37 minutes ago, birdguy said:

I'm not saying it's something to be ignored, but certainly the hype and panic are uncalled for.  Stop.  Take a deep breath.  Look a the numbers and analyze them viz-a-viz the entire populations.  Do the math.  The raw numbers seem scary.  The percentages put things in proper perspective.

 

1/ Ever heard of wheat and the chessboard problem  ? This is kind of  the story of Italy, France etc. and most probably the US soon. Small numbers first which grow terribly fast to very large numbers.

2/ The issue is not the number of sick people per se or the percentage over the population, it is the ratio between the number of extremely sick people and the number of ICU beds with ventilators and specialist MDs  (pneumology, infectionology etc.) . In all the Western countries, the hospitals rapidly saturate. People will have to die just because there won't be enough equipment. They saturate because we have not had such a pandemic in a century and because the flu season is in full swing in parallel.

3/ You may carry the virus (a very large percentage of the population will, in France at least half of the population should) and not die or be sick. Isn't that nice ? But if you don't accept some discipline recommended by the health authorities, The Surgeon General I suppose in the US, you will disseminate the virus to other people that will  die. Like young people. Less nice.

4/ You may not be sick or die of the virus but you or somebody dear to you may die because you may have, Heaven forbid, a heart attack or stroke or a road accident and the hospitals will not take you. No more bed.

Restriction are put in place to break the "contamination chains" and spread the disease over time to allow the medical infrastructure to properly respond. 

 

 

37 minutes ago, HighBypass said:

One quite dangerous idea IMHO at least, that has been mentioned over here in the UK is extending the working hours of truck drivers - presumably so that more deliveries can get through to supermarkets etc thanks to panic buying..  NO! truckers work long enough hours as it is.  What should happen is more drivers to be made available to make any deliveries within the current working practice. 

As a life long lorry driver, "truckers" live in America, there is built into the legislation the provision to relax the rules in the case of emergency and this has been successfully implemented many times during my 45 year career. Open rant The answer is to stop the stockpiling by the greedy and selfish who cannot spare a thought for anyone else, so long as they have filled their greedy pockets with more than they could ever use. It looks like it is happening in shops all over the so called civilised world and showing many of us up for what we actually are, pretty much despicable.Close rant

Best quote I've heard so far during all the mayhem was from Juan Brown:

An airliner is like a great white shark that needs to swim to stay alive to move oxygen through its gills, an airliner needs to keep flying with paying passengers on board in order to pay for itself, as soon as you park one it sinks it immediately.

@birdguy
Noel, your posts have been very dismissive of the effect that the virus has on the most vulnerable (including you) in societies to the point of recklessness.

Only because of governments restricting the movement of their populations has the virus been limited to what you feel is a small number of infected people and associated deaths.
Asian countries are seeing a spike in infection numbers after doing so well to initially contain the spread.
https://www.ft.com/content/859e9336-68db-11ea-a3c9-1fe6fedcca75
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-51955931

Currently, 80% of US coronavirus deaths have been among people 65 and older and based on worldwide figures, men are two-thirds more likely to die than women.
Even as a male over half your age, the idea of getting pneumonia-like symptoms is enough for me to alter my behaviour.
It is not about being 'brave' or 'letting the virus win', it's about preventing our healthcare systems from being overwhelmed and not infecting the most vulnerable through selfish behaviours.

Unfortunately, it seems that the UK and the US (both countries that are still in the early stages of this) are going to see very large numbers of deaths in the next few weeks despite advice from officials for people to limit social interactions and keep the number of infections and subsequent hospitalisations down to something approaching a manageable level.

Even if it turns out to be overblown, with such limited data and understanding in comparison to other infectious dieases, we are right to err on the side of caution. We don't even know yet if mutation is going to create other, more deadly strands of this virus.
Let's not forget that 1918's flu pandemic killed the most during the second wave.

Can we not just listen to the experts and heed their advice?
After all, they have vastly more experience and knowledge on contagion, that reporters, commentators, talking heads, or someone called 'Bob65189410354' on Twitter could ever possibly have.

Let's not make their jobs any harder.

 

Edited March 19, 20206 yr by F737NG

3 hours ago, birdguy said:

I'm not saying it's something to be ignored, but certainly the hype and panic are uncalled for.  Stop.  Take a deep breath.  Look a the numbers and analyze them viz-a-viz the entire populations.  Do the math.  The raw numbers seem scary.  The percentages put things in proper perspective.

I'm 86 years old.  We have about 24 cases in New Mexico. That leaves 1,999,976 who are suspects.  In my city we are over 200 miles from the closest case.  Yet we are acting like everyone we see when we are out and about is infected and should be avoided. I'm not staying at home.  I went to the supermarket.  I talked to the people in the checkout line.  Few of us are wearing masks.  Some of us might come down with it.  But not many overall.  Your chances of getting hit by a drunk or texting driver are greater than contracting the virus.

If I am one of the rare ones who does contract the virus I have a 95% or better chance of recovery.

Living inside your personal bubble inside your neighborhood bubble, inside your city bubble, inside your state or province bubble, inside your national bubble takes away a lot of your liberty.   That's not for me.  I'll hold on to my liberty as long as the law allows.

Noel

This is the same attitude that our politicians had at the beginning here in Italy.

Now look were it took us.

Don't underestimae this thing. IT IS dangerous. Is not "just a flu".

 

8 minutes ago, francy25 said:

Don't underestimae this thing. IT IS dangerous. Is not "just a flu".

it has arrived here in germany, the number of cases is beginning to rise very fast now,

and what are people doing?
super spring weather, people meet at the ice cream vendor,
walk along the lake, huge groups of people very close together,
the warnings are completely ignored, completely!
instead of keeping distance, best to stay at home.
I am so very disappointed in our society

1 minute ago, Nedo68 said:

it has arrived here in germany, the number of cases is beginning to rise very fast now,

and what are people doing?
super spring weather, people meet at the ice cream vendor,
walk along the lake, huge groups of people very close together,
the warnings are completely ignored, completely!
instead of keeping distance, best to stay at home.
I am so very disappointed in our society

Yes, we have seen the same behaviour here in Italy the first week. And someone still doesn't understand what a quarantine is.

BTW to answer the topic question: I work for LH group (one of the many airline of the group) and I saw all my flights being cancelled and I still known nothing about April. I guess I still won't fly.
I saw and heard the airline traffic disappear from Italian ACC during my last shift (was the first week of lockdown). Quite impressive, and while landing in FRA I saw a lot of LH plane parked on the taxyways.

I'm 25 so I marginally lived 9/11 and seeing all that plane parked there like the photos of those days is quite scary.

1 hour ago, F737NG said:

@birdguy
Noel, your posts have been very dismissive of the effect that the virus has on the most vulnerable (including you) in societies to the point of recklessness.

Only because of governments restricting the movement of their populations has the virus been limited to what you feel is a small number of infected people and associated deaths.
Asian countries are seeing a spike in infection numbers after doing so well to initially contain the spread.
https://www.ft.com/content/859e9336-68db-11ea-a3c9-1fe6fedcca75
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-51955931

Currently, 80% of US coronavirus deaths have been among people 65 and older and based on worldwide figures, men are two-thirds more likely to die than women.
Even as a male over half your age, the idea of getting pneumonia-like symptoms is enough for me to alter my behaviour.
It is not about being 'brave' or 'letting the virus win', it's about preventing our healthcare systems from being overwhelmed and not infecting the most vulnerable through selfish behaviours.

Unfortunately, it seems that the UK and the US (both countries that are still in the early stages of this) are going to see very large numbers of deaths in the next few weeks despite advice from officials for people to limit social interactions and keep the number of infections and subsequent hospitalisations down to something approaching a manageable level.

Even if it turns out to be overblown, with such limited data and understanding in comparison to other infectious dieases, we are right to err on the side of caution. We don't even know yet if mutation is going to create other, more deadly strands of this virus.
Let's not forget that 1918's flu pandemic killed the most during the second wave.

Can we not just listen to the experts and heed their advice?
After all, they have vastly more experience and knowledge on contagion, that reporters, commentators, talking heads, or someone called 'Bob65189410354' on Twitter could ever possibly have.

Let's not make their jobs any harder.

 

 

Good luck Noel. I hope you make it through this...............

From the "picture paints a thousand words" dept, consider this picture taken this morning, from a news site in Bergamo Italy:

https://bergamo.corriere.it/notizie/cronaca/20_marzo_18/coronavirus-troppi-morti-bergamo-l-esercito-porta-bare-fuori-regione-la-cremazione-7d5ec5f6-694e-11ea-913c-55c2df06d574.shtml

That's a convoy of 70 military trucks transporting hundreds of deceased COVID-19 victims to crematoriums in neighboring cities, as they have exceeded the local capacity to cremate them.

Does anyone ever remember seeing something like this attributed to "just the flu?" 

Me neither.

 

Wow... God bless all these poor souls and their loved ones. 

 

I have no doubt I'll make through this.  The odds are on my side.  I do have a strong immune system.

I'm not dismissing anything but I am saying the draconian tradeoffs are not warranted.

As of this evening (10:00PM my time in New Mexico) China has had 80,928 cases and 3199 deceased.  That's out of a population of 1.5 billion people.

The United States has 13,925 cases and 195 deceased.  That's out of a population of 350 million.

My state, New Mexico has 35 cases and no deaths.  That's out of a population 2 million.

Worldwide 246,000 cases and 86,054 deceased out of a population of 3.5 billion.

On the other side of the coin our governor has closed all the malls, theaters and restaurants (except for takeout).  Offices can only allow 10 people to come to work.  Hotels and motels can only operate at 50% capacity.  And this thread is full of what's happened to the airline industry.

Are the risks to the profitability of those businesses if this lasts for months worth it? Can those businesses, especially small businesses survive over the long term?  Or isn't that important?  What about all the people who won't be receiving paychecks?  How do they feed their families and pay their mortgages?  Our president has proposed giving every adult 1000 dollars and every child 500 dollars to make up for lost wages.  How far will that go?

And schools are closed for the rest of the school year at least.

I know I am on the wrong side of the opinion here (that's the story of my life).  And it's hard to make choices between lives and livelihoods.  But over-reacting the wrong way can make the protecting of a few, especially the elderly like myself at the expense of the jobs and businesses can mean long term economic hardships for the many.  And don't come back at me with my term of the few.  The sacrifices of the few for the good of the many should be a consideration.

As I said, agewise I'm in the high end of high risk group.  But I am retired living on a military pension and social security and have an excellent healthcare program.  So these closures and drastic measures don't affect me much.  But they do my children and grandchildren who must work for a living and my great grandchildren whose education is taking a hit from school closures.  Protecting me from a virus that has so far only attacked less than a quarter of million people out of a world population of 3.5 billion isn't worth sacrifice to the long term economic consequences for that vast majority of people who are not affected by the virus.

Noel

 

For some reason Italy has twice the average (8%) of coronavirus fatalities than the rest of the world (4%).  They are certainly an outlier in t hits case.

Noel

You can daze yourself with all the figures you want, Noel, the reality is that we face a major and devastating health issue with an exponential (loosening speaking here) kind of growth.

I am glad that a strong immune system protects you. Only thing, that makes you even more dangerous to the rest of the population when you go wandering about.

One important misconception to debunk is that only geezers are at risk. Not so. Geezers are more likely to die. Most of the cases are below 65 and most of them survive only if they are in the proper ICU environment.

Economy : yes, we will have a recession with all its miseries for our children and us. Governing is making tough choices.  Raising the rate of unemployment for a few years or raising the number of death to millions  ? 

Italy : there are many reasons why the figures are higher. Our Italian friends may correct me. The disease struck there first and the authorities response was not up to the challenge. People like you « Look the numbers are small. Its like the flu » and so on and so forth. Bob’s pic of military hearses in Bergamo above , says it all about your kind of approach.  Preparedness was also minimal. This is not only Italy btw. I am afraid that it will be the same in France, I won’t enter into French politics but I am kind of angry to see the dearth of FFP2 masks. These days, there are too many French MDs doing their duty without a mask ( my son among many). 

I write that knowing that I will not convince you. I am old (almost 71) enough not to have any illusion. But if I could convince a couple of more reasonable readers, I would have done my minuscule citizen’s duty. This a serious emergency guys. Don’t be selfish, follow the rules. Don’t think you know better than your health authorities. You don’t.
 

 

Edited March 20, 20206 yr by domkle

1 hour ago, birdguy said:

I'm not dismissing anything but I am saying the draconian tradeoffs are not warranted.

As of this evening (10:00PM my time in New Mexico) China has had 80,928 cases and 3199 deceased.  That's out of a population of 1.5 billion people.

The United States has 13,925 cases and 195 deceased.  That's out of a population of 350 million.

My state, New Mexico has 35 cases and no deaths.  That's out of a population 2 million.

Worldwide 246,000 cases and 86,054 deceased out of a population of 3.5 billion.

Noel -

Your numbers don't take into account the most critical factors - the rate of contagion, how quickly the disease spreads, the resulting impact on hospital systems, and how that factors back into fatality rates.  Italy, which you mention in your other post, is an outlier - and so is Wuhan - because in both cases the hospital systems were overwhelmed.  Many, many more people died as a result.

The point of the draconian measures is to keep that from happening - to slow down the rate at which the disease spreads so that the hospitals and healthcare workers can cope with the caseload - and not, for example, have to refuse to put older patients on ventilators, because there aren't enough ventilators to go around and the choice is made in favor of younger people who are in overall better health and stand a better chance of surviving.  That's Italy right now.

Then, of course, there's the question of what happens to all the other people who need medical care - the ones having heart attacks and strokes and auto accidents and recurrences of cancer - as a result of the collapse of the hospital system.

And there will also be high infection and fatality rates among healthcare professionals, which compound the problem.

The model that's driving the restrictions in the US, the UK and elsewhere is the one developed by the Imperial College, London.

Here's a brief summary

Here's a page where you can download the full report.

Here's a summary page with links to other coverage.

As you'll see, for the US, the figures that matter are not your 13,925 cases and 195 dead out of 350 million. That's just today's snapshot.  If nothing is done - if no restrictions are put in place - those numbers double every day.  The result would be 2.2 million dead in the U.S. Contrast that to 407,000 U.S. military deaths from all causes during the Second World War.

Mitigation - which means isolating infected people and their families, as well as people over 70 - cuts the rate in half.  But that's still over 1 million deaths in the U.S. And the rate of hospitalizations requiring critical care is eight times current U.S. critical care surge capacity.

It's only when total social isolation is put in place - including closing schools, colleges and universities, and long-term social distancing of the entire population - that the numbers come down to a level where the healthcare system might be able to cope with them.  UK deaths would fall from over 500,000 in the do-nothing scenario, to 200,000 in the mitigation scenario, to 20,000 in this suppression scenario. But it would be necessary for the restrictions remain in place - or that they be quickly reinstated in case of a new surge, perhaps in the autumn - and be sustained until a vaccine is available in 12-18 months' time.

That's what we're up against and that's what the draconian measures are about.

It's admirable that you have a strong immune system - but a lot of people who thought the same thing have either died or had their lives permanently changed by COVID-19.  The question now is not about any one person's odds - it's about the odds for millions of deaths and what we need to do to stop that from happening.

 

.

 

Edited March 20, 20206 yr by Alan_A