COVID-19

[Gatordev]

This site posts hospital beds in use. Of note, we're currently at about 118,000 people hospitalized with a capacity nation wide of about 250,000. Of course that nationwide number isn't very valuable since we're not going to fly a COVID patient from Wisconsin to Texas to get treatment. Additionally, hospitalized doesn't necessarily mean that the patient is in the ICU.

This site breaks it down a little more and gives ICU COVID patient breakdown vs total ICU patient population breakdown by state, which is a much more valuable number than a national overall number. Reading the data is annoying because the presentation is terrible, but it gives numbers and percentages by date and state, which is interesting to see.

As for masks, I live in the city and work out in the rural portion of N. FL. Masks are standard inside in the city (although there is mask fatigue), but out in the rural parts, masks aren't as much a part of life...in part because there isn't as much spread out there.

Amusingly (well, maybe not amusingly), there's one county that I fly to infrequently. It has a population of 5,000 people (or less, I can't remember). The several times I've gone there, it's been to pick up a COVID patient. My theory is it's a county of swingers.

 

[taxi1]

It's the difference between being an island nation that is less than 1/10th the population of the US.

Melbourne is a big city (DC area metroplex equivalent), with more people than entire states like Alabama, Louisiana, Oregon, North Dakota, etc. and far more dense, and they had community spread. It wasn't coming via airplanes, it was growing within. With no action, or half-assed actions like we've taken, it would have been just as bad as it has been here.

But they sucked it up and killed it, have gone weeks without a single case, and now they watch Cricket and try to figure out the rules.

Crowds shopping for Vegemite on Boxing Day

 

[ABMD]

Yes.

Everyone I see inside a store is wearing a mask with the possible exception of small children. If you don’t have one on you can’t go in. I’d say 75% of the people wear their masks the whole way from their car to the store. Same for gas stations. I’m not currently going to restaurants because I’m not allowed, but when I could, it’s the same story.

My children have to wear a mask at school from the moment they get out of the car from the moment they get back in at the end of the day. They are not allowed to take it off even when they’re outside at recess. They are 5 and 7. If they get ANY symptom of basically any illness, to include a “new or unexplained headache”, diarrhea, or a runny nose, they are supposed to not come back to school until 10 days after the symptoms first appeared.

Walking and exercising outside? Very few people I see out walking their dog, running, or just on a walk are wearing masks. I live in a spread out suburban area so there’s never a chance of not being able to keep distance.

Same where I am in MD, no mask - no entry. Stores like Target, Wal Mart, and grocery stores have someone posted up at the entrance checking for masks. I took the fam to Harper's Ferry yesterday for a history lesson, and I'd say about 95% of the people OUTSIDE where wearing masks. I did not, because we were outside and not within 6ft of someone for more than a few seconds. When I entered a building I wore the mask. Also surprised to see that the town/NPS had hand sanitizing stations affixed to light posts all around the town.

 

[taxi1]

You were saying? If the argument has only gotten better with time, find me a research paper refuting the findings of the Danish RCT study.

“The recommendation to wear surgical masks to supplement other public health measures did not reduce the SARS-CoV-2 infection rate among wearers by more than 50% in a community with modest infection rates, some degree of social distancing, and uncommon general mask use. The data were compatible with lesser degrees of self-protection.”

Damn, you keep making my arguments for me.

The article you cite (read it carefully) tells you that if you wear a mask but others don't (use is uncommon), you still get sick.

Everyone needs to mask up for masking to work.

 

[ABMD]

Melbourne is a big city (DC area metroplex equivalent), with more people than entire states like Alabama, Louisiana, Oregon, North Dakota, etc. and far more dense, and they had community spread. It wasn't coming via airplanes, it was growing within. With no action, or half-assed actions like we've taken, it would have been just as bad as it has been here.

But they sucked it up and killed it, have gone weeks without a single case, and now they watch Cricket and try to figure out the rules.

Crowds shopping for Vegemite on Boxing Day

Honestly, do you think you could see the US actually shutting down like they did in Australia and other parts of Eastern Asia? I tent to agree, had we done that at the onset, things may turned out different now.

 

[SlickAg]

Damn, you keep making my arguments for me.

The article you cite (read it carefully) tells you that if you wear a mask but others don't (use is uncommon), you still get sick.

Everyone needs to mask up for masking to work.

I’m not sure you’re understanding the bigger picture here: people who wore masks got infected at essentially the same rate as people who did not wear masks.

What percentage of people have to wear masks in order for it to work, and can they ever take them off? Because it seems to me that’s it’s very unlikely that many people continue to wear a mask inside their home.

Maybe it’s because I’m not a professional academic, but I don’t put much weight in theories or ideas that get proven wrong by subsequent real-life events. I mean, I understand that masks should work as long as certain conditions are controlled and variables are minimized throughout the test or experiment. But I think it’s a large leap to assume that what’s true in the laboratory environment or someone’s model will continue to hold up out in the real world, where variables abound and they no longer have effective control of their test subjects.

 

[Flash]

The claim that normalized case data doesn’t show a huge rise post-Thanksgiving? I showed you some data in terms of cases. You’re free to come up with your own interpretation.

Your one piece of 'normalized' data doesn't stand up too well against a record number of hopitalizations and deaths in December, with the highest number of deaths recorded in this country occurring 12 days after Thanksgiving. Those numbers aren't localized and stretch across the country to include warmer climes. But sure, just a coincidence.

 

[taxi1]

What percentage of people have to wear masks in order for it to work, and can they ever take them off? Because it seems to me that’s it’s very unlikely that many people continue to wear a mask inside their home.

If you go out of the house and get into close quarters with non-mask wearing people in not great ventilated spaces with conversation where there is a good chance someone has it (prevalence is high) then there is a good chance you’ll get it and bring the virus home, where you’ll then share it with the family.

Maybe it’s because I’m not a professional academic, but I don’t put much weight in theories or ideas that get proven wrong by subsequent real-life events.

Show me hard data that says mask wearing doesn’t work.

After you fail to find it, go look at the difference between the winners and the losers. What have the winners like Norway, Australia, and Taiwan (Uber-winner) done that losers like us haven’t?

The United States is about the worse country on the planet at dealing with this. That is hard data.

 

[Flash]

I’m not sure you’re understanding the bigger picture here: people who wore masks got infected at essentially the same rate as people who did not wear masks.

Studies showing that (that I've seen so far) are based on surveys of people who claim to wear their masks or not, surveys like that are often unreliable because they are based on what people claim and not necessarily what they did.

 

[SlickAg]

Your one piece of 'normalized' data doesn't stand up too well against a record number of hopitalizations and deaths in December, with the highest number of deaths recorded in this country occurring 12 days after Thanksgiving. Those numbers aren't localized and stretch across the country to include warmer climes. But sure, just a coincidence.

You’re exactly right. England and Japan have rising case counts after Thanksgiving too.

So Thanksgiving wasn’t just an American problem, but a global one!

 

[Gatordev]

In other news, I got my first shot this morning (Pfizer). Didn't hurt going in, but we'll see how it goes throughout the day. My wife got the same manufacturer and had a painful arm by the end of the day. Talking with the shot giver this morning, she said some people say it's like a Typhoid shot, others don't have any pain. Like everything else COVID, even the shot doesn't appear to be universal.

Regardless of all that, since the vaccine is rewriting my DNA, I'm pretty sure I should be a super-hero by the end of the week.

 

[SlickAg]

Studies showing that (that I've seen so far) are based on surveys of people who claim to wear their masks or not, surveys like that are often unreliable because they are based on what people claim and not necessarily what they did.

If you disagree with their findings, that’s your prerogative. The authors of the Danish mask study list that as one of the limitations of the study. However, that doesn’t invalidate what they found.

When you find another RCT study on mask wearing that reaches different conclusions, then we can talk. No real world study is perfect. But this one can logically explain what we’ve been seeing in our own country: covid is still spreading despite mask mandates. Instead of sticking to the dogma, maybe we should start looking elsewhere to explain what’s going on.

 

[ABMD]

In other news, I got my first shot this morning (Pfizer). Didn't hurt going in, but we'll see how it goes throughout the day. My wife got the same manufacturer and had a painful arm by the end of the day. Talking with the shot giver this morning, she said some people say it's like a Typhoid shot, others don't have any pain. Like everything else COVID, even the shot doesn't appear to be universal.

Regardless of all that, since the vaccine is rewriting my DNA, I'm pretty sure I should be a super-hero by the end of the week.

Let us know how you're feeling in a few days.

 

[Treetop Flyer]

Your one piece of 'normalized' data doesn't stand up too well against a record number of hopitalizations and deaths in December, with the highest number of deaths recorded in this country occurring 12 days after Thanksgiving. Those numbers aren't localized and stretch across the country to include warmer climes. But sure, just a coincidence.

The “12 days after Thanksgiving” doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with Thanksgiving since deaths reported are often weeks or months behind when the death occurred.

 

[Flash]

When you find another RCT study on mask wearing that reaches different conclusions, then we can talk. No real world study is perfect. But this one can logically explain what we’ve been seeing in our own country: covid is still spreading despite mask mandates. Instead of sticking to the dogma, maybe we should start looking elsewhere to explain what’s going on.

Or maybe people are just being people and ignoring mask mandates enough to spread the virus. I've worked in two places the past few months with large populations of employees with mandated mask wearing, that has been strictly enforced, along with other mitigations and both places have had minimal cases and even less spread of the virus (less than 100 cases of a total population for both of well over 20,000) even as cases in the surrounding areas have increased. This is with both having a full time workforce on site almost every workday.

Coupled with fact that every health professional I know personally, friend and family, along with the entire international public health establishment to include any local, state or national public health agency saying that wearing a mask along with social distancing other risk mitigations are critical in helping stop the spread of the virus, I'll heed their advice and not that of random folks on the internet no matter how many posts they produce an hour.