It amazes me how many epidemiologists and infectious disease experts there are...especially on eGriz.
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Are we prepared for no football this fall?
- Thread starter alabamagrizzly
- Start date
WaGriz4life
Well-known member
grizindabox said:
It amazes me how quickly Americans are willing to give up their civil liberties over a disease that has a 99.7% survival rate.
It also amazes me how wrong the infectious disease experts have been.
WaGriz4life said:
As far as I'm aware, Fauci has been correct on nearly every substantive question. I've seen no legitimate, unbiased reporting to suggest otherwise.
Early on in the other thread (before it turned into a political shit show), I predicted that after the successful implementation of social distancing, people would come out of the woodwork to decry how it wasn't necessary, hospitals weren't over run, etc. I couldn't have been more right, unfortunately. I guess ultimately that's a good thing....
My apologies if it doesn't fit neatly into whatever narrative you prefer, but social distancing has been 100% effective in what it was put in place to do (which never was about saving lives directly, but rather saving lives by not having overrun health care systems).
The reason SD doesn't have many deaths (so far) is because the entire state has built in social distancing naturally. That said, their trend line ain't pretty. To date, Noem has been lucky. Will it continue after the disaster in the meat packing industry? I guess we'll see. I suspect there may still be some communities in SD that get gut punched.
In either event, I'd rather not gamble my parent's lives on luck. I think I'll listen to the experts, and not some blubbering moron with an agenda on some "news" channel. And I'm glad that nearly 80% of Americans agree with me.
WaGriz4life
Well-known member
EverettGriz said:
ilovethecats
Well-known member
EverettGriz said:
EG you’re a solid poster. Likely a great guy. So I’m really asking. You don’t think it’s possible this whole thing has been overblown? I’m not saying definitively it is. I personally believe it may be. I ask because my experience so far feels like those on the side of the virus being so dangerous seem so sure of it. Nothing so far has led me to believe it’s as terrible as predicted, though I’m fine with a wait and see approach. It’s certainly possible it’s going to be every bit as horrendous as they’re predicting.
I’ve maintained that just as there’s very smart people like Fauchi on the side of the virus, there are also doctors, scientists and epidemiologists on the other side; maintaining it’s not as worrisome we’re made to believe. I find it interesting that some people are so quick to take the former as gospel, but those dispelling that opinion are disregarded. Despite the fact they’re all smart as shit!
We all want the same thing. Get back to normal with as few lives lost as possible. But my opinion as of today is I’m still way more concerned about the repercussions than the virus. And while it might not be all in one swoop, I honestly believe we’re going to see more lives destroyed and lost going forward than we will to the virus. I hate that people act like those of us that think this virus is overblown are selfish. I personally believe it’s more selfish to do what we’re doing right now because so many lives will be devastated because of it.
ILTC, thanks for the compliment.
Do I personally think this has been overblown? Hell NO. But then, I live in a hot spot zone. One of my friends had his Mom die on a Wednesday and his Dad on that Friday, and he couldn't see them, say goodbye to them, tell him he loved them, or even have a funeral for them. Another friend is a hospital administrator. He spent three 18 hour days drawing up an ethical document to determine who lives and who dies at their hospital when it got overrun (not IF it got overrun, WHEN it got overrun. Because without social distancing, it would have). Said it was the worst, most agonizing 3 days of his life. Another friend is a firefighter. He has 3 people who were healthy in the morning die in his aid car on the way to the hospital that evening. I could go on and on, but I suspect you get the idea.
That all said, if I'm sitting in Shelby, Montana, I'm probably saying this entire thing is overblown. But as for me, I know with every fiber of my being that had we not social distanced, we'd be in a very, very, very dark place as a nation right now.
Now, as an economist am I troubled by what's taken place? Of course. But it's my firm belief that had we not taken the steps we did, the damage to the economy would have been worse by a magnitude so great it likely would never have recovered.
Do I personally think this has been overblown? Hell NO. But then, I live in a hot spot zone. One of my friends had his Mom die on a Wednesday and his Dad on that Friday, and he couldn't see them, say goodbye to them, tell him he loved them, or even have a funeral for them. Another friend is a hospital administrator. He spent three 18 hour days drawing up an ethical document to determine who lives and who dies at their hospital when it got overrun (not IF it got overrun, WHEN it got overrun. Because without social distancing, it would have). Said it was the worst, most agonizing 3 days of his life. Another friend is a firefighter. He has 3 people who were healthy in the morning die in his aid car on the way to the hospital that evening. I could go on and on, but I suspect you get the idea.
That all said, if I'm sitting in Shelby, Montana, I'm probably saying this entire thing is overblown. But as for me, I know with every fiber of my being that had we not social distanced, we'd be in a very, very, very dark place as a nation right now.
Now, as an economist am I troubled by what's taken place? Of course. But it's my firm belief that had we not taken the steps we did, the damage to the economy would have been worse by a magnitude so great it likely would never have recovered.
WaGriz4life said:
Fauci has been right on most of what he's said and done. He hasn't been way out there like some, and like most of the early modelers.
What has he been wrong on? Show us what he said that was wrong. I'm sure he's been wrong on some stuff, but what are you talking about?
What did Fauci say about how lethal the virus was? Is it this: "Fauci said COVID-19 is at least 10 times “more lethal” than the seasonal flu, even if the mortality rate drops far below the World Health Organization’s current estimate of 3.4%."
I've seen .1% mentioned as mortality rate of the flu. I saw Cuomo mention some figures recently, and .5% was the lowest. So, that would be 5 times more than the flu. I don't think Fauci has been using the incredibly high percentages. Note that Fauci's quote was on March 11, and Cuomo's info is just a day or two ago.
Fauci has nothing to do with SD.
Personally, I"m in favor of social distancing, just not alot of the more strict stuff. And, social distancing could have been more relaxed in places like MT, than places not NYC.
The US is now at 62,000 deaths and rising. Nothing to sneeze at. I agree that it's not a good idea to shut down the economy like was done in the US, and that was overkill and has to get changed right away, but the virus by itself was also going to affect the economy.
ilovethecats
Well-known member
I appreciate that EG. I really do. In the case of your friends I’m sorry to hear that. We’re obviously way more effected by personal experience with everything. If you lose a family member to a drunk driver you’ll be way more invested in that cause. We know the stats on drunk driving deaths. They’re sky high. We all know the numbers, but for some of us they hit closer to home.EverettGriz said:
I also obviously agree that where you live will impact your thoughts on this thing. But the math remains the same no matter where you are.
I guess my biggest issues in this entire situation are these.....
I don’t like that top experts can throw out models with enormous amounts of lives lost. 2-3 million American lives lost. Then they have the power to force us to stop working, stop going to school, and stay in our homes. Then they can use the numbers of tiny amounts of deaths to show how great we’re doing. That scares the hell out of me. How easily people blindly follow orders, (myself included) when information is gained daily is shocking.
This overreaction, or to be fair POTENTIAL overreaction causes so many dominos to fall. We don’t know how many have been infected. Of the numbers we actually have, the death rate is tiny. It’ll only get smaller as the months go on.
In the end I guess we won’t really know for months. Like I said I could be wrong. This could be devastating and every bit as scary as I’m led to believe. I maintain I could pick any means of death and if it was on the news 24/7 with a ticker of cases and deaths updated every minute we’d look at those differently too. So while I’m aware the virus is real, my opinion is it’s not very deadly, and no where NEAR as scary as the media wants us to believe.
Appreciate your post. Hope your family stays safe!
EverettGriz said:
Cats, Everett is terrible poster (ha), and doesn't know what he's talking about on this subject.
Shelby, MT? Everett obviously doesn't know that Shelby/Toole County is actually MT's virus hotspot.
"Per capita, no Montana community has been hit harder by the virus. As of Monday, Toole County (pop. 4,800) had 29 confirmed cases, five [I think this is 6 now] of the state’s 11 deaths and 14 recovered — all but the most recent infection directly linked to Shelby’s 38-apartment Marias Heritage Center assisted-living facility and by extension the 21-bed Marias Medical Center."
If Everett's firm thinks that all of the lockdowns in the US were necessary to save the economy from something much worse, then everyone should avoid that firm. Actually, I don't believe what Everett said. He overstated like he often does. Sure, social distancing and some lockdowns were good and necessary, but some of it wasn't. I don't think that any of the states that didn't go complete lockdown, have ended up with huge virus problems, yet.
The unnecessary damage to the US economy compared to the threat, is just huge. If Everett's firm really doesn't understand that, then run from them.
This info is from April 26:
"About 1,850 of the state’s 2,212 coronavirus cases have been reported in Minnehaha County, which is South Dakota’s most populous county and the location of a large outbreak at a pork processing plant. More than 1,000 COVID-19 cases have been tied to the Smithfield Foods plant in Sioux Falls. [So, 362 cases in the rest of the state.]
Smithfield closed the plant indefinitely last week because of the outbreak and faced complaints that it wasn’t doing enough to protect its workers.
One new death was reported Sunday, leaving the South Dakota total at 11. Health officials said 64 people were hospitalized." [Think deaths are now 12, so less than MT's death count.]
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/south-dakota/articles/2020-04-26/south-dakota-covid-10-cases-grow-additional-death-reported
"About 1,850 of the state’s 2,212 coronavirus cases have been reported in Minnehaha County, which is South Dakota’s most populous county and the location of a large outbreak at a pork processing plant. More than 1,000 COVID-19 cases have been tied to the Smithfield Foods plant in Sioux Falls. [So, 362 cases in the rest of the state.]
Smithfield closed the plant indefinitely last week because of the outbreak and faced complaints that it wasn’t doing enough to protect its workers.
One new death was reported Sunday, leaving the South Dakota total at 11. Health officials said 64 people were hospitalized." [Think deaths are now 12, so less than MT's death count.]
https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/south-dakota/articles/2020-04-26/south-dakota-covid-10-cases-grow-additional-death-reported
Hoops watcher
Well-known member
PlayerRep said:
When push comes to shove I'd bet money that a lot of the Smithfield guys had it spread where they live. I spent 15 years in the logging business and worked with many Hispanic dudes. Good guys, family oriented, very thrifty and very hard working. Being frugal they would live 4 guys in a small apartment to save money as well as send it back home. If you are from the Midwest farm country where I grew up you know that a large share of the labor in food processing plants hails from Mexico and Central America. In all the media comments on S Dakota I've never seen this mentioned, not politically correct I guess.
I hope w have football but the way things are shaping up I'm not very optimistic.
WaGriz4life said:
You are not much for science...huh.
When was the last death in US caused by natural causes? OH I know, it was before Covid-19 was announced. Folks, if you feel ill stay home and stay away from people, take responsibility for yourselves! You don't need an expert in DC to tell you you're sick and what you should do...call your local hospital and they will tell you what to do. If you have pre-existing health problems, you know what you should be doing? The media is nothing but Doom and Gloom and Americans eat it up!
Let's play some football!
Let's play some football!
ILTC, I appreciate the intelligent and reasonable discourse. It's certainly a marked change from many posters on this issue.
So while i understand -- and agree completely -- with this sentiment, would be be better off blindly following the orders of politicians versus the recommendations of multiple subject experts?
Again, I believe anyone who focuses on the death rate is mistaken. The mortality rate wasn't the concern that drove the stay at home orders, although it is running a staggering 5.8% of confirmed cases). The primary concern was the hospitalization rate, and the number of those patients who would need ICU care. There are only 46,000 ICU beds in America. Even with social distancing and marked slowing in increased cases, some models project we'll be at ICU capacity on May 13th.
I'm very curious to get your thoughts on what would have happened if we hadn't social distanced.
So while i understand -- and agree completely -- with this sentiment, would be be better off blindly following the orders of politicians versus the recommendations of multiple subject experts?
Again, I believe anyone who focuses on the death rate is mistaken. The mortality rate wasn't the concern that drove the stay at home orders, although it is running a staggering 5.8% of confirmed cases). The primary concern was the hospitalization rate, and the number of those patients who would need ICU care. There are only 46,000 ICU beds in America. Even with social distancing and marked slowing in increased cases, some models project we'll be at ICU capacity on May 13th.
I'm very curious to get your thoughts on what would have happened if we hadn't social distanced.
ilovethecats
Well-known member
reinell30 said:
You didn't hear that there has been a miraculous cure for the flu, influenza, heart disease and cancer?! Because somehow....some way....all those forms of death are lower than they have been in the last 15 years! I can't put my finger on it, but the only LOGICAL conclusion a person can make is there is a cure for these ailments. Which is great news!
ilovethecats said:reinell30 said:
You didn't hear that there has been a miraculous cure for the flu, influenza, heart disease and cancer?! Because somehow....some way....all those forms of death are lower than they have been in the last 15 years! I can't put my finger on it, but the only LOGICAL conclusion a person can make is there is a cure for these ailments. Which is great news!
As Ester say's on Sanford and Son, "Oh Glory."
EverettGriz said:
I disagree. The death rate is very important. Yes, that didn't drive the early social distancing and stay at home order.
The death rate is no where close to 5.8%, so I don't know why you even mention it. It shows me that you are partisan and don't know what you're talking about.
NYC metro became a huge problem, and has its own unique issues. It's a mess and will continue to be difficult, in my view. So, let's talk the rest of the country.
There ended up being excess beds in NYC, with the additions. Did any other place run out of beds?
I think most people were/are on board with some amount of social distancing. However, some parts of the country got unnecessary stay at home orders, and that hurt some businesses and the economy (more than it had to). Also, the social distancing was done too restrictive, in my view. It should have been more tailored, and in any event, should have been toned down along the way.
Schools? I'm okay with shutting K-12, but I've yet to see any data or studies indicating that was necessary. In fact, I've seen references to K-12 shutdowns as probably having little or no virus benefits.
MT currently has 5 hospitalizations in the whole state. MT was never in danger of any ICU, bed, or ventilator shortage. Also, having hospitals and surgery centers delay other work, was incredibly stupid and has cost those facilities a lot of money. Much of the country was in a similar position to MT.
WA has 14,070 cases and 801 deaths. WA had 228 cases and 215 deaths yesterday. WA appears to have done a good, or very good job, in stopping the virus.
This site says there are 96,596 ICU beds, not what you cited. Most virus patients don't require hospitalization, let alone ICU.
"Acute care hospitals, ICU, step-down, and burn beds: The American Hospital Association (AHA) maintains a proprietary dataset of most hospitals in the United States. Data is gathered by voluntary survey. In April 2019, a study published in Critical Care Medicine analyzed the 2015 AHA data.3 For this current report, we extended the analysis from that publication using the most currently available 2018 AHA data and noting minimal changes from 2015.4 The 2018 AHA data indicate that there are 5256 AHA-registered community hospitals in the United States. Of these, 2704 (51.4%) deliver ICU services (Figure 3). These hospitals have 534,964 staffed (operational) acute care beds, including 96,596 ICU beds (Table 1), accounting for a median 16.7% of all hospital beds. The ICU beds can be categorized as adult, pediatric, or neonatal. There are 68,558 adult beds (medical-surgical 46,795, cardiac 14,445, and other ICU 7318), 5137 pediatric ICU beds, and 22,901 neonatal ICU beds. Additionally, there are 25,157 step-down beds, and 1183 burn beds. The proportion of ICU beds that are capable of negative pressure isolation is not recorded in the AHA dataset. The purpose of a negative pressure room is to confine pathogens to a single closed environment and to prevent the release of pathogens into other adjacent spaces. Negative pressure is strongly recommended with heavily communicable diseases such as COVID-19. When negative pressure rooms are not available, HEPA filters are installed in exhaust ducts leading from rooms with infected patients or patients needing isolation are cohorted together (often in separate locations) to facilitate safe and effective patient care."
https://sccm.org/Blog/March-2020/United-States-Resource-Availability-for-COVID-19
A recent article on ventilators. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2020/04/28/coronavirus-hospitals-avoid-ventilator-shortage-curve-new-york-flattens/3036008001/
Cuomo said in late March that NY need 30,000 ventilators. I can't find the stat, but I think they only used 7,000 or 8,000 at the peak. Cuomo said NY needed 140,000 hospital beds. I see that they were using 23,000 beds in late March. Anyway, a huge amount of the beds in NY were not used. Javits Center made into hospital and military ship came, and virtually not used.
Can you provide backup for your figure on ICU beds needed on May 13?
What's your assessment of the impact on the WA economy and the outlook?
reinell30 said:
yeah, man up and use your shop-vac to clear out your lungs. just stick that tube down your throat and into your lungs, turn the sucker on, wait a few minutes, and voila, all that gunk will be gone! then get your leaf blower out, and use it as a ventilator. again, just stick that tube down your throat and into your lungs, turn it on, then off, then on again, and you are breathing on your own... equipment! buncha pansies.
ilovethecats
Well-known member
EverettGriz said:
Great points.
Like you, I'm happy to follow the orders of experts over politicians every day of the week and twice on Sunday. But as I mentioned, we need to remember that there are epidemiologists and doctors that have said it's been overblown as well. We have very smart people dealing with this, and they all aren't in agreement.
I haven't looked much at the death rates to be honest because I don't think they are very fair to be honest. We know many have probably had this virus that had no idea. We also know that you had to check every box of symptoms to even qualify to be tested. There were people who were pretty sick that checked off 8-10 boxes and couldn't get tested. We were and to my knowledge still are only testing very sick, very vulnerable people. This is going to skew the numbers big time. I just don't think they are even close to being an accurate indicator of danger in my personal opinion.
Along those lines, I've never put much credence in the ventilator numbers for the same reasons. My sister is an administrator at Mayo in Fargo. Her information has been amazing. Like all hospitals, they basically shut everything down and put all resources into fighting Covid. They were even prepared to use the FargoDome early on when models were predicting so many hospitalizations. Last week they had something like 40 hospitalizations and I'll admit she said over 20 required ventilators. But obviously almost all were older, more vulnerable people. Like almost every other hospital in the country they haven't come close to filling the beds they prepared for, and it's costing them a ton of money.
As far as social distancing, I have no doubt in my mind it worked. I've said that all along. It's just science. Stay away from other people and you're less likely to get sick. My issue has always been the extent of the distancing, the fact that we were FORCED to quit working and going to school, and the fact that in the beginning we treated all states the same. I'm happy we have gotten away from that a bit.
My issue with the social distancing is that we have so much unknown at this time, and I feel like people could possibly be giving it far too much credit for fighting the virus. Note that I said COULD be, as we need to learn more. But I'm not happy that experts can just throw out a monster number like 3 million Americans will die, then force us to stop working and going to school, and then when the numbers are a fraction of a fraction of that huge death total.....give all the kudos to social distancing! It's a slippery slope in my eyes.
Social distancing may have in fact been the sole reason we'll probably see less than 100,000 deaths and not the 3 million predicted. But what if it's not? What if 90% of our population have already been infected. What if the deaths truly would have only been in the ballpark of 100,000 or so and the distancing was responsibly for a small amount of that. Was the cost worth it?
I've said before, if we were just talking about saved lives versus the economy and money I'd take the lives every time. But it's not. The effects of this lockdown will lead to lives lost too, they'll just be different lives.
I'll admit that when we learn more about this thing, if there really are not many more cases out there than what we have confirmed, I'll say it may have been more serious than I thought. However, I'd hope people on the other side will do the same thing if it's learned that many more people had it than thought, thus lower hospitalization rates, lower death rates, and lower danger overall. It just doesn't strike me as a fair way of looking at it that we can credit social distancing alone for saving millions of lives when it's possible there were never millions of lives in jeopardy in the first place.
