So, we are at 17k new cases over the last three days. That’s a bit more than the double compared with last monday. Since at least four/five weeks, we are on a steady curve which sees the number of new cases double every week. No signs of any change.
The authorities refuse to implement a lockdown so far. They want to try everything else first (more systematic use of the mask), but I doubt that it will bring much. In spite of a serious turn of the screw since a couple of weeks, there are no signs of any slow down of that curve. Hospitalisations and sadly, deaths, are following the exact same tendency. It quietly doubles each week, with a lag of two weeks for the hospitalisations, and three/four weeks for the deaths, starting from a low level thankfully.
Going by that rate, we will have slightly less than 100 deaths per day in four weeks, as we are roughly at 12 deaths per day right now. But only if the hospitals can cope with what is thrown at them currently: some hospitals are already transferring patients to other areas because they are overcharged.
Also, the epidemics starts to become far more personal lately. I know a fair few people who either have got it, have someone in their family who has it, or are in quarantine for having had a contact with someone who got it. Until lately, everything was far more abstract.
That being said, all people I know who got it have had no symptoms at all or only mild symptoms (for instance loss of the sense of smell for a time, one or two days of fever etc.) and healed quite easily, also more elderly people. The only person of which I have heard of who has more serious symptoms is an old gentlemen of 90+ who had already some health issues before getting covid-19. He’s still in hospital as far as I know.
Your in Switzerland aren’t you Hope?
I’m really worried about the ski season for France. If they don’t do something soon it could get extremely bad. Summer then schools back and then ski resorts is just piling too much on top of each other.
I’m not following really what ‘restrictions’ might be in place for ski resorts however I would not be surprised if they try to keep them open as near normal as possible (there’s a lot of money there). Italy, Austria, France and Switzerland in for more.
Yup. And you are right about the ski season, alpine areas here are the ones implementing the toughest rules in the country currently, because they want to be clean before Christmas, in order to be able to have a full ski season.
In my humble opinion, this is merely a sweet pipe dream, but ‘qui vivra verra’ I guess.
The problem I see is the virus is amonst the popular classes now which mean the seasonal workers. Last year it really was just with in the tourists and we saw what happened.
Been looking at what provisional measures for the ski season are going to be - it will be tough for resort owners to make it work. Long lift lines, because no sharing the lifts. Change rooms closed, so no income from bars and cafeteria. No at the hill purchase of lift tickets, working on a reservation system.
Despite all that, I think there is a good chance we will go, because there is nothing else for the kids to do other than be in front of a screen.
You also added [quote]Sure, but I’m talking about the PCR type, which I think is the more accurate one? Some are now turning these type test results around in 90 minutes I think, compared with 24-48 hours that was previously the quickest turnaround?
I think there are potentially tests that are even quicker (10 minutes or less) but those are the less reliable ones that are not detecting rna?[/quote]
Some time ago now however I didn’t know about these things yet was interested.
For information there is now a 15 minute test available in France (costs €15 plus €15 for the pharmacist to do it for you). It takes swabs from the nose however is an immune system test, not PCR and takes 15 minutes.
the problem is that it is only viable between 4 and 10 days after onset of symptoms. If it comes back negative to verify you need to do a PCR test (to be sure).
My son who as you might remember is a phamacist has just recently been ‘taught’ how to ‘administer’ this test and was telling me about it this weekend.
I would think such tests are being made available in other countries though probably not the exact same one. Found it interesting as it used nose swab so mucus secretions (like for PCR) but is testing for antibodies.
I look at that graphic, see Canada and then look at the UK.
If you’ve done poorly what the hell have we done? I dont think anyone comes out of this without any economic harm but I guess the question is what is considered par?
We are in the mediocre middle, the B student in the upper left quadrant, but only just. The UK is just downright poor, the bottom right quadrant of getting nothing correct.
You mean New Zealand’s? I think that is a function of the island property. They were able to isolate more effectively than Canada, thus reducing the death rate, but at comparably greater expense to the economy for the number of cases.
The one I keep looking at is Denmark. The ratlickers talk relentlessly about Sweden, never about Denmark. But what is remarkable about the Denmark-Sweden comparison is that there is no trade-off. Same economic outcome, more death. No slope/marginal cost argument.
Par probably is the Portugal-Canada-Ireland belt. What makes me unimpressed by Canada’s performance is that per capita, I believe Canada has spent more than just about anyone. For the price we will be paying, I want more left or more up on that graph.
In as afar these arguments never die, they just morph, the success of Sweden, at least among those who accept the actual data rather than their imagined data, is that they simply culled the heard quicker and now have a fit and immune population that will bounce back quicker to create a thriving economy.
I think the fascinating thing is that even in a country like the US your national statistics can get warped by one localized out of control outbreak. Doesnt that explain a significant part of Canada’s issue? Basically you can do the right things, but if one locality with a large enough population gets it wrong…
First wave, definitely. Mortality was disproportionately in Quebec, mainly Montreal. Second wave is more generalized, but the overall deaths per 1M statistic is still dominated by the events of the Spring. Most of the country just got September badly wrong - local estimates for R show aggressive action then could have paid dividends, perhaps even earlier to facilitate opening schools. Locally at least, R peaked at 1.39 on September 11, got it below 1 on October 2 and it has stayed there - but the absolute number of cases was allowed to get too far first.
We need to stick to the business, hospitalizations are trending downward, but it is not hard to envision a much worse scenario. Acute care occupancy is at 97%, ICU at 83%. A week more at the September run rate would have seen crisis.
So the number of antibodies being detected in testsing has dropped between June and September, but what the article doesn’t say is how many of those tested in June were part of the testing in September. I imagine that would play a fairly key role in knowing if that claim is true as that could be a fairly important factor in future plans of how to best cope with Coronavirus.
If antibodies does infact decrease in such a rapid time, then the governments original plan for herd immunity is completely useless. But that would only be known if those having had coronavirus or testing positive to the antibodies are supject to further testing later on.
