I 100% think that the Cal state system has made the right call, and that we need a critical mass of colleges and universities to follow suit. But I also don't think that will happen in most places.
Wouldn't it be nice to live in a country with a real government, like South Korea? My office is probably reopening in June, and unless I do the 28 mile round trip on my bike five days a week, which I've never managed before (I've tended to get tired and sore if I try to do more than three round trips a week) I'm on the subway for an hour each way.
I'll probably be fine when I catch it, I'm (barely) under fifty and healthy. But I really wish I had the option not to.
My wife is probably going back to work in about 3 weeks. In retail. In central London. I have to admit, that isn't filling me/us with joy.
I'm probably going to be home all summer because nobody I work with wants to go to the office anyway.
Jammies and I are agonizing over the smallest of decisions: can the kids play with the neighbor kid outside? should I hire my haircutter friend to come give haircuts on the porch?* And the scale of these decisions is just swamped by the failure of responsible leadership and safety precautions from the top.
* I pushed for this. She's coming this morning. But we debated this for so, so long.
If it weren't for a very reasonable fear of Pittsburgh drivers, I could bike to the office pretty easily. It's three miles, though with two big hills. Maybe if I strapped one of those empty RPG tubes to my back, I would get space?
6: Yes. Everything is fucked and trying to compensate by individual behavior is doomed.
7: We've discussed this. Carry a broomstick width-wise in your mouth. Do keep up.
Get a RadRunner or a RadCity. 28 miles a day on that is nothing- I (used to) do 13 miles a day and don't even sweat unless I decide to turn down the assist to get more exercise.
They have no plan. Except to force the CDC to undercount fatalities. This is criminal.
I mean, in still doing my best to be a good citizen and not put other people at risk, but I'm doing it because if someone come to me died after I got sick and recovered, if feel awful and not because it will be effective in a societal level.
Eve really likes her ebike and was using it for a similar commute during the beforetimes. (I guess only 18 miles roundtrip).
Steve Jobs really missed out by not making an iBike.
My son's teacher just ended a zoom meeting with "Next week, same Bat-time, same Bat-channel."
NOT ONLY DID YOU GET THE VICTORY, BUT YOU MANAGED TO FRAME US!
*highly* recommend an electric assist bike, lb. will completely change your relationship to using a bike to cover most distances within an urban area. i'm using mine to do our weekly/bi-weekly big shop as well, the shop isn't far but the bus line to and from is suspended and non-essential folks are supposed to stay off the buses at any rate. with the electric assist on the bike the shopping is completely not a problem even if particularly heavy.
I did put that in my original timeline. That by fall, we'll all be bored of this and it will just be the new leading cause of death that we ignore like all the other leading causes of death.
Electric bike thirded or fourthed or whatever. It's not necessary for my length of commute, but it means I don't have to bring a change of clothes. Only problem is they're expensive, and usually quite a bit heavier than comparable acoustic bikes.
Not caring what other people think about your stench is free.
How do they charge? Just plug in the battery to a charger at night?
Yes it just has a charger that plugs in to the wall, with an adapter slightly larger than a laptop charger. Most of them have a removable battery so you can charge it away from the bike.
There are quite a few options in the $1000 range. The Rad lines are 1200-1500 but include a lot of accessories you usually have to add on to regular bikes- odometer, headlight, taillight, brake lights, fenders. All lights run off the main battery, some models have a USB port to charge a phone while you ride too.
Depends on the model. Mine has a removable battery, comes with a charger that plugs into the mains. Some you have to plug in while still on the bike
Speaking of cycling commutes, one of the very few upsides of this whole situation is that they're accelerating the construction of a segregated cycle lane along the direct route to my work. I already had a fairly quick route along a "quietway", but this will make certain shorter journeys much safer, and the commute a little quicker.
They're also apparently going to ban cars from much of the City, from June, potentially permanently.
But what if the socket is down near the floor and you have to lean way over?
wide range of price, power, charging options, just types of electric assist bikes out there. if you are tempted by higher end, check out the video reviews by (milky realm longtime friends of family) the new wheel here in sf: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCP7dp9QxGSNvk3vRjlkHfWw
even if their bikes seem out of reach pricey, the videos are still very good for getting you up to speed on the different options out there, many of which have lower price range versions. also karen and brett are lovely lovely people.
I seem to recall that it's a piece of ancient unfogged wisdom that all threads eventually become bike threads.
AS I was walking all alane
I heard twa corbies making a mane:
The tane unto the tither did say,
'Whar sall we gang and dine the day?'
'--In behint yon auld fail dyke
I wot there lies a new-slain knight;
And naebody kens that he lies there
But his hawk, his hound, and his lady fair.
'His hound is to the hunting gane,
His hawk to fetch the wild-fowl hame,
His lady 's ta'en anither mate,
So we may mak our dinner sweet.
'Ye'll sit on his white hause-bane,
And I'll pike out his bonny blue e'en:
Wi' ae lock o' his gowden hair
We'll theek our nest when it grows bare.
'Mony a one for him maks mane,
But nane sall ken whar he is gane:
O'er his white banes, when they are bare,
The wind sall blaw for evermair.'
I'm having trouble making that scan to "Does anybody really know what time it is?"
30 Or swimming threads in ye olde days.
Call ajay, he'll sort you right out.
And I thought Scottish Twitter was hard to read.
Case counts and death counts over here seem to be declining remarkably smoothly: https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/
At present we should be down below 1000 cases per day and below 400 deaths a day by Sunday, and - on the present trend - zero deaths by mid June.
AS I was walking all alane (alone)
I heard twa corbies (two crows) making a mane: (talking to each other)
The tane unto the tither (the one to the other) did say,
'Whar sall we gang (where shall we go) and dine the day?'
'--In behint yon auld fail dyke (behind that old wall)
I wot (know) there lies a new-slain knight;
And naebody kens that he lies there
But his hawk, his hound, and his lady fair.
'His hound is to the hunting gane,
His hawk to fetch the wild-fowl hame,
His lady 's ta'en anither mate,
So we may mak our dinner sweet.
'Ye'll sit on his white hause-bane, (spine)
And I'll pike out his bonny blue e'en: (pick out his eyes)
Wi' ae lock (with a lock) o' his gowden (golden) hair
We'll theek (patch) our nest when it grows bare.
'Mony a one for him maks mane, (many people mourn him)
But nane sall ken whar he is gane: (none of them will know where he's gone)
O'er his white banes, when they are bare,
The wind sall blaw for evermair.'
declining remarkably smoothly
You're looking at the black "rolling average" line -- selected by the chart-makers to smooth the data to show the trend. The blue bars are the underlying data, which are jumpy for reasons that may have nothing to do with underlying reality.
I can only assume you are joking about the trend leading toward no deaths by mid-June, but I find it extraordinarily hard to make any sense out of the data at all. It seems to me that charts like this one actually understate the downward trend, since one might assume that case and death counts would get more accurate as time goes on -- meaning the peak was actually much higher, and the current toll is only a bit higher than the data show.
But who can say? Not me.
37:. Who killed the knight? I think it was "his lady fair".
His hunting beasts are out working. It was Dick Cheney.
No new cases again, on 697 tests. Down to 3 active hospitalizations, and 15 active cases. No one has died in weeks, I don't think: only 16 deaths altogether. Obviously, if/when the tourists come, things will change. Our fall tourists, though, are mostly hunters, I think. I won't be surprised if all sorts of outfitters -- including rafting in the summer -- just get whacked this year.
On the east, Glacier National Park borders the Blackfeet Nation, which speaks with real moral authority on the effects of the casual spread of infectious diseases. My prediction is that NPS does a lot to discourage visitation to Glacier this year, as they are already doing. https://flatheadbeacon.com/2020/05/13/a-culture-at-stake/ (The wife is impatient for CSKT to open up its lakes and mountain areas, which are good spots for boating and wildlife photography. Yeah, well, they'll take their time as well. That closure won't really impact tourism overall, because no one knows what gems these areas are. Don't tell anyone!)
We also get out-of-state visitors in our wildfire season -- not tourists but firefighters -- as well as having in-state crews go to other places, when needed, and mingling with other crews. Apparently, USDA had a report on this, but it's being re-done.
I suspect the UCs will follow suit. Also the elite universities with endowments that can survive the resulting drop in enrollment. But yeah, still a small chunk. And it will be decades for the institutions to recover.
I'm wondering if a 5-9 alternativng schedule can help with the schools. It will be a pain in the ass to schedule for most high schools.
I found a new COVID possibility to worry about today. What if a number countries succeed in completely eliminating COVID and it becomes endemic here, and Americans are just banned from travel to Australia (without a 2 week quarantine) forever?
Norway probably. The good Korea? The good China?
48: US/Canada border is going to be tricky soon.
If they're going to re-open the border, they should act quickly, while Miller is still in quarantine.
If Canada is closed, I want a summer vacation to Vermont.
Given the ongoing housing crisis, if the UCs/CSUs all have a virtual fall semester, the private student housing will fill up with non-students and may become non-recoverable.
The universities could have students build new housing out of cob.
At least in the warmer, dry parts of the state.
If only there were some excuse to have the labor-intensive Us construction sector build a bunch of new housing.
Maybe I should just go to upstate New York. Nature with less driving.
Maybe Maine? I've heard New Hampshire is mostly assholes.
Not Rand Paul-level assholes, but still.
I am definitely home through the end of June, and I think they are keeping most of us at home for a while, since I can do a lot of work remotely. They want to limit the density in the hospitals and at corporate. They are fully aware of how bad COVID can be.
I found a new COVID possibility to worry about today. What if a number countries succeed in completely eliminating COVID and it becomes endemic here, and Americans are just banned from travel to Australia (without a 2 week quarantine) forever?
That is definitely going to happen. Not banned overall but required a week of quarantine at least. That's the situation in many places now, albeit applying to all travelers - no nation trusts that it has been actually eliminated anywhere.
||
An Austrian law ties some benefits for foreign workers to the cost of living in home countries.Assholes.
62: it's pretty well accepted now but will become politically difficult when places start differentiating on country of origin/contact.
related: https://twitter.com/laurelchor/status/1260784481159442434
At the beginning of March I was feeling a sense of despair when I realized the response was not going to be adequate to support people financially. Then at the beginning of May I felt despair again when I realized other countries are able to not just "flatten" the curve to avoid overwhelming hospitals, but in fact reduce the number of cases to a trackable level, but our response was not coming anywhere near to that and there was not even an effort to ramp up tracking and quarantining people AWAY from their families, except on the local level.
But some people are feeling too much despair. The idea that we destroyed the economy for 2 months and got nothing out if it is just wrong.
- production of tests and protective equipment was ramped up, despite the federal government
- we know a lot better what things are safe and unsafe. Outdoors is basically safe unless there are packed crowds sitting in one spot for a long time, or you get coughed on by an actual sick person. The things opening up again are not things where lots of people sit indoors steadily talking for for an hour or more near each other, or things where mask wearing is difficult, except restaurants. I would bet during the summer 80% of cases outside nursing homes and meatpacking plants are now going to be spread in restaurants.
- most people now are OK with wearing masks all the time. This was inconceivable in February. Before I never saw a single person on the street in a given year wearing a mask, except elderly Asian ladies and maybe a cancer patient in a wheelchair.
- we know that the spread has a lot of randomness to it. New York being worst affected may seem obvious, but not New York being affected exponentially worse than everywhere else. Why were Philly and Baltimore exponentially less affected? I think "superspreader" individuals play a huge role. It won't spread like wildfire everywhere. May make it easier to track.
- we know better what the symptoms are for when people do get symptoms, e.g. it is not just something to treat with invasive ventilation, the vascular system may be as important as the lungs
- we know the increased risk associated with old age is even greater than we thought. Now everyone is pointing fingers about why efforts at preventing the spread were not focused on nursing homes, and to a lesser extent getting old people to stay inside and have everything delivered. The usual idiots are blaming Andrew Cuomo for this as well but all over the country nursing homes are being terribly affected. The main answer is "they are run for profit" but more could have been done.
Always look on the bright side of life.
> May make it easier to track.
You are right in 65 that there have been a number of good things developing, and better information. The most concerning thing, I think, is that although pressure is building to "reopen" the economy there hasn't been anything like a rational plan for tracking and testing provided that I've seen, and currently the testing capabilities seem to be well below the minimum need to make that viable, at least in many places.
65: That's all true, but it's not easing my panic about the fall. Are these things sufficient to keep it safe-ish in the fall?
No! Corpses will collect like cordwood!
I worry about that. I think that regardless of how bad it gets, in close enough with a prominent enough local mortician to get mom buried next to dad regardless.
67 to 68
Most likely, not without better test and trace.
Or I guess a pretty aggressive "rolling blackouts" approach to localized lockdowns.
You elected a fascist! Corpsewood! It's baked in!
baking with corpsewood may cause flavor, texture, and taste variations
62: I knew that'd be the case in the near future, but what I hadn't thought through was maybe it will be like that forever? Maybe not though, it's not like Australia is willing to have those rules for the UK forever, right?
Just discovered you should not microwave a fabric mask that has flannel in it.
Uhh, is there a reason to microwave any mask?
It's The amuse-bouche for the face he's eating and he wants to bring it up to temp.
I sneezed in it so I figured it was a good way to do a quick sterilization. I have other masks without flannel that microwave just fine.
How many of you are cutting your own hair? lourdes and I haven't paid for a haircut since 2012 or so, and little K's hair is of a mysteriously slow-growing, self-maintaining nature, so I'd kind of forgotten that seeing hairstylists was a thing. (My hair is wavy enough to hide uneven trims, so I just make a loose ponytail and chop it once a year. Idgaf. You can pry this particular privilege from my cold, dead hands.)
But not so stupid that it would not look worse if I cut it.
We are going to get take out tonight. First unfrozen, prepared food we'll have had since March.
81: My wife says I look "like some crazy 70s dude". I don't think that was intended as a compliment.
I've been ribbing M for weeks about how shaggy he's gotten, and teasing that he should just let me give him a haircut, because nothing I do could make his hair look worse than it does now. He has adamantly refused. And then yesterday suddenly he said he couldn't stand it anymore, and ordered a set of haircutting tools online. My bluff has been called! I have NO IDEA how to cut hair, and based on the shipping and delivery estimate, I have like three days to learn? Fuck.
You just get a bowl, put it on his head, and cut what sticks out.
I mean, he's reasonably realistic about this. He bought clippers too, so that if (when?) I screw up, he can just shave it all off.
I think there's some basic principle where you go slowly and incrementally, so you don't end up in the cycle of trying to even things up until all the hair is gone. If you want to take an inch off, target half an inch since you'll invariably overshoot it. Maybe? My hair is pretty much optimized for hiding bad cuts.
Those feathering scissors always seemed appealing.
65: New York is a huge incredibly dense city. The difference between Boston and Philadelphia is fascinating to me.
The thing is, M is traumatized by a childhood of haircuts inflicted by his father, who has some kind of ADD/OCD/perfectionism disorder. His dad would snip off a millimeter of hair at a time, step back to carefully consider the effect, and snip again, etc., for hours and hours and hours. So whatever else this haircut is, it has to be fast.
I mean, this is going to be terrifying, and hilarious.
Two of my colleagues have Trek ebikes. They feel smug as they pass me on my bike up the hill. I feel smug because I'm hauling my daughter in a trailer. Everyone gets outside and everyone wins. But buy quickly! According to the local bike stores here they can't keep anything in stock as everyone wants to ride a bike in the pandemic.
The fastest way is to light the hair on fire and then put the bowl on the head when it is mostly the right length.
I cut my own hair earlier this pandemic. "Unicorn haircut method" is your YouTube Google and I even cut in layers. Great for curly hair.
I guess I could start with a home perm.
65:. I haven't been out much but I'd estimate under 30% for masks here. Agreed with the rest, but universities and schools are the last institutions that will get back to normal.
Bars will take a long time to get back to normal. If that's even possible. I'm sad about that.
But tennis courts are open! I'm nervously happy about that. My normal running loop in the park reopened yesterday but I was too scared to go.
Honestly, my usual bar still allowed smoking. It was not a place for the health conscious is what I'm saying.
I got Conair clippers (long wait on Amazon, but they came) and brought my mop to max 1cm all around. It was a great improvement.
We joined the local tennis club last year- despite being in a snooty part of town it's not that expensive- and they're planning to open as soon as next week depending on what the governor allows. There are going to be some rules about who you're allowed to play with and maybe only doubles with people from your household but we should be able to play as we normally do, two adults and two kids.
Remember how a while back I asked you all to talk me down from worrying about no longer having a functioning democratic state? Things aren't getting better.
Michigan Cancels Legislative Session to Avoid Armed Protesters
That's not at all good, but it's worth remembering the only reason they can't just bad guns from the building is because Republicans control the legislature. Since the governor is a Democrat, it's not like the legislature was going to make things better.
I don't care what decisions they were going to make. PEOPLE WITH GUNS WERE ALLOWED TO SIT IN THE VISITORS GALLERY WHILE THE SENATE WAS IN SESSION. Instead of keeping out the guns, they're ending the session. That is not how the fuck democracy works.
Yes, it's spineless in a way that is incompatible with freedom.
96: Fascinating! You're in northern Utah, right? In SLC I'd guess it's more like 70%. Like 95% compliance in Whole Foods, 70% in Trader Joe's, and 60% in Smith's.
This is why the future is ours.
My hair is terrible. A few years ago I decided that I was never going to get the hang of doing anything appealing with long hair, and settled on a shaggy short haircut roughly along the lines of David Cassidy in the early seventies. I even have a steady 'stylist' -- a Russian woman who works in a Wall Street barbershop who does a terrific job for $25, except that she spends the whole time yelling at me for poor eyebrow grooming and failure to dye to hide my greying. But two months after my last cut, it's just a mess and there's no way I'm going to layer it around my face the way I like at home.
65: yes.
80: yes! did a layered, asymmetric bob for the opinionated academic and de-mulletized my own. it can be done!
Newt is looking like a Eurotrash villain from an eighties action movie -- his hair was at the long end of a standard men's cut when things shut down, and now it's pushed straight back in a way that makes him look like he's going to take hostages in an Austrian accent.
It's kind of shocking how off the deep end Michigan has become.
I know. Even all the things they said about it in Ohio weren't that bad.
The songs were always thin on details as to what was wrong with Michigan.
But "Michigan Militia" was a term in the public discourse back when Clinton was president.
119: That's true -- I had forgotten about that.
"Jackbooted Tugs" would be a good name for a right-wing massage parlor.
They provided support to McVeigh, right? I think they just used to stay on the other side of the state and not occupy the capital.
116: Just a border and/or some water away, fucking pandemonium. I literally hope Dane County closes its borders. (Sorry, rest of Wisconsin. Sorry, my aunt in the northwoods. Sorry everyone in Madison who doesn't want to spend the entire goddamn summer in Madison. It may not be widely known how bad the lakes are in Madison; they are Poor Quality Lakes. I miss them.)
I'm so glad right now that I grew my hair out a while ago. It needs to be cut, but shoulder length and a bit longer doesn't look bad. I want a pedicure so badly. I am so worried about the people at the nail salon. The whole family is in the nail business, so I don't know what other income they would have, and I don't know that they would have been savvy enough to get a loan.
Tim's hair is awful.
We are supposedly starting to open on the 18th, but I'm not even sure what that means.
I actually first drafted 116 to include Wisconsin! Then I pared it back.
I've grown a goatee due to the quarantine. My hair is pretty shaggy and I'm thinking about some new options for it. As for work, my office had a webinar or whatever about reopening. Lots of reassurances but no details or date yet. Earlier this week Atossa's summer camp/daycare announced that they were still tentatively planning to open on schedule, which means June 22nd. I figure as long as I can work from home until then, the only thing I have to worry about is my sanity.
My office is indoors with bad circulation, but on the other hand with little human contact, and I normally bike to work. I might volunteer to go into the office early if I have the option.
I got a haircut just before the sip order. I'm not shaving very often, on the theory that my straggly face distracts from my unkempt hair.
I have not had a haircut this decade.
I find AJ's long hair kind of cute. It's a bit floppy but nice. He usually wears it pretty short, so being months late for a haircut has left him still looking kempt. My hair is long and straight, so it basically looks like it always does, just with a few split ends. I think my last haircut was in fall.
Michigan is weird. AJ, who grew up here, keeps reminding me that the state was one of the most compliant in following stay-home orders, dropping travel something like 80%. I think the protestors are basically a repeat of the 90s era fringe "Michigan Militia," funded and encouraged by far right groups. In Grand Rapids, we have the DeVos/Prince family, as well as annual GOP big deal meetings. These ridiculous assholes are generally tolerated with the polite fiction that they are hunting enthusiasts or well-meaning eccentrics who love personal freedom. I would hope all those protestors get sick, but our health care system can't support more than the smallest outbreaks.
122: The capital is kind of in the middle - it's about an hour's drive from Grand Rapids and 1.5 h from Detroit. It's easy for the crazies to show up there.
I was thinking there had to be some useful reason the state is split in half by a lake.
That's why one lake gets to split the state and the other lake gets to pick the first slice of the state.
I had already gone to seed. I appreciate that the quarantine is bringing others down to my level.
Riding bikes regular and electric around SF has become far more pleasant since COVID because there are so many fewer cars.
Nice comparison of a bunch of Asian countries.
Like 95% compliance in Whole Foods, 70% in Trader Joe's, and 60% in Smith's.
What are you doing in Smith's when there's a Harmons downtown?
131/132, Michigan and Wisconsin are two states!
135: we cannot waste this moment! (we will, tragically, waste this moment) we need to waive ceqa goddammit and build a shit ton of protected bike infrastructure *now*. the single biggest factor holding back people from biking is safety. i cannot tell you how drearily repetitive it was in the before-times for me to be in the elevator up to my office in my biking jacket and helmet and have a colleague wistfully remark that they'd love to bike but are too terrified. sickeningly common. makes me so amazing furiously angry.
I'm just going with rocking the Jerry Garcia/Grizzly Adams look. I have a buzzer to take out some of the scruffiness of the beard and trim the sideburns but I haven't really gone to town with it.
137: I live near 9th and 9th. The Harmon's downtown is miles away!
This is one town away from where my parents live on LI. Batshit insane.
I've been cutting my hair, and xelA's hair. Turns out, I'm actually OK at it. The only problem is the top of my hair is getting a little long, so it ends up in a bit of a fluffy faux-hawk without a little "product". Mrs ttaM approves of xelA's hair, and she's quite fussy.
The only problem is the top of my hair is getting a little long
Nice problem to have.
I'd be genuinely shocked if schools open and stay open in the fall. Seems like a school is exactly the kind of thing you can't run if 2% of the pop has a deadly virus.
Can someone with more medical or statistical chops than me explain why at least ~1.8 million Americans aren't going to die of this? This thing appears to have a ~.7% mortality rate, at least as best I can calculate based on the NYC antibody results plus the NYC excess deaths, and if we assume that there's enough lasting immunity that it actually does burn out, and that there's no herd immunity overshoot and about 70% infection rate actually does it...well, that's ~1.8 million, which means, given a just-spitballing estimate excess deaths, that we're perhaps 1/18 of the way through, death-wise. I don't understand where people are getting all of this "240,000 people will die, oh no" stuff. If 240,000 people die, we'll be incredibly lucky.
Also, can someone explain how this doesn't just crash the hospitals? If every state is reopening, then in two to four weeks the infection rate is going to climb, and climb, and climb until we hit 70% infected, and there's no way the hospital system can cope with that. As far as I can see, every city is going to be like NYC was, except it's going to go on and on and on for months because there will just keep being new cases.
I am just having huge cognitive dissonance here, because I don't understand where any public figure, even respectable, broadly trustworthy ones, are getting their numbers. Are they just lying to prevent a mass panic?
Here in Minnesota, the governor seems to be expecting about 70% to get to herd immunity and about a .7% IFR, so he's saying ~26,000 deaths. I still think that's optimistic, because I keep reading about herd immunity overshoot, where it doesn't just, eg, reach 70% and then stop.
But anyway, if we're expecting that many deaths, surely the US deaths are going to be in the millions?
I can't even imagine what the geopolitical thing is going to be like in a couple of years, when every other rich country stopped this thing with a relatively small number of deaths and we lost 1% of our population. That's assuming that immunity occurs and lasts, which seems to me unlikely given that this isn't how any other coronavirus works.
So anyway, Unfoggers, please feel welcome to point out any large holes in my reasoning.
This is wishful thinking rather than knowledge. But maybe public caution (voluntary mask wearing, not going to restaurants, that kind of thing) will be enough to slow transmission to the point that it cases stay at a fairly low level? NYC is still remarkably hard hit, even while compliance with distancing is lower in other places, which suggests that NYC might have been unusually unlucky, on top of being poorly managed, and most places, being mildly cautious will control it.
Frowner, the one mediating fact is that I think since we've been underestimating how long it's been here, we've therefore been overestimating how quickly it explodes in a population. Which only mediates your second paragraph.
Badly managed compared to Wisconsin?
Ay the current infection rate we'd need years to hit 70%, so either we somehow force people to stop social distancing or there is a vaccine before we hit that number. Now if a vaccine isn't possible then presumably we never stop social distancing and we just have 30% unemployment forever like Egypt.
151: But would the infection rate pick up? If there's one person in a population infecting people it's pretty slow, but when there's two it's faster, etc etc.
New cases per day in the US have essentially been flat for the last 6 weeks 20-30k a day, even if we assume the real infection rate is 5x that number you would still need 3 years to hit 70% at 150k a day.
But most of the US is still semi-shut-down - won't that mean that when people are out and about the rate will go up substantially?
If the number of cases goes up, the rate of new cases will go up. The time it takes to go from 50,000 cases per day to twice that will be much shorter than the time it takes to go from 25,000 to 50,000 (if that happens).
151: Or really effective treatments. Feel unwell - get tested for flu and COVID, then start your treatment right away. I prefer a vaccine, but it's an option, a very American one too.
I don't think we are going to substantially end the shutdown regardless of what people are saying, because people don't want to get sick and are going to stay home. But yes, if cases go back to doubling every three days or so like in March you can hit 70% in a month. My guess is we limp along in a state of shutdown until next year.
Frowner, here's a cheerier note. Source paper.
A country that can't roll out mass testing (absolutely necessary to reopen safely) isn't going to be able to roll out mass-treatment more complicated than a shot which can use the exsisting flu-vaccine distribution infrastructure.
Michigan Militia
Oklahoma City I think hurt a lot of popular interest in those groups. Ydnew's remark that they were right-wing funded is interesting to me, were there journalists who covered that? I lived in Ohio at the time, and a botched bank robbery by a local who chose to call himself Commander Pedro was the only evidence of activity from those groups. I learned from others there that the court systems took them seriously enough to make sure that they started talking with their security staff more frankly, possibly some quiet improvements, but nothing systematic that I heard about secondhand. Mostly the "Militia" then yelled about flags and house numbers and like their co-destitute neighbors didn't pay property taxes.
The clowns on parade now may well be funded by someone external, and they're disturbing. It's truly insane that regulations don't bar weapons in a legislature. They're barred in courthouses, state and federal, right?
Has there been anything like the Bundy standoff in Michigan, where there's explicit confrontation with law enforcement? Alternately, are there counties where the local sherriff is one of these guys and publicly doing anything substantial (releasing suspects or Arpaio shenanigans)?
1.8m Americans is 0.5% of your population. And at that level the death rates among 0ver 60s might for real tip the electoral college, yes? Yinz have the the electoral numbers all handy.
The IFR estimates are based on random antibody tests to pick up asymptomatic infections, right? And they're coming back depressingly low- 5% of Spain even though they were hard hit, I forget NYC but lower than hoped. But Ab testing has a many week lag, so since we're still not that far out from the peak there could be a lot more people who have already been infected but haven't had detectable antibodies yet. If that's the case then the IFR is lower than estimated.
161- I think part of the concern is that there haven't been confrontations with law enforcement because many in law enforcement are sympathetic to their position. Certainly LE has responded with much more restraint than they have with other demographics.
(Gswift bait...)
I too appeal to the medical people: given how variously patients are presenting, is there any hope of mass-applicable simple treatments being developed?
There are something like 2.5 million Americans in nursing and long term care homes. I don't think I've seen an estimate for just that population, which would seem more useful to me that looking at things by county. The 240,000 deaths estimate for the whole U.S. strikes me as bullshit just thinking about what percent of the people have died in various nursing home outbreaks.
That's not going to clog hospitals because they aren't going to get let out of the home.
159: interesting. Thanks Tia.
162: it might, but perhaps not in the way you are thinking; judging by the UK BAME patients over 60 are multiple times more likely to die than white.
The time it takes to go from 50,000 cases per day to twice that will be much shorter than the time it takes to go from 25,000 to 50,000 (if that happens).
Is this correct? Why?
169: I said electoral college, not everything.
169: I think it may be different over here because of the private health system. It's a race between black older people dying because they live in the same household as people who have to go to work and get sick, and white older people dying because they have enough money to live in a nursing home that gets infiltrated by the virus.
170: Because the odds if a new case depend on the odds of coming across somebody infected and those odds go up as the number of cases go up.
173: yes, but the example you gave shows them going up faster than I would expect - why isn't the doubling time the same in both cases?
NYC's was 19% when last I looked, but yeah, perhaps it would be higher now.
159: Thanks, Tia, that is a tiny bit cheering. (It seems to suggest that not all people are equally susceptible, so once the most susceptible have been infected (or are, ideally, safely sequestered?) the rate of spread goes down and so does the percentage needed to get to herd immunity.
174: I think you're right. I should have compared to going from 1 to 50,000 (same absolute increase) not the doubling time.
It its strange that right wing groups assemble as dangerous crowds and suddenly the police have forgotten all about tear gas.
172: most people in most nursing homes are poor. Some people can afford to pay, but most exhaust their assets and are on Medicaid.
This isn't a new thought, but I really preferred my politics when I semi-consciously felt that there was still a chance that the sorta-left liberal viewpoint was broadly correct and that I was just being extreme.
It had always seemed to me that the effectiveness of the state was about its willingness to use violence (again, not a new thought). It had also always seemed to me unlikely that the state would be willing to use violence against, eg, Elon Musk (who should be arrested and whose factory should be shut down and who should be fined into poverty and oblivion) or against right wing protesters and that this would be bad if it ever came to the test, because it would show that the state was a spent force. And now it's happened, and the state is a spent force. There won't be much likelihood of getting a second shutdown if there's another wave.
The thing, is, we need some high-profile arrests of people who violate shut down rules, and we aren't getting them. That's the test of the state, is it willing to use violence to preserve its own authority when that requires using violence against someone with power? And it's not. The state only hits people who are largely unable to hit back.
I had always hoped that this was not true.
You think about all the millions of people who just disappeared in history's mass calamities, and you realize that you'd of course always thought that somehow you wouldn't be one of them, and yet here one is.
The threat of losing a liquor license is what's keeping bars from opening ahead of the opening for that area. I think that is probably better than arresting people in the park for standing too close.
Looking up the Michigan Militia, they declined precipitously after Oklahoma City (in line with what I recalled), however they appear to be still somewhat active and made new recently by vowing to "protect" a barber who opened in defiance of Michigan shutdown order.
The motive of the Las Vegas concert shooter remain unknown, but I do recall one person he encountered describing how he regaled them with Sovereign Citizenry claptrap. (OF course no evidence those views were linked, but I would posit the mind of someone capable of what he did do is probably susceptible to that kind of claptrap.)
The incident in that vein whose societal reaction still burns me the most* was the Austin IRS building. So much "they were asking for it" stuff. For instance Steve King (R-Iowa) "I think if we'd abolished the IRS back when I first advocated it, he wouldn't have a target for his airplane."
*Actually upon reflection the McVeigh thing in addition to being much worse in toll, also is still rage-inducing.
The motive of the Las Vegas concert shooter remain unknown, but I do recall one person he encountered describing how he regaled them with Sovereign Citizenry claptrap. (OF course no evidence those views were linked, but I would posit the mind of someone capable of what he did do is probably susceptible to that kind of claptrap.)
I think it is more than reasonable to assume a white supremacist/right wing terrorist unless proven otherwise.
136: That was a really interesting article and set of charts. Thanks MC!
I was thinking the chicest, though hardly the cheapest, option for LB would be an electric Brompton.
187: Is going to Vegas and attacking a bunch of country music fans, while making no effort to hide his identity, something that a right wing white supremacist would see as effective?
The very high concentration of fatalities in long-term care facilities is really good news for continued improvement in treatment outcomes. In New Jersey, more than 50% of fatalities are in long-term care settings. In West Virginia, it's 80%. One random website said there were 3.34 million people in such homes in the US in 2015, which is just a shade over 1% of the population. So if we effectively control the spread only in long-term care facilities, affecting only 1% of the population (and to some extent employees and visitors), we reduce fatalities by 40-50%. In fact, some extremely simple measures will vastly reduce cases in such places: Weekly testing all employees, delivery persons, and residents, and perhaps temperature checks and mask-wearing requirements for visitors would go a very long way. For new admissions, require a pre-entrance test and maybe an brief initial quarantine period.* New York and some other states are aready doing these things.
On the cost/benefit scale, this also means that any measures affecting the population at large but not long-term facilities, e.g. closing or opening bars and hair cutters, will at most affect only 50% of fatalities. States that open up early but control the long term care facilities at the same time may not see a net increase in fatalities.
*My mother moved into assisted living last year.** She was annoyed that she needed a TB test and then wait a few days to move in, although there was no reason to think she might have TB. It was a legal requirement, and if the legislature ever convenes again that law will assuredly be expanded.
** 14 cases and seven fatalities among 115 residents there to date, but no new cases in the past two weeks. Mom is ok. The place may already have herd immunity.
Are there enough tests to do half of that?
Uh, Elon Musk needs to go to prison? Was he outed as a war criminal when I wasn't looking?
Certainly LE has responded with much more restraint than they have with other demographics.
(Gswift bait...)
Back in reality a bunch of Black Panthers open carrying long guns protested the Arbery shooting in GA and nothing happened.
US-Canada border ban has been extended to June 21, and will likely be extended beyond that, which I don't even want to think about. It's not a complete ban, of course: food, medical supplies, and essential workers still cross the border every day.
To the OP, and re: college students. I think a lot of college admins already know that they won't be operating as usual in the fall, but they're not yet ready to admit it, for fear of depressing enrollments.
Elon Musk needs to go to prison?
No one said he needs to go to prison, unless my ctrl-F for "Musk" is not finding it here. Frowner said he should be arrested -- which is what Musk himself dared the authorities to do after opening the factory -- and additionally said he should be fined into oblivion, which is like prison for his poor innocent money. Arrest is possible ("State law allows a fine of up to $1,000 per day or up to 90 days in jail for operating in violation of health orders"), but no one called his bluff. Tesla was in the process of negotiating an opening deal with Alameda County, Musk jumped the gun with lots of tweeting and shitposting, they concluded the negotiations after the factory was already running, and that is the state of play.
194: Tim read an article about a woman who was giving birth whose spouse (possibly a committed partner and not her husband) was not allowed to cross the border to be there for the birth of his child.
191: My 89 year old mother is in a very nice assisted living facility in Ohio that has had no COVID-19 cases yet. They have locked everything down for the last two months with no visitors and a medical check for all employees before they enter the facility each day. From the letter I just received, it sounds like they also will not allow employees into the building that are not social distancing and/or live with someone who is working elsewhere. As a result it sounds like they are getting a little short of help and my mother complains that the food is not as good as it was. It seems they are doing a great job but according to the letter there is another problem.
The letter says they have discovered through surveillance video that some people have been encouraging the residents to open the front doors after hours so people can come in and give the resident a hug. They have also seen people remove the window screens to resident's rooms so they can have physical contact. As much as I sometimes despise much of humanity, I find these peoples actions despicable beyond belief.
At least they aren't trying to force their way in with guns and poorly spelled signs.
I worry about my mom's place because most of the place is assisted living and those residents are asked to stay in, but there's no way to order them to do so. Mostly the memory care section has its own staff, but not for all things.
201: a friend of mine is in the independent section of a continuing care community. They are not letting staff work at other places, and residents have to quarantine for 14 days if they leave the campus. So everybody is doing Instacart to the concierge desk and virtual doctors visits.
I offered to take her to live with me but my evangelical mother said there was no way she could live with us because we are not believers (You know, atheists in that socialist hell hole Oregon). She rarely forgets to tell me I am headed for hell each time I call. There is nothing like a mother's love.
Maybe that's a good reason not to call? I don't know. I'm sorry you're in that position.
She has been telling me this for probably 35 years after I finally told them I didn't believe all that crazy ass shit that they tried to pound into my head as a kid. I still remember sitting in a pew in my early teens thinking this was the craziest story I have ever heard. Anyway, I call and it is more or less - yes mom, whatever, how was your dinner.
"Shoved through a screen window by the Grubber Hubber."
And yet when I ask why the fuck people talk to their parents it's all "Filial piety!" "Utiles!" "Decency!"
We got confused by the terms and thought we were respecting phials.
198: This article? Canadian woman, six months pregnant, tries to return to Canada with her American husband. Husband is denied entry. This is clearly wrong.
The federal government order prohibiting entry into Canada during the pandemic makes clear exceptions for immediate family members, including spouses of Canadian citizens or permanent residents, as long as they don't show symptoms of COVID-19 or their trip isn't deemed to have an "optional or discretionary purpose, such as tourism, recreation or entertainment."
Unfortunately, border guards have a lot of discretion to interpret, and misinterpret, the law.
Steve Jobs really missed out by not making an iBike.
It's difficult to unseat a recumbent.
161: I'm sorry for the slow response. I meant that the current protestors are DeVos-funded (protestors come from different groups, including militias as well as solo malcontents), not that the original 90s-era militias were, although my sentence was not the most clear. It has been pretty well-reported (sorry for the ugly links; the HTML formatting is a PITA on an iPad for some reason).
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/apr/26/devos-family-michigan-protest-rightwing-donors
https://www.motherjones.com/coronavirus-updates/2020/04/a-devos-linked-group-promoted-the-right-wing-operation-gridlock-tantrum-in-michigan/
The association of McVeigh and the MI militia (he was interested and friendly with members, but apparently not a member and not provided support) may or may not have hurt membership - rolls dropped in 96 and 97, so it seems reasonable, but I've found some disagreement about what the cause was.
The standoff question is interesting. Currently, there is a barber in a small, poor town between Flint and Lansing gleefully defying the shutdown. The Michigan Militia is "protecting" him from delivery of his professional license revocation, the county court won't shut him down without a hearing, and the local sheriff says he has "better things to do" than enforce the shutdown orders.
https://www.abc12.com/content/news/Michigan-Militia-offers-support-to-Owosso-barber-Karl-Manke-570450521.html
One thing I've learned from the shutdown is that conservative white men are the biggest drama queens ever. Norma Desmond has got nothing on a guy who can turn stopping the barber from getting a letter into the next Thermopylae with the postal carrier as the Persian invaders.
I guess I should have been the deer hunting garb is really a form of drag. Camo under blaze orange.
And the people who created a court, sued my dad in it, and sent him a letter demanding $1,000,000 (in pre-1964 coins).
I can't remember who originated this discussion or where I read it, but I remember once reading a conversation about straight camp. Like, once you stop seeing it as the default, what starts looking cartoonish and flamboyant?
The giant trucks owned by white collar workers too.
217 Oh, it's straight camp. That's great.
The orange camo is funny. Its an effort to blend in with the surrounding woods combined with one to make sure you are highly visible in the surrounding woods.
Glittery bass boats. Led to a worldwide glitter shortage although the reason for the shortage wasn't admitted for a while.
And speaking of gay culture, I was confused moving from California to Alabama because all the straight guys (undergrads) dressed like the gay guys I knew in the Bay Area. Except in Alabama the guys used to run in short shorts and nothing else and that was saved for special occasions in SF.
There was also a weird thing where women (undergrads) were ignored in bars and bartenders were men that was contrary to my own undergrad and grad experiences.
The coldest jog I ever had was a shirtless, short-short run in San Francisco.
I think this story belongs in "Doom"
Inside Parisian Nail Salon:"Who specializes in ingrown? Because I have an ingrown," Greta Holland, who was in her 60s, said, extending her hand through a hole in an acrylic partition so she could get a manicure from a woman on the other side, wearing a mask.
Holland, who was not wearing a mask, turned to chat with her friend in the next chair, who was reclining for her pedicure.
"If this is risking my life, then I've been risking my life going to Costco," said Betty Luke. "I went to the antique mall yesterday on Highway 9 and it was just like -- it was like freedom. We have to get out. We have to live in this world, and if we don't --"
"It's not living," said Holland, who checked her nail color -- "Oh I love it!" -- paid $32 and began to put on a surgical mask, but then decided not to.
"I hate these things," she said, heading back outside into the sun, where the music had switched to "Party in the U.S.A." and the sidewalks were getting more crowded with people walking three and four across along Avalon Boulevard. Many were no longer paying attention to the green one-way arrows, the dashes of fluorescent tape marking six-foot increments or the clerk at the front of Urban Outfitters offering Purell.
"Hand sanitizer?" she said to the people walking by. "Hand sanitizer?"
