Coronavirus spreads. But don't panic! (topical thread)

[Nursey]

I called my mom on the way home and told her I actually had a “good day” at work. She asked why. “Well, it’s going to sound bad on the surface. But. One of my patients died. And then that bed was empty the rest of the day.” Fuck. When that’s the bar for a “good” day, you know shit’s been rough. And by not being rushed to get my patient to the morgue because there’s a patient waiting on an ICU bed in the ED, it means our volume is dropping.

[Cavebear]

I called my mom on the way home and told her I actually had a “good day” at work. She asked why. “Well, it’s going to sound bad on the surface. But. One of my patients died. And then that bed was empty the rest of the day.” Fuck. When that’s the bar for a “good” day, you know shit’s been rough. And by not being rushed to get my patient to the morgue because there’s a patient waiting on an ICU bed in the ED, it means our volume is dropping.

Some days, a GOOD day is one that just doesn't bring more pain. May you have more empty beds soon, and for longer than a day...

[mordant]

The Covid variant B.1.1.7 (sometimes referred to as b117) has come to the US and is now in 33 states:

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-nco...cases.html

This variant spreads through children and schools. I found this English summary of an Italian article:


Predictably, we'll insist on keeping schools open anyway. The Biden administration is trying to force schools to open over the objections of teacher's unions. Opening school is critical to reopening businesses, after all.

My teacher / husband is scheduled to get his first shot in about 2 weeks. They've started vaccinating the elementary school teachers first then the middle school then the high school teachers which is what my husband teaches.   Then they have to wait for the antibodies to build up from the first shot and then schedule the second shot which will take another few weeks to schedule, and then after the 2nd shot the body has to make the antibodies that will effectively prevent Covid.  So we're looking at sometime in early April that he'll be back in the classroom. Those are the details of what is going on with teachers.  I read a few month ago that over 1000 teachers have died from Covid. I don't know what the current numbers are.

I've been following the debate about reopening schools.  It doesn't affect me personally, but it does reflect some general issues for parents, businesses, and children.  One side says that schools are some of the least likely locations for spreading Covid-19 and lack of in-class schooling is harming students (which makes some sense).  The other side says that children deserve special protection and are more computer-comfortable than we adults realize (which also makes some sense).  

A part of me says that teachers are around sick children all the time and it is part of the job.  Another part of me says both that teachers are hard to replace when ill and that it is unfair to increase their risk to such a serious illness.  OPK, there is a 3rd group that says the whole thing is fake, but let's ignore them for now.  

I'm annoyed at my inability to resolve this issue in my mind; I feel like a fence-straddler.  Help me resolve this uncertainty...  

I think of it in the context of the overall problem which is that the virus is burning through us out of control and we need, if not necessarily an across the board national shutdown, at least a coordinated national strategy that enforces hard shutdowns in actual hot spots, and also taking into consideration the dominant Covid variant in each area.

To do this we need to keep families afloat with some workable combination of direct assistance, unemployment benefits and a crisis medicare expansion. Which we have no political will to do. The wealthy ruling class wants businesses open as much as possible, and children in school facilitates workers putting themselves at-risk by going back to work. Hell, the corporation I'm currently doing work for reopened its Atlanta offices some time ago and has kept them open in a relative Covid hot spot.

Schools need to be funded to do a proper job of remote learning, etc. It is true that Covid hasn't transmitted through children < 12 years old nearly as well as through adults and any infections have had mild symptoms, but they are still concentrations of people who can convey illness to teachers and, through mild or asymptomatic Covid, to extended, often multigenerational families at home. And now we have variants that are infecting children more readily.

I consider all the going on about children committing suicide because they aren't in school to be a red herring (Las Vegas for example is citing a sharp rise in student suicides, but the total number is 18). Schools don't prevent suicide; hell, for middle school students, sometimes I think they cause it. Children are committing suicide because being home with their toxic families is exposing a previously covert issue that schools were inadvertently helping minimize, and in those cases where the family isn't the problem it's exposing faults in our mental health system. It's true that any depressed person is less likely to become suicidal if they are distracted by being busy and engaged and getting exercise, all of which school, particularly in-person, facilitates. It's also true that we've made decisions as a society for decades to medicate depression rather than to actually treat it intelligently (see: almost anything written by Johann Hari). So: depressed students isn't much of an input to decisions around school reopening.

Another argument for school reopening is that remote learning isn't working, and it's not acceptable to have students out of class for still more time. They go on about a "lost generation", etc. But why isn't remote learning working? Because of shit internet and overpriced internet, poor people and schools can't afford proper hardware, and there was no infrastructure and teacher training in place to do it right. These are all solvable problems, but again there's no political will. It would give the hoi polloi to much of a taste of how much better society can and should be through good government, of how large sums can be spent to benefit citizens when they have actual needs without the sky falling.

A final argument for school reopening is that parents are going crazy dealing with their kids 24/7. As a person who home schooled my children for some time, I have some sympathy for this. Distance learning to an extent puts parents in at least an ancillary role of teacher's aide, getting the kids in front of the computer, enforcing schoolwork, etc. Children are expert little buggers at playing both ends when you have both the role of parent and teacher. It's my main objection to home schooling after having actually done it. I think teaching is a role that is better kept separate from parenting. Still, it is not too much to ask of parents to actually be engaged with their kids in a crisis, IF said parents are not stressed with the additional worries of not getting evicted or not getting needed healthcare and know that they are basically going to be okay rather than abandoned to twist in the wind. But again ... there's no political will to tend to that.

So in summary I think the reason there's no clear answer is that we're so fucked up as a society that we don't know where to start and the Powers That Be don't want anything to fundamentally change anyway. There is no leadership from the top and this is something that needs leadership from the top.

[Cavebear]

My teacher / husband is scheduled to get his first shot in about 2 weeks. They've started vaccinating the elementary school teachers first then the middle school then the high school teachers which is what my husband teaches.   Then they have to wait for the antibodies to build up from the first shot and then schedule the second shot which will take another few weeks to schedule, and then after the 2nd shot the body has to make the antibodies that will effectively prevent Covid.  So we're looking at sometime in early April that he'll be back in the classroom. Those are the details of what is going on with teachers.  I read a few month ago that over 1000 teachers have died from Covid. I don't know what the current numbers are.

I've been following the debate about reopening schools.  It doesn't affect me personally, but it does reflect some general issues for parents, businesses, and children.  One side says that schools are some of the least likely locations for spreading Covid-19 and lack of in-class schooling is harming students (which makes some sense).  The other side says that children deserve special protection and are more computer-comfortable than we adults realize (which also makes some sense).  

A part of me says that teachers are around sick children all the time and it is part of the job.  Another part of me says both that teachers are hard to replace when ill and that it is unfair to increase their risk to such a serious illness.  OPK, there is a 3rd group that says the whole thing is fake, but let's ignore them for now.  

I'm annoyed at my inability to resolve this issue in my mind; I feel like a fence-straddler.  Help me resolve this uncertainty...  

I think of it in the context of the overall problem which is that the virus is burning through us out of control and we need, if not necessarily an across the board national shutdown, at least a coordinated national strategy that enforces hard shutdowns in actual hot spots, and also taking into consideration the dominant Covid variant in each area.

To do this we need to keep families afloat with some workable combination of direct assistance, unemployment benefits and a crisis medicare expansion. Which we have no political will to do. The wealthy ruling class wants businesses open as much as possible, and children in school facilitates workers putting themselves at-risk by going back to work. Hell, the corporation I'm currently doing work for reopened its Atlanta offices some time ago and has kept them open in a relative Covid hot spot.

Schools need to be funded to do a proper job of remote learning, etc. It is true that Covid hasn't transmitted through children < 12 years old nearly as well as through adults and any infections have had mild symptoms, but they are still concentrations of people who can convey illness to teachers and, through mild or asymptomatic Covid, to extended, often multigenerational families at home. And now we have variants that are infecting children more readily.

I consider all the going on about children committing suicide because they aren't in school to be a red herring (Las Vegas for example is citing a sharp rise in student suicides, but the total number is 18). Schools don't prevent suicide; hell, for middle school students, sometimes I think they cause it. Children are committing suicide because being home with their toxic families is exposing a previously covert issue that schools were inadvertently helping minimize, and in those cases where the family isn't the problem it's exposing faults in our mental health system. It's true that any depressed person is less likely to become suicidal if they are distracted by being busy and engaged and getting exercise, all of which school, particularly in-person, facilitates. It's also true that we've made decisions as a society for decades to medicate depression rather than to actually treat it intelligently (see: almost anything written by Johann Hari). So: depressed students isn't much of an input to decisions around school reopening.

Another argument for school reopening is that remote learning isn't working, and it's not acceptable to have students out of class for still more time. They go on about a "lost generation", etc. But why isn't remote learning working? Because of shit internet and overpriced internet, poor people and schools can't afford proper hardware, and there was no infrastructure and teacher training in place to do it right. These are all solvable problems, but again there's no political will. It would give the hoi polloi to much of a taste of how much better society can and should be through good government, of how large sums can be spent to benefit citizens when they have actual needs without the sky falling.

A final argument for school reopening is that parents are going crazy dealing with their kids 24/7. As a person who home schooled my children for some time, I have some sympathy for this. Distance learning to an extent puts parents in at least an ancillary role of teacher's aide, getting the kids in front of the computer, enforcing schoolwork, etc. Children are expert little buggers at playing both ends when you have both the role of parent and teacher. It's my main objection to home schooling after having actually done it. I think teaching is a role that is better kept separate from parenting. Still, it is not too much to ask of parents to actually be engaged with their kids in a crisis, IF said parents are not stressed with the additional worries of not getting evicted or not getting needed healthcare and know that they are basically going to be okay rather than abandoned to twist in the wind. But again ... there's no political will to tend to that.

So in summary I think the reason there's no clear answer is that we're so fucked up as a society that we don't know where to start and the Powers That Be don't want anything to fundamentally change anyway. There is no leadership from the top and this is something that needs leadership from the top.

That was... "profoundly impressive". And I'll add, well-organized and thoughtful. If I understand you correctly, I think what you are saying is that the response to Covid-19 has not been coordinated through all of society (and I agree). We need someone in charge of this with a multi-experience background that included medical, social, and educational knowledge. I mhave no idea who that person might be, but there have to be a few out there somewhere.

In some emergencies, a person with specialized knowledge is key. But in others, breadth of experience is more important. I think that is the case here.

I greatly thank you for the thoughtful and detailed reply. I know it took time to write, but It has helped me understand how we should proceed.

[Dom]

Firstly, how many months without school can we absorb financially? Each mom who is forced to stay at home costs us either money or negatively impacts the economy. Personally I think there should be financial aid to mothers who are temporarily forced to stay home due to Covid. It would help to fuel our economy.

When I was a kid, we went to school from 8 to 12. Then we went home for lunch and had 2 to 3 hours worth of homework to do. This was from age 6 to age 10. We did out homework and then we went outside to play until dark.

The hours at school got longer after that, 8 to 2 or so, depending on the courses you took. 

Today, I think a combo of physical school and online school would be best. Online school can reinforce what was learned in class, and it would be a lot more effective than our homework was. For students who cannot go home to a computer, the school should provide locations for properly distanced, masked and supervised computer homework. With proper air circulation.

That would be a solution I think would be positive for learning. Better than the old system. It would need to be tweaked to fit available space. 

The financial support is based on the assumption that we are talking about several months of transition while everyone gets immunized.  Can we come up with something to bridge a few months?

[Nursey]

My son’s school district shut down last March with the state quarantine. They offered chrome books per child and WiFi hot spots per family and requested that only the people who needed it pick one up, and did NOT make it based on 2019 income, just the honor system. They provided a meal pick up station for families in need that lasted through the summer and for kids still doing virtual this year. For the 2020-2021 school year they offered for children to be completely virtual or attend school in person (allowing families to decide what best fit their needs), while continuing to provide WiFi hotspots and chrome books. *Every* child has had free breakfast and lunch this year - that has been a HUGE help. They’ve also put mental health resources in place. I decided my son was better served by attending school in person.

Every child received a mask the first day of school, and they hand out masks each time a child forgets one. They’ve done a hybrid system for the in school kids. The first part of the year they sent half the kids on Monday/Tuesday (kids at home virtual), everyone virtual on Wednesday while the school is cleaned, and then the other half on Thursday/Friday. When we’ve had lower rates, they’ve attended Monday through Friday. They get daily outdoor mask breaks and don’t get to eat in the cafeteria, they have to eat in their classrooms where they are all distanced. They have to bring their own water bottles because the water fountains have been disabled. When our area has been a hot spot, they’ve reverted to virtual and gradually reopen via hybrid. Any time a child or teacher is positive, the entire class is sent home to do virtual in quarantine for 14 days. If it’s a child in middle or high school, that means every classroom the child attended is sent home immediately - my son’s gym class was exposed and I got called to pick him up at 0930. Immediately following that incident they also reverted to a hybrid schedule again. The school administration has daily meetings with local health officials to keep up to date.

The caveat is that my son attends one of the wealthiest schools in the state. I don’t know where the funding is coming from - I don’t know if it’s some of the wealthier residents making donations or because the school affords a greater tax income or from grants, perhaps a combination. They cancelled the more expensive electives. But, it has worked quite well for us and I’m pleased with our local leadership.

[Dom]

California churches will be able to re-open with limited capacity after the Supreme Court struck down some of the state’s strict coronavirus policies.


The decision signals the priorities of the court’s new conservative super-majority to protect religious rights, even at the potential expense of public health.

“If Hollywood may host a studio audience or film a singing competition while not a single soul may enter California’s churches, synagogues, and mosques, something has gone seriously awry,” wrote justice Neil Gorsuch, a Trump appointee.

He joined the five other conservatives on the court. They argued the state was singling out religious institutions for stricter rules while other types of establishments have remained open under limited capacity.

“This Court certainly is not downplaying the suffering many have experienced in this pandemic,“ Mr Gorsuch added.

Prior to the ruling, California governor Gavin Newsom introduced a tiered series of coronavirus restrictions across the state, prohibiting indoor church services in regions with widespread Covid cases.


The court ruled religious institutions could re-open for indoor worship with 25 per cent capacity, though didn’t explain how it reached this resolution to the case, which arrived before the tribunal on a fast-tracked emergency appeal with limited briefing.



Justice Elena Kagan, writing in dissent on behalf of the Court’s remaining liberal wing, blasting the ruling as hypocritical, given the Supreme Court itself is conducting business remotely, and warned that the jurists shouldn’t second-guess health experts with “armchair epidemiology.”


“Justices of this Court are not scientists,” she wrote. “If this decision causes suffering, we will not pay. Our marble halls are now closed to the public, and our life tenure forever insulates us from responsibility for our errors. That would seem good reason to avoid disrupting a state’s pandemic response.”

[Dancefortwo]

My teacher / husband is scheduled to get his first shot in about 2 weeks. They've started vaccinating the elementary school teachers first then the middle school then the high school teachers which is what my husband teaches.   Then they have to wait for the antibodies to build up from the first shot and then schedule the second shot which will take another few weeks to schedule, and then after the 2nd shot the body has to make the antibodies that will effectively prevent Covid.  So we're looking at sometime in early April that he'll be back in the classroom. Those are the details of what is going on with teachers.  I read a few month ago that over 1000 teachers have died from Covid. I don't know what the current numbers are.

I've been following the debate about reopening schools.  It doesn't affect me personally, but it does reflect some general issues for parents, businesses, and children.  One side says that schools are some of the least likely locations for spreading Covid-19 and lack of in-class schooling is harming students (which makes some sense).  The other side says that children deserve special protection and are more computer-comfortable than we adults realize (which also makes some sense).  

A part of me says that teachers are around sick children all the time and it is part of the job.  Another part of me says both that teachers are hard to replace when ill and that it is unfair to increase their risk to such a serious illness.  OPK, there is a 3rd group that says the whole thing is fake, but let's ignore them for now.  

I'm annoyed at my inability to resolve this issue in my mind; I feel like a fence-straddler.  Help me resolve this uncertainty...  

I think of it in the context of the overall problem which is that the virus is burning through us out of control and we need, if not necessarily an across the board national shutdown, at least a coordinated national strategy that enforces hard shutdowns in actual hot spots, and also taking into consideration the dominant Covid variant in each area.

To do this we need to keep families afloat with some workable combination of direct assistance, unemployment benefits and a crisis medicare expansion. Which we have no political will to do. The wealthy ruling class wants businesses open as much as possible, and children in school facilitates workers putting themselves at-risk by going back to work. Hell, the corporation I'm currently doing work for reopened its Atlanta offices some time ago and has kept them open in a relative Covid hot spot.

Schools need to be funded to do a proper job of remote learning, etc. It is true that Covid hasn't transmitted through children < 12 years old nearly as well as through adults and any infections have had mild symptoms, but they are still concentrations of people who can convey illness to teachers and, through mild or asymptomatic Covid, to extended, often multigenerational families at home. And now we have variants that are infecting children more readily.

I consider all the going on about children committing suicide because they aren't in school to be a red herring (Las Vegas for example is citing a sharp rise in student suicides, but the total number is 18). Schools don't prevent suicide; hell, for middle school students, sometimes I think they cause it. Children are committing suicide because being home with their toxic families is exposing a previously covert issue that schools were inadvertently helping minimize, and in those cases where the family isn't the problem it's exposing faults in our mental health system. It's true that any depressed person is less likely to become suicidal if they are distracted by being busy and engaged and getting exercise, all of which school, particularly in-person, facilitates. It's also true that we've made decisions as a society for decades to medicate depression rather than to actually treat it intelligently (see: almost anything written by Johann Hari). So: depressed students isn't much of an input to decisions around school reopening.

Another argument for school reopening is that remote learning isn't working, and it's not acceptable to have students out of class for still more time. They go on about a "lost generation", etc. But why isn't remote learning working? Because of shit internet and overpriced internet, poor people and schools can't afford proper hardware, and there was no infrastructure and teacher training in place to do it right. These are all solvable problems, but again there's no political will. It would give the hoi polloi to much of a taste of how much better society can and should be through good government, of how large sums can be spent to benefit citizens when they have actual needs without the sky falling.

A final argument for school reopening is that parents are going crazy dealing with their kids 24/7. As a person who home schooled my children for some time, I have some sympathy for this. Distance learning to an extent puts parents in at least an ancillary role of teacher's aide, getting the kids in front of the computer, enforcing schoolwork, etc. Children are expert little buggers at playing both ends when you have both the role of parent and teacher. It's my main objection to home schooling after having actually done it. I think teaching is a role that is better kept separate from parenting. Still, it is not too much to ask of parents to actually be engaged with their kids in a crisis, IF said parents are not stressed with the additional worries of not getting evicted or not getting needed healthcare and know that they are basically going to be okay rather than abandoned to twist in the wind. But again ... there's no political will to tend to that.

So in summary I think the reason there's no clear answer is that we're so fucked up as a society that we don't know where to start and the Powers That Be don't want anything to fundamentally change anyway. There is no leadership from the top and this is something that needs leadership from the top.

Distance teaching is meant to be a stop gap measure. It isn't a replacement for in class teaching.  Teachers find it far, far more difficult to teach on a computer and would certainly prefer in class teaching.....if they weren't exposed to Covid.  Many teachers are middle aged and more succeptable to the virus.  I think the average age of teachers in the US is around 43. 

During the 1917 pandemic children used correspondence courses and mailed in the lessons.  It was their version of distance learning.  Several of the New York and Chicago schools stayed open in 1917 but that's because the filth and poverty of the tenements were teaming with new immigrants all packed together and the health authorities felt is was less hazerdous to be in school than at home.  The schools at that time were newly built and clean and they opened up the windows even in winter to keep the air circulating.  The kids wore coats in class and the schools heaters were cranked up to try and keep the kids warm.  

My husband asked his students to write an essay on how Covid has effected them and their family.  I read many of them and one of the common themes in almost every essay was the realization of how much they missed school and all the social activities.  They didn't appreciate how much they loved school until it was take away.    At first they were thrilled to be out of school but then it slowly dawned on them how important it was and how much high school was the center of their life.   For sure, the kids will have a bump in their education road but their brains are young and they will catch up.  

Historically life is altered by plagues, war and famine.  It just is.  We will get through this somehow.

[mordant]

Firstly, how many months without school can we absorb financially?

A better question, in my view, is how long can we afford not to properly shut down and control the virus? How many times do we have to open businesses, churches and schools only to close them down again as the hospitals fill up?

Government has a monopoly on money. It is perfectly appropriate AND feasible for it to provide funds in a crisis. There is an upper limit, where it can produce inflation, but it is nowhere near as low a limit as most seem to have been conditioned to think that it is.

Yes, I pretty much buy into modern monetary theory (MMT). For those interested, read Stephanie Kelton's NYT best seller The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory and the Birth of the People's Economy.

The current regime however favors a scarcity mentality, means-testing and excessive bureaucracy on what aid does go out, etc. We see the effects of this pretty clearly, but I see no sign of it changing anytime soon. Ordinary citizens MUST not be given a taste of the better life that is possible through good public policy. They would not want to turn back.

[Aroura]

I'm also torn on the school Issue. Fortunately, my state has prioritized teacher vaccinations even above the elderly, so we have partial/hybrid return to school now, and they expect all teachers and staff to be fully vaccinated by fall, so hopefully we can see a full time return to school then.

My daughter has had a great deal of unconventional schooling and even so is finding this year extra hard.
She went to a normal public school for K and 1st, but we pulled her out early in second grade and homeschooled her through 4th. Not for stupid religious reason, obviously, but because the school was overcrowded and we simply thought we could give her a more focused education at home. We mostly supplemented her social life using Girl Scouts, where she had a very close friend and made more. In the summer between her 4th and 5th, we moved to Germany and she then attended a public school there. That was rough, full foreign language immersion, not a lot of friends made, but she did alright. Then we switched her to the private international school for her 6th year, and that was awesome.

Back to the US, she started in a new public school for 7th, but of course that ended in March with the state Shutdown. She was doing fine, grades and social life, until the shut down. They did distance learning until June. This year for her 8th, she opted for full online school instead of the hybrid version which would have her some days in school some days distance learning, sometimes school canceled and back to full time distance, etc. It's quite difficult, but since I'm not employed, I have the time to help her find lesson supplements if she needs them, check that she's taking notes, make sure she's got a schedule she's sticking to, etc. I feel very privileged to be able to do this. I cannot imagine how families where both parents work are managing. Their kids must really be floundering through this, and likely not feeling good about education in general right now. This will set some kids back.

There is a lot more hunger, and a lot more stress on kids because of the pandemic, but that's true of all people, all ages, all walks of life, to one degree or another. Sometimes there simply isn't a "right" answer, as any choice made will result in more harm to one group or another. We are all just fumbling in the dark, doing our best to make the best choices we can under the circumstance.

[TonyAnkle]

UK Today

15,845 Positives and 373 Deaths.

The figures are going in the right direction, of course the weekend figures are always below the actual numbers, but I reckon we are over the peak again.

Let's just see for how long that the powers that be can resist easing restrictions. If I was Boris I wouldn't even think about reopening secondary schools and colleges until after the Easter break... Exams are not going ahead, the kids are old enough to look after themselves, and remote learning shouldn't be a problem in this day and age....

The UK government needs to get a grip of things while the going is good, and not fall into the same trap again.

[Fireball]

UK Today

15,845 Positives and 373 Deaths.

The figures are going in the right direction, of course the weekend figures are always below the actual numbers, but I reckon we are over the peak again.

Let's just see for how long that the powers that be can resist easing restrictions. If I was Boris I wouldn't even think about reopening secondary schools and colleges until after the Easter break... Exams are not going ahead, the kids are old enough to look after themselves, and remote learning shouldn't be a problem in this day and age....

The UK government needs to get a grip of things while the going is good, and not fall into the same trap again.

..
Not to worry- Mardi Gras is the 16th of February. Here comes the rise again...with apologies to the Eurythmics.

[TonyAnkle]

UK Today

15,845 Positives and 373 Deaths.

The figures are going in the right direction, of course the weekend figures are always below the actual numbers, but I reckon we are over the peak again.

Let's just see for how long that the powers that be can resist easing restrictions. If I was Boris I wouldn't even think about reopening secondary schools and colleges until after the Easter break... Exams are not going ahead, the kids are old enough to look after themselves, and remote learning shouldn't be a problem in this day and age....

The UK government needs to get a grip of things while the going is good, and not fall into the same trap again.

..
Not to worry- Mardi Gras is the 16th of February. Here comes the rise again...with apologies to the Eurythmics.

I'm sure that lessons have been learnt over there, the streets will be empty.

[Fireball]

UK Today

15,845 Positives and 373 Deaths.

The figures are going in the right direction, of course the weekend figures are always below the actual numbers, but I reckon we are over the peak again.

Let's just see for how long that the powers that be can resist easing restrictions. If I was Boris I wouldn't even think about reopening secondary schools and colleges until after the Easter break... Exams are not going ahead, the kids are old enough to look after themselves, and remote learning shouldn't be a problem in this day and age....

The UK government needs to get a grip of things while the going is good, and not fall into the same trap again.

..
Not to worry- Mardi Gras is the 16th of February. Here comes the rise again...with apologies to the Eurythmics.

I'm sure that lessons have been learnt over there, the streets will be empty.  

It'll be interesting to see if the authorities can keep up with the drunken revelers in the French Quarter of New Orleans. 

[Fireball]

Here's another reason it's spreading-undercounting the number of infections.

Uncounted Covid Estimate

[Dom]

Here's another reason it's spreading-undercounting the number of infections.

Uncounted Covid Estimate

Add in all the poor people who don't get tested and die at home, all the frightened people who are scared to go to the hospital, all the old who just as rather let go than endure and die at home or take a bunch of extra pills. There is no telling how many people died of Covid. Looking at the death rate comparison may help:

From 1980 to 2019, between eight and nine people per 1,000 have died each year in the United States. In 2019, the most recent year with official death estimates, 2,854,838 Americans died, and 3,747,540 were born. That means that 8.7 people died per 1,000 that year — up from a low of 7.9 deaths per 1,000 people in 2009.

[Fireball]

If you look at the lone comment, the knucklehead says since it is 1/5 as big a problem (in terms of death), we ought to open things back up. That person should just keep that opinion to themselves. It doesn't change a thing with loading up the medical community. I looked again, and someone rebutted the first comment.  

[Dancefortwo]

I wonder if traffic deaths are down this year, what with less cars out on the road.

[TonyAnkle]

I wonder if traffic deaths are down this year, what with less cars out on the road.

Less cars usually means more chance to speed, although you would think that accidents figures would be down.

[RobbyPants]

He joined the five other conservatives on the court. They argued the state was singling out religious institutions for stricter rules while other types of establishments have remained open under limited capacity.

I don't know all the ins and outs of California's restrictions and how they're applied, but I do agree with this reasoning. I don't like churches getting special privileges because America is so religious, but I also don't want to see them singled out for additional restrictions.

[Dānu]

He joined the five other conservatives on the court. They argued the state was singling out religious institutions for stricter rules while other types of establishments have remained open under limited capacity.

I don't know all the ins and outs of California's restrictions and how they're applied, but I do agree with this reasoning. I don't like churches getting special privileges because America is so religious, but I also don't want to see them singled out for additional restrictions.

I read an article (link) that pointed out that this was comparing church activity to business activities that were not comparable to them, expanding the definition of discrimination to any restriction that differs from that of secular activities, no matter how unlike the activities. The one like activity they brought in was singing in the filming of a movie, for which those in the affirmative admitted they didn't have enough data to compare the two. This was a pro-religious ruling that went beyond mere fairness.

[RobbyPants]

I read an article (link) that pointed out that this was comparing church activity to business activities that were not comparable to them, expanding the definition of discrimination to any restriction that differs from that of secular activities, no matter how unlike the activities.  The one like activity they brought in was singing in the filming of a movie, for which those in the affirmative admitted they didn't have enough data to compare the two.  This was a pro-religious ruling that went beyond mere fairness.

That makes sense. I should know better than to take majority conservative Supreme Court rulings about religious issues at face value without digging in further.

[mordant]

This past 7 day's figures for the US.

* New cases continue to fall (about 10% vs last week)
* Deaths continue to fall (about 9% vs last week)
* Number of active cases have just begun to convert to recovered a bit faster than new cases are coming in
* Daily new cases dropped below 100K for the first time since I've tracked this (mid November, when it was averaging 175K)

Predictions:

* Businesses will foolishly take this as a sign to force people back to in-person work
* Government will foolishly continue the push to reopen schools "safely"
* We'll be right back where we started not less than 60 days hence

I base these predictions on:

* Vaccine distribution not expected to significantly slow spread anytime soon
* New, more infectious strains will likely become dominant during the next 60 days or less
* At least one of these strains (B.1.1.7) infects young children at much higher rates
* At least one of these strains (Brazil 2) appears to be reinfecting already-recovered Covid sufferers at high rates and may require a new vaccine
* I have been contacted this week by 6 recruiters, and I can tell tech companies at least are chomping at the bit to get people back into the office

Date         Deaths  New cases 1 in x total cases 1 in x deaths 1 in x active cases

Wed Feb 03    4,032    114,032          12              717              34
Thu Feb 04    3,668    124,943          12              711              34
Fri Feb 05    3,665    132,045          12              706              34
Sat Feb 06    2,797    108,502          12              701              34
Sun Feb 07    1,315     91,256          12              699              34
Mon Feb 08    1,592     90,346          12              697              34
Tue Feb 09    3,265     95,542          12              692              34
Weekly total 20,334    756,666   (avg 2,905 deaths/day, 108,095 cases / day)

Record deaths: 4,491 on Jan 12
Record new cases: 307,607 on Jan 08

[Cavebear]

This past 7 day's figures for the US.

* New cases continue to fall (about 10% vs last week)
* Deaths continue to fall (about 9% vs last week)
* Number of active cases have just begun to convert to recovered a bit faster than new cases are coming in
* Daily new cases dropped below 100K for the first time since I've tracked this (mid November, when it was averaging 175K)

Predictions:

* Businesses will foolishly take this as a sign to force people back to in-person work
* Government will foolishly continue the push to reopen schools "safely"
* We'll be right back where we started not less than 60 days hence

I base these predictions on:

* Vaccine distribution not expected to significantly slow spread anytime soon
* New, more infectious strains will likely become dominant during the next 60 days or less
* At least one of these strains (B.1.1.7) infects young children at much higher rates
* At least one of these strains (Brazil 2) appears to be reinfecting already-recovered Covid sufferers at high rates and may require a new vaccine
* I have been contacted this week by 6 recruiters, and I can tell tech companies at least are chomping at the bit to get people back into the office

Date         Deaths  New cases 1 in x total cases 1 in x deaths 1 in x active cases

Wed Feb 03    4,032    114,032          12              717              34
Thu Feb 04    3,668    124,943          12              711              34
Fri Feb 05    3,665    132,045          12              706              34
Sat Feb 06    2,797    108,502          12              701              34
Sun Feb 07    1,315     91,256          12              699              34
Mon Feb 08    1,592     90,346          12              697              34
Tue Feb 09    3,265     95,542          12              692              34
Weekly total 20,334    756,666   (avg 2,905 deaths/day, 108,095 cases / day)

Record deaths: 4,491 on Jan 12
Record new cases: 307,607 on Jan 08

Another excellent post on the subject.

It seems to me that the major social conflict is deaths vs socioeconomic disruption.

We started a war that has lasted 20 years because 3500 or so people were killed in an attack that is very umnlikely to be repeated. Yes that was horrible; I do not forgive or forget... I remember it every year and many times in between.

But we are losing almost that many people EVERY DAY and a substantial part of the nation is ignoring all the ways to reduce the deaths because of bizarre theories and simple refusalk to "inconvienence themselves". How is that even possible? Has some large percent of us simply lost the ability to relate causes to consequences?

Too many people seem to think "well *I* won't catch Covid-19, while others are dying around them. Well, so long as it isn't "THEM" I suppose, they can ignore. Until it is and they die and then they do stop objecting to the pandemic as "fake news", don't they. The dead don't talk...

Maybe they rationalize it. Granny was old anyway. That doctor had early cancer and it would have gotten him eventually. That schoolteacher ate a lot of fast food, so that was the REAL problem. Anything to avoid reality.

I understand that our children are not getting the education they deserve. I understand business are distressed or failing. Our question is "How many people should die every day to keep the routines going"? At what point do we have to legally (with penalties) force the people not protecting us from their own careless habits to act responsibly?

I say we do that today.

480,000 people have died of Covid-19 in the US alone. This is not "fake news". This is not "it will go away in the Summer heat". The variants are worse. We're just STARTING through this nightmare...

[Phaedrus]

Downloaded an app, Healthy Together, that sends me a text when my recent C-19 test has been processed.

Still been negative since we became aware of it almost a year ago. Makes me wonder if maybe I've already had it, before the testing began, or if I'm just super lucky to not have caught it.