corona virus alerts - Latest cruising Information for vessels/locations/rules

[fivecapes]

According to mathematical modelling by Los Alamos National Laboratory, COVID-19 R0 is more than twice what the World Health Organization and other public health authorities reported in February.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...bloombergdaily

I wonder how this affects the IHME model.

[Montanan]

Originally Posted by fivecapes

According to mathematical modelling by Los Alamos National Laboratory, COVID-19 R0 is more than twice what the World Health Organization and other public health authorities reported in February.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...bloombergdaily

I wonder how this affects the IHME model.

Wow, 5.7 that is a much higher R0 that seems to have been presented in other studies. That certainly makes it much harder to get below one and implies the strong need for social isolation.

Background info on R naught.

"The formal definition of a disease’s R0 is the number of cases, on average, an infected person will cause during their infectious period.

The term is used in two different ways.

The basic reproduction number represents the maximum epidemic potential of a pathogen. It describes what would happen if an infectious person were to enter a fully susceptible community, and therefore is an estimate based on an idealized scenario.

The effective reproduction number depends on the population’s current susceptibility. This measure of transmission potential is likely lower than the basic reproduction number, based on factors like whether some of the people are vaccinated against the disease, or whether some people have immunity due to prior exposure with the pathogen. Therefore, the effective R0 changes over time and is an estimate based on a more realistic situation within the population.

It’s important to realize that both the basic and effective R0 are situation-dependent. It’s affected by the properties of the pathogen, such as how infectious it is. It’s affected by the host population – for instance, how susceptible people are due to nutritional status or other illnesses that may compromise one’s immune system. And it’s affected by the environment, including things like demographics, socioeconomic and climatic factors.

For example, R0 for measles ranges from 12 to 18, depending on factors like population density and life expectancy. This is a large R0, mainly because the measles virus is highly infectious.

On the other hand, the influenza virus is less infectious, with its R0 ranging from 2 to 3. Influenza, therefore, doesn't cause the same explosive outbreaks as measles, but it persists due to its ability to mutate and evade the human immune system.

What makes R0 useful in public health?
Demographer Alfred Lotka proposed the reproduction number in the 1920s, as a measure of the rate of reproduction in a given population.

In the 1950s, epidemiologist George MacDonald suggested using it to describe the transmission potential of malaria. He proposed that, if R0 is less than 1, the disease will die out in a population, because on average an infectious person will transmit to fewer than one other susceptible person. On the other hand, if R0 is greater than 1, the disease will spread.

When public health agencies are figuring out how to deal with an outbreak, they are trying to bring R0 down to less than 1. This is tough for diseases like measles that have a high R0. It's especially challenging for measles in densely populated regions like India and China, where R0 is higher, compared to places where people are more spread out.

For the SARS pandemic in 2003, scientists estimated the original R0 to be around 2.75. A month or two later, the effective R0 dropped below 1, thanks to the tremendous effort that went into intervention strategies, including isolation and quarantine activities.

However, the pandemic continued. While on average, an infectious person transmitted to fewer than one susceptible individual, occasionally one person transmitted to tens or even hundreds of other cases. This phenomenon is called super spreading. Officials documented super spreader events a number of times during the SARS epidemic in Singapore, Hong Kong and Beijing." https://labblog.uofmhealth.org/round...-like-covid-19

[rbk]

Originally Posted by Montanan

Correct the CDC provided medical guidance only the FDA has the authority for approval.

Which is likely why the CDC pulled the specific reference to anecdotal dosages. The updated, and shortened, guidance says simply that "hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine are under investigation in clinical trials” for use on coronavirus patients and "there are no drugs or other therapeutics approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to prevent or treat COVID-19."

The above fda link is a guideline for treating covid with hcq.

[Montanan]

New CDC guidance for essential workers during coronavirus
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has issued new guidelines for essential workers, such as those in the health care and food supply industries. The guidance is focused on when those workers can return to work after having been exposed to the new coronavirus.

Interim Guidance for Implementing Safety Practices for Critical
Infrastructure Workers Who May Have Had Exposure to a Person with
Suspected or Conrmed COVID-19
To ensure continuity of operations of essential functions, CDC advises that
critical infrastructure workers may be permitted to continue work following
potential exposure to COVID-19, provided they remain asymptomatic and
additional precautions are implemented to protect them and the community.
A potential exposure means being a household contact or having close
contact within 6 feet of an individual with conrmed or suspected COVID-19.
The timeframe for having contact with an individual includes the period of
time of 48 hours before the individual became symptomatic.
Critical Infrastructure workers who have had an exposure but remain
asymptomatic should adhere to the following practices prior to and during
their work shift:
Pre-Screen: Employers should measure the employee’s temperature and
assess symptoms prior to them starting work. Ideally, temperature checks
should happen before the individual enters the facility.
Regular Monitoring: As long as the employee doesn’t have a temperature or
symptoms, they should self-monitor under the supervision of their employer’s occupational health program.
Wear a Mask: The employee should wear a face mask at all times while in
the workplace for 14 days after last exposure. Employers can issue
facemasks or can approve employees’ supplied cloth face coverings in the
event of shortages.
Social Distance: The employee should maintain 6 feet and practice social
distancing as work duties permit in the workplace.
Disinfect and Clean work spaces: Clean and disinfect all areas such as
oces, bathrooms, common areas, shared electronic equipment routinely.
If the employee becomes sick during the day, they should be sent home
immediately. Surfaces in their workspace should be cleaned and disinfected.
Information on persons who had contact with the ill employee during the
time the employee had symptoms and 2 days prior to symptoms should be
compiled. Others at the facility with close contact within 6 feet of the
employee during this time would be considered exposed.
Employers should implement the recommendations in the Interim Guidance
for Businesses and Employers to Plan and Respond to Coronavirus Disease
2019 to help prevent and slow the spread of COVID-19 in the workplace.

ADDITIONAL CONSIDERATIONS
This interim guidance pertains to critical
infrastructure workers, including personnel in
16 dierent sectors of work including:
Federal, state, & local law enforcement
911 call center employees
Fusion Center employees
Hazardous material responders from
government and the private sector
Janitorial sta and other custodial sta
Workers – including contracted vendors – in
food and agriculture, critical manufacturing,
informational technology, transportation,
energy and government facilities


Employees should not share headsets or other
objects that are near mouth or nose.
Employers should increase the frequency of
cleaning commonly touched surfaces.
Employees and employers should consider
pilot testing the use of face masks to ensure
they do not interfere with work assignments.
Employers should work with facility maintenance staff to increase air exchanges in room.
Employees should physically distance when
they take breaks together. Stagger breaks and
don’t congregate in the break room, and don’t
share food or utensils.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019...-practices.pdf

[Lake-Effect]

Canada begins clinical trial of experimental COVID-19 treatment using plasma from recovered individuals

A team of blood transfusion experts from across Canada is planning the world’s largest clinical trial of a potential treatment for COVID-19.

The study, which will involve 1,000 patients from across the country, will include at least 40 Canadian hospitals, and is being overseen by doctors from the University of Montreal, University of Ottawa, University of Toronto, McMaster and the University of British Columbia, among other schools.

[Montanan]

Hopes for at-home finger-prick coronavirus test dashed after accuracy is questioned

"Sadly, the tests we have looked at to date have not performed well," said Sir John Bell, the professor heading up the tests for the British government.
It was promoted as a potential coronavirus game changer, a breakthrough that would allow millions of people to resume their daily lives within a matter of days.

Governments and companies around the world put great faith in the idea of an "antibodies test" — a home-administered finger-prick kit designed to detect whether someone has had the coronavirus in the past and, crucially, has built up immunity.

But the initial optimism was dented this week after leading British scientists revealed that none of the tests they had tried so far were accurate enough to be of any use. The U.K. government, whose prime minister, Boris Johnson, is in intensive care with symptoms of COVID-19, the disease associated with the coronavirus, said it had ordered millions of the kits and was now seeking refunds.

"Sadly, the tests we have looked at to date have not performed well," Sir John Bell, the Oxford University professor heading up the tests for the British government, wrote in a blog post Sunday. "We see many false negatives ... and we also see false positives."

The U.K. "is now uniquely positioned to evaluate and find the optimal test for this disease," but no country has found a kit that is up to standard, he said.

Finding one "should be achievable" but will take at least a month, he added.

His views were echoed by the top U.S. infectious diseases expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, who told JAMA, the journal of the American Medical Association, on Wednesday: "You have to validate the tests [or] otherwise go down a path that would be very misleading."

The British findings came days after the Spanish government said it had sent back another shipment of inaccurate antibody tests, bought from a European company that had sourced them in China.

Different from the nasal and throat swabs that tell you whether you currently have COVID-19, the antibody test — also called a serology test — looks a bit like a pregnancy test, with results on a series of lines on a strip. It takes just 20 minutes to complete and can be done at home or at a pharmacy.

In theory, it could tell whether people have already had the virus, even if they had not shown any symptoms. That could allow people to resume their daily lives with the confidence that they had built up some immunity.

Governments in London and Berlin have already floated the idea that these people could get "immunity certificates" to show that they pose no threat to themselves or others.

That led to fears that some people might seek infection so they could recover and return to work, but for those who had genuinely survived the virus, it held the promise of a degree of freedom.

Some officials cast it as the first step to an exit strategy while offering bold predictions on when the tests might be available.
"That will happen this week," Sharon Peacock, director of the U.K's National Infection Service, said March 25, suggesting that the tests would be available on Amazon and at pharmacies. "In the near future, people will be able to order tests that they can conduct themselves.”

As the societal lockdowns covering much of the world continue to buy time until a vaccine can be found, testing is seen as crucial to tracking and tackling the disease.

In the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration is issuing its first Emergency Use Authorization for the tests.

Scanwell Health, a digital health care company based in Los Angeles, is seeking government clearance for a kit that lets users submit scanned images of blood tests to doctors via their phones.

While theoretically simple for people to administer, the tests are quite complex. They would require that blood that a test-taker had donated before the epidemic began be available to detect false positives that might come from the antibodies of other types of coronavirus.The mantra among experts is that the only thing worse than no test is a bad test, so mistakenly telling thousands of people they are immune could be catastrophic.

According to the U.K.'s Department of Health and Social Care, about 100 kits are on the market, but no government has developed an antibody testing program that is up to the necessary standard — comments echoed by Franco Locatelli, the head of Italy's Higher Health Council.

Spain sent back an unspecified number of antibody tests it had bought from a European intermediary that used a Chinese supplier, and Dr. María José Sierra, deputy director of the country's Emergency Coordination Center, said Monday that the test's accuracy was as low as 64 percent.

In Germany, the Health Ministry warned anyone thinking of buying rapid antibodies tests online that the kits were likely to be inaccurate.

There is a significant risk, it said, that "the person being tested is already highly infectious and imagines themselves to be safe.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/h...ioned-n1179541

[Montanan]

Dr. Anthony Fauci offered some insight into crucial questions about coronavirus immunity during an interview on Wednesday.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/anthony-f...020000739.html

In a livestreamed conversation with Journal of the American Medical Association editor Howard Bauchner, Fauci said it's unlikely that people can get the coronavirus more than once.

"Generally we know with infections like this, that at least for a reasonable period of time, you're gonna have antibodies that are going to be protective," he said.

Fauci added that because the virus doesn't seem to be mutating much, people who recover will likely be immune should the US see a second wave of spread in the fall.

"If we get infected in February and March and recover, next September, October, that person who's infected — I believe — is going to be protected," he said.

A second spike in the US's caseload is a real threat, Dr. Deborah Birx warned on Wednesday. Birx, the White House coronavirus response coordinator, said Americans are at risk of a "very acute second wave" of coronavirus infections if they don't continue social distancing.

Developing immunity to the coronavirus
One reason the coronavirus has spread so quickly is because it's new, so none of our bodies have encountered it before. The immune system has to develop antibodies — proteins that fight a specific antigen — before we gain protection against a virus.

Generally, once your body has antibodies to fight off a particular disease, you can't get it again. That's why someone who had chickenpox or got the vaccine won't get the disease twice. However, with viruses that mutate — such as the common cold or seasonal flu — antibodies people build up against one strain aren't effective against others. Plus, some types of antibodies weaken over time.

Fauci said it's possible that could happen with the coronavirus as well, but it's unlikely.

"If a person gets infected with coronavirus A, and then gets reinfected with a coronavirus, it may be coronavirus B," Fauci said. "But right now, we don't think that this is mutating to the point of being very different."

Over 315,000 people worldwide have recovered from the coronavirus (likely more, given that many mild and asymptomatic cases are not reported in official counts). Given that a third of the world is under some kind of lockdown, those who have recovered could potentially emerge and return to work first.

"Those are the people, when you put them back to particularly critical infrastructure jobs, that you worry less about them driving an outbreak than those who are antibody-negative and very likely have never been exposed," Fauci said.

Lingering questions about coronavirus immunity
Scientists still don't know how long immunity to the coronavirus lasts, since it has only been around since November or December.

"It hasn't been looked at as carefully as we would have liked now to have looked at it," Fauci said of the question of immunity.

Some early research suggests that not all recovered patients develop coronavirus-neutralizing antibodies to the same degree. According to a report from Chinese scientists that has not yet been peer-reviewed, about 10 of 130 participants studied did not develop neutralizing proteins. This suggests they might have a higher risk of reinfection.

As scientists race to develop a vaccine for the coronavirus, these findings could have implications about its potential effectiveness.

"What this will mean to herd immunity will require more data from other parts of the world," Huang Jinghe, the leader of the Chinese research team behind the report, said on Tuesday, according to the South China Morning Post.

If the virus does not always produce an antibody response, a vaccine might not always create immunity, either.

"Vaccine developers may need to pay particular attention to these patients," Huang added.

Some reports also describe people who've recovered from an infection then tested positive again later. This was the case for a Japanese tour guide who got sick, got better, then tested positive for the coronavirus three weeks later. Doctors aren't sure if she was reinfected or had not fully recovered from the first infection.

Earlier this week, the Korean Center for Disease Control reported that 51 patients in South Korea retested positive for the virus, according to the Yonhap News Agency. Jeong Eun-kyeong, Director-General of the Korean CDC, said the virus was likely "dormant" then "reactivated." The tests were conducted within a "relatively short time" after the patients were released, he said, so it's unlikely the patients got reinfected. Plus, PCR tests for active coronavirus infections can be inaccurate.

More research is needed to determine whether virus can indeed go dormant.

[Montanan]

Could the coronavirus pandemic bring about the end of handshakes?
You bet, if Dr. Anthony Fauci has anything to say about it.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/i-...of2&yptr=yahoo

“I don’t think we should ever shake hands ever again, to be honest with you.”
That’s what Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease and the most prominent face of the U.S. fight against COVID-19, said in a Wall Street Journal podcast released Tuesday.

“When you gradually come back, you don’t jump into it with both feet,” Fauci told Kate Linebaugh on The Journal, while speaking about how life could eventually start returning to normal. “You say, what are the things you could still do and still approach normal? One of them is absolute compulsive hand-washing. The other is you don’t ever shake anybody’s hands.

“I don’t think we should ever shake hands ever again, to be honest with you. Not only would it be good to prevent coronavirus disease; it probably would decrease instances of influenza dramatically in this country.”

When asked when life could “get back to normal,” Fauci said: “It isn’t like a light switch on and off, it’s a gradual pulling back on certain of the restrictions and getting society a bit back to normal. . . bottom line, it’s going to be gradual.”

Fauci reiterated his no-handshake stance at Wednesday’s White House briefing. “I mean it sounds crazy, but that’s the way it’s really got to be,” he said.

Fauci added that if current social-distancing measures are successful in slowing the spread of COVID-19 through the end of April, it could be appropriate to start thinking about relaxing some restrictions.

[Montanan]

Excellent questions and answers regarding COVID-19
https://www.yahoo.com/news/coronavir...024102058.html

As daily coronavirus-related deaths reached new highs in New York and nationally, USA TODAY’s Editorial Board spoke Wednesday with Dr. Marc Lipsitch, one of the nation’s leading epidemiologists, about the state of the pandemic. Lipsitch is a professor of epidemiology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and director of Harvard’s Center of Communicable Disease Dynamics. Questions and answers have been edited for length and clarity.

Q. What is the trajectory of the coronavirus, and where are we headed?

A. Assuming that we're detecting something like one-tenth of all the cases, or one-fifth or something like that, and assuming that protective immunity occurs after most cases, then we're near the beginning in the sense that most of the population in the country remains susceptible. The goal of the current set of restrictions is not to solve the problem, but rather to solve the acute problem of keeping the numbers of patients from exceeding health care capacity.

Q. Are the restrictions working to do that?

A. Some evidence is beginning to accumulate that we may be able to accomplish that in many places. New York is already near the maximum it can handle, and the question is whether it will come down. There's maybe some hint that's happening. And in other places we'll see whether it goes up more and then peaks in the next week or so, or whether it keeps on going up and exceeds capacity in various places.

Q. Then what?

A. If that works out well, then there's the big question of what do we do next? Because if we relax restrictions, as we saw in the 1918 pandemic, and as we've seen probably in China now, there's every reason to expect a resurgence of cases and we're back in the same problem. On the other hand, keeping these restrictions in place is economically disastrous. Under this scenario, we're in a dilemma, and I don't think anyone has found a good answer.

Q. So what do we do?

A. Some ideas out there are probably worth trying, including essentially trying to bring cases down in each locality to a point where they can be controlled individually. There is a contingent of people — a number of them at my university with whom I disagree very, very strongly — who are saying that we need to implement Chinese-style out-of-home mandatory quarantine and isolation as part of that response strategy for containment. The evidence that that is necessary is slim, and the evidence that it would be acceptable in the United States is nonexistent. But there is that view.

Q. Wuhan, the original epicenter, is opening up. Do you find China’s reported numbers — about 83,000 confirmed cases and 3,300 deaths — to be credible?

A. I don't think they're credible in terms of actual number of cases. And I don't think that they even captured all the deaths, because they probably missed deaths at home and things like that. There's clearly underdetection. Whether they were hiding things, I don't have any more insight, and probably less, than many of you. It doesn't seem to me crazy that those are the best numbers they can come up with, but I'm open to persuasion that there's funny business going on.

Q. In the hot spots like Wuhan and northern Italy, 3% or 4% of the population had confirmed infections. But you and other epidemiologists talk about 40% or 70% of the entire population getting infected. Can you explain that gap?

A. There's a first wave, and then there's the whole epidemic. A lot of the confusion is premised on the misunderstanding that if you control the epidemic once, then you're done. There's no reason to think that. Wuhan is starting to see resurgence of cases as they let up, and in 1918, we saw it all over the country as restrictions were lifted. So 40% or 70% is the number that you need to have immune before viral transmission stops on its own. The number that get infected under very intense control measures is the number that happened before those control measures fully take effect. Those are two different numbers.

Q. Do we know that if someone has been infected, they will be immune? And if we don't know that, how does this work in second and third waves?

A. We don't know that yet. We do know for other coronaviruses that there is a period of immunity that's partial but quite strong. The thing that matters for control of the epidemic is the proportion of the population that's immune, or at least immune enough so that they're not going to significantly transmit infection.

That's the number that we have to get high enough, either through vaccination or through infection.

Q. Could that number already be higher than we think?

A. One possibility is that there are just a huge number of undetected infections, many of which may produce immune responses. We may just have more “herd immunity” than we know. There are anecdotal hints about that, but no firm data yet. The flip side of it is that if some significant proportion of those infected don't get immune, then that subtracts from the immune fraction of the population. We really, really need serologic studies (to see if people have been infected and have antibodies).

Q. How protective is the immune response?

A. We and others are trying to study that, but that's actually kind of tricky to do. Someone will figure that out, but it will be a while.

Q. Do the nation's governors deserve the greatest amount of the credit so far for their decisive stay-at-home actions?

A. The Northeastern governors have been very aggressive. The Washington state governor has been very aggressive. The California governor has been very aggressive. And on the flip side, Texas and Florida, probably among others that are less notorious, have been quite a bit less aggressive. So I think the successes are not coming from a central source. The federal messaging has been confusing at best. So I would give a lot of credit to the governors who have been aggressive.

Q. How will we know when it is safe to discontinue stay-at-home orders?

A. That's a great question, and I think the serologic surveys will be critical in doing that, because that's a necessary piece of the puzzle to understand how many people have been infected. The second piece, once we have those serologic studies, is figuring out how protective immunity is. We don't know whether it will be possible to distinguish someone who is functionally immune from someone who has an immune response that's not that protective. We hope that it will be possible. But that's an open scientific question right now.

Q. How long will it take to answer that question?

A. I hesitate to say this, because I understand that it's economically and otherwise not really acceptable, but from the standpoint of trying to keep cases under control, I don't see an answer coming until at least the next month or two about it being okay to reopen. There may also just be so much fatigue that places will try it, and then they'll see the consequences. … Waiting until the ICU is overwhelmed again is not a good policy. It is a disastrous policy.

Q. Do you know of a plan for these serologic surveys? Are you involved in that?

A. In a high-functioning environment, this would be mainly the project of the CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). And I think that the CDC has begun to do, or at least plan, some of these surveys.

Q. How about the states?

A. I've been on a large team of really extraordinary people that are trying to do this in a comprehensive and strategic way. So I think Massachusetts will be one of the first. I think New York will be one of the first, and probably some other states that I don't know about.

Q. The CDC seems to be largely absent from the public communication effort. What effect does that have?

A. I think it's very unfortunate. I think Americans trust the CDC because they see the professionals there as apolitical and trustworthy and trying to protect health. I was there for a brief period in the 1990s, and I've worked with them since then, and that's what they are. Having filtered messages coming through politicians is much less trustworthy than having physicians and public health professionals telling what they know.

Q. Why is that?

A. The CDC, as a scientific organization, is well placed to say, “This is what we know, and this is what we don't know.” Politicians don't like saying what they don't know. Every crisis communication expert I've ever talked to says you need to hear both. People need to hear both, because then when the knowledge changes, it's not a surprise, and it doesn't feel like it's a reversal or something fishy going on. It's just scientific knowledge changing as definitely happens in a crisis like this.

Q. Polls show political differences in how people perceive the threat.

A. We're all vulnerable to the virus. It doesn't matter what party we vote for, or what church we go to or don't go to. It's a virus. And to the extent that people can get messages that are not mixed with politics, that's a whole lot better for helping them to protect themselves.

Q. What are the biggest unknowns?

A. To me, the enormous questions are about immunity. How much is there in the population now? How many of those people didn't even know they were infected? How protective is it? And then for the potential vaccine, how protective will immunity be? I think immunity is what's going to get us through to the other side. And that's the part that's still the biggest uncertainty.

Q. So how long will people have to hunker down?

A. It's not a scientific choice only. It's ultimately a political choice, and science is one input. I hope it's a very important input, but if a governor decides to lift these restrictions, there's not much that can be done other than to watch the consequences and kick the governor out. The question is, can we endure the consequences of them long enough either to get a vaccine or to let the cases accumulate more slowly so that we get towards herd immunity naturally? But that's a slow process.

Q. How important is testing capacity to the decision about reopening?

A. I think serologic testing capacity is probably even more important than viral testing capacity for making that decision. But viral testing capacity is going to be necessary for trying to control the infections that will inevitably spring up as restrictions are lifted.

Q. Does the country have the viral testing capacity that it needs?

A. Nowhere near. Nowhere near. I mean, it's been a debacle, and it's now almost what we need for the sickest patients and health care workers. But even locally here, there are intense shortages of swabs. If you can't swab people, then you don't have tests. It doesn't matter how good your machines are.

Q. Why has the testing rollout been so hapless?

A. It's partly hapless because there's not a strategy. Nobody has articulated, if we come out of these restrictions, how are we going to keep a lid on the cases that begin to emerge? And there are many challenges to doing that if you have good testing, but it's pretty clear that you can't do it if you don't have the testing.

Q. So how do you see things playing out?

A. If I had to make a prediction about how the interaction between social and scientific and public health factors will play out, I think there's going to be fatigue at some point. Some places are going to let up either after they've controlled the first peak or before they've controlled the first peak. Cases will reemerge, and because people are so tired of social distancing, it will take until the intensive care units are overwhelmed in that place to get people to crack down again, and then there will be some cycles of that. There are ways to try to avoid that, but they all involve this very long and destructive process of social distancing. It's easy to say as the public health person, this is what we need to do for public health. But I'm acutely aware that there are also other considerations, and I don't see a really good answer.

Q. Is there evidence the hot, humid weather in the summer will suppress this like it does other coronaviruses?

A. I think it will suppress it to a degree. The decline of coronaviruses, of all the winter viruses in the summer, is an interplay between running out of susceptible people to infect and having the conditions become less favorable. And when you have tons of susceptible people still around to infect, the virus can survive in less favorable conditions. It would slow the growth rather than bringing the number of cases down by itself. That's our best guess.

Q. Is there more of a threat to younger people than we originally thought?

A. You're right that the messaging has been more focused on the old and those with underlying conditions and probably missed a lot of opportunities with the younger crowd. There needs to be caution, because they do have a risk, even though it's a lower risk.

Q. What about the idea of sending younger people back to work first?

A. I don't think this is a great idea, but there is a school of thought that (this) would be less destructive than the alternative. The problem is that those people have parents and siblings and others that they can infect. I'm not sure that it's a very feasible option, but it may be the best option that we have, if we decide that staying closed for extended periods is not acceptable.

Q. Why is the virus hitting minority communities harder?

A. Underlying health disparities are well established. Hypertension and other disparate risk factors are going to be part of the problem here. It's also an economic issue. Density of housing is clearly a risk for transmission, and so the interaction between race and ethnicity on one hand, and income on the other means, there's that aspect as well.

Q. Are prisons a breeding ground for the disease?

A. Overcrowded prisons are a problem and a health hazard. The idea that it's better to have it all bottled up in a prison, and not let those individuals out into society, is kind of missing the point. Prisons have guards, prisons have kitchen workers, prisons have lots of people who are in contact with those prisoners. And the idea that it's better to just keep it in there is, apart from the inhumanity of it, also just wrong.

Q. We've long heard epidemiologists talk about “the Big One.” In your view, is this the Big One, and how does it compare with past pandemics?

A. Yeah, I think this is the Big One. The amount of social disruption is certainly unparalleled since 1918. The final health and mortality impact still remains to be seen but is clearly going to be higher than previous flu pandemics, with the possible exception of 1918. I think this is the worst thing we've had from a public health standpoint in terms of an acute infection since 1918. This is certainly big enough. I hope never to see bigger.

[GordMay]

We know the virus persists on different surfaces, like cardboard and plastic, for varying amounts of time.
But what about beards and facial hair?
Dr. Scott Weese, a veterinary professor at the University of Guelph, who researches emerging infectious diseases and infection control says:
“No one knows for sure.”
What epidemiologists, and infectious disease specialists, do know, is that the novel coronavirus can't tolerate most environments, including beards.
Dr. Weese says: “... the virus would likely last on beards for hours — not days.”

[Montanan]

The federal government has released the modelling data forecasting the impact of COVID-19 across Canada.



For the short-term epidemic track of the virus, it’s predicted that Canada will see 27,215 cases Apr. 16. The lower prediction limit would see 22,580 cases and the upper prediction limit is 31,850. This could result in between 500 and 700 deaths by Apr. 16.

Experts have made their predictions using two models, one with stronger epidemic control, with a high degree of physical distancing, contract tracing and cases isolated. The weaker control has a lower degree of these public health measures.

Stronger epidemic control:

There will be a 1 to 10 per cent infected rate peaking and the end of spring, beginning of summer and ending in the fall.

Between 11,000 and 22,000 deaths in Canada are predicted.

There will be between 73,000 and 146,00 hospitalizations, and between 23,000 and 46,000 in intensive care.

Weaker epidemic control:

There will be a 25 to 50 per cent infected rate peaking between summer and fall, ending in spring 2021.

More than 200,000 deaths are expected to occur in Canada.

Dr. Theresa Tam was, Canada's Chief Public Health Officer, said Canada is “fairly early on” in the epidemic and a “high and sustained degree of physical distancing” is essential to maintain the stronger epidemic control scenario.

“It’s a matter of life and death,” she said, adding that she believes the country has a “very good chance” of staying in the stronger epidemic control model.

“We must do everything that we can now to remain in that best care scenario,” Dr. Tam said.

Deputy Chief Public Health Officer Howard Njoo said the first wave of the outbreak could end by summer but anticipates multiple smaller waves will follow. He added that predicting the lifespan of the virus for Canada is difficult because all province and territories have their own epidemic curve and timeframe.

Dr. Tam said even when Canada has hit the peak of the curve and the outbreak is on its way down, the country will need to have “highly sensitive” testing for any possible new infections, and continue to practice strong social distancing measures.

“We’re looking for...the slowing down of that growth rate,” Dr. Tam said. “These models are very sensitive to our actions.”

Provinces reveal projections for COVID-19 See article for details.


https://news.yahoo.com/covid-19-coro...174047508.html

[Montanan]

Oh Canada, Oh Corona This is going to be long, hard, drawn out issue.

My thoughts from seeing the comments of a number of world leaders is that border restrictions banning non-essential travel will continue for a longtime, maybe until effective vaccines have been deployed and thence require proof of vaccination in order to obtain a visa, or to embark.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/coronavir...190048955.html


Dr. Theresa Tam, Canada’s Chief Public Health Officer says the “aspirational and ambitious” goal for the country would be to have a one per cent infection rate, while the projected best-case scenario suggests a 2.5 per cent infection rate.

Tam stressed that it is still extremely important for Canadians to continue to practice the public health measures in place. She added that the collective efforts of Canadians has allowed the healthcare system “to cope.”

Dr. Tam added that we have a “long way” to go in the trajectory of the pandemic and the virus could change as time progresses. We won’t know how long the immunity in some Canadians today will last.

In terms of testing, the chief public health officer said the government is working to increase testing capacity across the country but Canada has maintained “a good rate of testing.” Canada is also looking into serological testing for the future, which measure antibodies in the blood.

When will Canada reopen its borders?

Deputy Prime Minister, Chrystia Freeland, said “we just can’t say today” when that will happen.

“It would be foolhardy and extreme to make long-term predictions about what border measures will be,” Freeland said. “We need a vaccine to really be through this.”

Minister of Health Patty Hajdu highlighted that there needs to be a “global effort” to eliminate COVID-19, while Dr. Tam said that cutting down on the amount of travel between Canada and the U.S. will remain “very key,” as is looking at what is happening on the other side of the border.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau commented on the COVID-19 modelling information released earlier in the day, saying that Canada is at a “fork in the road” between the best and worst case scenarios.

“We’re in an earlier stage of the outbreak,” Trudeau said. “We have a chance to determine what our country looks like in the weeks and months ahead.” The prime minister reiterated that the first wave could conclude in the summer but there will be a number of “recurrences” to follow, until there is a vaccine for the virus.

“In order for it to last as short as it can and to harm as few Canadians as possible, we need to keep doing what we are doing,” he said.
“Even after we’re through this fist wave, we will need to remain vigilant. Normality as it was before will not come back, full on, until we get a vaccine for this.”

Trudeau added that the scenario that becomes the reality for Canadians is based on the actions everyone in the country makes right now.

[hpeer]

From Beaufort, NC

Just in case anyone is planning on heading there.

BEAUFORT — The Beaufort Police Department will begin a checkpoint to restrict entry to town beginning Thursday, according to a release from the town.

The checkpoint is set to be operated at the only open entrance to town at this time, on Turner Street near the intersection with Highway 70.

The checkpoint and the restriction of accesses to Beaufort are part of the town’s response to the novel coronavirus pandemic.

According to Wednesday’s release, which advised residents to “be prepared,” entry is permitted to full-time, year-round Carteret County residents; those sheltering in place in Beaufort and nowhere else as of March 31; those engaging in essential business, outdoor service or essential government service in Beaufort; and those providing necessary care to a Beaufort resident.

[Montanan]

New Zealand Prime Minister Deems Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy Essential Workers in Adorable Message to Kids

Video:

http://https://www.nzherald.co.nz/li...ectid=12322921

The country’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern reassured the children of New Zealand at a news conference on Sunday that both mythical creatures were absolutely considered essential, but added they may be a little busy right now.

“You’ll be pleased to know that we do consider both the Tooth Fairy and the Easter Bunny to be essential workers. But as you can imagine at this time, of course they’re going to be potentially quite busy at home with their family as well and their own bunnies,” Ardern said. “And so I say to the children of New Zealand: if the Easter Bunny doesn’t make it to your household, then we have to understand that it’s a bit difficult at the moment for the bunny to perhaps get everywhere.”

While holidays like Easter may fall right in the middle of the COVID-19 global pandemic, forcing many to remain in their homes, Ardern suggested a socially distant Easter egg hunt in keeping with the spirit of the season. And to help, she posted a template on her Instagram page that people could color and place in their windows for other kids to find.

[Montanan]

Originally Posted by hpeer

From Beaufort, NC

Just in case anyone is planning on heading there.

Great heads up.

Good to see the checkpoints so as to restrict travel by those who are inclined to be non-self compliant.

We see such at various Native Persons reservations here in Montana and also in Canada where the tribes have implemented checkpoints to evaluate essential travel only and turn away visitors.

Stay at Home, means just that. Home is a good place to be, enjoy it.

Self isolation upon arrival also requires checking into a hotel / motel, or remaining in an RV for 14 days upon entry into Montana by either residents or non-residents. Which means you don't exit the room, a.k.a. like Hotel California of the Eagles Song.

A more and more common requirement with inter-State travel, or Inter-Provincial travel but also with sub-jurisdictional travel, e.g., city to city, county to county.

Everyone should anticipate this to become the norm, locally, regionally, internationally.