Dire situation in New York State

[NW-Bound]

+1

While it's fun to poke blame someplace other than ourselves, a clear lack of cooperation, defiance really, on the part of some citizens and a lack of clear leadership by many local gov't officials came into play. We locked down slowly and incompletely compared to many other countries. That would be part of our "independent and free" culture, which sometimes does not serve us well.

For example, I believe it was just yesterday that Mayor Lightfoot of Chicago came down hard on citizens blowing off the lockdown rules and now they have even made a few arrests. Part of the news coverage included a crowd of young people pumping fists in the air and chanting about their right to congregate however and wherever they wished......

I don't think S Korea had that much pushback from citizens. And when they did, I don't think their leaders hesitated to use appropriate force to quarantine and contain. Here we could test and attempt to isolate the infected and those they've been near, but would definitely meet resistance (here comes the ACLU!) from a significant percentage who didn't want to be forcefully isolated.

Not just Americans but Europeans too, up until recently, showed an attitude of "who's afraid of the bad virus".

While people in Milan were clogging up the ER and their PM instituted "social distancing" and allowed restaurants to stay open, people in southern Italy were totally oblivious of the danger, and jammed up restaurants. The PM ordered everything closed down after a day or two.

And while northern Italians were dying, Spain allowed a political demonstration of 120,000 people in Madrid. And that's where they are now using a skating ice rink to keep dead bodies, because crematoriums are running 24/7 and cannot keep up.

And more recently, Brit tourists held "corona parties" out on the streets of some Spanish tourist towns, despite the order from the local police to disperse.

All that despite the pleas from Italian doctors, and later also Italian citizens, that the world should learn from them, and not call this "just a flu".

No, people simply do not learn. They have to see death in their family, or themselves waiting in line for a hospital bed before they learn. Very sad!

 

[Just_Steve]

So all those folks standing outside the Queens hospital shown on TV waiting to get inside/tested are all idiots then......

YES!

 

[NW-Bound]

Yes, my wife stayed home, and yes, I stayed home as well. However, without a test, nobody knows whether she had or even has COVID-19...

They are importing serologic test kits from South Korea. This can tell after the fact if you were infected with the virus, and conquered it. It does this by detecting antibodies in your blood, and only needs a couple of drops or so. The test can be administered at the POC (point of care) by a nurse, and the result is known within minutes.

It would be nice to know if you might have developed immunity to this virus. The problem is that some say it is not 100% reliable. I think EastWestGal made a post about it on this forum regarding this.

 

[48Fire]

Good for you doing the right thing!

It's too bad your wife can't be tested so you'd both know whether she is infected with COVID-19 or her similar symptoms are from some other issue. Not knowing makes you feel uncomfortable and that's not good. But you're doing the same thing in regard to containing the virus now (self-isolation) as you would do with the test.

Thanks, we've tried to take this seriously from the start. We were the only ones wearing masks on a flight we took on 3/4/20. When my wife couldn't buy any, she made them herself - custom colors

 

[48Fire]

They are importing serologic test kits from South Korea. This can tell after the fact if you were infected with the virus, and conquered it. It does this by detecting antibodies in your blood, and only needs a couple of drops or so. The test can be administered at the POC (point of care) by a nurse, and the result is known within minutes.

It would be nice to know if you might have developed immunity to this virus. The problem is that some say it is not 100% reliable. I think EastWestGal made a post about it on this forum regarding this.

Thanks, very interesting. I would be surprised if these are readily available to us, but we will keep following this.

 

[Tailgate]

[rant]There is an implicit myth that drives the public discourse in times like this: That the relief organizations are well-oiled and experienced machines and, thus, any problems are due to incompetence.

In reality, the organizations are being built on the fly and all disasters are unique. So being in the middle of one is like changing all four tires while you're blasting down the road to an uncertain destination.

BTDT on a small scale flying search & rescue. I have also had most of the national Incident Command System training, which is basically to teach standard language and standard org charts for people who are coming together to deal with a problem.

Overlay this with a political situation where every elected official considers themselves to be in charge; sheriff, mayor, governor, cabinet secretary, president, etc. and one of their most important goals is to push everyone aside and get on TV. All of this prevents the people who actually know what they're doing from doing it efficiently.

Logistics is also a nightmare. Space has to be identified and procured. The staff has to be housed and fed beginning at time zero. Then the inbound and outbound freight capacity has to be acquired and organized. Radios, telephones, computers, ... all have to be pulled from emergency warehouses and distributed. Special things like gowns and masks, respirators, etc. must also be acquired or identified and moved. All of this requires a triage function that serves to prioritize, making almost no one happy.

Really, it's a miracle that anything at all gets accomplished. Think about it and be grateful, folks.[/rant]

Edit: As I read this I realize it could be interpreted as an attack on posters here. Really, as I think about it the rant is probably aimed mostly at the politicians and idiots [MOD EDIT] who want to hog all the resources and to see themselves on TV. Apologies to anyone who was offended.

Appreciate your perspective..

 

[48Fire]

Not just Americans but Europeans too, up until recently, showed an attitude of "who's afraid of the bad virus".

While people in Milan were clogging up the ER and their PM instituted "social distancing" and allowed restaurants to stay open, people in southern Italy were totally oblivious of the danger, and jammed up restaurants. The PM ordered everything closed down after a day or two.

And while northern Italians were dying, Spain allowed a political demonstration of 120,000 people in Madrid. And that's where they are now using a skating ice rink to keep dead bodies, because crematoriums are running 24/7 and cannot keep up.

And more recently, Brit tourists held "corona parties" out on the streets of some Spanish tourist towns, despite the order from the local police to disperse.

All that despite the pleas from Italian doctors, and later also Italian citizens, that the world should learn from them, and not call this "just a flu".

No, people simply do not learn. They have to see death in their family, or themselves waiting in line for a hospital bed before they learn. Very sad!

We witnessed this first hand on 3/13/20. Social distancing was starting to be emphasized. We went out to a local Irish restaurant, mid-afternoon, thinking it would be quiet enough. Local fire departments were there pre-celebrating Saint Patrick's day. A LOT of hugging, kissing, and drunks saying F the virus, etc. Macho guys

 

[ExFlyBoy5]

+2. While testing has ramped up, it's still not readily available on a scale needed for the US. For a variety of reasons the US blew it, and we have more cases than any other country - even though the population of China is more than 4 times ours and they didn't have the benefit of anyone going before them. If we're so advanced (we're not with routine medical care IMO), how did South Korea manage so much better than we did? https://www.huffpost.com/entry/coro...rsus-united-states_n_5e729a8fc5b63c3b6489eb9a

How do we know what percentage of Chinese and South Koreans were tested? Right now, we don't know what we don't know. Check back in 5 years for "lessons learned" about this.

 

[ExFlyBoy5]

We could have developed a "Best Practice", but instead, we were extremely slow to react.

Best practices are the result of learning from the past. We are currently dealing with this and it's ever evolving....so there is little that is clear. Add in the fact that we are relying on the media for "the truth"...well, I think the truth isn't very clear, at all.

 

[misanman]

This is a 1 hour interview with a pulmonary doctor in NYC (recorded Zoom session for friends and family). He is on the front lines of treating patients. Well worth the time to watch if you have the time (and who doesn't these days).

Lots of reasonable information about the virus and steps that should be taken to protect one’s family. Will help calm some of the hysteria, in my opinion.

https://vimeo.com/399733860

 

[NW-Bound]

Thanks, very interesting. I would be surprised if these are readily available to us, but we will keep following this.

Search the Web for "coronavirus serologic test" to learn more. The test can be self-administered, not too differently than the finger-prick test for blood glucose.

There are many companies producing this kind of test, but the FDA has not approved any for home use. I think some clinics were able to get some for experimental use.

I think the main drawback of this kind of test is due to its nature. Early in the illness, a patient might not have developed enough antibodies to be detectable. You can have the virus, and the test still indicates negative. By the time the test reads positive, the disease can be too advanced. On the other hand, once you have recovered from the virus and not a cold or common influenza, they say the test nearly always shows positive.

 

[48Fire]

Search the Web for "coronavirus serologic test" to learn more. The test can be self-administered, not too differently than the finger-prick test for blood glucose.

There are many companies producing this kind of test, but the FDA has not approved any for home use. I think some clinics were able to get some for experimental use.

I think the main drawback of this kind of test is due to its nature. Early in the illness, a patient might not have developed enough antibodies to be detectable. You can have the virus, and the test still indicates negative. By the time the test reads positive, the disease can be too advanced. On the other hand, once you have recovered from the virus and not a cold or common influenza, they say the test nearly always shows positive.

Thanks! I will check this out.

 

[audreyh1]

Search the Web for "coronavirus serologic test" to learn more. The test can be self-administered, not too differently than the finger-prick test for blood glucose.

There are many companies producing this kind of test, but the FDA has not approved any for home use. I think some clinics were able to get some for experimental use.

I think the main drawback of this kind of test is due to its nature. Early in the illness, a patient might not have developed enough antibodies to be detectable. You can have the virus, and the test still indicates negative. By the time the test reads positive, the disease can be too advanced. On the other hand, once you have recovered from the virus and not a cold or common influenza, they say the test nearly always shows positive.

I thought that the coronavirus serologic test was a tool to see if someone had already been exposed to the virus and recovered (assuming they weren't still sick or had never been sick) and as a result indicated someone had immunity. So they could go back to work, help others, etc.

Not a tool to detect if someone is currently sick or about to get sick.

 

[JoeWras]

Even on this forum, which has more level-headed individuals than just about any other website I visit, the implied political and social blame I'm seeing has been a disappointment. I had hoped for better, but it looks like politics has become a great divide in this country.

Agree. The media loves to stoke politics. I think we just see that reflected. Gotta blame a politician.

But what about bureaucracy? That transcends parties. I hope we take a look at how our FDA, CDC, etc. operate.

Now as for testing, I also hope we install some sort of "sentinel testing" in place. This seemed to be lacking... probably because the tests were completely lacking. To get back to the title of this thread, the Dire Situation in NYC. Sampled sentinel tests would have indicated a problem much earlier than how it rolled out.

 

[NW-Bound]

This is a 1 hour interview with a pulmonary doctor in NYC (recorded Zoom session for friends and family). He is on the front lines of treating patients. Well worth the time to watch if you have the time (and who doesn't these days).

Lots of reasonable information about the virus and steps that should be taken to protect one’s family. Will help calm some of the hysteria, in my opinion.

https://vimeo.com/399733860

Thanks for the link. We watched it in its entirety. I always appreciate hearing from a doctor on the front line actually treating COVID-19 patients, and not hearsay. It is indeed assuring. In the middle of the talk, he promised to tell people what to do when they could not get Purell, but then he forgot.

I thought that the coronavirus serologic test was a tool to see if someone had already been exposed to the virus and recovered (assuming they weren't still sick or had never been sick) and as a result indicated someone had immunity. So they could go back to work, help others, etc.

Not a tool to detect if someone is currently sick or about to get sick.

If you are in the incubation period, there are no antibodies to find. And as I repeated what I read earlier, even in the middle of the illness, there may not be enough antibodies to detect either. The test will show negative.

Some people are anxious to know if they have COVID-19, so would want to use it to assure themselves when they have a cold or a flu, but it does not really work for that. I don't know what South Korea uses it for. Perhaps it's to check for "herd immunity".

I mentioned the info to 48Fire because he suspected that he had COVID-19, but has recovered. The serologic test would tell him if he indeed had it, and now has immunity.

 

[Just_Steve]

Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Daily Data Summary

https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-daily-data-summary-deaths.pdf

 

[NW-Bound]

Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) Daily Data Summary

https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-daily-data-summary-deaths.pdf

Thanks for the info.

I wonder if health officials bother to keep similar statistics for influenza deaths, so we can compare.

PS. Hey, I do not see them listing the number of hospitalizations for each age group. Without that, we don't know the mortality rate for each age group.

 

[Just_Steve]

Thanks for the info.

I wonder if health officials bother to keep similar statistics for influenza deaths, so we can compare.

PS. Hey, I do not see them listing the number of hospitalizations for each age group. Without that, we don't know the mortality rate for each age group.

This one?

https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-daily-data-summary

 

[Sunset]

This one?

https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-daily-data-summary

Surprisingly, the majority of hospitalizations are under the age of 50.

 

[audreyh1]

Surprisingly, the majority of hospitalizations are under the age of 50.

Yes, this has been remarked upon. Quite a different scenario so far in the US.

 

[CRLLS]

No, lockdown is not the only thing that helps. Many European countries did not learn from what was done in some countries in Asia (e.g. S. Korea, Taiwan, Singapore). Early testing & contact tracing helped enormously. Germany had aggressive testing and contract tracing early on, and it has helped a lot. Western hemisphere countries had the benefit of seeing what had happened in Asia and then in parts of Europe, but that benefit was squandered in the US.

In the coming month, I think the US is likely to see huge differences in Covid-19 cases in states where governors acted quickly to shut things down, and those states where governors waited (and in some cases are still waiting) until the virus had spread significantly more in the population.

FWIW, according to https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/, Germany has 2x the infection rate per capita as the USA. Those European countries that have higher infection rates are( in decreasing order): Netherlands, France, Luxembourg, Spain, Switzerland, Italy, Monaco, Austria Belgium, Norway, Germany, France Netherlands, Ireland, Portugal, Denmark, Slovenia

I see no relationship between universal healthcare and infection rate. Drs and hospitals have no influence on one's social and personal health habits.

 

[street]

Lots of finger pointing now.

How can societies stock up supplies and equipments for every imaginable disaster possible? Even if you could afford it, where would you put it?

The only way to reduce the problem is as many experts have said: "Lockdown, lockdown, lockdown".

China did that. They are slowly getting back to normal. Italy has been pleading with other countries to learn from its experience. It falls on deaf ears.

I agree 100%.
Finger points because some of those leaders from other states have to blame someone so they look good. They aren't much of a leader if they keep blaming someone else for what is happening. We need to listen and get through this thing together.

The one thing that stands out for me in NY issue they as a state were slow into shutting down and keeping people at home. A lot of the finger pointers need to look at what they didn't do to make some difference also.

 

[48Fire]

Best practices are the result of learning from the past. We are currently dealing with this and it's ever evolving....so there is little that is clear. Add in the fact that we are relying on the media for "the truth"...well, I think the truth isn't very clear, at all.

In a crisis, it's critical to learn quickly, and rely heavily on experts. And aside from that, there have been several recent health crises we could have learned from. Watch the Ted Talk from Bill Gates on Ebola, a near-miss for us.

And I don't expect to get truth from the media. I don't know if you have seen this, but this link is full of pretty good data. Easy to drill up to countries or down to states, with the links on the right of each state. Some of the exponential curves are absolutely scary. And now Italy's hope that the curve is flattening is absolutely false hope with yesterday's 919 deaths.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/

 

[NW-Bound]

This one?

https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-daily-data-summary

Thanks.

Surprisingly, the majority of hospitalizations are under the age of 50.

Quite a contrast from what originally came out of Wuhan. In NY, almost 1/2 are under 50.

Also, it is roughly split evenly between the sexes, while China reported many more males.

Authorities and the media should stress the above statistics again and again. They need to drill it into people's head that young people get sick and some of them die too.

 

[Freedom56]

Results from 48,600 tests in California are still pending. So the results are still under-reported.

https://calmatters.org/health/2020/03/california-coronavirus-test-results-delayed-backlog/

The only state that has been testing on a large scale and reporting results is New York. California went into lock down a week ago and San Francisco two weeks ago due to a lack of test kits and recommendations by local public health officials to stop the spread. This was a wise move. They mayor of Los Angeles has told people to expect the lock down to last into May. He has taken action to close down locations where people were still gathering in large numbers. Officials in this state are taking the matter seriously and this state will get through this with minimum casualties.

There are 150,000 test kits that California acquired from Hong Kong that should allow a ramp up of testing. The statements made by federal officials about "millions of test kits being distributed" are about as real as the Google website for scheduling your test.

In about 6 weeks things should be back to normal in this state. But the issue is that without a national lock down, we will be faced with returning waves of infections.