Coronavirus?
Cleaning Products Can Kill The COVID-19 Virus. Here's What to Use in Your House
LENA CIRIC, THE CONVERSATION
26 MARCH 2020
COVID-19 has only been around for a few months, so at this point scientists don't know that much about it. But more is being learned every day.
We now know, for example, it can live on surfaces for up to nine days and survives in the air for a few hours. We also now know that the virus particles are shed through saliva and fluids coughed up from the lungs. And that the virus can also be shed from our faeces.
It's easy for an infected person to spread the virus particles through coughing, touching other people or leaving the virus on surfaces.
Undoubtedly, hand-washing after being in public spaces is key to reduce the spread of COVID-19. But what should we be doing in our homes to eliminate it?
Two recent studies have investigated how long coronaviruses survive on different surfaces. The research looked at a number of different viruses including SARS-CoV-2 – the coronavirus that has caused COVID-19. And it found that the survival times varied according to the type of surface.
The virus survived for longest on stainless steel and plastic – for up to nine days. The shortest survival times of one day was for paper and cardboard.
The amount of virus particles during this time does reduce, but it's worrying that the particles can last for days rather than hours or minutes on a surface.
So, how good are the cleaning products already in your cupboards at killing SARS-CoV-2? There is some good news in the list below.
Soap and water
Soap and water is your first line of defence – it will not kill the virus, but it will remove it from surfaces. The detergent in soap will lift the virus from surfaces and this will then be rinsed off by water.
So, you are removing the virus, but not killing it. Of course you need to wash you hands when you come in from the shops and wash your food as normal.
Bleach
The active ingredient in bleach – sodium hyperchlorite – is very effective at killing the virus. Make sure you leave the bleach to work for 10-15 minutes then give the surface a wipe with a clean cloth.
The bleach works by destroying the protein and what's known as the ribonucleic acid (RNA) of the virus – this is the substance that gives the blueprint for making more virus particles when you become infected. Be sure to use the bleach as directed on the bottle.
Surgical spirit
Surgical spirit is mostly made up of the alcohol ethanol. Ethanol has been shown to kill coronaviruses in as little as 30 seconds. Like bleach, the alcohol destroys the protein and RNA that the virus is made up of.
Moisten a cloth with some neat surgical spirit and rub it over a surface. This will evaporate and you will not need to wipe it off.
Surface wipes
The active ingredient in surface wipes in an antiseptic – usually benzalkonium chloride. The wipes work by physically removing germs through the pressure you apply when you use them, and the germs then attach to the wipe.
They also leave a layer of the antiseptic on the surface that works to kill germs. The antiseptic works well on bacteria as well as on coronaviruses that infect mice and dogs – but it seems to make no difference to the spread of human coronavirus.
Antiseptics work by disrupting the fats in pathogen cells, but SARS-CoV-2 does not contain many fats. So far, there is no evidence that antiseptics can kill human coronaviruses.
Hand sanitisers
A word of warning though about hand sanitisers. The main ingredient in hand sanitisers that will kill SARS-CoV-2 is ethanol, the alcohol in surgical spirit. But its concentration in the sanitiser is very important – it has to be over 70 percent or it will not kill the virus effectively.
One thing you can also do is make sure you air out the spaces you are spending time in regularly. An infected person will produce thousands of tiny droplets which contain the virus every time they cough.
SARS-CoV-2 can survive in the air for up to three hours. So by opening the window, you can remove and disperse the droplets and reduce the amount of virus in the air – which will reduce the risk of infection for others.
We are living in uncertain times but it's reassuring to know that we have some weapons we can use to fight COVID-19 in our homes.
The bottom line: keep washing your hands, use 70 percent hand sanitiser, dust off the bleach and open a window to let in the spring air.
Lena Ciric, Associate Professor in Environmental Engineering, UCL.
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
source : sciencealert.com
Who needs Instacart? U.S. farmers expand food deliveries during coronavirus outbreak
CHICAGO/OKLAHOMA CITY (Reuters) - Farmers in rural America are expanding food delivery services to meet rising demand from consumers seeking to isolate themselves during the coronavirus pandemic and frustrated by empty grocery-store shelves.
Food suppliers are being forced to adapt as the outbreak has shut restaurants, bars and schools and is sending shoppers looking for reliable sources for goods from meat to vegetables. Many want to steer clear of supermarkets that have been picked over by shoppers, unnerved by the highly contagious respiratory virus.
Farmers said they had supplies and were seeing an uptick in demand for home deliveries in areas where grocery delivery services like Instacart and Amazon.com’s AmazonFresh are not widely available.
“We’re finding that these farms have a lot of opportunity to step in and prove their value now,” said Dan Miller, chief executive of Steward, a company that provides capital to sustainable farms and helps them set up e-commerce platforms.
In Alex, Oklahoma, married farmers Carrie and Joe Chlebanowski began making “porch deliveries” on Sunday, after suspending sales at a weekly farmers market in Oklahoma City over health concerns. They delivered lettuce and other greens to about 16 customers and also opened a stand to make sales at their farm.
“People are recognizing that local farms like ours have access to food and have the ability to provide them things that they don’t have to go into the grocery store to get,” Carrie Chlebanowski said.
More farmers are focusing on direct-to-consumer sales amid declining demand from local restaurants. The nation’s biggest meat processors like Tyson Foods Inc have also scrambled to shift their supplies to grocery storesThe pandemic could cost local and regional food systems, including farmers markets, $688.7 million in lost sales from March to May, according to researchers from Colorado State University and the University of Missouri. That could lead to a total economic loss of up to $1.3 billion, they said.
The Congressional Research Service estimated local U.S. food sales, including farm sales directly to retail stores, at $11.8 billion in 2017.
Chad Ward, who raises chickens and crops near Pawnee, Oklahoma, said he had seen an explosion in demand for deliveries of frozen meat. He is still making trips to the Oklahoma City farmers market, although home deliveries allow consumers to practice social distancing to help counter the spread of the coronavirus.
“People have turned to us in the same way that we have always depended on them,” Ward said. “It’s caused us all to lean in on each other.”
Reporting by Tom Polansek in Chicago and Nick Oxford in Oklahoma City; Editing by Peter Cooney
source: reuters.com
12 Experts Question The COVID-19 Panic
Via Off-Guardian.org,
Below is our list of twelve medical experts whose opinions on the Coronavirus outbreak contradict the official narratives of the MSM, and the memes so prevalent on social media.
* * *
Dr Sucharit Bhakdi is a specialist in microbiology. He was a professor at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz and head of the Institute for Medical Microbiology and Hygiene and one of the most cited research scientists in German history.
What he says:
We are afraid that 1 million infections with the new virus will lead to 30 deaths per day over the next 100 days. But we do not realise that 20, 30, 40 or 100 patients positive for normal coronaviruses are already dying every day.
[The government’s anti-COVID19 measures] are grotesque, absurd and very dangerous […] The life expectancy of millions is being shortened. The horrifying impact on the world economy threatens the existence of countless people. The consequences on medical care are profound. Already services to patients in need are reduced, operations cancelled, practices empty, hospital personnel dwindling. All this will impact profoundly on our whole society.
All these measures are leading to self-destruction and collective suicide based on nothing but a spook.
* * *
Dr Wolfgang Wodarg is a German physician specialising in Pulmonology, politician and former chairman of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. In 2009 he called for an inquiry into alleged conflicts of interest surrounding the EU response to the Swine Flu pandemic.
What he says:
Politicians are being courted by scientists…scientists who want to be important to get money for their institutions. Scientists who just swim along in the mainstream and want their part of it […] And what is missing right now is a rational way of looking at things.
We should be asking questions like “How did you find out this virus was dangerous?”, “How was it before?”, “Didn’t we have the same thing last year?”, “Is it even something new?”
That’s missing.
* * *
Dr Joel Kettner s professor of Community Health Sciences and Surgery at Manitoba University, former Chief Public Health Officer for Manitoba province and Medical Director of the International Centre for Infectious Diseases.
What he says:
I have never seen anything like this, anything anywhere near like this. I’m not talking about the pandemic, because I’ve seen 30 of them, one every year. It is called influenza. And other respiratory illness viruses, we don’t always know what they are. But I’ve never seen this reaction, and I’m trying to understand why.
[…]
I worry about the message to the public, about the fear of coming into contact with people, being in the same space as people, shaking their hands, having meetings with people. I worry about many, many consequences related to that.
[…]
In Hubei, in the province of Hubei, where there has been the most cases and deaths by far, the actual number of cases reported is 1 per 1000 people and the actual rate of deaths reported is 1 per 20,000. So maybe that would help to put things into perspective.
* * *
Dr John Ioannidis Professor of Medicine, of Health Research and Policy and of Biomedical Data Science, at Stanford University School of Medicine and a Professor of Statistics at Stanford University School of Humanities and Sciences. He is director of the Stanford Prevention Research Center, and co-director of the Meta-Research Innovation Center at Stanford (METRICS).
He is also the editor-in-chief of the European Journal of Clinical Investigation. He was chairman at the Department of Hygiene and Epidemiology, University of Ioannina School of Medicine as well as adjunct professor at Tufts University School of Medicine.
As a physician, scientist and author he has made contributions to evidence-based medicine, epidemiology, data science and clinical research. In addition, he pioneered the field of meta-research. He has shown that much of the published research does not meet good scientific standards of evidence.
What he says:
Patients who have been tested for SARS-CoV-2 are disproportionately those with severe symptoms and bad outcomes. As most health systems have limited testing capacity, selection bias may even worsen in the near future.
The one situation where an entire, closed population was tested was the Diamond Princess cruise ship and its quarantine passengers. The case fatality rate there was 1.0%, but this was a largely elderly population, in which the death rate from Covid-19 is much higher.
[…]
Could the Covid-19 case fatality rate be that low? No, some say, pointing to the high rate in elderly people. However, even some so-called mild or common-cold-type coronaviruses that have been known for decades can have case fatality rates as high as 8% when they infect elderly people in nursing homes.
[…]
If we had not known about a new virus out there, and had not checked individuals with PCR tests, the number of total deaths due to “influenza-like illness” would not seem unusual this year. At most, we might have casually noted that flu this season seems to be a bit worse than average.
– “A fiasco in the making? As the coronavirus pandemic takes hold, we are making decisions without reliable data”, Stat News, 17th March 2020
* * *
Dr Yoram Lass is an Israeli physician, politician and former Director General of the Health Ministry. He also worked as Associate Dean of the Tel Aviv University Medical School and during the 1980s presented the science-based television show Tatzpit.
What he says:
Italy is known for its enormous morbidity in respiratory problems, more than three times any other European country. In the US about 40,000 people die in a regular flu season and so far 40-50 people have died of the coronavirus, most of them in a nursing home in Kirkland, Washington.
[…]
In every country, more people die from regular flu compared with those who die from the coronavirus.
[…]
…there is a very good example that we all forget: the swine flu in 2009. That was a virus that reached the world from Mexico and until today there is no vaccination against it. But what? At that time there was no Facebook or there maybe was but it was still in its infancy. The coronavirus, in contrast, is a virus with public relations.
Whoever thinks that governments end viruses is wrong.
– Interview in Globes, March 22nd 2020
* * *
Dr Pietro Vernazza is a Swiss physician specialising Infectious Diseases at the Cantonal Hospital St. Gallen and Professor of Health Policy.
What he says:
We have reliable figures from Italy and a work by epidemiologists, which has been published in the renowned science journal ‹Science›, which examined the spread in China. This makes it clear that around 85 percent of all infections have occurred without anyone noticing the infection. 90 percent of the deceased patients are verifiably over 70 years old, 50 percent over 80 years.
[…]
In Italy, one in ten people diagnosed die, according to the findings of the Science publication, that is statistically one of every 1,000 people infected. Each individual case is tragic, but often – similar to the flu season – it affects people who are at the end of their lives.
[…]
If we close the schools, we will prevent the children from quickly becoming immune.
[…]
We should better integrate the scientific facts into the political decisions.
– Interview in St. Galler Tagblatt, 22nd March 2020
* * *
Frank Ulrich Montgomery is German radiologist, former President of the German Medical Association and Deputy Chairman of the World Medical Association.
What he says:
I’m not a fan of lockdown. Anyone who imposes something like this must also say when and how to pick it up again. Since we have to assume that the virus will be with us for a long time, I wonder when we will return to normal? You can’t keep schools and daycare centers closed until the end of the year. Because it will take at least that long until we have a vaccine. Italy has imposed a lockdown and has the opposite effect. They quickly reached their capacity limits, but did not slow down the virus spread within the lockdown.
– Interview in General Anzeiger, 18th March 2020
* * *
Prof. Hendrik Streeck is a German HIV researcher, epidemiologist and clinical trialist. He is professor of virology, and the director of the Institute of Virology and HIV Research, at Bonn University.
What he says:
The new pathogen is not that dangerous, it is even less dangerous than Sars-1. The special thing is that Sars-CoV-2 replicates in the upper throat area and is therefore much more infectious because the virus jumps from throat to throat, so to speak. But that is also an advantage: Because Sars-1 replicates in the deep lungs, it is not so infectious, but it definitely gets on the lungs, which makes it more dangerous.
[…]
You also have to take into account that the Sars-CoV-2 deaths in Germany were exclusively old people. In Heinsberg, for example, a 78-year-old man with previous illnesses died of heart failure, and that without Sars-2 lung involvement. Since he was infected, he naturally appears in the Covid 19 statistics. But the question is whether he would not have died anyway, even without Sars-2.
– Interview in Frankfurter Allgemeine, 16th March 2020
* * *
Dr Yanis Roussel et. al. – A team of researchers from the Institut Hospitalo-universitaire Méditerranée Infection, Marseille and the Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, Assistance Publique-Hôpitaux de Marseille, conducting a peer-reviewed study on Coronavirus mortality for the government of France under the ‘Investments for the Future’ programme.
What they say:
The problem of SARS-CoV-2 is probably overestimated, as 2.6 million people die of respiratory infections each year compared with less than 4000 deaths for SARS-CoV-2 at the time of writing.
[…]
This study compared the mortality rate of SARS-CoV-2 in OECD countries (1.3%) with the mortality rate of common coronaviruses identified in AP-HM patients (0.8%) from 1 January 2013 to 2 March 2020. Chi-squared test was performed, and the P-value was 0.11 (not significant).
[…]
…it should be noted that systematic studies of other coronaviruses (but not yet for SARS-CoV-2) have found that the percentage of asymptomatic carriers is equal to or even higher than the percentage of symptomatic patients. The same data for SARS-CoV-2 may soon be available, which will further reduce the relative risk associated with this specific pathology.
– “SARS-CoV-2: fear versus data”, International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents, 19th March 2020
* * *
Dr. David Katz is an American physician and founding director of the Yale University Prevention Research Center
What he says:
I am deeply concerned that the social, economic and public health consequences of this near-total meltdown of normal life — schools and businesses closed, gatherings banned — will be long-lasting and calamitous, possibly graver than the direct toll of the virus itself. The stock market will bounce back in time, but many businesses never will. The unemployment, impoverishment and despair likely to result will be public health scourges of the first order.
– “Is Our Fight Against Coronavirus Worse Than the Disease?”, New York Times 20th March 2020
* * *
Michael T. Osterholm is regents professor and director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota.
What he says:
Consider the effect of shutting down offices, schools, transportation systems, restaurants, hotels, stores, theaters, concert halls, sporting events and other venues indefinitely and leaving all of their workers unemployed and on the public dole. The likely result would be not just a depression but a complete economic breakdown, with countless permanently lost jobs, long before a vaccine is ready or natural immunity takes hold.
[…]
[T]he best alternative will probably entail letting those at low risk for serious disease continue to work, keep business and manufacturing operating, and “run” society, while at the same time advising higher-risk individuals to protect themselves through physical distancing and ramping up our health-care capacity as aggressively as possible. With this battle plan, we could gradually build up immunity without destroying the financial structure on which our lives are based.
– “Facing covid-19 reality: A national lockdown is no cure”, Washington Post 21st March 2020
* * *
Dr Peter Goetzsche is Professor of Clinical Research Design and Analysis at the University of Copenhagen and founder of the Cochrane Medical Collaboration. He has written several books on corruption in the field of medicine and the power of big pharmaceutical companies.
What he says:
Our main problem is that no one will ever get in trouble for measures that are too draconian. They will only get in trouble if they do too little. So, our politicians and those working with public health do much more than they should do.
No such draconian measures were applied during the 2009 influenza pandemic, and they obviously cannot be applied every winter, which is all year round, as it is always winter somewhere. We cannot close down the whole world permanently.
Should it turn out that the epidemic wanes before long, there will be a queue of people wanting to take credit for this. And we can be damned sure draconian measures will be applied again next time. But remember the joke about tigers. “Why do you blow the horn?” “To keep the tigers away.” “But there are no tigers here.” “There you see!”
– “Corona: an epidemic of mass panic”, blog post on Deadly Medicines 21st March 2020
source: zerohedge.com
It is concerning how many practice dry runs we have seen about a 'virus pandemic'!!
Uploaded files:
We decided to double post this story. We have a thread on the general science forum called INSANITY FILES, and since this particular article is relevant to both threads we posted in both places.
https://smashomash.com/forum/forum/topic/insanity-files/?part=2#postid-533
Authorities Are Charging A Woman Who Coughed On $35,000 Worth Of Food At A Grocery Store That Had To Be Thrown Away
"While it is always a shame when food is wasted, in these times when so many people are worried about the security of our food supply, it is even more disturbing," Joe Fasula, the co-owner of the store, said.
The journalists at BuzzFeed News are proud to bring you trustworthy and relevant reporting about the coronavirus. To help keep this news free, become a member and sign up for our newsletter, Outbreak Today.
Authorities in Pennsylvania are planning on filing criminal charges against a woman who coughed on more than $35,000 worth of food that all then had to be thrown away in what the grocery store owners are calling a coronavirus prank.
“The Hanover Township Police Department is investigating an incident at 2280 Sans Souci Parkway, Gerrity's Supermarket, for a female customer who intentionally contaminated produce/meat/merchandise for sale,” the police department wrote in a statement on Facebook.
“The suspect has been identified and is being evaluated at a local hospital for a mental health evaluation. Criminal charges will be filed.”
Joe Fasula, the co-owner of Gerrity’s, wrote about the incident in a Facebook post, saying, “while there is little doubt this woman was doing it as a very twisted prank, we will not take any chances with the health and well-being of our customers.”
Fasula said the woman had coughed on items in the bakery, meat case, and grocery sections of the market.
He said 15 staff members had to clean up the mess and dispose of the food.
“I’m absolutely sick to my stomach about the loss of food,” Fasula wrote. “While it is always a shame when food is wasted, in these times when so many people are worried about the security of our food supply, it is even more disturbing.”
The Pennsylvania incident appears to be the latest in a series of recent hoaxes where people are pretending to have the coronavirus to cause panic.
Justin M. Rhodes, a 31-year-old man from North Carolina, was arrested for allegedly pretending to have COVID-19 and going to Walmart, which he proudly talked about in a Facebook video.
"If I got it, y'all gonna get it too," he said in the three-minute video. “Fuck all y'all, that's how I feel about it.”
The Albemarle Police Department investigated the incident and confirmed that “no one in Stanly County has tested positive for the Coronavirus” and then charged Rhodes with felony perpetrating a hoax in a public building and disorderly conduct.
Another man, from New Jersey, 50-year-old George Falcone, was charged with making terrorist threats after allegedly coughing on an employee at a Wegmans Food Markets and telling them he had the coronavirus.
"We must do everything we can to deter this type of conduct and any similar conduct that harms others during this emergency," New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir S. Grewal said in a statement.
"Just as we are cracking down on bias offenses and those who use the pandemic to fuel hatred and prejudice, we vow to respond swiftly and strongly whenever someone commits a criminal offense that uses the coronavirus to generate panic or discord."
source : buzzfeednews.com
US Overtakes China As The Country With The Most COVID-19 Cases: Live Updates
Summary:
- Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulchre closed
- New York City hospitals report "apocalyptic" surge in cases
- US overtakes China as country with the most COVID-19 cases with 81,321 cases
- Elmhurst Hospital in Queens is overwhelmed with new cases
- More than 500k volunteers sign up to help the NHS in Britain
- 500k COVID-19 cases diagnosed
- Italy reports largest batch of new cases in 5 days
- Abbott Labs submitted application to FDA for point-of-care test
- New Orleans hosts major outbreak
- NJ reports another 2k+ cases, 19 deaths
- Inmate in Washington DC tests positive
- NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell tests positive
- India passes $22.6 billion bailout package
- Tokyo reports 40 cases for 2nd day in a row
- A record 3.3 million Americans file for unemployment
- China bans entry of foreigners
- 157 more deaths reported in Iran
- Putin shuts down Moscow, delays vote on constitutional measures
- Wednesday was deadliest yet in US
- President Xi calls on nations to improve policy coordination to avoid a recession
- Mnuchin says he speaks with Powell up to '30 times a day'
* * *
Update (1835ET): Dr. Birx said Thursday that 86% of tests run in the US so far have been negative, a lower rate than experts had expected. She also listed off a handful of "particularly concerning" counties, like Illinois' Cook County and Michigan's Wayne County.
Additionally, Dr. Birx played down some of the more dire predictions, including an Imperial College study that has circulated widely over the last week or so which called for 500k deaths in the UK. Dr. Birx noted that this number has "already been revised down to 20k".
* * *
Update (1810ET): VP Pence said during Thursday's press conference that Abbott Labs has applied for a point-of-care test that can be done in a doctor's office, with results in 15 minutes.
Pence also advised any travelers from New York to "check their health" and "self-isolate" if they've traveled elsewhere.
* * *
Update (1800ET): Cuomo praised more New York businesses - in this case, hotels - stepping up to house medical workers or the sick.
Proud to see NY's hotels stepping up.@StRegisNewYork, @LotteNYPalace & @Yotel will provide their facilities for non-critical patients (freeing up beds in hospitals).@RoomMateGraceNY & @WytheHotel will offer free rooms to medical workers responding to #COVID.
NY thanks you.
— Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) March 26, 2020
Andrew Cuomo✔@NYGovCuomo
Tomorrow we will tour the 4 sites that NY has identified for additional temporary hospitals that will add much needed capacity.
The sites are the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, the Aqueduct Racetrack facility in Queens, CUNY Staten Island, and the NY Expo Center in the Bronx.
* * *
Update (1740ET): In a testament both to the US's ability to ramp up testing, and the sheer penetration of the novel coronavirus within the US population, the number of confirmed cases in the US has surpassed China to become the largest outbreak in the world.
According to the NYT, at least 81,321 people have been diagnosed in the US, including more than 1,000 deaths, more cases than China and Italy and any other country. As the Times notes, the US is suffering from a shortage of personal protective equipment and ventilators.
As President Trump said during Thursday evening's press conference, the fact that the US has overtaken China is "a tribute to the amount of testing we're doing - we're doing a lot of testing," Trump said.
He also (again, correctly) pointed out that "you don't really know" the total scope of the crisis in China, where tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands, of cases are believed to have gone unreported.
Trump is set to speak with President Xi Thursday night via phone.
Watch the task force's nightly presser:
Here's a breakdown of cases by state:
Find more statistics at Statista
Find more statistics at Statista
* * *
Update (1415ET): New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy is holding his daily press conference.
Governor Phil Murphy✔@GovMurphy
Holding a COVID-19 briefing. WATCH: https://www.pscp.tv/w/cUuTeDFvTlFscGRXQVd6UXd8MXZBR1JCZGxrbVlHbBOuy-wwrbK3rWpMc6nsQZFY_kXseaN6pCjFj-DeYSy4 …
Governor Phil Murphy @GovernorPhilMurphy
Holding a COVID-19 briefing. WATCH:
pscp.tv
As we mentioned below, New York hospitals have started 'splitting' ventilators for patients, as some New York coronavirus patients are staying on ventilators for much longer than doctors had expected. While patients typically spend 3 to 4 days on ventilators with other serious lung ailments, COVID-19 patients are spending as long as 30 days on ventilators in New York, dimming hopes that the state will secure enough machines.
After FEMA promised 400 machines, Cuomo's complaints convinced VP Pence to increase the allocation to 4,000. But that's still 26k short of the 30k Cuomo said are needed by hospitals in the state, with Cuomo offering to personally deliver them to the next state that needs them after New York's apex.
On Thursday, Cuomo reported 100 more fatalities, for a total of 385, as hospitals brace for more. New York City is even deploying refrigerated trailers for use as temporary morgues as the number of bodies overwhelms some hospitals.
"This is the really bad news," Cuomo said at a news conference Thursday.
Cuomo expressed alarm over the 35% rise in deaths in one day. On Wednesday, he sounded a more hopeful tone.
"The longer they’re on, the more likely they’re not going to come off," he said. "That is what has happened. We do have people who have been on for quite a period of time, and those are the people we’re losing."
In New Jersey, COVID-19 cases increased by 2,492 from a day earlier to 6,876, while another 19 deaths brought the state-wide total to 81, Gov. Murphy said.
* * *
Update (1315ET): China's Foreign Ministry announced Thursday that beginning on Saturday, all foreign nationals, including those with valid visas and residence permits, will be temporarily barred from entering China as Beijing continues to turn the tables on the US and other western countries that barred Chinese nationals in the wake of the outbreak.
Columbia University will let medical students graduate early so they can help with the coronavirus response efforts in New York, university officials told ABC News.
Chicago's popular Lakefront Trail was shut down on Thursday, blocking access to the extensive trail and park, after too many people congregated and violated social distancing guidelines, said Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot.
During Thursday's press conference, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Congress' $2 trillion stimulus bill "failed to meet the governmental need", adding that it does "absolutely nothing for us" in terms of the massive hit to the state's budget from lost tax revenue, while also not even doing enough to meet the base-level need in New York's hospitals.
He added that he was "disappointed" that Congress passed such a "reckless" bill at a time of such tremendous need.
"I'm disappointed," Cuomo said on Thursday. "I find it irresponsible. I find it reckless. Emotion is a luxury. And we don't have the luxury at this time of being emotional about what they [Congress] did. When this is over, I promise you I'm going to give them a piece of my mind."
"We don't have the luxury at this time to be emotional about what they did...when this is over, I'll give them a piece of my mind. This is an extraordinary time for this nation...this was the time to put politics aside and put partisanship aside."
The fact that lawmakers aren't adequately addressing the problem in the areas with the most acute need is almost unconscionable, Cuomo said.
In other news, the new cases reported out of Italy combined with some other new cases reported Thursday morning have delivered the ~20k cases needed to put the global total over 500k, a major milestone in the outbreak.
Norbert Elekes@NorbertElekesCoronavirus pandemic:
From 0 to 250,000 cases: 4 months
From 250,000 to 500,000 cases: 1 week
Epidemiologists expect 2-3 million cases will be diagnosed eventually, and that's according to the sunnier projections.
* * *
Update (1310ET): Italy's Civil Protection Agency reported the largest jump in new cases in five days on Thursday, dealing yet another blow to hopes that cases might finally be peaking in the current 'epicenter' of the global outbreak.
The 6,153 new cases confirmed for Wednesday represents an 8.3% growth rate compared with the prior day. Fatalities from the outbreak saw a slight dip over the past 24 hours, totaling 662, compared with 683 for the previous day. All told, 8,165 of those diagnosed have died from COVID-19.
Here's a breakdown by region, courtesy of Corriere della Sera, a popular Italian daily newspaper:
Finally, some good news: The number of Italians who have recovered passed 10,000 on Thursday (totale guariti).
* * *
Update (1155ET): Andrew Cuomo is delivering his daily press update, saying that 6,448 new cases were confirmed yesterday in New York State out of 18,650 tests. That brings the state's total to 37,258 COVID-19 cases, with 5,327 currently hospitalized, and 1,290 patients in the ICU.
Andrew Cuomo✔@NYGovCuomo
Holding a briefing with updates on #Coronavirus. WATCH LIVE: https://www.pscp.tv/w/cUtxczIyNjcxMDN8MURYeHllb3ZPb1l4TcuJBMuAVT2hnBMj0RCVT0C03BIRJuvT8lb8DAtjM1Fk …
Andrew Cuomo @NYGovCuomo
Holding a briefing with updates on #Coronavirus. WATCH LIVE:
pscp.tv
Here's the breakdown by county.
Steve Lookner✔@lookner
6,448 new cases in New York State
3,537 new cases in New York City
1,253 new cases in Westchester County
Note: 18,650 tested in past day, roughly 50% more than yesterday
Cuomo added that hospitals were beginning to experiment with assigning one ventilator between two patients, a setup that can be easily jerryrigged during periods of dire need, according to media reports.
* * *
Update (1130ET): In more news about who's testing positive Thursday, NBCUniversal CEO Jeff Shell has reportedly tested positive for COVID-19.
Shell
Yashar Ali✔@yashar
News: In an email sent to NBC employees, the CEO of NBC Universal, Jeff Shell, says he’s tested positive for the coronavirus.
* * *
Update (1030ET): The Treasury Department has announced new sanctions against several senior Iranian officials and business entities on Thursday, after hinting earlier this month that more sanctions against the Iranians would land soon, and that the US wouldn't hold back because of the coronavirus epidemic.
- U.S. IMPOSES FRESH IRAN-RELATED SANCTIONS -TREASURY WEB SITE
- U.S. IMPOSES SANCTIONS ON 15 INDIVIDUALS, FIVE ENTITIES UNDER IRAN AND TERRORISM-RELATED SANCTIONS PROGRAMS
Earlier, Iranian authorities reported 157 deaths over the last day, raising the total to 2,234, while it confirmed 2,389 new cases, bringing the total official count in Iran to 29,406.
Health ministry spokesman Kianoush Jahanpour said “fortunately, until today 10,457 of those infected have recovered and been discharged from hospitals," he told a news conference.
During Thursday’s videoconference between G20 leaders, Chinese President Xi Jinping called for nations to improve coordinations in macro economic policies to stave off a global recession.
Xi said nations need to implement strong, effective fiscal and monetary policies; coordination needed to strengthen global financial supervisions, and nations need to work jointly to stabilize global supply chain. He added that China will increase output of raw-material level medicines, living necessities, preventive medical gears, and increase their supplies to the global market.
* * *
Update (0930ET): In the US, stocks have gone vertical at the open. Meanwhile, comments from President Xi are just hitting the tape.
- CHINA'S XI JINPING SAYS CORONAVIRUS OUTBREAK HAS HIT GLOBAL PRODUCTION, DEMAND - STATE MEDIA
- XI CALLS FOR JOINT EFFORTS TO STABILIZE SUPPLY CHAIN:XINHUA
Meanwhile, in Italy, the hard-hit Lombardy region reported a jump in cases.
On CNBC, during an interview with an almost overly sympathetic Jim Cramer, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said that not a day goes by where he doesn't speak with Fed Chairman Jerome Powell. Mnuchin says he’s approved “every single one of” the Fed’s requests for new lending facilities. On new jobless claims report, he says "these numbers right now are not relevant".
For the second day in a row, health officials in Tokyo reported 40 additional coronavirus cases, matching or possibly exceeding yesterday's total of 41.
Earlier, weekly unemployment claims data showed a massive jump last week, as expected.
* * *
President Trump's hurried demands to get the nation "back to work" before Easter probably couldn't come at a worse time. Across the US, but mainly in a handful of 'hot spots', most notably New York City and the surrounding area, the number of confirmed cases and deaths attributed to COVID-19 is climbing at an alarming rate.
According to John Hopkins data, Wednesday was the deadliest day yet for the US with 233 fatalities reported, taking the US to 65,273 cases and 938 deaths. In New York and California, the number of confirmed cases is doubling every few days.
As Russia reports record growth for a second day, President Vladimir Putin has ordered the country's capital and largest city, Moscow, to close up all restaurants, bars and "non-essential" shops. In an online post, Moscow mayor Sergei Sobyanin ordered the closure of government offices and religious sites - which he urged Muscovites not to visit - and asked all other Russians not to visit the capital during a planned 'nationwide holiday' set to last for all of next week. The Kremlin has also halted all international air traffic, both for airlines and charter flights, excluding repatriation flights bringing Russian citizens back into the country.
Russia reported 182 new coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours on Thursday, bringing the country’s total to 840, along with 3 deaths.
Last night, President Putin delivered a nationwide address where he delayed a vote on constitutional amendments that would allow him to remain in the Kremlin until 2036, and announced that next week would be a national holiday, urging Russians to stay at home. He didn't declare a national emergency or any other type of special circumstance, but a government medical advisor has reportedly told Putin that given the spread already documented in Moscow, that he must shut the country down to prevent a full-blown outbreak.
The lockdown comes as roughly one-third of the world's population is now facing some degree of movement restriction: Indian PM Narendra Modi followed up his decision to lock down the second-largest country in the world by announcing a $22.6 billion relief package to help the "poor and suffering."
"It’s only been 36 hours since the lockdown was imposed," the country’s Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said at a news conference on Thursday. "Now we have come up with a package which will immediately take care of the welfare concerns of the poor and suffering workers and those who need immediate help."
The relief package includes medical insurance coverage of up to $66,400 per person (a considerable sum in India) for those battling the virus on the front lines, incuding medical workers, sanitation workers and community health workers.
The measure is expected to cover 2 million people, a tiny fraction of the country's population. Firefighters have been repurposed to spray disinfectant around the country, and police have been acting aggressively to enforce the lockdown.
More importantly, the government will provide 800 million people, roughly two-thirds of the country’s population, with 5 kilograms of rice or wheat each month for the next three months for free.
"We do not want anyone to go hungry," Sitharaman said.
Other measures announced include fast-tracking subsidies and benefits for farmers, construction workers, widows and the disabled as well as increasing the minimum wage. Workers under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, which guarantees 100 days of unskilled manual work per year, will see their wages rise by $26. Of course, like Russia and most other major countries at this point, India has also banned international flights.
Across the UK, as Britons trudge through their first full week of lockdown, more than half a million people in the UK have signed up as volunteers to support the NHS, according to the UK’s Health Secretary Matt Hancock.
Matt Hancock✔@MattHancock
NEWS: Fantastic that 560,000 people have now responded to our call to volunteer to support our NHS to defeat #Coronavirus. Join us: http://goodsamapp.org/NHS
Globally, the number of coronavirus cases topped 480k on Thursday, and at its current pace, will likely top 500k by Friday, according to Johns Hopkins data. The total number of cases in the US, at last check, was 69,197, a sliver behind Italy, leaving the US in third place globally for number of cases, and far lower down the rankings for number of deaths. The US has recorded 978 deaths as of Thursday morning, leaving behind Spain and France in terms of death toll.
The death toll in coronavirus-ravaged Spain continued to climb on Thursday, with more than 600 additional fatalities reported so far. In total, more than 4,000 people have been killed by the novel coronavirus in Spain so far. Only Italy has recorded more deaths during the outbreak, and only Spain and Italy have recorded more deaths than mainland China - though we suspect the US will join them soon enough.
Yesterday, we discussed the boom in cases in the tri-state area, the suburban area around New York City. Now, on Thursday, the tally of known coronavirus cases in Washington DC, Maryland and Virginia - the Greater DC area, as it's known - stands at 1,051 as of Thursday morning after Maryland reported an additional 74 cases Wednesday, bringing the state’s total to 424, Virginia reported 101 more cases for a total of 392, and DC reported 48 new cases Wednesday, bringing its total to 235. Yesterday, Maryland extended its school closures another four weeks out to April 24.
An inmate at a Washington DC jail has tested positive for the virus, the first to do so, as the US fears an outbreak inside its prisons similar to what happened in Italy and China.
In Florida, the total number of confirmed cases is climbing rapidly. Last night, the Miami City Commission unanimously voted to implement a citywide curfew from 10 pm to 5 am beginning on Friday.
Joey Flechas✔@joeflech
Our story: https://hrld.us/2UBNnxl https://twitter.com/joeflech/status/1243011385547767808 …
Citing coronavirus fears, Miami will enact a 10 p.m. curfew starting Friday night
The city of Miami will enact a 10 p.m. curfew starting Friday night, creating the most severe restrictions yet for the city’s more than 460,000 residents as government leaders push to curb the spread...
miamiherald.com
Joey Flechas✔@joeflech
Replying to @joeflechMiami City Commission, which is meeting via online video conference tonight, has voted unanimously to implement a 10 p.m.-5 a.m. citywide curfew, beginning Friday night. Exceptions include ppl going to/from work, seeking medical services, & walking their dogs w/in 250 ft of home
's other TweetsThe situation in NYC is growing increasingly dire, while Louisiana also experiences a sudden surge in cases, as the NYT pointed out. According to one study, Louisiana is experiencing the fastest growth in new cases in the world, which is why President Trump approved Gov. John Bel Edwards' request for a major disaster declaration, which unlocked additional federal funding to combat the outbreak.
Sharon Finlay@sharonafinlay
's other TweetsThe situation in and around New Orleans is particularly acute, with the city reporting 827 confirmed cases as of Wednesday night, more than the total number of cases in all but 15 states, while Orleans Parish, which is the same boundary-wise as the city of New Orleans, has reported the largest number of deaths per capita in the country.
Find more statistics at Statista
In New York, city hospitals are being overrun as they report an "apocalyptic" surge in patients who are seriously ill from COVID-19, as Elmhurst Hospital in Queens reported 13 deaths in one day on Wednesday.
Across the world from New York, Israel was an early mover in terms of restricting citizens' movement when there were only a few cases confirmed. And as group prayers are postponed, mass and Sunday church gatherings are suspended and pilgrimages like the Hajj are temporarily halted, religious sites are also being closed to delay the spread of the virus.
In Jerusalem, the sacred Church of the Holy Sepulchre was shuttered Wednesday night in keeping with tighter restrictions on movement as Israel attempts to slow the spread of the coronavirus, church officials said.
The church, the holiest site in Christianity, is believed to mark the place where Jesus was crucified, buried and later resurrected. The sprawling compound, which is home to some clergy custodians, is shared by six Christian denominations: The Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Armenian Orthodox churches are the primary custodians, while the Syrian, Coptic and Ethiopian Orthodox churches have lesser responsibilities.
source : zerohedge.com
Wake Up! Your Fears Are Being Manipulated
We have a terrifying example in 9/11 of how this goes. Let's calm down and figure out who has what to gain by stirring panic.
I’m not worried about the guy coughing next to me. I’m worried about the ones who seem to be looking for Jim Jones.
Jones was the charismatic founder of the cult-like People’s Temple. Through fear-based control, he took his followers’ money and ran their lives. He isolated them in Guyana where he convinced over 900 of them to commit suicide by drinking cyanide-laced grape Kool Aid. Frightened people can be made to do anything. They just need a Jim Jones.
So it is more than a little scary that media zampolit Rick Wilson wrote to his 753,000 Twitter followers: “People who sank into their fear of Trump, who defended every outrage, who put him before what they knew was right, and pretended this chaos and corruption was a glorious new age will pay a terrible price. They deserve it.” The tweet was liked over 82,000 times.
The New York Times claims that “the specter of death speeds across the globe, ‘Appointment in Samara’-style, ever faster, culling the most vulnerable.” Others are claiming Trump will cancel the election to rule as a Jim Jones. “Every viewer who trusts the words of Earhardt or Hannity or Regan could well become a walking, breathing, droplet-spewing threat to the public,” opined the Washington Post. Drink the damn Kool Aid and join in the panic en route to Guyana.
The grocery store in Manhattan, just after the announcement of the national state of emergency, was pure panic. I saw a fight break out after an employee brought out paper towels to restock the shelf and someone grabbed the whole carton for himself. The police were called. One cop had to stay behind to oversee the lines at the registers and maintain order. To their credit, the NYPD were cool about it. I heard them talk down one of the fighters, saying, “You wanna go to jail over Fruit Loops? Get a hold of yourself.” Outside New York, sales of weapons and ammunition spiked.
Panic seems to be something we turn on and off, or moderate in different ways. Understanding that helps reveal what is really going on.
No need for history. Right now, in real time, behind the backs of the coronavirus, is the every-year, plain-old influenza. Some 12,000 people have died, with over 13 million infected from influenza just between October 2019 and February 2020. The death toll is screamingly higher (as of this writing, coronavirus has infected 60,653 and killed 819 Americans). Bluntly: more people have already died of influenza in the U.S. than from the coronavirus in China, Iran, and Italy combined. Double in fact. To be even blunter, no one really cares, even though a large number of bodies are piling up. Why?
The first cases of the swine flu, H1N1, appeared in April 2009. By the time Obama finally declared a national emergency seven months later, the CDC was reporting that 50 million Americans, one in six people, had been infected, and 10,000 Americans had died. In the early months, Obama had no HHS secretary or appointees to the department’s 19 key posts, as well as no commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration, no surgeon general, no CDC director. The vacancy at the CDC was especially important because in the early days of the crisis, only they could test for the virus (sound familiar?). Yet some 66 percent of Americans thought the president was protecting them. There was no panic. Why?
Of course, Trump isn’t Obama. But if you really think it is that black and white, that one man makes that much difference in the multi-leveled response of the vast federal government, you don’t know much about bureaucracy. Most of the people who handled the swine flu are now working the coronavirus, from the rank and file at CDC, HHS, and DHS to headliners like Drs. Andrew Fauci (in government since 1968, worked ebola) and Deborah Brix (in government since 1985, prior to corona was an Obama AIDS appointee).
Maybe the most salient example is 9/11. Those who lived through it remember it well, the color threat alerts, the jihadi cells around every corner, the sense of learned/taught helplessness. The enemy could be anywhere, everywhere, and we had no way to fight back. But because the Dems and Repubs were saying the same thing, there was a patina of camaraderie to it (led by Rudy Giuliani and Mike Bloomberg, where are they now?), not discord. But the panic was still very real.
Why? We panicked when people took steps to ensure we would. We were kept calm when there was nothing to gain by spurring us to panic (the swine flu struck in the midst of the housing crisis; there was enough to worry about). After 9/11, a fearful populace not only supported everything the government wanted to do, they demanded more. Nearly everyone cheered the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and not believing the government meant you were on their side. The Patriot Act, which did away with whole swaths of the Bill of Rights, was overwhelmingly supported. There was no debate over torture, offshore penal colonies, assassinations, kidnappings, and all the little horrors. The American people counted that as competent leadership and re-elected George W. Bush. Fear was political currency.
Need a 2020 example of how to manipulate panic? Following fears of a liquid bomb, the TSA limited carry-on liquids to four ounces for years. Can’t be too careful! Yet because of corona, they just changed the limit for hand sanitizer only (which, with its alcohol content, is actually flammable, as opposed to say, shampoo) to 12 ounces. Security theater closed down alongside Broadway tonight.
False metrics are also manipulative because they make fear seem scientific. We ignore the low death rate and focus on the number of tests done. But whatever we do will never be enough, never can be enough, the same way any post-disaster aid is never delivered quick enough because the testing is not (just) about discovering the extent of the virus. For those with naughty motives, it is about creating a race we can’t win, so testing becomes proof of failure. Think about the reality of “everyone who wants one should get a test.” The U.S. has 331 million people. Testing 10 percent of them in seven days means 4,714,285 individuals a day while the other 90 percent hold their breath. Testing on demand is not realistic at this scale. Selective decision-based testing is what will work.
South Korea, held up as the master of mass testing, conducted at its peak about 20,000 a day. Only 4 percent were positive, a lot of effort for a little reassurance. Tests are valuable to pinpoint the need for social distancing, but blunt tools like mass social distancing (see China) also work. Tests do not cure the virus. You can hide the number of infections by not testing (or claim so to spur fear), but very sick people make themselves known at hospitals and actual dead bodies are hard to ignore. Tests get the press, but actual morbidity is the clearest data point.
There will be time for after-action reviews and arguments over responsibility. That time is never in the midst of things, and one should question the motives of journalists who use rare access to the president to ask questions meant largely to undermine confidence. If they succeed, we will soon turn on each other. You voted for him; that’s why we’re here now. Vote for Bernie and Trump wins and we all literally die. You bought the last toilet paper. You can afford treatment I can’t. You’re safe working from home while I have to go out. Just wait until the long-standing concept of medical triage is repackaged by the media as “privilege” and hell breaks loose in the ERs. We could end up killing each other even as the virus fades.
At the very least, we will have been conditioned to new precedents of control over personal decisions, civil life, freedom of movement and assembly, whole city lockdowns, education, and an increasing role for government and the military in health care. Teachers, don’t be surprised if less of you, and fewer classrooms, are needed in the virus-free future, in favor of more classes online. It’s almost as if someone is taking advantage of our fears for their own profits and self-interest.
There are many reasons to take prudent action. There are no good reasons for fear and panic. The fear being promoted has no rational basis compared to regular influenza and the swine flu of 2009. We have a terrifying example in 9/11 of how easily manipulated fearful people are. Remaining calm and helping others do so is a big part of what your contribution to the disaster relief could be.
That’s one way to see this. Too many right now, however, seem to be looking for Jim Jones.
source : theamericanconservative.com
A Swiss Doctor on Covid-19
Published: March 14, 2020; Updated: March 26, 2020
Languages: DE, EN, FR, ES, HU, IT, NO, PL
A Swiss medical doctor provided the following information on the current situation in order to enable our readers to make a realistic risk assessment. (Daily updates below)
According to the latest data of the Italian National Health Institute ISS, the average age of the positively-tested deceased in Italy is currently about 81 years. 10% of the deceased are over 90 years old. 90% of the deceased are over 70 years old.
80% of the deceased had suffered from two or more chronic diseases. 50% of the deceased had suffered from three or more chronic diseases. The chronic diseases include in particular cardiovascular problems, diabetes, respiratory problems and cancer.
Less than 1% of the deceased were healthy persons, i.e. persons without pre-existing chronic diseases. Only about 30% of the deceased are women.
The Italian Institute of Health moreover distinguishes between those who died from the coronavirus and those who died with the coronavirus. In many cases it is not yet clear whether the persons died from the virus or from their pre-existing chronic diseases or from a combination of both.
The two Italians deceased under 40 years of age (both 39 years old) were a cancer patient and a diabetes patient with additional complications. In these cases, too, the exact cause of death was not yet clear (i.e. if from the virus or from their pre-existing diseases).
The partial overloading of the hospitals is due to the general rush of patients and the increased number of patients requiring special or intensive care. In particular, the aim is to stabilize respiratory function and, in severe cases, to provide anti-viral therapies.
(Update: The Italian National Institute of Health published a statistical report on test-positive patients and deceased, confirming the above data.)
The doctor also points out the following aspects:
Northern Italy has one of the oldest populations and the worst air quality in Europe, which had already led to an increased number of respiratory diseases and deaths in the past and is likely an additional risk factor in the current epidemic.
South Korea, for instance, has experienced a much milder course than Italy and has already passed the peak of the epidemic. In South Korea, only about 70 deaths with a positive test result have been reported so far. As in Italy, those affected were mostly high-risk patients.
The few dozen test-positive Swiss deaths so far were also high-risk patients with chronic diseases, an average age of more than 80 years and a maximum age of 97 years, whose exact cause of death, i.e. from the virus or from their pre-existing diseases, is not yet known.
Furthermore, according to a first Chinese study, the internationally used virus test kits may give a false positive result in some cases. In these cases, the persons may not have contracted the new coronavirus, but presumably one of the many existing human coronaviruses that are part of the annual (and currently ongoing) common cold and flu epidemics. (1)
Thus the most important indicator for judging the danger of the disease is not the frequently reported number of positively-tested persons and deaths, but the number of persons actually and unexpectedly developing or dying from pneumonia (so-called excess mortality).
According to all current data, for the healthy general population of school and working age, a mild to moderate course of the Covid-19 disease can be expected. Senior citizens and persons with existing chronic diseases should be protected. The medical capacities should be optimally prepared.
Medical literature
(1) Zhuang et al., Potential false-positive rate among the ‚asymptomatic infected individuals‘ in close contacts of COVID-19 patients, Chinese Medical Association Publishing House, March 2020.
(2) Grasselli et al., Critical Care Utilization for the COVID-19 Outbreak in Lombardy, JAMA, March 2020.
(3) WHO, Report of the WHO-China Joint Mission on Coronavirus Disease 2019, February 2020.
Reference values
Important reference values include the number of annual flu deaths, which is up to 8,000 in Italy and up to 60,000 in the US; normal overall mortality, which in Italy is up to 2,000 deaths per day; and the average number of pneumonia cases per year, which in Italy is over 120,000.
Current all-cause mortality in Europe and in Italy is still normal or even below-average. Any excess mortality due to Covid-19 should become visible in the European monitoring charts.
Updates
March 17, 2020 (I)
- The mortality profile remains puzzling from a virological point of view because, in contrast to influenza viruses, children are spared and men are affected about twice as often as women. On the other hand, this profile corresponds to natural mortality, which is close to zero for children and almost twice as high for 75-year-old men as for women of the same age.
- The younger test-positive deceased almost always had severe pre-existing conditions. For example, a 21-year-old Spanish soccer coach had died test-positive, making international headlines. However, the doctors diagnosed an unrecognized leukemia, whose typical complications include severe pneumonia.
- The decisive factor in assessing the danger of the disease is therefore not the number of test-positive persons and deceased, which is often mentioned in the media, but the number of people actually and unexpectedly developing or dying from pneumonia (so-called excess mortality). So far, this value remains very low in most countries.
- In Switzerland, some emergency units are already overloaded simply because of the large number of people who want to be tested. This points to an additional psychological and logistical component of the current situation.
March 17, 2020 (II)
- Italian immunology professor Sergio Romagnani from the University of Florence comes to the conclusion in a study on 3000 people that 50 to 75% of the test-positive people of all ages remain completely symptom-free – significantly more than previously assumed.
- The occupancy rate of the North Italian ICUs in the winter months is typically already 85 to 90%. Some or many of these existing patients could also be test-positive by now. However, the number of additional unexpected pneumonia cases is not yet known.
- A hospital doctor in the Spanish city of Malaga writes on Twitter that people are currently more likely to die from panic and systemic collapse than from the virus. The hospital is being overrun by people with colds, flu and possibly Covid19 and doctors have lost control.
March 18, 2020
- A new epidemiological study (preprint) concludes that the fatality of Covid19 even in the Chinese city of Wuhan was only 0.04% to 0.12% and thus rather lower than that of seasonal flu, which has a mortality rate of about 0.1%. As a reason for the overestimated fatality of Covid19, the researchers suspect that initially only a small number of cases were recorded in Wuhan, as the disease was probably asymptomatic or mild in many people.
- Chinese researchers argue that extreme winter smog in the city of Wuhan may have played a causal role in the outbreak of pneumonia. In the summer of 2019, public protests were already taking place in Wuhan because of the poor air quality.
- New satellite images show how Northern Italy has the highest levels of air pollution in Europe, and how this air pollution has been greatly reduced by the quarantine.
- A manufacturer of the Covid19 test kit states that it should only be used for research purposes and not for diagnostic applications, as it has not yet been clinically validated.
March 19, 2020 (I)
The Italian National Health Institute ISS has published a new report on test-positive deaths:
- The median age is 80.5 years (79.5 for men, 83.7 for women).
- 10% of the deceased was over 90 years old; 90% of the deceased was over 70 years old.
- At most 0.8% of the deceased had no pre-existing chronic illnesses.
- Approximately 75% of the deceased had two or more pre-existing conditions, 50% had three more pre-existing conditions, in particular heart disease, diabetes and cancer.
- Five of the deceased were between 31 and 39 years old, all of them with serious pre-existing health conditions (e.g. cancer or heart disease).
- The National Health Institute hasn’t yet determined what the patients examined ultimately died of and refers to them in general terms as Covid19-positive deaths.
March 19, 2020 (II)
- A report in the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera points out that Italian intensive care units already collapsed under the marked flu wave in 2017/2018. They had to postpone operations, call nurses back from holiday and ran out of blood donations.
- German virologist Hendrik Streeck argues that Covid19 is unlikely to increase total mortality in Germany, which normally is around 2500 people per day. Streeck mentions the case of a 78-year-old man with preconditions who died of heart failure, subsequently tested positive for Covid19 and thus was included in the statistics of Covid19 deaths.
- According to Stanford Professor John Ioannidis, the new coronavirus may be no more dangerous than some of the common coronaviruses, even in older people. Ioannidis argues that there is no reliable medical data backing the measures currently decided upon.
March 20, 2020
- According to the latest European monitoring report, overall mortality in all countries (including Italy) and in all age groups remains within or even below the normal range so far.
- According to the latest German statistics, the median age of test-positive deaths is about 83 years, most with pre-existing health conditions that might be a possible cause of death.
- A 2006 Canadian study referred to by Stanford Professor John Ioannidis found that common cold coronaviruses may also cause death rates of up to 6% in risk groups such as residents of a care facility, and that virus test kits initially falsely indicated an infection with SARS coronaviruses.
March 21, 2020 (I)
- Spain reports only three test-positive deaths under the age of 65 (out of a total of about 1000). Their pre-existing health conditions and actual cause of death are not yet known.
- On March 20, Italy reported 627 nationwide test-positive deaths in one day. By comparison, normal overall mortality in Italy is about 1800 deaths per day. Since February 21, Italy has reported about 4000 test-positive deaths. Normal overall mortality during this time frame is up to 50,000 deaths. It is not yet known to what extent normal overall mortality has increased, or to what extent it has simply turned test-positive. Moreover, Italy and Europe have had a very mild flu season in 2019/2020 that has spared many otherwise vulnerable people.
- According to Italian news reports, 90% of test-positive deceased in the Lombardy region have died outside of intensive care units, mostly at home or in general care sections. Their cause of death and the possible role of quarantine measures in their deaths remain unclear. Only 260 out of 2168 test-positive persons have died in ICUs.
- Bloomberg highlights that „99% of Those Who Died From Virus Had Other Illness, Italy Says“
March 21, 2020 (II)
- The Japan Times asks: Japan was expecting a coronavirus explosion. Where is it? Despite being one of the first countries getting positive test results and having imposed no lockdown, Japan is one of the least-affected nations. Quote: „Even if Japan may not be counting all those infected, hospitals aren’t being stretched thin and there has been no spike in pneumonia cases.“
- Italian researchers argue that the extreme smog in Northern Italy, the worst in Europe, may be playing a causative role in the current pneumonia outbreak there, as in Wuhan before.
- In a new interview, Professor Sucharit Bhakdi, a world renowned expert in medical microbiology, says blaming the new coronavirus alone for deaths is „wrong“ and „dangerously misleading“, as there are other more important factors at play, notably pre-existing health conditions and poor air quality in Chinese and Northern Italian cities. Professor Bhakdi describes the currently discussed or imposed measures as „grotesque“, „useless“, „self-destructive“ and a „collective suicide“ that will shorten the lifespan of the elderly and should not be accepted by society.
March 22, 2020 (I)
Regarding the situation in Italy: Most major media falsely report that Italy has up to 800 deaths per day from the coronavirus. In reality, the president of the Italian Civil Protection Service stresses that these are deaths „with the coronavirus and not from the coronavirus“ (minute 03:30 of the press conference). In other words, these persons died while also testing positive.
As Professors Ioannidis and Bhakdi have shown, countries like South Korea and Japan that introduced no lockdown measures have experienced near-zero excess mortality in connection with Covid-19, while the Diamond Princess cruise ship experienced an extrapolated mortality figure in the per mille range, i.e. at or below the level of the seasonal flu.
Current test-positive death figures in Italy are still less than 50% of normal daily overall mortality in Italy, which is around 1800 deaths per day. Thus it is possible, perhaps even likely, that a large part of normal daily mortality now simply counts as „Covid19“ deaths (as they test positive). This is the point stressed by the President of the Italian Civil Protection Service.
However, by now it is clear that certain regions in Northern Italy, i.e. those facing the toughest lockdown measures, are experiencing markedly increased daily mortality figures. It is also known that in the Lombardy region, 90% of test-positive deaths occur not in intensive care units, but instead mostly at home. And more than 99% have serious pre-existing health conditions.
Professor Sucharit Bhakdi has called lockdown measures „useless“, „self-destructive“ and a „collective suicide“. Thus the extremely troubling question arises as to what extent the increased mortality of these elderly, isolated, highly stressed people with multiple pre-existing health conditions may in fact be caused by the weeks-long lockdown measures still in force.
If so, it may be one of those cases where the treatment is worse than the disease. (See update below: only 12% of death certificates show the coronavirus as a cause.)
March 22, 2020 (II)
- In Switzerland, there are currently 56 test-positive deaths, all of whom were „high risk patients“ due to their advanced age and/or pre-existing health conditions. Their actual cause of death, i.e. from or simply with the virus, has not been communicated.
- The Swiss government claimed that the situation in southern Switzerland (next to Italy) is „dramatic“, yet local doctors denied this and said everything is normal.
- According to press reports, oxygen bottles may become scarce. The reason, however, is not a currently higher usage, but rather hoarding due to fear of future shortages.
- In many countries, there is already an increasing shortage of doctors and nurses. This is primarily because healthcare workers testing positive have to self-quarantine, even though in many cases they will remain fully or largely symptom-free.
March 22, 2020 (III)
- A model from Imperial College London predicted between 250,000 and 500,000 deaths in the UK „from“ Covid-19, but the authors of the study have now conceded that many of these deaths would not be in addition to, but rather part of the normal annual mortality rate, which in the UK is about 600,000 people per year. In other words, excess mortality would remain low.
- Dr. David Katz, founding director of the Yale University Prevention Research Center, asks in the New York Times: „Is Our Fight Against Coronavirus Worse Than the Disease? There may be more targeted ways to beat the pandemic.“
- According to Italian Professor Walter Ricciardi, „only 12% of death certificates have shown a direct causality from coronavirus“, whereas in public reports „all the people who die in hospitals with the coronavirus are deemed to be dying of the coronavirus“. This means that Italian death figures reported by the media have to be reduced by at least a factor of 8 to obtain actual deaths caused by the virus. Thus one ends up with at most a few dozen deaths per day, compared to an overall daily mortality of 1800 deaths and up to 20,000 flu deaths per year.
March 23, 2020 (I)
- A new French study in the Journal of Antimicrobial Agents, titled SARS-CoV-2: fear versus data, concludes that „the problem of SARS-CoV-2 is probably overestimated“, since „the mortality rate for SARS-CoV-2 is not significantly different from that for common coronaviruses identified at the study hospital in France“.
- An Italian study of August 2019 found that flu deaths in Italy were between 7,000 and 25,000 in recent years. This value is higher than in most other European countries due to the large elderly population in Italy, and much higher than anything attributed to Covid-19 so far.
- In a new fact sheet, the World Health Organization WHO reports that Covid-19 is in fact spreading slower, not faster, than influenza by a factor of about 50%. Moreover, pre-symptomatic transmission appears to be much lower with Covid-19 than with influenza.
- A leading Italian doctor reports that „strange cases of pneumonia“ were seen in the Lombardy region already in November 2019, raising again the question if they were caused by the new virus (which officially only appeared in Italy in February 2020), or by other factors, such as the dangerously high smog levels in Northern Italy.
- Danish researcher Peter Gøtzsche, founder of the renowned Cochrane Medical Collaboration, writes that Corona is „an epidemic of mass panic“ and „logic was one of the first victims.“
March 23, 2020 (II)
- Former Israeli Health Minister, Professor Yoram Lass, says that the new coronavirus is „less dangerous than the flu“ and lockdown measures „will kill more people than the virus“. He adds that „the numbers do not match the panic“ and „psychology is prevailing over science“. He also notes that „Italy is known for its enormous morbidity in respiratory problems, more than three times any other European country.“
- Pietro Vernazza, a Swiss infectious disease specialist, argues that many of the imposed measures are not based on science and should be reversed. According to Vernazza, mass testing makes no sense because 90% of the population will see no symptoms, and lockdowns and closing schools are even „counterproductive“. He recommends protecting only risk groups while keeping the economy and society at large undisturbed.
- The President of the World Doctors Federation, Frank Ulrich Montgomery, argues that lockdown measures as in Italy are „unreasonable“ and „counterproductive“ and should be reversed.
- Switzerland: Despite media panic, excess mortality still at or near zero: the latest testpositive „victims“ were a 96yo in palliative care and a 97yo with pre-existing conditions.
- The latest statistical report of the Italian National Health Institute is now available in English.
March 24, 2020
- The UK has removed Covid19 from the official list of High Consquence Infectious Diseases (HCID), stating that mortality rates are „low overall“.
- The director of the German National Health Institute (RKI) admitted that they count all test-positive deaths, irrespective of the actual cause of death, as „coronavirus deaths“. The average age of the deceased is 82 years, most with serious preconditions. As in most other countries, excess mortality due Covid19 is likely to be near zero in Germany.
- Beds in Swiss intensive care units reserved for Covid19 patients are still „mostly empty“.
- German Professor Karin Moelling, former Chair of Medical Virology at the University of Zurich, stated in an interview that Covid19 is „no killer virus“ and that „panic must end“.
- In Italy, overall national mortality of the 65+ age group until March 7 remained below the level of earlier years, especially due to the rather mild winter (see red line in chart below).
March 25, 2020
- German immunologist and toxicologist, Professor Stefan Hockertz, explains in a radio interview that Covid19 is no more dangerous than influenza (the flu), but that it is simply observed much more closely. More dangerous than the virus is the fear and panic created by the media and the „authoritarian reaction“ of many governments. Professor Hockertz also notes that most so-called „corona deaths“ have in fact died of other causes while also testing positive for coronaviruses. Hockertz believes that up to ten times more people than reported already had Covid19 but noticed nothing or very little.
- The Argentinean virologist and biochemist Pablo Goldschmidt explains that Covid19 is no more dangerous than a bad cold or the flu. It is even possible that the Covid19 virus circulated already in earlier years, but wasn’t discovered because no one was looking for it. Dr. Goldschmidt speaks of a „global terror“ created by the media and politics. Every year, he says, three million newborns worldwide and 50,000 adults in the US alone die of pneumonia.
- Professor Martin Exner, head of the Institute for Hygiene at the University of Bonn, explains in an interview why health personnel are currently under pressure, even though there has hardly been any increase in the number of patients in Germany so far: On the one hand, doctors and nurses who have tested positive have to be quarantined and are often hard to replace. On the other hand, nurses from neighbouring countries, who provide an important part of the care, are currently unable to enter the country due to closed borders.
- Professor Julian Nida-Ruemelin, former German Minister of State for Culture and Professor of Ethics, points out that Covid19 poses no risk to the healthy general population and that extreme measures such as curfews are therefore not justified.
- Using data from the cruise ship Diamond Princess, Stanford Professor John Ioannidis showed that the age-corrected lethality of Covid19 is between 0.025% and 0.625%, i.e. in the range of a strong cold or the flu. Moreover, a Japanese study showed that of all the test-positive passengers, and despite the high average age, 48% remained completely symptom-free; even among the 80-89 year olds 48% remained symptom-free, while among the 70 to 79 year olds it was an astounding 60% that developed no symptoms at all. This again raises the question whether the pre-existing diseases are not perhaps a more important factor than the virus itself. The Italian example has shown that 99% of test-positive deaths had one or more pre-existing conditions, and even among these, only 12% of the death certificates mentioned Covid19 as a causal factor.
March 26, 2020 (I)
- USA: The latest US data of March 25 shows a decreasing number of flu-like illnesses throughout the country, the frequency of which is now well below the multi-year average. The government measures can be ruled out as a reason for this, as they have been in effect for less than a week.
USA: Decreasing flu-like illnesses (March 25, 2020, KINSA)
- Germany: The latest influenza report of the German Robert Koch Institute of March 24 documents a „nationwide decrease in activity of acute respiratory diseases“: The number of influenza-like illnesses and the number of hospital stays caused by them is below the level of previous years and is currently continuing to decline. The RKI continues: „The increase in the number of visits to the doctor cannot currently be explained either by influenza viruses circulating in the population or by SARS-CoV-2.“
Germany: Decreasing flu-like illnesses (20 March 2020, RKI)
- Italy: The renowned Italian virologist Giulio Tarro argues that the mortality rate of Covid19 is below 1% even in Italy and is therefore comparable to influenza. The higher values only arise because no distinction is made between deaths with and by Covid19 and because the number of (symptom-free) infected persons is greatly underestimated.
- UK: The authors of the British Imperial College study, who predicted up to 500,000 deaths, are again reducing their forecasts. After already admitting that a large proportion of test-positive deaths are part of normal mortality, they now state that the peak of the disease may be reached in two to three weeks already.
- UK: The British Guardian reported in February 2019 that even in the generally weak flu season 2018/2019 there were more than 2180 flu-related admissions to intensive care units in the UK.
- Switzerland: In Switzerland, the excess mortality due to Covid19 is apparently still zero. The latest „fatal victim“ presented by the media is a 100-year-old woman. Nevertheless, the Swiss government continues to tighten restrictive measures.
March 26, 2020 (II)
- Sweden: Sweden has so far pursued the most liberal strategy in dealing with Covid19, which is based on two principles: Risk groups are protected and people with flu symptoms stay at home. „If you follow these two rules, there is no need for further measures, the effect of which is only marginal anyway,“ said chief epidemiologist Anders Tegnell. Social and economic life will continue normally. The big rush to hospitals has so far failed to materialize, Tegnell said.
- German criminal and constitutional law expert Dr. Jessica Hamed argues that measures such as general curfews and contact bans are a massive and disproportionate encroachment on fundamental rights of freedom and are therefore presumably „all illegal“.
- The latest European monitoring report on overall mortality continues to show normal or below-average values in all countries and all age groups, but now with one exception: in the 65+ age group in Italy a currently increased overall mortality is predicted (so-called delay-adjusted z-score), which is, however, still below the values of the influenza waves of 2017 and 2018.
Related articles
Please allow a global pandemic bring out the best in you, as it's exposing both the best and the worst. You decide which!
A letter from Senator Pat Browne :
 | ||||
In this Issue:
Department of Labor and Industry Offers Info on New Paid Family and Medical Leave RequirementsAs part of a new federal law to respond to the coronavirus, certain employers will be required to provide employees with paid sick leave or expanded family and medical leave for absences related to COVID-19. Wages paid under the new law will be reimbursed to business owners on a dollar-for-dollar basis through business tax credits. The Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry has created a webpage to help employers and employees better understand the new requirements. Fact sheets for employers and employees, answers to frequently asked questions and other helpful links are available here. The state Senate also approved a package of bills this week to move the state forward during the current public health emergency, including measures to provide emergency changes to the state’s Unemployment Compensation law, provide additional funding for medical supplies and equipment, postpone the state’s primary election, and update the School Code to waive certain mandates. More information on those measures is available here. Reminder: Resources Available for Employees Impacted by COVID-19 Mitigation
Efforts to reduce the spread of the coronavirus have created a major disruption in the lives of many Pennsylvania workers. Many employees who are unable to work or have reduced hours as a result of COVID-19 are now eligible for Unemployment Compensation. Affected employees can learn more about how to apply for Unemployment Compensation online here. Claimants no longer have to wait a week to apply, and all work search and work registration requirements have been temporarily waived. Information is also available for individuals who are dealing with job loss related to COVID-19 and have lost employer-sponsored health insurance coverage. Information on getting coverage through the state health insurance marketplace is available at http://www.healthcare.gov. All children in Pennsylvania can receive coverage through the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). Details about CHIP are available at http://www.chipcoverspakids.com. Depending on household income, Medicaid may also be an option for adults who need health insurance coverage. More information on Medicaid is available here. Food Services Available for Families Affected by Public Health EmergencyEfforts are in place to ensure that all Pennsylvanians have access to food as the state steps up its COVID-19 mitigation efforts. Pennsylvanians can contact local food banks or pantries through Feeding Pennsylvania and Hunger-Free Pennsylvania, and the Department of Human Services is continuing to process applications and benefit renewals for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). Pennsylvanians can apply for SNAP online at http://www.compass.state.pa.us. The Department of Agriculture has provided resources for Pennsylvanians to access emergency food assistance during COVID-19 mitigation, including locations of food banks and food pantries that are assisting individuals and families during this time. Both departments are calling on healthy individuals to volunteer with a local food bank or other community agencies. The emergency Feeding Taskforce, a panel of state agencies, charitable food networks, food retailers and others, is working to match available resources with communities in need. Businesses with resources to help feed and shelter Pennsylvanians are encouraged to fill out this survey. Anyone in need of food should complete this survey so the task force can direct resources where they are needed. PA’s REAL ID Enforcement Date Delayed Until October 2021
The deadline for Pennsylvania to comply with the federal government’s REAL ID identification standards has been extended by one year to October 1, 2021. The federal REAL ID law imposes tougher identification standards on state-issued driver licenses and photo identification cards. The new standards were originally designed to take effect on October 1 of this year, but the COVID-19 public health emergency cut into the amount of time Pennsylvanians had to purchase an optional REAL ID license. PennDOT’s driver and photo license centers have been closed since March 16. Pennsylvanians are not required to purchase a REAL ID, but beginning on October 1, 2021, normal state driver licenses and ID cards will no longer be considered a valid form of identification for the purposes of boarding a commercial flight or visiting a secure federal building, such as a federal courthouse. More information about REAL ID is available here. New Web Portal Will Help Medical Supplies Get to Healthcare Providers
To ensure healthcare providers can safely treat patients during the COVID-19 outbreak, lawmakers approved a bill this week that provides up to $50 million toward the purchase of critical medical supplies and equipment. A new web portal will provide a convenient and efficient way for manufacturers, distributors and other suppliers to get these supplies into the hands of healthcare facilities and workers quickly. A complete list of medical equipment needed – including surgical masks, respirators, ventilators and other hospital supplies – is available on the web portal here, as well as procurement forms for interested businesses. Links will also be available for businesses that wish to donate goods and services for distribution, as well as organizations that have additional capacity to manufacture and supply goods that are critical to healthcare providers. Trout Fishing Opening Day Set for April 18, Social Distancing Encouraged
Although many large events and activities have been postponed or canceled throughout the country, local anglers can still look forward to the beginning of trout season on April 18. The Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission (PFBC) is operating under modified procedures to ensure all Pennsylvanians can enjoy one of the state’s favorite pastimes. The statewide opening day for trout fishing will be April 18; there will not be an earlier regional opening day this year. Trout stocking will still be completed by PFBC on an accelerated schedule. In order to safeguard public health, no volunteers will be permitted to help stock trout this year. Anglers are encouraged to keep a distance of at least 6 feet between themselves and other people, avoid large crowds and carpooling, and clean all equipment thoroughly. More information is available here. Want to Help Neighbors in Need? Consider Donating Blood
The first few weeks of COVID-19 mitigation measures led to the cancelation of many scheduled blood drives at schools and workplaces throughout the country. As a result, the Miller Keystone Blood Center is now experiencing a critical shortage of blood and platelets for patients in need. Community residents who are able to donate blood can find the closest scheduled event here. Please check back frequently and search 7-15 days out for newly scheduled blood drives. | ||||
| ||||
source : Senate of Pennsylvania | https://www.senatorbrowne.com | Privacy Policy |
