Slitherine

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ORIGINAL: fcooke

BB - that was just evil.....

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e there are no confirmed cases.
John Enger | MPR News 2014

Rick Blodgett has a lot of theories about why nobody in Lake of the Woods County has tested positive yet for the coronavirus. Theory No. 1: Far Northern Minnesotans are just tougher people.

“When I was a kid, we used to sleep with the window open,” he said. “It might be 20 below. We’d just pile the blankets. Are we heartier? I don’t know.”

He wishes that were the reason. It would be something to brag about. But it’s probably not why there aren’t any COVID-19 cases in his county yet. Lots of people have tested positive for the disease in other northern communities — Cook County, the other longtime holdout, just recorded its first COVID-19 case this week — and presumably some of those people once slept with their windows open, too. Besides, there’s no research to suggest that “hearty” makes a difference when it comes to getting a COVID-19 diagnosis.
Baudette, Minn.
Baudette, Minn.
William Lager | MPR News

Another theory? Maybe people who live in Baudette, Minn., where he runs the local Hardware Hank store, are just much better at taking the recommended coronavirus precautions than the rest of the state — the rest of the country, for that matter.

Maybe they wash their hands more, disinfect more, stay home when they’re sick, social distance on all occasions, wear masks more effectively and more often.

But: Blodgett isn’t wearing a mask these days — and, he said, neither are any of his employees, or the vast majority of his customers. So prevention probably isn’t it, either.

“I think it’s more luck than anything else,” he said.

COVID-19Full coverage of the pandemic from MPR News
'A marathon for all of us'MN's rural communities brace themselves for COVID-19
In Lake of the Woods Co.Northwest Angle first isolated by geography, now by COVID-19

Luck might have something to do with it but according to state infectious disease director Kris Ehresmann, the lack of COVID-19 cases in Lake of the Woods County has more to do with geography and population than being lucky.

Places like New York City were hit hard by the highly infectious disease, she said, in part because the people there live tightly packed together, with a high population density.

Lake of the Woods County, on the other hand, is the second least-populated county in the state of Minnesota, just before Traverse County. There are fewer than 4,000 people, spread out over more than 1,000 square miles. It is the opposite of New York City. And at least when it comes to the transmission of a disease like COVID-19, all of that space and distance is an advantage.

Some communities have low numbers of COVID-19 cases, because they’re not doing much — or any — testing for the disease. But according to the state Health Department, Baudette’s LakeWood Health Center, the county’s only COVID-19 testing site, has tested 69 people. All of those people tested negative for the virus. Ehresmann said that even though it’s not a huge testing program, adequate for the county’s population.

It’s still possible that a few people in the county have — or have had — the disease, but without symptoms, and haven’t been tested.

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ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

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ORIGINAL: warspite1

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Don't make any hard plans yet. The situation is pretty fluid and there's immense pressure to act, so countermeasures might be reinstated, any place, any time.

To this point, mortality continues to drop steadily nationwide and in many states, so it doesn't yet seem that the increasing number of cases is similar to what we faced in February, March, April. I hope that proves true.

warspite1

Lol, no we are making no plans yet after the cancelling of plans for 2020... The idea of visiting Florida under the present conditions - even if the parks do open - holds zero appeal.

We have this strange situation where the contagiousness of the disease remains as powerful as ever, but I don't get any feel for how bad the disease actually is.

In Northern Italy, parts of Spain, the UK, France and the USA (to name but 5) you had large numbers of cases, leading to a great many deaths - including for so many doctors and nurses.

But now that does not seem to be the case. Why? I must confess I don't really know what is going on. But what I do know is that the seemingly reducing death rate is not helping when trying to impose lockdown on people who seem to have lost the fear factor. This, allied to the human need for people to get out and about means that getting people to obey social distancing (if re-imposed) may be difficult.

Just what the hell is going on with this thing?

What seems to be going on is that the young clubbing crowd who were locked out of Spring Break carousing saw a chink of light in the door opening and rushed out to make up for lost time. The fear factor was never really there, because the teenage/early 20s years are the age of invincibility (imagined). And of course, they were getting a steady message about how harmless the virus is to young people. They barely thought about the other people they would be coming in contact with after the club/beach/bar.
And now there is a rising chorus among physicians that after infected young people seem to be free for virus symptoms, they are exhibiting signs or organ damage and/or chronic fatigue syndrome. This thing is just nasty in every way.

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Which is why MLB just shouldn't be having a season, but ya'know.

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I read the article and it doesn't say what you hold it out to say.

It says a consortium of Houston hospitals has determined ways to add additional ICU beds to its capacity. This is sensible given rising case loads. It says that consortium has omitted ICU data from its website and hasn't yet replied to a press request for why. It doesn't say there is anything underhanded going on, whether this is short term or long term, whether it'll be changed.

But there is no way some consortium of Houston hospitals is lying or hiding information to present a false narrative. In the first place, they're under scrutiny and would get caught. In the second place, they would then get roasted professionally and by the media.

Most professionals are doing their best to handle this properly. And very few people are willing to lie/fudge when they know they're going to get caught.

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ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I read the article and it doesn't say what you hold it out to say.

It says a consortium of Houston hospitals has determined ways to add additional ICU beds to its capacity. This is sensible given rising case loads. It says that consortium has omitted ICU data from its website and hasn't yet replied to a press request for why. It doesn't say there is anything underhanded going on, whether this is short term or long term, whether it'll be changed.

But there is no way some consortium of Houston hospitals is lying or hiding information to present a false narrative. In the first place, they're under scrutiny and would get caught. In the second place, they would then get roasted professionally and by the media.

Most professionals are doing their best to handle this properly. And very few people are willing to lie/fudge when they know they're going to get caught.

But why were ICU beds listed on line for weeks and weeks and the day they run out the information is not longer available? The change came one day after the hospitals reported their base intensive care capacity had hit 100 percent for the first time during the pandemic, with projections showing the institutions — which together comprise the world’s largest medical complex — were on pace to exceed their “unsustainable surge capacity” by July 6.

It also followed discussions between Gov. Greg Abbott and hospital executives in which the governor expressed displeasure with negative headlines about ICU capacity. Friday morning, 24 hours after the four CEOs’ press conference, the TMC released no new data. After reporting 17 charts and graphs on most days for three months, the organization did not post from Thursday morning until Saturday at about 9 p.m.
When the charts re-appeared, eight of the 17 original slides had been deleted — including any reference to hospital capacity or projections of future capacity — and the lone remaining slide referencing the risks associated with shrinking capacity had been altered.

That's like saying if I don't weight myself I don't gain weight. Or if I don't take a pregnancy test I'm not pregnant Or if I don't test people they are not sick? The only logic is deception, and hardly the first case of deception we have seen. If I am losing the game I lets just change the rules so it doesn't look like I'm losing. They did lie, they did cheat, and they just got caught.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Houston-hospitals-hit-100-base-ICU-capacity-15372256.php

My favorite line from these condescending pr%$^ks is "TMC leaders are in discussions about how to “best educate” news media and the public on hospital capacity issues." Guess they never taught me to count in engineering school

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ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I read the article and it doesn't say what you hold it out to say.

It says a consortium of Houston hospitals has determined ways to add additional ICU beds to its capacity. This is sensible given rising case loads. It says that consortium has omitted ICU data from its website and hasn't yet replied to a press request for why. It doesn't say there is anything underhanded going on, whether this is short term or long term, whether it'll be changed.

But there is no way some consortium of Houston hospitals is lying or hiding information to present a false narrative. In the first place, they're under scrutiny and would get caught. In the second place, they would then get roasted professionally and by the media.

Most professionals are doing their best to handle this properly. And very few people are willing to lie/fudge when they know they're going to get caught.

But why were ICU beds listed on line for weeks and weeks and the day they run out the information is not longer available? The change came one day after the hospitals reported their base intensive care capacity had hit 100 percent for the first time during the pandemic, with projections showing the institutions — which together comprise the world’s largest medical complex — were on pace to exceed their “unsustainable surge capacity” by July 6.

It also followed discussions between Gov. Greg Abbott and hospital executives in which the governor expressed displeasure with negative headlines about ICU capacity. Friday morning, 24 hours after the four CEOs’ press conference, the TMC released no new data. After reporting 17 charts and graphs on most days for three months, the organization did not post from Thursday morning until Saturday at about 9 p.m.
When the charts re-appeared, eight of the 17 original slides had been deleted — including any reference to hospital capacity or projections of future capacity — and the lone remaining slide referencing the risks associated with shrinking capacity had been altered.

That's like saying if I don't weight myself I don't gain weight. Or if I don't take a pregnancy test I'm not pregnant Or if I don't test people they are not sick? The only logic is deception, and hardly the first case of deception we have seen. If I am losing the game I lets just change the rules so it doesn't look like I'm losing. They did lie, they did cheat, and they just got caught.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Houston-hospitals-hit-100-base-ICU-capacity-15372256.php

My favorite line from these condescending pr%$^ks is "TMC leaders are in discussions about how to “best educate” news media and the public on hospital capacity issues." Guess they never taught me to count in engineering school

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Your second post adds assertions and contentions not mentioned in the article you invited us to read at first. You seem to be speculating about what might be going on, and I know from your previous posts that you believe there's widespread fudging of numbers. I don't, and the article you linked to doesn't make any substantiated assertions.

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ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

I read the article and it doesn't say what you hold it out to say.

It says a consortium of Houston hospitals has determined ways to add additional ICU beds to its capacity. This is sensible given rising case loads. It says that consortium has omitted ICU data from its website and hasn't yet replied to a press request for why. It doesn't say there is anything underhanded going on, whether this is short term or long term, whether it'll be changed.

But there is no way some consortium of Houston hospitals is lying or hiding information to present a false narrative. In the first place, they're under scrutiny and would get caught. In the second place, they would then get roasted professionally and by the media.

Most professionals are doing their best to handle this properly. And very few people are willing to lie/fudge when they know they're going to get caught.

But why were ICU beds listed on line for weeks and weeks and the day they run out the information is not longer available? The change came one day after the hospitals reported their base intensive care capacity had hit 100 percent for the first time during the pandemic, with projections showing the institutions — which together comprise the world’s largest medical complex — were on pace to exceed their “unsustainable surge capacity” by July 6.

It also followed discussions between Gov. Greg Abbott and hospital executives in which the governor expressed displeasure with negative headlines about ICU capacity. Friday morning, 24 hours after the four CEOs’ press conference, the TMC released no new data. After reporting 17 charts and graphs on most days for three months, the organization did not post from Thursday morning until Saturday at about 9 p.m.
When the charts re-appeared, eight of the 17 original slides had been deleted — including any reference to hospital capacity or projections of future capacity — and the lone remaining slide referencing the risks associated with shrinking capacity had been altered.

That's like saying if I don't weight myself I don't gain weight. Or if I don't take a pregnancy test I'm not pregnant Or if I don't test people they are not sick? The only logic is deception, and hardly the first case of deception we have seen. If I am losing the game I lets just change the rules so it doesn't look like I'm losing. They did lie, they did cheat, and they just got caught.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Houston-hospitals-hit-100-base-ICU-capacity-15372256.php

My favorite line from these condescending pr%$^ks is "TMC leaders are in discussions about how to “best educate” news media and the public on hospital capacity issues." Guess they never taught me to count in engineering school

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ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

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ORIGINAL: fcooke

That's a tough one JD. I think it will be years before we really have the data (accurate that is) to figure out what the best approach to this thing would be. You really cannot lockdown. Still need to buy food unless you are on a farm. It will slow the spread and 'crush the curve', but until there is a vac it will be out there and the heartless part of me says we got to get out there again. And as stated earlier, the vac probably is not coming for a while. Meanwhile all kinds of collateral damage is occurring, and it going to take the over-taxed medical community a while to figure everything out, though as you mentioned, they are learning many things in the crucible.....tough way to learn.

Yes, you can really lockdown. One only need to look at NYC. look at Korea, look at most of Western Europe............They didn't need to be prefect, they just needed to be good. They were good and the results speak for themselves. They are where the rest of the country needs to be. Not perfect, but any uptick can quickly be tamped down until there is a vaccine. Texas and Florida can lockdown again now, or lockdown again later, but there is not other way forward. They tried the easy way. There is not easy way. Infections are higher than they were in March. That is astonishing. That should not have happened. You know what else is years away? Single digit unemployment, manageable deficients, restoration of the economic ruin of many lives and business, economic growth, tourists, nice vacations, safely going to gyms, bars, restaurants, sporing events and movie theaters. But hey, we got haircuts.

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

To BBfanboy: I doubt that's the case. I haven't heard anyone say anything like that. There are levels of responsibility and people defer to hierarchies, which are there for a reason, but to this point I've generally heard, "We'll help if needed and to the extent we can."

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ORIGINAL: Lokasenna

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

To BBfanboy: I doubt that's the case. I haven't heard anyone say anything like that. There are levels of responsibility and people defer to hierarchies, which are there for a reason, but to this point I've generally heard, "We'll help if needed and to the extent we can."

Signals are sent from the top. This fact is a key component of organizational psychology and culture. That's certainly as true of organizations like FEMA as it is for any other organization.

And what's the top doing? Cutting funding for testing and not taking it seriously, trying to wish it away or pretending it doesn't exist, and so on.

There has been no tangible federal response to COVID-19 that is worthy of mention. Please share what you've heard otherwise, as I'd be happy to be wrong... but aside from the CDC website I'm just not seeing it. The feds aren't physically doing anything of note.

What could they be doing? Certainly, for the most part states will have to manage on their own. But the feds could contribute emergency/disaster resources and assets, like the Navy (belatedly) did for NYC with that hospital ship. The feds could've built up a stockpile of ICU/ventilator resources that could travel around the country to wherever the next hot spot is, such as Texas's situation right now, but they didn't. Those in charge seem to have purposefully made the "to the extent that we can" part of your synopsis mean "we can't help you because we don't have the capability."

To that end, where's the massive testing regime? There's no reason that the richest nation in the history of humanity couldn't have created a gigantic testing and contact tracing regime at any point within the last 7 months if it had wanted to, with the resources coming from the federal level, that would have been able to be tapped into by the states as needed - and that would have us returning to a semblance of pre-COVID life sooner than whenever we're on track for now. Which is looking like "not until there's a vaccine."

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ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

Please. Georgia, Maine, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Virginia, Florida and Texas have all been CAUGHT combining Covid tests with Antibody as one "testing result" that overstates the number of actual tests. They changed their reporting after they got caught. That's widespread fudging.
The widespread use of the practice means that it remains difficult to know exactly how much the country’s ability to test people who are actively sick with COVID-19 has improved. The CDC winks and nods and says "oopsie!"
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Ashish Jha, the K. T. Li Professor of Global Health at Harvard and the director of the Harvard Global Health Institute, told us when we described what the CDC was doing. “How could the CDC make that mistake? This is a mess.”
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2020/05/cdc-and-states-are-misreporting-covid-19-test-data-pennsylvania-georgia-texas/611935/

Iowa and Nebraska stop including workers at meatpacking plants because, well, those are "abnormal hots spots " and are skewing the numbers. That's fudging.

Texas changes the rules on counting ICU beds the minute it hits 100%. that is like saying I turned over the odometer in my cars so now I have an new car! That's fudging.

Florida fired their top data scientist because she would not manipulate Covid numbers. Turns out her numbers were right! And look where Florida is now. That's Fudging
Florida has twice the pneumonia deaths in the same period as the last few years which is entirely coincidental with Covid. Another "oopisie" and more fudging.

Georgia had to withdraw and apologize for a graph misrepresenting actual cases and showing the days of the week in the wrong order! (It could happen to anyone, remembering the days of the week is tough). More fudging. https://www.ajc.com/news/state--regional-govt--politics/just-cuckoo-state-latest-data-mishap-causes-critics-cry-foul/182PpUvUX9XEF8vO11NVGO/

Tennessee Covid counting computer suddenly had an "unplanned" outage. It's back up, but they won't be reporting numbers for a now because they don't want to "overload" the computer. More fudging

What you never, ever, see is a State having to apologize for overstating covid numbers. All the "oopsies" seems to go the same way. Undercutting and misreporting how bad things are.

The fact of the matter is state after state has been caught fudging numbers to misrepresent how bad things were so those same states could rush reopening. And no look where those same states are? The entire counties economy is a mess and about to get worse because states fudged numbers so they could reopen too soon. Lots of people made lots of sacrifices including jobs, lives, putting their families at risk, losing business and and their entire livelihoods and futures at risk and the country is now in worse shape then they were in March. 4% of the population, 25% of the death. The country is in terrible, terrible shape. It could have been much better, but states systematically fudged numbers and rushed to reopen.

A global pandemic the likes of which nobody alive has ever seen and we have no Federal method of counting test results? We are relying on each state to use their own methodologies to count cases? A global pandemic screams for a unified national response. We let each state choose their own adventure and look where it got us. Again I ask, what is the unified, national plan to defeat the virus?

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Why should Montana with 19 counties reporting no Covid-19 cases have the same response as New York? UNITED states

The Health Departments are State and Local entities, are you going to do away with those and get a Federal one? What Federal one.? GLOBAL pandemic and the Federal Government has left the building and is not leading, has no national counting methodology and is making no countrywide initiatives to beat the virus.

Did you ever think that some of the results are because of the bureaucratic mindset?

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ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

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Why should Montana with 19 counties reporting no Covid-19 cases have the same response as New York? UNITED states

The Health Departments are State and Local entities, are you going to do away with those and get a Federal one? What Federal one.? GLOBAL pandemic and the Federal Government has left the building and is not leading, has no national counting methodology and is making no countrywide initiatives to beat the virus.

Did you ever think that some of the results are because of the bureaucratic mindset?

Oh absolutely the are the result of one particular bureaucratic mindset. One particular mindset indeed. And that particulate mindset has put their head in sand and painted a false rosy picture in the hopes that the virus would go away. How is that working?

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Georgia was not "CAUGHT" fudging numbers, as John D implies. It did make a mistake in tabulating numbers several months ago, readily acknowledged doing so, and corrected it.

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ORIGINAL: mind_messing

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Georgia was not "CAUGHT" fudging numbers, as John D implies. It did make a mistake in tabulating numbers several months ago, readily acknowledged doing so, and corrected it.

See post #315

As of the time of posting this, viral and antibody tests are STILL being reported under the same total, despite being for clearly different purposes.

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ORIGINAL: RangerJoe

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ORIGINAL: Lokasenna

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ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

To BBfanboy: I doubt that's the case. I haven't heard anyone say anything like that. There are levels of responsibility and people defer to hierarchies, which are there for a reason, but to this point I've generally heard, "We'll help if needed and to the extent we can."

Signals are sent from the top. This fact is a key component of organizational psychology and culture. That's certainly as true of organizations like FEMA as it is for any other organization.

And what's the top doing? Cutting funding for testing and not taking it seriously, trying to wish it away or pretending it doesn't exist, and so on.

There has been no tangible federal response to COVID-19 that is worthy of mention. Please share what you've heard otherwise, as I'd be happy to be wrong... but aside from the CDC website I'm just not seeing it. The feds aren't physically doing anything of note.

What could they be doing? Certainly, for the most part states will have to manage on their own. But the feds could contribute emergency/disaster resources and assets, like the Navy (belatedly) did for NYC with that hospital ship. The feds could've built up a stockpile of ICU/ventilator resources that could travel around the country to wherever the next hot spot is, such as Texas's situation right now, but they didn't. Those in charge seem to have purposefully made the "to the extent that we can" part of your synopsis mean "we can't help you because we don't have the capability."

To that end, where's the massive testing regime? There's no reason that the richest nation in the history of humanity couldn't have created a gigantic testing and contact tracing regime at any point within the last 7 months if it had wanted to, with the resources coming from the federal level, that would have been able to be tapped into by the states as needed - and that would have us returning to a semblance of pre-COVID life sooner than whenever we're on track for now. Which is looking like "not until there's a vaccine."

California had a large stockpile of equipment but five million dollars per year was too much to maintain it. New York city had a stockpile, it disappeared before this time as well. Why should it be up to the Federal government?