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Coronavirus: How dangerous a threat?

Page 165 - Get up to date with the latest news, scores & standings from the Cycling News Community.
We talked about it earlier, the US is behind Europe by a couple of weeks. Seems like the strongly increasing infection phase has started in many American states. We're breaking records in almost every EU country at the moment, so I can tell you it's moving incredibly fast. About 4-5 weeks ago, regular Joe's here were wondering if the virus lost its vigour and more of that. Now, we're seeing hospital admissions that are already nearing the late March peak. For a president to keep insisting your country has rounded the corner is pretty incredible. The next months are going to be difficult in many places in the northern hemisphere.
Did people think that the virus was gone and became complacent, or did they just get tired of following the guidelines and went YOLO? I can understand people seeing the case curves going to a minimal level in Europe and thinking that the outbreak was over. But was it communicated effectively by the authorities that the virus was just as big a threat as before? I guess my question is whether it is a top-down problem, or a bottom-up one at this point.
 
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According to worldometer cases are skyrocketing not deaths or serious cases'. Covid deaths are about the same ratio as back in July. In US deaths peaked in April. If you have evidence for the bold, please share.

Don't get me wrong, I think the US is a disaster but it is important to get the numbers and sense of proportion right.
Because you first have to catch covid, then be admitted into hospital, then die. Compare the situation in Europe 4 weeks ago and now - a different world. First infections were rising, then hospital admissions, and deaths are starting to go up as well. As long as hospitals aren't overrun, we can probably keep mortality lower because we now know better what (not) to do and because, at least in Belgium, we've been able to protect nursing homes better (so less really old people infected).

However, because we can't expect help the climate this time, and because most governments want to avoid full lockdowns, the drop after the peak is expected to be slower.

Did people think that the virus was gone and became complacent, or did they just get tired of following the guidelines and went YOLO? I can understand people seeing the case curves going to a minimal level in Europe and thinking that the outbreak was over. But was it communicated effectively by the authorities that the virus was just as big a threat as before? I guess my question is whether it is a top-down problem, or a bottom-up one at this point.
Both. People started to become complacent, and politicians were hesistant to impose restrictions early out of fear they would lose popularity. Also, many 'other' voices were heard in the public debate, saying we shouldn't overreact etc. etc. Understandable, I guess, but looking back, very foolish.
 
It's weird to single out masks in my opinion,I believe the device is a component,a single variable in a problem that would factor out for 100's if not thousands of pages..even using simple decision blocks..ask the question if yes go this way if no go another..anybody watching the NFL this weekend got the obvious and subconscious message..the Denver game..it wasn't white out snowing but it will get there soon, Chicago..flurry here and there.
reading about Oklahoma..ice storms..so we saw how the virus and it's human transfer vessels were behaving when outdoor drinking,eating and shopping were seasonally available,that outdoor variable is going to be off the table soon for many. Yes I am sure that some American families celebrate Thanksgiving and Christmas outdoors,but my hypotheses says that is a minority. Again more group gatherings indoors..
so if we are @8 months in @230,000 dead,rising infections and hospitalization, President encouraging super spreader events and we are still kickin' around the idea of mask usefulness..I am guessing that this will be one of the longest winters in memory..
 
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Does anyone have validated numbers for long-term issues that many covid survivors are experiencing? I read reports in our media but they never state proportion. I am suspicious because the media do have a tendency to sensationalize.

I posted on this upthread a while back. Based on a large European study, the number is less than 0.5% of those infected. But a problem at that time was that enough time had not passed since the (first) peak of infections to include people in that cohort. To qualify as a long-termer, one has to have symptoms that persist more than a month, maybe longer. So the proportion might be closer to 1%. It does not appear to be very high.

According to the data I can find, about 1% of Covid active cases are listed as serious or critical. I assume it is only those who get serious or critical symptoms who are at risk from long term problems like Inflammation of the lung, brain, and heart ?

No, actually, it's just the opposite. The long-termers tend to be young, in their 30s and 40s, and with no prior health issues. That's one of the big mysteries associated with this.

There have also been studies, again, I posted on this upthread, in which relatively young and healthy people have had effects on the heart. The proportion of these is much larger, 10-20% or more, but no one yet knows how long these effects last.

anedoctally, masks haven't had any effect in stopping the spread here in the Denver-Metro area.

The problem with these data is we don't have proper controls. How many cases would there have been without masks? How has social distancing and other helpful forms of behavior been affected by wearing masks? I can only repeat that the evidence is OVERWHELMING, SLAM DUNK NO QUESTION WHATSOEVER that masks block a certain proportion of viral particles. Why wouldn't one wear one, given that it's not that much of an imposition?

It's a choice they've made in life that comes with severe health consequences.

I'm all for reducing obesity. But there is a persistent myth that people who are overweight are exactly like people who aren't, except that they're too lazy to restrict their diet. In fact, overweight people frequently battle a slower metabolism that other people don't have. Even the kind of person who is willing to struggle and suffer to stay on a diet undoubtedly has genes that contribute to that condition that others don't have the benefit of. Genes don't affect just physical traits, but also mental ones. If some riders are willing to train much harder than other riders, you don't think this willingness is partly the result of genes?

It's very easy to look at others and say, why can't they do what I do so easily? While ignoring that all of us have things that we find very, very, very difficult to overcome, and which are easy for others to overcome. Staying thin comes very easy for me, including not over-eating even when I might like to on occasion. I don't delude myself that that's because of some magic will power that has nothing at all to do with my genetic makeup.

Even the old buck 68 yr Nick Saban of Bama was asymptomatic:

As was Jack Nicklaus's 80 year old wife. They might have been false positives, particularly Saban, given that he tested negative very soon after. But in any case, it's well-established that COVID outcomes are a crapshoot. There have been very healthy people in their 30s and 40s who have died.

No baseball player has so far, but ask Freddie Freeman about his experience. He thought he was going to die. And there are players who had to drop out of the season because of complications.
 
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I posted on this upthread a while back. Based on a large European study, the number is less than 0.5% of those infected. But a problem at that time was that enough time had not passed since the (first) peak of infections to include people in that cohort. To qualify as a long-termer, one has to have symptoms that persist more than a month, maybe longer. So the proportion might be closer to 1%. It does not appear to be very high.



No, actually, it's just the opposite. The long-termers tend to be young. There have been very healthy people in their 30s and 40s who have died.

Thanks I have not been able to keep track of everything discussed here but it is valuable compared to what we get in the MSM.

On the bold part, I don’t know about America or Europe but I posted a link to the official Australian stats above and they confirm that Covid deaths in Australia are very few below the age of 50. Over 70 dominates the distribution.
 
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Because you first have to catch covid, then be admitted into hospital, then die. Compare the situation in Europe 4 weeks ago and now - a different world. First infections were rising, then hospital admissions, and deaths are starting to go up as well. As long as hospitals aren't overrun, we can probably keep mortality lower because we now know better what (not) to do and because, at least in Belgium, we've been able to protect nursing homes better (so less really old people infected).
Yes I recall someone mentioned this when I asked how the TdF managed to get through and then there were problems with the bubble at the Giro. Some of those problems should have been managed such as the police and eating arrangements but the virus was much worse by the time the Giro started. Your point on nursing homes also relates to Australia. We need to protect the vulnerable.
 
The value of masks is an interesting debate - In most countries,Masks have been sold as a panacea for when the virus is out of control and seen by many in the community as a magic bullet - My opinion is that even though masks are mandated in a few countries they seem to have done little to stop infections - My long-held theory is that masks are misused - Governments mandate them when out in the public and in some busy indoor places where they probably aren't needed - Where they are needed is when people visit friends and families in indoor environments and this is where they are often not used.
 
The value of masks is an interesting debate - In most countries,Masks have been sold as a panacea for when the virus is out of control and seen by many in the community as a magic bullet - My opinion is that even though masks are mandated in a few countries they seem to have done little to stop infections - My long-held theory is that masks are misused - Governments mandate them when out in the public and in some busy indoor places where they probably aren't needed - Where they are needed is when people visit friends and families in indoor environments and this is where they are often not used.

This. People are forgeting that except mass events which are banned in most countires anyway the most risk enviroment for virus spreading are households and work enviroment.
 
That is so true and also why the numbers reported about the percentage of people wearing masks seem high, but are probably way overstated. A lot of people are wearing masks some of the time, but are they wearing them at the optimal times? Private family gatherings are definitely a big source of the continued spread. Communal break rooms have been linked to some of the hospital and transit worker outbreaks. Letting your guard down is how this virus thrives. Incidentally, that is also why places like Sweden have an inherent advantage with more single person households.

Masks are an easy solution because they offer some benefit with little adverse reaction for most people.

The baseball player in the World Series perfectly exemplified the 'following the rules when it is convenient' mentality. But it is an endemic mindset here and is a bigger problem than who is dispensing the public health advice IMO. People know, they just don't care enough.

View: https://twitter.com/OliviaMesser/status/1321805302094798854
 
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Scientists identify prolific coronavirus strain which started in Spain and spread across Europe

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - A coronavirus strain that emerged in Spain in June has spread across Europe and now makes up a large proportion of infections in several countries, researchers said, highlighting the role of travel in the pandemic and the need to track mutations.

The variant, which has not been found to be inherently more dangerous, was first identified among farm workers in the eastern Spanish regions of Aragon and Catalonia.

Over the last two months, it has accounted for close to 90% of new infections in Spain, according to the research paper, authored by seven researchers with backing by Swiss and Spanish public-sector science institutions.

It was posted on a so-called preprint server https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.10.25.20219063v1.full.pdf and is yet to be peer reviewed for publication in a scientific journal.

The strain has crossed European borders and accounted for 40-70% of new infections in Switzerland, Ireland and the United Kingdom in September, they found.

The scientists said the strain's characteristic mutation did not give it any apparent edge and its success may be down to the people who caught it first being particularly mobile and sociable.

But in some places outside Spain the variant's journey developed a dynamic of its own, indicating it may have a transmission advantage.

"Its frequency in the UK has continued to increase even after quarantine-free travel was discontinued and the main summer travel period ended. Thus this variant might transmit faster than competing variants," the researchers wrote.

Efforts to sequence viral genomes differ widely across Europe, limiting their research, they said.

"The rapid rise of these variants in Europe highlights the importance of genomic surveillance of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic... it is imperative to understand whether novel variants impact the severity of the disease."The World Health Organisation said in July that there was no evidence mutations of the virus had led to more severe disease. It formed a working group to better understand how mutations behave.

All viruses make only imperfect copies of themselves when they infect a host but the tendency for this random drift varies between classes of viruses.

Coronaviruses, which were also behind the 2002–2004 SARS outbreak, are known to be more stable than, for instance, the seasonal flu, which requires a new vaccine every year.
 
I found this very interesting, regarding the spread of the virus indoors:
 
I found this very interesting, regarding the spread of the virus indoors:

It's not correct that particles less than 100 microns in diameter can stay suspended in the air for hours. Even particles as small as 10 microns in diameter will settle in about 10-15 minutes. Aerosols are usually defined as < 3-5 microns in diameter.

Notice that the examples they give involve several hours before many people are infected. This is partly because these larger particles do settle quickly, so it takes several hours of speaking for an equilibirum to be reached in the air, in which new particles are replacing those that settle out. Also--and articles on air-borne transmission almost never mention this--the smaller the particle, and therefore the longer it can remain suspended in the air, the less virus it will contain. In fact, particles small enough to stay suspended for more than an hour rarely contain any virus, so it takes a large number of these particles to provide an infectious dose. This is another factor contributing to the long period of time of transmission.

Another important factor, which might have contributed to the author's confusion, is that when droplets or aerosols initially are released into the air from the mouth, they are hydrated with saliva. They lose this liquid very rapidly, usually in less than a second, and as a result the particle size shrinks. So a 100 micron particle will quickly become a 20 micron particle. But this is still in the size range of droplets.

That said, all their recommendations should be taken seriously.
 
The methodology background (at the bottom) states:
Methodology: we calculated the risk of infection from Covid-19 using a tool developed by José Luis Jiménez, an atmospheric chemist at the University of Colorado and an expert in the chemistry and dynamics of air particles. Scientists around the world have reviewed this Estimator, which is based on published methods and data to estimate the importance of different measurable factors involved in an infection scenario. However, the Estimator’s accuracy is limited as it relies on numbers that are still uncertain – numbers that describe, for example, how many infectious viruses are emitted by one infected person. The Estimator assumes that people practice the two-meter social distancing rule and that no one is immune. Our calculation is based on a default value for the general population, which includes a wide range of masks (surgical and cloth), and a loud voice, which increases the amount of aerosols expelled.

I would think that major issues would have been corrected, and that this was not based on the interpretation of one person.
 
Meanwhile in Japan:

204 seems to be around average for the fluctuating numbers for Tokyo the past few months, though of course they're not testing as many as they could, so likely more.
The severe cases have risen into early 30s, after remaining constant in the 20s for a long time.

I'm still waiting for the numbers to rise, especially as Tokyo was recently allowed to join the nationwide gvt "Go To" travel/holiday subsidy so there are more people traveling in and out of Tokyo with these discounts.
Of course I've been expecting the numbers to rise since April! However if Japan follows suit with EU, UK, US, as the weather continue to cool down perhaps this low status quo here will change. Let's hope not.

Japan also recently hit 100,000 cumulative cases (including recovered cases, etc).
 
The value of masks is an interesting debate - In most countries,Masks have been sold as a panacea for when the virus is out of control and seen by many in the community as a magic bullet - My opinion is that even though masks are mandated in a few countries they seem to have done little to stop infections - My long-held theory is that masks are misused - Governments mandate them when out in the public and in some busy indoor places where they probably aren't needed - Where they are needed is when people visit friends and families in indoor environments and this is where they are often not used.
The value of masks is quite high in reducing viral load (if there really was a debate at some point, that is long past). Mask mandates don't stop infection, as you pointed out, mask use does.
 
I'm all for reducing obesity. But there is a persistent myth that people who are overweight are exactly like people who aren't, except that they're too lazy to restrict their diet. In fact, overweight people frequently battle a slower metabolism that other people don't have. Even the kind of person who is willing to struggle and suffer to stay on a diet undoubtedly has genes that contribute to that condition that others don't have the benefit of. Genes don't affect just physical traits, but also mental ones. If some riders are willing to train much harder than other riders, you don't think this willingness is partly the result of genes?

It's very easy to look at others and say, why can't they do what I do so easily? While ignoring that all of us have things that we find very, very, very difficult to overcome, and which are easy for others to overcome. Staying thin comes very easy for me, including not over-eating even when I might like to on occasion. I don't delude myself that that's because of some magic will power that has nothing at all to do with my genetic makeup.
Genes? Slower metabolism? Don't get me started on this. Heck, I don't have the greatest genes (never could make it as a pro athlete) and have a slow metabolism. My parents were overweight and my father died of heart disease in his early 50s. I'm no spring chicken either, and sustained some significant injuries in a car accident 3 yrs ago. There are days I can barely get out of bed because of PTOA but somehow find the mental strength to get to the gym or go out for a ride or run. Plus I experienced a death with an immediate family member 6 yrs ago that tore our family apart and virtually gave me a nervous breakdown where I could have easily quit working out, start drinking excessively and pigged out on bad food all day.

You'll find many people who have bad genes & slow metabolism and have let themselves get obese. But through will power & mental fortitude have committed to a lifestyle of healthy nutrition & excercise losing tremendous amounts of weight. I've seen this many times over the years at the gym - incredible success stories. Old people, disabled people, people with PTSD, etc., all committed to losing weight and becoming healthy. For example, go look at Drew Carey's story - from obese and a diabetic to healthy, fit, & aerobically strong due to a commitment of healthy nutrition & daily excercise.

The majority of the obese in this country simply don't care and refuse to take personal responsibility for their health. As I said before, obesity is a preventive condition. And more & more young people are getting obese as well. It's estimated that ~40% of Americans are obese, which is deplorable! The thing that irks me is when I see a morbidly obese person in a store rolling around in a scooter with their cart full of the most unhealthy, toxic food known to mankind. I think to myself; I have to wear a mask and probably be forced to take Covid vaccine (I live in a strong Leftist state) to protect these people, who take no responsibility for their health and expect others to protect them. And the sad irony is the vaccine may not even be effective for this group!


On a focus protection strategy, this is one main group that needs to be locked down & shielded. It doesn't do any good with them out in the general public suspectable to getting infected and having a very high risk of complications. A lot of these ICU hospitalizations that are occurring and has gripped the nation in fear are obese people (as well as the elderly with pre-existing conditions who are on multiple medical drugs and have fragile immune systems).

No baseball player has so far, but ask Freddie Freeman about his experience. He thought he was going to die. And there are players who had to drop out of the season because of complications.
Yes...I've read the Freeman story several times and I have a perspective on it. His symptoms are identical to influenza. Remember the big flu outbreak with the Red Sox back in April, 2017? Several players and coaches came down with the flu missing several games. For example, Hanley Ramirez was very sick with a fever of 104 degrees (the same temp Freeman reported). Like Freeman, no one was hospitalized and they recovered with no complications moving on. No quarantines...no mass testing...no shutting down the season.

Furthermore, when my son & I had a severe case of seasonal flu back in the first week of February (remember we debated some issues on that), my symptoms were near identical to Freeman's. His fever at one point was 104.5 - mine was around 103. However, Freeman said he only lost one (1) pound - I lost 12 pounds! Neither one of us required hospitalization and have recovered with no complications. He's 31 and I'm on the short side of 60.

IMO, this was a classic example of the MSM overhyping & blowing out of proportion a "Covid" case with a high-profile professional athlete for the "shock & awe" effect (it seems to have had this effect on you). Arguably, I was more sick than he was but having severe flu symptoms these days can't stand a chance against the media's induced-Covid hype with athletes.
 
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One thing that I will agree with Nomad about is that our societal attitude towards Influenza has been massively poor through the years. This really should've been recognized as the #1 warning flag that we have ignored the cost of infectious disease and that we would be susceptible to a world altering pandemic.

Population density has definitely been a factor in disease spread, but I think not enough has been made about how totally overrun even places like North Dakota has gotten. They have more missile silos than people (joking) and look at these per capita numbers.
View: https://twitter.com/thehowie/status/1322204199019597824
 
Tommorrow starts mass testing of whole Slovakia with antigen tests. It is chaotic it is crazy but we will do it. I am so curious it will help or we will have total lockdown anyway. It is optional but it is "optional" really. They excluded chlidren to 10 years and some other groups. Citizen without test need to stay quarantined and are not able to work and will not get any money (I dont know word in english for money from state when you are sick). So lot of people will go because they cant work if they wont go to test. By the way I am working in state sphere and we will have cancelled home office next week so we basically have to go if we want to work. I would go anyway but it is not very democratic :D. The last thing is the army and volunteers are prepared but health workers are up to 72% of plans few hours before start. Cheer for us it will be quite a ride :D

 
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