Why do we need a new normal?

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Just_Steve said:
Well, it is a quote from one of the investigators.

“We’re trying to move at warp speed,” Dr. Anna Bershteyn, an assistant professor at NYU Langone and the study’s co-principal investigator, said in an interview with CNBC. “The fastest an answer can possibly come we think is in two months.”

By the way it sounds like you have an agenda because it won't help you. Guess we all have axes to grind.
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If you read the literature on this drug, it also CAN damage the retina. That is why it needs to be used in a controlled environment and people will,have to be seen in a year and see if there were side effects.
 
aiken said:
The Spanish Flu was extraordinarily deadly because most people got associated bacterial infections and antibiotics hadn't been invented yet.
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Probably didn't help that World War I was still going on when the pandemic started.
 
Math said:
If you read the literature on this drug, it also CAN damage the retina. That is why it needs to be used in a controlled environment and people will,have to be seen in a year and see if there were side effects.
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Yes, it is definitely not the "safe innocuous" drug that has been promoted.

In fact - for people with cardiovascular disease (121 million people give or take, source: https://healthmetrics.heart.org/wp-...eart-Disease-and-Stroke-Statistics-–-2019.pdf) extreme caution is urged by the AHA: https://newsroom.heart.org/news/cau...-patients-with-cardiovascular-disease-6797342

They say:

The AHA, the ACC and the HRS guidance for health care professionals includes additional mechanisms to reduce the risk of arrhythmias.

Steps outlined:

* Electrocardiographic/QT interval monitoring
* Withhold hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin in patients with baseline QT prolongation (e.g. QTc ≥500 msec) or with known congenital long QT syndrome;
* Monitor cardiac rhythm and QT interval; withdrawal of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin if QTc exceeds a present threshold of 500 msec;
* In patients critically ill with COVID-19 infection, frequent caregiver contact may need to be minimized, so optimal electrocardiographic interval and rhythm monitoring may not be possible;
* Correction of hypokalemia >4mEq/L and hypomagnesemia >2mg/dL; and
Avoid other QTc prolonging agents whenever feasible.


meaning, this is not a drug you can just prescribe and let them walk away with willy nilly (and never has been, finding the right dose is a patient/patient deal).

You have to monitor (EKG) on a periodic basis how the heart is dealing with it. If you have the virus - this point: "n patients critically ill with COVID-19 infection, frequent caregiver contact may need to be minimized, so optimal electrocardiographic interval and rhythm monitoring may not be possible" - meaning hospitalization/monitoring in a medical facility would be key.
 
And a lot of us non-smokers could still smell the smoke. Which was much larger particles than the tiny coronavirus.

Just_Steve said:
The future restaurant will look like the smoking rooms that used to be inside some restaurants. What were they? negative pressure? a table and chairs all segregated in little rooms. Remember, you heard it here first.
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DH read yesterday that surviving the original SARS conferred immunity to the common cold! There seems to be some cross-immunity with the coronaviruses.
 
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There is no common cold, there are more than 200 of them, rhinoviruses that sorta look like corona eh?

That should infer that being older (and having had many colds) would be a good thing?

But no, you older, you gonna die first.
 
aiken said:
The Spanish Flu was extraordinarily deadly because most people got associated bacterial infections and antibiotics hadn't been invented yet.
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Not entirely true. In the age of antibiotics, flu still kills.

The Spanish flu differs from COVID in several ways. First, it spread fast and each wave in each community was over fast-6-10 weeks in most communities. Flu has a short incubation period and the illness is short. It hit young people hard-average age of those dying was 28. Oldsters were protected, probably by pandemic flu 40-50 years earlier. Communities that locked down did much better than communities that stayed open.

John Barry wrote a book, The Great Influenza: The story of the deadliest pandemic in history. He’s been giving interviews and I listened to a couple of them. DH is reading the book now.

Which makes me think life is going to be very different for a lot longer than we would like.
 
P.S. said:
IMO

Yes, we need a new normal. Why? Because SARS CoV2 is not going away. And when it finally does affect every last remaining human, there will be SARS 3... then SARS 4...



SARS and MERS were like the practice outbreaks. It could have been our (global) opportunity to get public health (i.e. public will ) prepared. Ramp up Public Health offices. Coordinate research efforts (like SEPI). Remove the profit and need for bottom line from science research. [soapbox] Hopefully COVID19 teaches us what is really important to us as humans and as a species.



Lasting, durable, sterilizing immunity to coronaviruses would be the exception, i.e. not demonstrated yet. Could very well be that no vaccine will be soon developed that protects humans from COVID19. Or maybe from bad disease. Measles vaccine took 5y to develop. Polio almost 50. Neither measles or polio are coronaviruses.

Then the other hope is treatment. Maybe a mix of anti-virals, immunosuppressants, and good hospital care. SARS-CoV2 is a “clever” virus and has particular features that make it tricky to treat from a virologic perspective. My guess is a successful regimen is going to take very particular timing for the different drugs for the optimal effect, and will depend on patients doing the right thing and presenting at the right time.

Meanwhile you have Americans jumping to get back together! And share things like restaurant door handles, gym equipment, and bannisters. Just cause some elected official says go back and mingle, doesn’t mean the virus goes into hiding.



So what does that mean as a species? This could be Darwinian theory played out in real time. Survival of the fittest. The smartest. The luckiest who was the smartest who got the richest and could best protect self and family. The one who stayed lean and mean, who could read the events and stocked up enough in advance, not just TP, but enough protein, ingredients for healthy meals, educational adv. for their offspring.



The biggest problem with SARS-CoV2 is not that it kills people, but that it kills obese people AND people who have health problems. And American citizens are exactly that. Our case report series will be different and have different stats than those from China, Italia, etc because of our lifestyle.



Maybe the new normal should be that we spend 2T on public heath and preventative health. What if we made it a goal to get rid of diabetes and obesity? REALLY push public health, so that people not just have easy cheap access to important meds, but all the other things so that they didn’t have to take meds. Fitness built into our daily lives. Heavily tax those things, like fast foods and smoking etc , that ultimately lead to the poor health that leads us to have to shut down our economy to protect the unhealthy. To make our citizens and our public health as robust as possible. So that when a new novel virus came to attack our species, we will fare better, and not have to debate bailing out cruise lines. [end soapbox]
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We should stop subsidizing “big food” like soybean oil and big grain. Monsanto (Now owned by Bayer) spends/spent a lot of money lobbying for their foods to be on the recommended diet. That determines what hospitals feed their patients and what goes into the school lunch program. Everything is low fat, high carb. Big Pharma doesn’t help either. There’s a lot more money to be made treating hypertension and diabetes with drugs than a low carb diet and intermittent fasting. Vegans and vegetarians have political clout. Carnivores do not.

Tobacco is heavily taxed and smoking rates have dropped significantly. But now we have vaping.
 
Multiple posts were removed. Folks, how about setting aside what words POTUS used and sticking to the thread topics. :greetings10:
 
EastWest Gal said:
We should stop subsidizing “big food” like soybean oil and big grain. Monsanto (Now owned by Bayer) spends/spent a lot of money lobbying ... Big Pharma doesn’t help either. There’s a lot more money to be made treating hypertension and diabetes with drugs than a low carb diet and intermittent fasting...
Tobacco is heavily taxed and smoking rates have dropped significantly. But now we have vaping.
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Yes, AMEN.

As a society, we need also a new normal re: death and dying. And end of life. Which are normal, can even be beautiful, but have been so medicalized and removed from everyday American living.
 
Math said:
If you read the literature on this drug, it also CAN damage the retina. That is why it needs to be used in a controlled environment and people will,have to be seen in a year and see if there were side effects.
Click to expand...

I wasn't suggesting it should be available over the counter.
 
P.S. said:
IMO


The biggest problem with SARS-CoV2 is not that it kills people, but that it kills obese people AND people who have health problems. And American citizens are exactly that. Our case report series will be different and have different stats than those from China, Italia, etc because of our lifestyle.

Maybe the new normal should be that we spend 2T on public heath and preventative health. What if we made it a goal to get rid of diabetes and obesity? REALLY push public health, so that people not just have easy cheap access to important meds, but all the other things so that they didn’t have to take meds. Fitness built into our daily lives. Heavily tax those things, like fast foods and smoking etc , that ultimately lead to the poor health that leads us to have to shut down our economy to protect the unhealthy. To make our citizens and our public health as robust as possible. So that when a new novel virus came to attack our species, we will fare better, and not have to debate bailing out cruise lines. [end soapbox]
Click to expand...


This is exactly what is needed, you are right. But I don't see it happening anytime soon in this country, unfortunately. The trend has been moving in the opposite direction for years, as you know - more obesity, more diabetes, more chronic diseases in general, and a less fit population overall. And one of the the biggest problems is that traditional medicine is designed to treat disease after it happens, not prevent chronic disease. Plus, there is a lot more money to be made treating sick people than there is by keeping people healthy. And the govt. subsidizes all sorts of unhealthy processed foods that fill most of the aisles of our grocery stores. These junk foods are highly profitable, so we are bombarded by ads from the companies that make them, telling us why we should be eating this stuff, and we mostly comply. Not many people eat a diet consisting mostly of whole, real food anymore. It takes time to cook meals using whole foods, and not many people are willing to take the time to do it. I could go on and on, but the basic point is that we are an unhealthy society in general, and getting unhealthier as time goes on. This is correctable, but a lot of forces are working against it happening. I'm not optimistic.
 
ShadowBloom said:
This is a genuine question--I'm trying to understand, not argue that we don't. Many of the discussions about exit strategies say that we won't be going back to normal; there'll be some kind of new normal.


My question, why do we need a new normal? Did the 1918 epidemic dramatically change society? If it didn't (and I'll admit I didn't research this deeply), why/how is the current virus so different that its impact on society has to be long-lasting? I'm talking about long-lasting changes in how ordinary citizens do things, not in how states prepare for epidemics.
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until we know more about THIS virus , i think we should stay watchful

if you mean the 'old normal' circa 1918 to 1922 ( not the madness of the roaring Twenties or even the post GFC madness , ) yes i could agree there

but different from the events going from the dot.com boom until now calling it the same unfixed pattern , that we need to fix the Keynesian's policies have clearly failed as did those embracing the policies recklessly

do we go back to the Austrian School of economics or try a completely different policy to MMT , human nature will ensure that fails , you can't expect elected politicians to show the needed restraint with MMT

the problem is NOT the virus , the problems are much deeper if anything the virus has given us the opportunity to think of a better way forward ( we have probably already met those 2030 climate targets ) time for the next long-term issue like the various health-care systems etc etc

the virus has been the blow-torch applied to an inefficient and fragile system

don't get me wrong the virus is VERY dangerous and will probably return too soon for us to be prepared

ALSO have a plan for NO vaccine that works , there is no vaccine for SARS or MERS the two other corona virus that attack humans so you probably should not expect one now . maybe a preventive drug ( say quinine in SMALL doses might work drink some tonic water when the first cases start flaring , not when you are already in emergency care )

but the main danger is a completely collapsed economy totally buried in debt
 
I have no plan. Give me the virus and/or give me death!
 
Originally Posted by P.S. View Post
IMO


The biggest problem with SARS-CoV2 is not that it kills people, but that it kills obese people AND people who have health problems. And American citizens are exactly that. Our case report series will be different and have different stats than those from China, Italia, etc because of our lifestyle.

Maybe the new normal should be that we spend 2T on public heath and preventative health. What if we made it a goal to get rid of diabetes and obesity? REALLY push public health, so that people not just have easy cheap access to important meds, but all the other things so that they didn’t have to take meds. Fitness built into our daily lives. Heavily tax those things, like fast foods and smoking etc , that ultimately lead to the poor health that leads us to have to shut down our economy to protect the unhealthy. To make our citizens and our public health as robust as possible. So that when a new novel virus came to attack our species, we will fare better, and not have to debate bailing out cruise lines. [end soapbox]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

no i disagree

the virus seems to have picked the low-hanging fruit THIS TIME

BUT VIRUSES MUTATE

they need to to keep on reproducing so who will they pick on next

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/cont...niemoeller-first-they-came-for-the-socialists

to totally butcher this fine poem

first the virus came for the old , but they were going to die soon , anyway

then the virus came for the obese , but food was getting scarce

then to virus came for the alcoholics , what a shame they paid so much in extra taxes

will the virus spare the last humans on earth , or will the humans fight back ?
 
Oz investor said:
no i disagree

the virus seems to have picked the low-hanging fruit THIS TIME

BUT VIRUSES MUTATE

they need to to keep on reproducing so who will they pick on next
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Well, I don't think that is entirely correct. Yes, viruses mutate, but our immune system produces "memory cells" that can recognize new strains of a virus, and defend against those also. Those memory cells are of course the basis for how vaccines work. Even without a vaccine, though, someone that is in good health, with a strong immune system, is usually going to have a better chance to survive any virus strain that comes along. That doesn't mean the healthiest people will always survive, but it definitely improves your chances. Below is a link to an article that sheds a little more light on this, and a quote from the article:

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/04/180430212353.htm

"We have found the immune system is able to recognize threats from new strains of a virus. We have long known of the existence of different types of immune memory cells, and now we know what these differences mean.
"After exposure to one strain of virus, these memory cells are then better able to recognize variants of the virus if they encounter them in the future. The immune system learns to protect against a whole group of related viruses, not just the one it experienced."


And if you want to really learn more about viral mutations and our immune system, including some educated guesses as to how the COVID-19 virus may or may not mutate over time (and whether a COVID-19 vaccine is likely to be effective or not), this article is really good:

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/can-you-become-immune-sars-cov-2-180974532/
 
You might not think we need a new normal, but we will have one for the near future. Just finished shopping at Trader Joe's and they have a limit to the number of people that can shop. 10 people queued up waiting to get in, which took about 10 minutes. Imagine there will be similar lines at your favorite restaurant.
 
If I had a nickel for every time, over the decades, that someone has proclaimed a "New Normal"....
 
I didn’t start hearing that phrase until after the 2008 Great Recession.
 
Oz investor said:
the virus seems to have picked the low-hanging fruit THIS TIME

BUT VIRUSES MUTATE

they need to to keep on reproducing so who will they pick on next
Click to expand...

Fortunately mutations are usually bad for the virus.

"However, the bulk of the mutations that appear as a virus spreads are either harmful to the virus itself (meaning it is less likely to survive or replicate) or don’t change how it functions."

Yes, the new coronavirus is mutating—but that’s not a bad thing
 
There may never be a effective vaccine. The flu vaccine really varies each year. If it’s a one and done vaccine more people will take it.
 
ShadowBloom said:
This is a genuine question--I'm trying to understand, not argue that we don't. Many of the discussions about exit strategies say that we won't be going back to normal; there'll be some kind of new normal.


My question, why do we need a new normal? Did the 1918 epidemic dramatically change society? If it didn't (and I'll admit I didn't research this deeply), why/how is the current virus so different that its impact on society has to be long-lasting? I'm talking about long-lasting changes in how ordinary citizens do things, not in how states prepare for epidemics.
Click to expand...

I'm feeling the same as you..but here's a bit more about 1918. They did do quarantine..or many big cities did, and it helped. They did know to wear masks and not shake hands and stay in. Many did. And some didn't. The cities that did , fared better than those that didn't. But then, and here's the rub, after 10 months of losing 1/3 of the population (I'm making that number up, but it think its right), then the flu kind of ended its huge growth. There were very few to no cases. Why? Because the human population had reached herd immunity. There were no more people left that could still get it..they had already gotten it, or had died. So..that's that. And today, the Spanish Flu is in the Flu vaccine, as are all the flus we know of. Vaccines changed the world, and..herd immunity. To get to herd immunity, look how many had to die? But..interestingly, it was 'only' 10 months of hell. But your question is, did the world go to a different normal, after 1919? I don't think so. What was done was done. So, do we need to go to a 'new normal'? I'm hoping that if/when we get a working vaccine, we can think of this as another 'type' of a flu issue. The flu, as recently as 2018 killed a huge amount of people (60k-100k in the US) ..more than (hopefully) Covid will, as that vaccine wasn't working all that great. And..notice, the world didn't shut down for it. We went on..and had a better flu year the next year. I hate the thought of a 'new normal'. I'm praying that working drugs and vaccines, can let us 'soon' as wort of the old normal back again.
 
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