Colombia / Travel Coronavirus Updates

[Nounce]

Sweden is doing quite badly and suffering for their decision. They are currently just under 2 k dead and at 192 dead per million. The US is at 144 dead per million. Italy and Spain are both over 400 dead per million. That gives you an idea of where Sweden is headed unless they achieve herd immunity.

I think it is too early to tell which approach is better. Like you said, there could be second wave. I have a difficult time to guess what will happen with the total lock down approach for a prolong period of time. This is a question no one can answer.

Currently Sweden's number is better than Spain and Italy but not as good as US. The debate in a way is can you put a value or price on human life, freedom, or economic suffering? Sweden's has a very mild version of social distancing that still maintain some freedom.

[YippieKayay]

Sweden is not lockdown. I read that they think they have reached the peak or close to and will achieve herd immunity in a few weeks.

Sweden is doing quite badly and suffering for their decision. They are currently just under 2 k dead and at 192 dead per million. The US is at 144 dead per million. Italy and Spain are both over 400 dead per million. That gives you an idea of where Sweden is headed unless they achieve herd immunity.

[Mojo Bandit]

The lockdown was NEVER, NEVER put in place to stop deaths..

The vast majority of people would disagree with you:

The Wall Street Journal.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/yes-fla...ve-11584571566

UCLA.

https://www.uclahealth.org/workfiles...4_20_FINAL.pdf

Everyone else who explicitly says that social distancing flattens the curve to save lives:

https://blog.providence.org/blog-2/c...tten-the-curve

https://apnews.com/4984a419e7f0fbdadf93aa9cf84b64e6

https://www.econlib.org/cost-benefit...ing-the-curve/

https://www.fox5atlanta.com/news/see...sands-of-lives

https://www.realclearpolicy.com/arti...ad_488197.html

https://www.baltimoresun.com/opinion...eau-story.html

https://www.augustahealth.com/health...ning-the-curve

https://www.geisinger.org/health-and...the-curve-mean

https://www.wwltv.com/article/news/h...a-0f685dfe74dc

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/19/coro...t-matters.html

https://www.fool.com/investing/2020/...-it-matte.aspx

https://www.wfaa.com/video/news/nati...c-841d0e04adce

[YippieKayay]

Dude, you don't know what them viruses be thinkin'. It may be an evolutionary advantage not to kill the host too quickly. They don't care if you die -- they just want to make the most of theyselves before you do!

And. "...A vaccine is possible. We have one for SARS-COV-1... ".

Don't think so. Maybe something preclinical...

We have a vaccine for SARS (2003 pandemic). Dr. Fauci even mentions it in several interviews when asked about a vaccine. The problem is it was developed too late and SARS disappeared by then.

[Nounce]

Sweden: The number of cases seem to be at a plateau, but the number of deaths still has some high peaks. The reported number of deaths is 192 per one million population.

Sweden is not lockdown. I read that they think they have reached the peak or close to and will achieve herd immunity in a few weeks.

[Fun Luvr]

There are quite a few small countries that have not gone into lockdown, but the population is so small that I don't think it's beneficial to look at them. I found three countries that have not had any required lockdowns, and each have about 10 million people - Belarus, Hungary, and Sweden.

Belarus: The number of cases and deaths have been at a plateau since the beginning. The reported number of deaths is 21 per one million population.

Hungary: The number of cases and deaths reached a peak and have been going down. The reported number of deaths is 23 per one million population.

Sweden: The number of cases seem to be at a plateau, but the number of deaths still has some high peaks. The reported number of deaths is 192 per one million population.

As a comparison, the number of deaths in the US is 144 per one million population.

Italy and Spain have been in a national lockdown since mid March. Their numbers of deaths per one million population are 415 and 464, respectively.

Personally, I think the lockdown and social distancing in the US have had an influence on the rise in numbers of cases and deaths, but they may have extended the time of the virus.

[Mojo Bandit]

Dude, you don't know what them viruses be thinkin'. It may be an evolutionary advantage not to kill the host too quickly. They don't care if you die -- they just want to make the most of theyselves before you do!

And. "...A vaccine is possible. We have one for SARS-COV-1... ".

Don't think so. Maybe something preclinical...

There are at least 30 entities that are currently working on a vaccine for this Covid-19, Pharmaceutical companies and universities sometimes both working together.

https://www.foxnews.com/health/possi...-testing-trial

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01179-x

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/ox...ugh-2020-04-21

[Mojo Bandit]

Where do you get off saying isolation and the lockdown saved lives? That is such bullshit!!

LOL where does YippieKayay get off saying that? You say that like he made it up. Like he is the only one in the world saying it. And then you attack him like he made it up. Every scientist in the world is saying this. And then you attack the scientist and accuse them of being political? Dude what planet do you live on? When in fact you need to get out of what every bubble of information you live in. I have been around researchers a lot in my adult life and when it comes to their particular science, "objective" is built into the scientific process and that is virtually their religion, if you argue with this it just proves to me that you have never been around these people and you are "guessing". Anyone who has ever studied anything related to science knows that science geeks are religiously true to the scientific method. Politics isn't going to fit in anywhere in the process.
One way you know its not political (besides the fact that these people work for the president) is that it is in every country besides some third-world countries and countries who got on the ball early with testing and contact tracing.

Since I know that most people know this it even makes me wonder if you are not just trolling with some of these comments - and to reply to YippieKayay as if he had just said something exrta ordinary when he just repeating what has been coming from Trumps own team at the White House - again it seems like trolling.

What YippieKayay said is exactly what everyone except whoever lives in your little bubble is saying. This is old but it is from the Surgeon General saying exactly what you were asking YippieKayay where he got off saying:

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/con...ering-n1173866

She asked Adams whether the country could see 96,000 people dying over the next several weeks.

"Those projections are definitely sobering, but they don't have to be our reality," Adams said in response.

"If we really do our part stay at home, social distance then we can flatten our curve even below those projections, but it really depends on all of us," he added.

[John Clayton]

...its an evolutionary advantage not to kill your hosts for a strand of RNA...

Dude, you don't know what them viruses be thinkin'. It may be an evolutionary advantage not to kill the host too quickly. They don't care if you die -- they just want to make the most of theyselves before you do!

And. "...A vaccine is possible. We have one for SARS-COV-1... ".

Don't think so. Maybe something preclinical...

[YippieKayay]

There is an argument that flattening the infection curve actually increases number of deaths. Since this is a new disease, there was no immunity.

You're right about herd immunity but you're wrong about this. Flattening the curve is about lowering the number of people who end up in ICU so we don't end up with a situation like Italy. You can still achieve herd immunity over a number of waves. If you look at the flu pandemic of 1918-1920 herd immunity eventually won out after two years. The virus did mutate but eventually became much less lethal because its an evolutionary advantage not to kill your hosts for a strand of RNA.

A vaccine is possible. We have one for SARS-COV-1 (which caused the SARS pandemic).

[John Clayton]

...Where do you get off saying isolation and the lockdown saved lives?...

There is an argument that flattening the infection curve actually increases number of deaths. Since this is a new disease, there was no immunity. Regardless of the shape of the infection curve, the area under it remains the same, which is the entire human population. Barring the invention of a miracle vaccine (unlikely for many reasons), we wouldn't achieve "herd immunity" until 80+% of humans developed antibodies. Therefore, from a cold blooded epidemiological POV, the best strategy would be to achieve the required percentage as quickly as possible. For this particular virus, which seems to mostly kill old, fat smokers, we should have infected the young and healthy as soon as possible, while isolating the old and immunocompromised. While this may have lead to the distressing sight of corpses in the street for a while, if probably would have resulted in lower infection rate overall.

Covid-19 probably is not the zombie apocalypse plague virus (although it still could be), but it is an RNA virus, which means that it is constantly mutating. So, the idea that we are going to beat this or "win" somehow is probably (without a miracle cure) wrong. The virus is similar in structure and transmission to cold viruses. The reason we don't have any vaccines against colds is that it is futile. RNA viruses mutate so quickly that by the time we developed a vaccine against a particular strain of cold, it would be gone and the vaccine would be useless (although it probably / maybe might offer some protection). I mean, there might be some miracle cure in the next coupla' / three years, but I kind of doubt it. Point is, this thing is going to be around for a while. We just have to learn to deal with it.

[Elvis 2008]

Some perspective. The current cases of COVID-19 deaths in the US stands at 47,000. That's in one month with a lock down in most parts of the country. I ask you, if there wasn't a lock down how many more would die? Two? Three? Four times the amount? Are you saying that a few million dead won't have an economic impact?

The lockdown was NEVER, NEVER put in place to stop deaths. It was too slow the spread so the health care system was not overrun. What is going to stop the contagion is herd immunity.

I repeat, the data on Covid is absolute crap. Where do you get off saying isolation and the lockdown saved lives? That is such bullshit!!

EDIT: The evidence that the virus will come back in a second wave is based on science. Until we have herd immunity the virus will keep spreading like the flu pandemic did between 1918-1920

Bullshit! We just found out today that the dates on the first US flu death were wrong, and we have absolutely no fucking clue how many people are immune right now. You doom and gloomers are literally pulling stuff out of your ass.

You know what you call "science" without data? Religion, and that is what you are preaching, doom and gloom just like a preacher does. I don't have faith in scientists without data, and neither should you.

[Elvis 2008]

But to your point. How many deaths in the US is okay with you. For the sake of the economy?

Given that the data on Covid-19 is absolute shit, how can you make a statement like that?

Let us put things in perspective, if the economy remains shut down, the amount of debt will skyrocket, and the economy WILL get worse. You think printing money to pay things is going to last forever?

If we open things, it is unknown what happens because the data on Covid-19 is like I said pure shit.

You act is if the economy is opened up now, the death rate HAS to go up. How do you know that? Hell, it might even go down because people are more mobile. As I pointed out, the total DEATH rate as of March 2020 was LOWER than the last five years.

If you really are so worried about viruses and death, why not teach all elementary school on line? Elementary schools and daycare are breeding grounds for influenza, but that is not part of the long term picture? Why not? Influenza and the pneumonia associated with it THIS YEAR ALONE still has killed more people than Covid-19.

This is not just about money for lives. You have 10 million people lose their job and health insurance and their health goes down. That is a fact.

The goal with isolation was to flatten the curve. Mission accomplished. Now what? Destroy the economy? For what purpose?

If the so called experts can't even make up their mind what good fucking masks are, what do they know about anything? Nobody knows nothing, but if you keep people in isolation, you destroy the economy, and a bad economy leads to bad health care outcomes and death. That IS known.

When do we stop with isolation? Why not just stay in isolation forever then? Hell, Covid might be here forever.

[ShooBree]

On that last time I checked colds were still around. They have never gone away. Now that is scary because if Covid-19 doesn't create an immunity (like the cold coronavirus) we are all in bad trouble.

But to your point. How many deaths in the US is okay with you. For the sake of the economy?

How many lives are you ready to ruin? How many do you want to see homeless, heavily indebted, forced into bankruptcy or unemployment?

I've yet to see anyone answer those questions.

It's nature and Darwinism in practice, weak people die, but that doesn't mean that we all should stop living. To me it's really simple, people will die and that's tragic, but we can't continue to ruin the world economy. The show must go on and those who are old, fat or suffer from poor health should just stay at home.

A bit funny, the first corona related death in California occurred the 6th of February, more than a month before any lockdown. The virus had plenty of time to infect people.

[Surfer500]

Seems like most of the posts of lately revolve around numbers and statistics and lot's of disagreements about what all of it means.

I saw two videos yesterday of how other Cities were managing things. In Wuhan in China apparently they have a scan code on your phone which has a green, yellow, and red color. Supposedly with the green code your cleared to go places where it's allowed, I wasn't clear on the yellow but I think it means you needed to be checked in some way before being allowed somewhere, and red meaning your were totally locked down. Maybe some other posters can explain it better.

Now let's go to Dubai in the UAE, they recently instigated a 24 hour curfew and you are only allowed out if you have obtained a permit. You apply on line and fill out a form with all kinds of questions like where your going like to a market or pharmacy, and so on, and how will you get there, by car or on foot. No exercising or walking the dog allowed. You enter the information with your ID and then are issued a permit with a time window when you can depart. The reporter said they got a response in five minutes so that part is good but lots of restrictions and a $ 1200 fine for violating the permit.

Now lets go to Southern California were I am, after seeing these two videos I become depressed thinking about how restricting this was being basically on the end of a leash, and what the future might be like. I live in a beach town and the entire beach, parking lot, pier and water are shutdown and the lifeguards are patrolling the sand to enforce it. I got in my car and drove down to the next beach town as I had heard it was open and wanted to see for myself. None of the public parking lots were open, but the beach was in full swing with surfers out in the water, along with beach chairs, umbrellas, and families playing in the sand like a completely normal summer day.

I am having a hard time reconciling all this, it's hard to fathom, scary, and defy's logic as to how things can be so different not only all over the World, but in the USA as well.