COVID-19 | science, damage limitation, NO POLITICS

[faberryman]

Say you have a cruise with 2000 people: test them all before boarding, say 24 hours before. Of course there is a residual risk of someone who got negative result becoming infected 1 hour before boarding, but that is a small risk. Simple and effective.

Or you could say to yourself that perhaps now is not the best time to go on a cruise. Simple and effective.

[Paulo Bizarro]

Tests are not 100% accurate. Something like a 15% false negative rate.

Sure. But much better than not testing.

[Paulo Bizarro]

The last two posts are examples why everyone has difficulty in knowing what to do.  Mistakes are made because the "truth" is hard to get a handle on.  In America, we have 50 governors and one president who think they know what to do.  Add to that the medical and economic communities.  So everyone is doing it slightly differently or on a different timetable.  The truth is there's is no exact answer.  Health priorities are opposed to economic priorities.  You can't satisfy both areas simultaneously.  We're all shooting craps.

It is not difficult knowing what to do. Test travellers is what is required to do. Of course there is no 100%accuracy, but 85 % is better than letting travellers board planes or boats with no testing. Implementing some basic effective public health rules is simple. Those rules allow health and economy to walk alongside. If a surge occurs, or second wave, authorities simply need to be prepared to handle them.

A clear message from the parties in government is required, from national to state level. People's lifes are more important than egotistical priorities.

[Paulo Bizarro]

Or you could say to yourself that perhaps now is not the best time to go on a cruise. Simple and effective.

Sure. But that has no bearing on what the policy wrt travelling should be. Right now, in the EU, testing is required for airplane travel, cruise ships should be the same.

[Alan Klein]

Right now, here in central New Jersey, the tropical storm Isaias is starting to hit.  Some things, you have to batten down the hatches and ride it out.  There's not much you can do.  There is no exact answer that will cure the problem. Covid 19 is like that.  It's a terrible plague that is hurting us medically and economically as well as socially and politically.  Whatever we do will not eliminate the disastrous effects.  Insisting you know the correct plan to conquer it is a fool's errand.

[faberryman]

Right now, here in central New Jersey, the tropical storm Isaias is starting to hit.  Some things, you have to batten down the hatches and ride it out.  There's not much you can do.  There is no exact answer that will cure the problem. Covid 19 is like that.  It's a terrible plague that is hurting us medically and economically as well as socially and politically.  Whatever we do will not eliminate the disastrous effects.  Insisting you know the correct plan to conquer it is a fool's errand.

Don't get your panties in a bunch. It's a routine tropical storm, not a hurricane. Obviously a local problem.

[hogloff]

Right now, here in central New Jersey, the tropical storm Isaias is starting to hit.  Some things, you have to batten down the hatches and ride it out.  There's not much you can do.  There is no exact answer that will cure the problem. Covid 19 is like that.  It's a terrible plague that is hurting us medically and economically as well as socially and politically.  Whatever we do will not eliminate the disastrous effects.  Insisting you know the correct plan to conquer it is a fool's errand.

But there are many examples of what needs to be done to fight this virus...many successful examples of countries doing it right. Insisting on doing the same thing that has got you into this mess is truly a fool's errand.

[Alan Klein]

Don't get your panties in a bunch. It's a routine tropical storm, not a hurricane. Obviously a local problem.

Well it's a problem for us.   We just lost power.

[faberryman]

Well it's a problem for us.   We just lost power.

Be patient. It will come back on. I lose power practically every time it rains. There are a lot of trees around here.

Think of how great you have it. You are not worried about how you are going to pay your rent or feed your family. Just pretend you are camping.

By the way, before losing power, was Trump on TV with a map and a Sharpie showing where the storm was headed? Alabama perhaps?

[hogloff]

Well it's a problem for us.   We just lost power.

I as in Tansania for 3 weeks. We lost power daily, many times a day for extended time. We lost water daily, many times a day for extended times. It was a very care occurance th have power and water on at the same time...so no hot water.

Sometimes we need to travel to other parts of this world to know how blessed we are at hone.

[Alan Klein]

Well we are very blessed.  But my wife still wants to get an emergency generator.  😎

[Jeremy Roussak]

Sure. But much better than not testing.

Perhaps. It depends on how much confidence is placed in a negative result that might well (some reports suggest 30%) be false and how one is expected to react to a negative test.

Jeremy

[Alan Klein]

Worse will be the efficacy of any vaccines.   The seasonal flu vaccine is around 40% effective.  Let's say the Covid vaccine is 50%. How much confidence will you have traveling in a plane or on a ship if you got the vaccine?  For an old guy like me,  those aren't very good odds.  So how much will behavior change? Frankly the only way we'll get back to normal is when the virus goes away.

[faberryman]

The seasonal flu vaccine is around 40% effective.

Those odds sound awfully pessimistic. Do you have a link?

Let's say the Covid vaccine is 50%. How much confidence will you have traveling in a plane or on a ship if you got the vaccine?  For an old guy like me,  those aren't very good odds.  So how much will behavior change?

Some people are more risk adverse than others, so judgments about air and sea travel will vary quite a bit.

Frankly the only way we'll get back to normal is when the virus goes away.

The COVID-19 virus is not going anywhere, so things will never get back to "normal." People will just have to make adjustments in their lives.

[Paulo Bizarro]

Perhaps. It depends on how much confidence is placed in a negative result that might well (some reports suggest 30%) be false and how one is expected to react to a negative test.

Jeremy

True. One way to deal with that is step it up a notch and do 2 tests either to confirm positive or to confirm negative. This is being done in Portugal for all participants in football matches (2 tests).

[Paulo Bizarro]

Worse will be the efficacy of any vaccines.   The seasonal flu vaccine is around 40% effective.  Let's say the Covid vaccine is 50%. How much confidence will you have traveling in a plane or on a ship if you got the vaccine?  For an old guy like me,  those aren't very good odds.  So how much will behavior change? Frankly the only way we'll get back to normal is when the virus goes away.

Again, better than 0%. And no, the virus will not go away. It will become endemic in the population. I would have no problem travelling on a plane. On a cruise ship, no money for that...

[kers]

True. One way to deal with that is step it up a notch and do 2 tests either to confirm positive or to confirm negative. This is being done in Portugal for all participants in football matches (2 tests).

So you can ask yourself ; why don't they do it for everybody...:
too much work- not enough manhours
too much costs... i believe 150 € a test
not enough testkits ...
then it provides only a valid answer for a very limited time. So a very costly operation.
It could help if you could do a test of every citizen at one time and then put the positives in quarantaine.
They did that in China i believe.

[Alan Goldhammer]

Worse will be the efficacy of any vaccines.   The seasonal flu vaccine is around 40% effective.  Let's say the Covid vaccine is 50%. How much confidence will you have traveling in a plane or on a ship if you got the vaccine? 

The seasonal influenza vaccine varies in efficacy because of viral mutation.  CDC makes an educated guess in January about what types of flu strains will be circulating in the fall/winter months.  they provide this information to the manufacturers who manufacture the vaccine.  If the guess is wrong or there is a new mutation the vaccine will not work as well.  Most recent influenza vaccines have more than one strain.  It is also complicated by the embyonated egg manufacturing process.  COVID-19 vaccines are quite different as the virus is now well known and we know what type of antigen needs to be expressed in the vaccine.  the difficulty is that we have a variety of different approaches and the two newest gene based vaccines do not have a commercial track record.  Fortunately, we have some traditional protein and attenuated or inactivated viral vaccines also being developed.  I am optimistic that we will have a good vaccine for COVID-19 but I don't know at this point which will be the best one.

If we do get a vaccine it will take several months before enough people are vaccinated and herd immunity is achieved.  Most of the vaccines in trials right now require two injections at a 28 day interval for full antibody response.  You can do the math to see how long this will take. 

[Alan Goldhammer]

Perhaps. It depends on how much confidence is placed in a negative result that might well (some reports suggest 30%) be false and how one is expected to react to a negative test.

Jeremy

I don't think the testing situation is this bleak.  Every day I see new approaches to testing that have very high specificity and sensitivity.  The difficulty is getting some of these rolled out at commercial scale.  Serology tests are complicated in that some recovered SARS-CoV-2 infected patients, particularly younger ones, do not mount a major antibody response and hence test negative.

[hogloff]

So you can ask yourself ; why don't they do it for everybody...:
too much work- not enough manhours
too much costs... i believe 150 € a test
not enough testkits ...
then it provides only a valid answer for a very limited time. So a very costly operation.
It could help if you could do a test of every citizen at one time and then put the positives in quarantaine.
They did that in China i believe.

Basically anyone who tests positive in Canada needs to be quarantined. That's just smart. Here in BC there is also contact tracing and all contacts are asked to self quarantine.