolute end any time soon. Australia will have to reopen its borders at one point? I don't know about Australian economy, but in our times of globalisation... new cases can't be controlled at a 100% rate, can they?

This is why I said "assuming new sources of infection can be controlled". Yes the Australian economy is in trouble. Overnight we suddenly see long lines of people to register for social security benefits not seen since the Great Depression. Very unsettling. Already in Europe where the virus is far worse they are asking that restrictions be eased so that the economy can recover somewhat.

So I guess my point is, in theory it is possible to kill off the virus via the actions taken to date but per your point, in reality it is far more difficult. To ease restrictions is a risky balancing act to keep the infection ratio below a threshold where the virus does indeed die out. I think Merckx Index posted something on this earlier in the thread? But SARS and MERS are other coronavirus outbreaks which died out without a vaccine so I am hopeful. The measures taken in Australia buy us time and also help flatten the curve so our hospitals and ICUs can cope. Recoveries are still easily outnumbering new cases as I write.

 

[Cookster15]

Australia acted very quickly. Shame the US and UK didn't.

Yes but it could have been even better. When it was initially suggested flights from China should be stopped some claimed that was racist. So more sources of infection were imported prior to March. Then we had major source of infection from some cruise ships and quite a number of elderly passengers have already died from the disease. Very sad. But thankfully sanity has prevailed and after some initial complacency people got on board with closing the borders and implementing our lockdown. But this isn't economically sustainable so we will see where we go from here.

 

[del1962]

Another problem for the UK as opposed to Australia is large number of people where returning from holidays in Northern Italy before it was understood how sever the outbreak was

 

[Unchained]

Not sure where I am going w my overall nutrition..homemade pizza w fennel sausage,artichoke hearts and fresh basil..spaghetti sauce w fresh ground veal included..chicken pot pie..apple sauce cake..tamales all by hand and that is only the start.
I read a statistic about Americans @52 and younger..almost 50-50 on grocery -restaurant expenditures. Looking for silver linings..I am eating way better..rediscovering salads and fruit on there own..and the financial outlay is still far far further in the black then when I feel into the 50-50 stat..my bank account and credit card use show dramatic savings..and drastic reductions in prepared food purchases..
Will I maintain better behavior when something doesn't force me to do the right thing?

 

[Merckx index]

Important thread about interpreting antibody tests on random populations with low expected prevalence. It is a lot more tricky than it seems.

Yes, we actually had a discussion about this problem when we were talking about doping tests, when the number of dopers might be very small. If you have a relatively small number of true positives, then even a relatively low false positive rate can result in a situation in which a large fraction of the positives are false.

However, i thought the false positive rate was very low for this virus. There reportedly are a lot of false negatives (some estimates up to 30%), because it can be hard to get the virus from the deep recesses of the nose, but I had heard that when you tested positive, it was almost certainly genuine. If you don't have the virus, I'm not sure how PCR would indicate a positive, unless there were some lab error. That 4.4% figure surprises me. But then, when you have so many tests in demand, the quality of the people performing them may vary widely.

Here's a study in which PCR was used to detect a bacterium, and very wide rates of false positives were reported. However, it's very old, and probably out of date:

https://jcm.asm.org/content/32/2/277

"Senior Government sources said that while 'the balance of scientific advice' was still that the deadly virus was first transmitted to humans from a live animal market in Wuhan, an accident at the laboratory in the Chinese city was 'no longer being discounted'.

Yes, that theory has been going around for a while now. It seems that there really is a lab not far from the wet market where they were doing research on viruses.

The U.S. and other major Euro countries that top the case list are now all reporting daily increases of cases of less than 5% (except UK, which is getting close), which is every encouraging.

Regarding a vaccine, Gilbert knows more about this than I do, obviously, but I really don't see how a vaccine could be available this fall. The consensus among experts has always been that this takes at least a year to a year and a half, and even then it would be record time. The problem is that you have to have safety and efficacy trials, and they take time. There's really not a lot of room for shortening the time involved.

 

[jmdirt]

For the record your attitude isn't necessary no matter what your point is, if I was you I'd review how you responded and how there might have been a more effective way to make your point. Also for the record I am wearing a mask to shops - plus wearing plastic disposable gloves, and maintaining social distancing where possible. I am also staying at home indoors as instructed by my government. A good way to get people to ignore whatever valid your points of view you might have is to be rude rather than respectful of differing opinions. During very testing times for all of us up to you if you take this on board.

I note Australia just recorded another fall in new cases yesterday - 65 new cases yesterday compared to a peak of 537 on March 22 prior to the current lockdown being implemented. This despite masks optional. That means the virus will die out on current trajectory assuming new sources of infection can be controlled. Impressive knowing Australia's source of infection was some cruise ships and our large Chinese university student population who brought back the virus after Chinese New Year and before incoming flights from China and other seriously affected nations were stopped by our government.

For the record, my attitude flared up because you lectured me and downplayed my assertion ("...calm down, just wash your hands..."), just like you did again with this response. I'd encourage you to also review how you respond because adults tend not to enjoy being lectured by other adults. Now saying that you wear a mask also reviles that you were playing devil's advocate just to take a dig,

EDIT: The use of flippant statements like "...if you listen them...", "...check the stats..." don't tend to go over well either.

 

[Cookster15]

Now saying that you wear a mask also reviles that you were playing devil's advocate just to take a dig,

No that is once again your faulty perception. I didn't intend to lecture you either. You started all this will your unnecessary "Wow" post then making out I don't care about other people. Completely unnecessary as I said we are all under enough stress. My line of argument is primarily along the lines of my country record to date in flattening the COVID-19 curve without telling everyone they must wear masks or that those who do not are simply selfish and uncaring.

 

[Cookster15]

Another problem for the UK as opposed to Australia is large number of people where returning from holidays in Northern Italy before it was understood how sever the outbreak was

Australia had problems with students returning from Chinese New Year before any flights from that region were stopped. Not sure how the numbers of Chinese students coming to Australia at that time (February), compared to the number of British returning from holiday in Northern Italy before the severity of the outbreak was known.

 

[jmdirt]

Yes, we actually had a discussion about this problem when we were talking about doping tests, when the number of dopers might be very small. If you have a relatively small number of true positives, then even a relatively low false positive rate can result in a situation in which a large fraction of the positives are false.

However, i thought the false positive rate was very low for this virus. There reportedly are a lot of false negatives (some estimates up to 30%), because it can be hard to get the virus from the deep recesses of the nose, but I had heard that when you tested positive, it was almost certainly genuine. If you don't have the virus, I'm not sure how PCR would indicate a positive, unless there were some lab error. That 4.4% figure surprises me. But then, when you have so many tests in demand, the quality of the people performing them may vary widely.

Here's a study in which PCR was used to detect a bacterium, and very wide rates of false positives were reported. However, it's very old, and probably out of date:

https://jcm.asm.org/content/32/2/277



Yes, that theory has been going around for a while now. It seems that there really is a lab not far from the wet market where they were doing research on viruses.

The U.S. and other major Euro countries that top the case list are now all reporting daily increases of cases of less than 5% (except UK, which is getting close), which is every encouraging.

Regarding a vaccine, Gilbert knows more about this than I do, obviously, but I really don't see how a vaccine could be available this fall. The consensus among experts has always been that this takes at least a year to a year and a half, and even then it would be record time. The problem is that you have to have safety and efficacy trials, and they take time. There's really not a lot of room for shortening the time involved.

This is the question that keeps popping into my head. Is there a way to shorten the time if there is no 'red tape'? By that I don't mean skipping the testing stages, but is the usual system unnecessarily cumbersome as we often read, so there is room to streamline? We certainly don't want to rush it and kill people with the vaccine though. I did read something from ??? (disease expert) who said, "I hope for a vaccine as a xmas gift to the world, but that is my dream" or something very similar.

OT: How is your recovery going?

 

[Koronin]

Yes, we actually had a discussion about this problem when we were talking about doping tests, when the number of dopers might be very small. If you have a relatively small number of true positives, then even a relatively low false positive rate can result in a situation in which a large fraction of the positives are false.

However, i thought the false positive rate was very low for this virus. There reportedly are a lot of false negatives (some estimates up to 30%), because it can be hard to get the virus from the deep recesses of the nose, but I had heard that when you tested positive, it was almost certainly genuine. If you don't have the virus, I'm not sure how PCR would indicate a positive, unless there were some lab error. That 4.4% figure surprises me. But then, when you have so many tests in demand, the quality of the people performing them may vary widely.

Here's a study in which PCR was used to detect a bacterium, and very wide rates of false positives were reported. However, it's very old, and probably out of date:

https://jcm.asm.org/content/32/2/277



Yes, that theory has been going around for a while now. It seems that there really is a lab not far from the wet market where they were doing research on viruses.

The U.S. and other major Euro countries that top the case list are now all reporting daily increases of cases of less than 5% (except UK, which is getting close), which is every encouraging.

Regarding a vaccine, Gilbert knows more about this than I do, obviously, but I really don't see how a vaccine could be available this fall. The consensus among experts has always been that this takes at least a year to a year and a half, and even then it would be record time. The problem is that you have to have safety and efficacy trials, and they take time. There's really not a lot of room for shortening the time involved.

There have been several reports I've read that a short term vaccine that may last up to 3 months per dose could be possible by fall, but a true vaccine would take 12 to 18 months depending on how much they could speed up the process and cut red tape. There are currently two vaccines in human trials in the US. The first one started in Washington (state) and a handful of other places in March. They did say as long as everything goes perfectly it could approved in about 12 months.

 

[gregrowlerson]

Australia acted very quickly. Shame the US and UK didn't.

Australia are also not only known as the lucky country. As an island nation we have had an advantage in this scenario, and outside of our capital cities our population is scarce. We did have the cruise ship disaster, but that probably wasn't anything on the scale of such events as (don't take my 100% word for this, what I've heard):

Large number of people flying out of Wuhan shortly after the outbreak, direct to Italy.
European soccer match taking place in Italy between Spanish side; huge crowd.
Many people returning to Britain from Italy after holidays.

As for the USA, they probably didn't lock down early enough, but also it was always going to be more of a struggle to contain the virus there then it was in Australia.

 

[Cookster15]

The below linked story is hidden behind a paywall, underneath I have posted a quote from the story … Not sure if someone can find anything in the free media to support it? According to further research this drug is an immune modulator that needs to be taken early in the illness cycle to prevent the cytokine storm that produces the ARDS illness. This drug has been used for 60 years to treat malaria and autoimmune diseases such as systemic lupus and inflammatory arthritis.

Ebola drug being trialled for COVID-19 treatment

"A failed Ebola drug is emerging as the treatment of choice for COVID-19 after Australian scientists helped map a key vulnerability in the molecular structure of the coronavirus."

 

[Merckx index]

Is there a way to shorten the time if there is no 'red tape'? By that I don't mean skipping the testing stages, but is the usual system unnecessarily cumbersome as we often read, so there is room to streamline? We certainly don't want to rush it and kill people with the vaccine though. I did read something from ??? (disease expert) who said, "I hope for a vaccine as a xmas gift to the world, but that is my dream" or something very similar.

Boy, I don't know. Usually, these trials take years. You need to be so careful to identify any side effects or adverse reactions. The efficacy trials, phase 2 and 3, might be shortened a little, possibly, because in this urgent situation, determining the precise effect is less important than potentially saving lives. E.g., even if the vaccine only worked on a subset of people, and in such a short time there was no way to determine who those people were in advance, you might still go through with it as long as you were certain it wouldn't harm the people it didn't help.

By the way, when we do get a vaccine, will the anti-VAXers boycott it? Will they take their chances with the virus? Going to be interesting to see their response.

OT: How is your recovery going?

Better, thanks for asking. Can get into and out of bed on my own now, and sit on a toilet. Access to a pool has really helped, as i can get some exercise there. Just the freedom of movement does wonders for my state of mind. I think Froome made the same point, that it was a big turning point in his recovery when he could get into the water.

 

[djpbaltimore]

Yes, we actually had a discussion about this problem when we were talking about doping tests, when the number of dopers might be very small. If you have a relatively small number of true positives, then even a relatively low false positive rate can result in a situation in which a large fraction of the positives are false.

However, i thought the false positive rate was very low for this virus. There reportedly are a lot of false negatives (some estimates up to 30%), because it can be hard to get the virus from the deep recesses of the nose, but I had heard that when you tested positive, it was almost certainly genuine. If you don't have the virus, I'm not sure how PCR would indicate a positive, unless there were some lab error. That 4.4% figure surprises me. But then, when you have so many tests in demand, the quality of the people performing them may vary widely.

Here's a study in which PCR was used to detect a bacterium, and very wide rates of false positives were reported. However, it's very old, and probably out of date:

https://jcm.asm.org/content/32/2/277



Yes, that theory has been going around for a while now. It seems that there really is a lab not far from the wet market where they were doing research on viruses.

The U.S. and other major Euro countries that top the case list are now all reporting daily increases of cases of less than 5% (except UK, which is getting close), which is every encouraging.

Regarding a vaccine, Gilbert knows more about this than I do, obviously, but I really don't see how a vaccine could be available this fall. The consensus among experts has always been that this takes at least a year to a year and a half, and even then it would be record time. The problem is that you have to have safety and efficacy trials, and they take time. There's really not a lot of room for shortening the time involved.

Yes, similar issues. It is my understanding that it is a problem with the antibody tests and not the PCR based tests.

The 1 year safety endpoint date is somewhat arbitrary. It could probably be changed to 6 months. Especially for ones where the vector has been studied previously. Hard to say whether that is likely.

Cookster. That sounds like chloroquine. According to gov of NY, there will be a preliminary announcement about the clinical trial in the US on the 20th.

 

[Merckx index]

Yes, similar issues. It is my understanding that it is a problem with the antibody tests and not the PCR based tests.

Ah, my bad, you did say Ab tests. I've had that Austrian virus study on my mind, where the number of positives was really low, and was thinking in those terms. The German Ab test, in contrast was 14%, though that was only one town. Yes, the false positive rate for Abs makes a lot more sense.

Of the major countries, Spain has the highest concentration of cases, about 0.35% of the population, and even throwing in a very high proportion of asymptomatics, the total would not likely exceed 1% by very much.

 

[Koronin]

The below linked story is hidden behind a paywall, underneath I have posted a quote from the story … Not sure if someone can find anything in the free media to support it? According to further research this drug is an immune modulator that needs to be taken early in the illness cycle to prevent the cytokine storm that produces the ARDS illness. This drug has been used for 60 years to treat malaria and autoimmune diseases such as systemic lupus and inflammatory arthritis.

Ebola drug being trialled for COVID-19 treatment

"A failed Ebola drug is emerging as the treatment of choice for COVID-19 after Australian scientists helped map a key vulnerability in the molecular structure of the coronavirus."

Unfortunately I can't get the link here to come up. Is this failed Ebola drug Remdesivir from Gilead? If it is, it's been in trials since at least March with preliminarily results back. Those preliminary results resulted in a wide spread trial and approval for it as a compassionate treatment. This one is being used mostly in hospitalized patients.

I agree with djpbaltimore that the malaria drug sounds like chloroquine.

I read yesterday one of the hospitals in NYC has started using a bloodclot buster medication on patients on ventilators. The only article I can find doing a quick search is from the NY Times and that is behind a paywall.

 

[Cookster15]

Unfortunately I can't get the link here to come up. Is this failed Ebola drug Remdesivir from Gilead? If it is, it's been in trials since at least March with preliminarily results back. Those preliminary results resulted in a wide spread trial and approval for it as a compassionate treatment. This one is being used mostly in hospitalized patients.

I agree with djpbaltimore that the malaria drug sounds like chloroquine.

I read yesterday one of the hospitals in NYC has started using a bloodclot buster medication on patients on ventilators. The only article I can find doing a quick search is from the NY Times and that is behind a paywall.

I just checked the story - yes its Remdesivir. Thank you.

 

[Koronin]

I just checked the story - yes its Remdesivir. Thank you.

You're welcome. All the reports that I've seen about it have shown some positive indicators for it as a treatment.

This is another possible/hopeful treatment for Covid-19.

U.S. to Trial Japan's Anti-Flu Drug Avigan for Coronaviru...

The Japanese anti-viral drug is said to interfere with the virus replication process, which may help combat the COVID-19 virus.

www.newsweek.com