COVID-19 news & status

Thanks NM. Yep, we call them fizzy drinks too. My sister has friends who ran out of wine during an isolation (flooding, rather than covid). I think they were not happy about it.

In latest Covid news, we are in for 12 more days of alert 2, and Auckland still locked down in level 3, as there are now up to 30 cases.

Ontario, I do not see the same thing here in Ohio. People here seem to be wearing their face diapers all the time, everywhere. I stopped at an intersection red light on my way to work y'day and there was a pedestrian on the corner waiting to cross the road. Yup, outside, nobody else in sight, face diaper on.  

Contact tracing: I have my Ga Tech alternative ID handy in George P Burdell. I bet he will be id'd by a lot of contact tracers as us Tech alum like using George for this type of thing. As well as Al Newman (Alfred E, from Mad magazine fame.) So, I won't be in the 45% of people NJ Gov Murphy says refuse to provide info when contacted. Gov Murphy 45%
I haven't seen anything like this elsewhere, but would assume it is in line with what's happening elsewhere.

Annie - just read an article in the New York Times (get a briefing to hear what the other side is up to) about your cell of Covid that you've mentioned on here. They are still at the 14 number, guess they didn't get the update to 30.

Here it is a mixed bag of masks vs no masks. I see people in their cars, by themselves with masks on, or walking down the street like Rig mentioned. Then I see others take them off the minute 1 foot is out of a store

Not sure about contact tracing here, but you have a good plan Rig.

Rig, we do have the die hard mask wearers here, too. You know, the ones wearing them outside and in their cars. I have no idea if they're drinking the Kool-aid or just afraid of conflict. It's hard to say.

Ontario - I do wear my mask at work, and so do most of my employees, unless working a dangerous machine or in a closed office. I do it only because my local gov't has decided to make spot checks for compliance and I don't want to lose my business over it or land in jail. I even chose to put up signs around, just in case. Never had them until this week. Hoping if inspectors show up and they see signs on the door, maybe they'll pass on by.

Narrowminded, yes, totally! I get that . One must earn a living and you have a responsibility to your employees to have a functioning place for them to earn their living. If we were absolutely mandated we would, too. I would hate it but we gotta eat. Luckily our office is exempt. I also think our cases are likely lower than your. Ontario, 14.6 million has been at less than 100 cases per day for about 6 weeks now. Those ridiculously low numbers are adding to the feelings of dissent.

Ontario - I “think” your numbers are lower. It’s hard to tell. Things have been so messed up here with counts, I’m not sure what or who to believe.

Looking at the numbers for Ontario and Pennsylvania, there is really no doubt that Ontario’s numbers are lower.

From the Public Health Ontario dashboard, Ontario has had 40,546 cases, 2,789 deaths. Recent new cases are between 50 and 100 per day.

From Johns Hopkins data, Pennsylvania has had 128,531 cases, 7,451 deaths. Recent new cases are between 750 and 950 per day.

The populations are close (14.6 vs 12.7 million). So current per capita cases in PA are ten times higher than Ontario. More important, Ontario’s daily numbers have been decreasing since the spring peak, while PA’s numbers decreased for a while but have been increasing for about two months.

What proportion of those are sick and in hospital? How many have died? How many deaths have there been over and above the number you would normally expect in the same period of time?

These the the figures that seem very hard to come by.

Interesting story on mask wearing.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/nicholasreimann/2020/08/12/coronavirus-cases-drop-46-in-parts-of-s-carolina-with-mask-mandates-compared-to-areas-without/#22f583b97123

Ekba - thanks for doing the research on numbers and population.

Annie - Rig has been posting a chart either weekly or monthly that gives the info you are looking for I believe.

Thanks for the article V.

Week 32 data:


Annie, this link shows where I'm getting my data:
Chart sources
and this one on "how to read" in response to a question from V:
How to read

Thank you for sharing once again Rig.

Thanks Rig. Interestingly, New Zealand’s death rate is currently 5% lower than average.

"As of July 20, 17,955 people had died this year. It is the lowest absolute figure since 2016; when accounting for population growth, it is the lowest death rate per 100,000 people in at least 10 years."

So it seems our lockdown did in fact save lives, but not just from Covid. Influenza is down, along with other circulating viruses, road toll is down. Pollution was also down temporarily, which may have contributed to improved respiratory disease figures.

Congrats Annie, that is a very good report.

No new Covid news here today. I did however see a report about people protesting in a large group about not voting in person. It totally dripped of Irony.

Not so good that the lockdown was illegal.  The courts have ruled that for nine days the PM gave orders that were not lawful.

Have you seen the latest out of Maine:

From https://www.maine.gov/decd/checklists/restaurants

Employees
Require employees to wear cloth face coverings and practice good hand hygiene. It is acceptable for kitchen staff to wear face shields in lieu of masks when the kitchen or weather is warm. Front-of-house staff may wear a face shield in lieu of a face covering only if the shield is designed to be worn inverted, attaching below the face (e.g. as a collar) and open at the top of the shield, with the shield extending above the eyes and laterally to the ears. Face shields that are open at the bottom, directing breath downward, are not acceptable replacements for face coverings for front-of-house staff. (Updated 8/14/20)

Your servers in Maine are gonna look like this:

Annieh wrote:Not so good that the lockdown was illegal.  The courts have ruled that for nine days the PM gave orders that were not lawful.

I'm glad that this is starting to come to light. I am a history major and this whole time all I've been doing is thinking back to how governments, in the past, started with small things like this and it escalated. We need to be VERY careful about maintaining our rights. This has been my beef all along. I don't care how concerned or not concerned you are about Covid, what you should be concerned about is the infringement of rights. Because today you might be "okay" with this infringement when it doesn't affect you but tomorrow they'll infringe on a right you DO care about. It's not okay.

That reminds me of the cone of shame that dogs wear after surgery!

Pedi, EXACTLY the same thought.

Indeed, the cone of shame. I'd laugh my butt off if I went to a restaurant and my server was wearing one of those. How do you suppose they keep it in place without it annoying the crap out of them?

Ontario, +1 on the rights point.

Of course you won’t see this at any restaurant because the picture is a joke. The type of face shield the Maine rules refer to are like those at the link below. No doubt also annoying to wear, but less funny to covid deniers.

https://www.zverse.com/our-products/

Actually, the cone of shame would be better than the link attached. That particular shield could move out of place, and no coverage would be available, where a cone of same could fully rotate and never lose protection.

+1 on the rights issue.

And while I'm fed up with all of this mess, and I do think much of it is over played, I don't deny the existence as I have friends who truly did have it.

ekba wrote:Of course you won’t see this at any restaurant because the picture is a joke. The type of face shield the Maine rules refer to are like those at the link below. No doubt also annoying to wear, but less funny to covid deniers.

https://www.zverse.com/our-products/

FYI.....not everyone who isn't unnecessarily freaking out about Covid or thinks there is tremendous government overreach is a denier. It IS possible to not be pulled into the hype but believe it exists. It's called common sense.

Yesterday I came across an interesting stat. Did you know that worldwide there have been around 23 million cases of Covid? But, did you also know that in 2019 there were a BILLION cases of the flu. A freaking billion! https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/coronavirus/coronavirus-disease-2019-vs-the-flu