Coronavirus COVID-19 - Global Health Pandemic #41

[margarita25]

Japan:

Japan on brink of emergency as coronavirus spreads: government spokesperson

——

North Korea launches projectiles into the Sea of Japan

“A TV screen shows a file image of North Korea's missile launch during a news program at the Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, Sunday, March 29, 2020. North Korea on Sunday fired two suspected ballistic missiles into the sea, South Korea said, calling it "very inappropriate" at a time when the world is battling the coronavirus pandemic.”

—-

Can Japan’s Economy Get Any Worse? It May Soon Find Out

“Trade has slowed to a crawl as other leading nations come to virtual standstills to curb the virus. Tourism has nearly evaporated, with bankruptcies starting to pop up among hotels, restaurants and tour operators. Large sports and cultural events have been canceled, and postponing the Tokyo Olympics to 2021 will require a dizzying amount of money and time, while delaying an expected economic boost.

The situation is so dire that even Japan’s unwaveringly optimistic officials now express worry about the country’s growth, saying the economy — the world’s third largest after the United States and China — is facing “severe circumstances” because of the pandemic.”

 

[Cool Cats]

Do you guys think that cheesecloth would make a effective mask?

No. Too pourous. And Cotton was mentioned on here as being better than synthetics.

 

[katydid23]

My walmart has tons of fat quarters besides the usual bolts of fabric. Jmo

Are they allowing people to purchase things from the fabric department? Someone posted upthread that 'non-essential' goods were no longer being sold.

 

[Anirtak]

But can you breathe through tightly woven fabrics?

You should be able to. It won't be like regular air but that's the point, to filter. MOO

 

[katydid23]

From your link, the official transcript of the presser:
"And we’re also sending things that we don’t need to other parts. I just spoke to the Prime Minister of Italy, and we have additional capacity. We have additional product that we don’t need. We’re going to be sending approximately 100 million dollars’ worth of things — of surgical and medical and hospital things to Italy. And Giuseppe was very, very happy — I will tell you that. They’re having a very hard time."
------------------------------------
Citizens even lacking a sewing machine are making masks to help out medical staff and old folks' homes, nurses are wearing garbage bags due to lack of PPE, we are way behind in testing compared even to S Korea, I wonder which product he is talking about that "we don't need".

There may be other products that are not in short supply. But he was not talking about masks or ventilators, in my opinion.

 

[margarita25]

Spain:

Spain's Health Staff Are Catching The Coronavirus As Protective Gear Runs Short


“By last Friday, more than 9,400medical personnel were infected, which was nearly 15% of all confirmed cases at the time. As of Tuesday, Spain registered over 94,400 cases — more than China's infections — and the world's second highest death toll at over 8,200.”

[...]

“Hospitals need more COVID-19 test kits, ventilators, intensive care unit beds and even basic protective gear, says emergency physician Tomás Toranzo, president of the Spanish Confederation of Medical Unions.

"The government is constantly lying," says Toranzo, who works in a hospital in Salamanca, in western Spain. "They promise more material, but it doesn't come."”

—-

Exclusive: Inside a hospital battling coronavirus in Spain
-video at link


“In Italy, France and Spain, dozens of health care professionals have died of the coronavirus, and thousands of others have had to self-isolate.

“There is no longer only the danger of falling ill but there is the danger that we become vectors of the virus and transmit it to our loved ones,” Dr Lopez-Contreras said.

It is impossible to know how many patients have infected doctors and vice versa, but the fast spread within hospitals has now left the government struggling with a shortage of both professionals and equipment.”

—-

COVID-19: Spain, France record highest single-day deaths

“The coronavirus outbreak shows no sign of slowing down in Europe.

Spain and France have recorded their highest single-day death tolls, while more than 800 deaths were reported in Italy today.”

—-
‘We Are in a Cage:’ Spanish Town Lives Under a Lockdown Within a Lockdown
A town near Barcelona has withdrawn into itself to contain the spread of the coronavirus. Dozens have died at an overstretched hospital, and the cost of confinement goes far beyond illness.

“After its hospital was identified as a hub of a regional outbreak that has reached nearly 20,000 coronavirus infections and more than 2,500 deaths, officials sealed off Igualada and three smaller neighboring towns, at midnight on March 12, stranding about 65,000 people.

Police forces guard every access point, allowing only essential workers to enter and leave. The barriers have divided families like Ms. Rodríguez’s, put people out of work and thrown households into uncertainty for weeks, if not more.

“We are in a cage, and we are learning how to stop trying to control everything,” said Gemma Sabaté, a 48-year-old physical therapist stranded there.”

[...]

“Those inside and those outside the cordon can meet at checkpoints, but only to exchange essential goods under the eyes of police officers.”

[...]

““I never thought we would have to restrict people’s freedom of movement,” she said. “But 10,000 people get out of Igualada every day, mostly to Barcelona. We had to stop the virus from getting out.”@

 

[katydid23]

You should be able to. It won't be like regular air but that's the point, to filter. MOO

Right. But if you try and wear a mask that is too tightly woven, you cannot catch your breath after awhile.

I have been wearing the disposable hospital masks, and putting an extra 'filter' type piece on the inner side, by pinning it with safety pins. When I tried vacuum cleaner filters, it was too hard to breathe. The mask would fill up with my own exhaled breaths, and I didnt get any fresh air and would feel dizzy......

I was in the airport and didnt want to take the mask off but it was hard to breathe and I felt light headed. Since then, I found another material, the type in my husband's mask he used for painting with more toxic type paints...And I used a strip of that on the inside of my mask, and it allows me to breathe...

 

[Amonet]

Louisiana:

Hundreds attend Sunday service at Life Tabernacle Church near Baton Rouge amid coronavirus pandemic

“An estimated 500 people attended this past Sunday, according to The Associated Press. Worshippers from five different parishes were bused in to attend. Sunday’s service was the second one Spell held in defiance of the governor’s ban. Spell says he’ll gather his flock together again this week.

“The virus, we believe, is politically motivated," said Spell. “We hold our religious rights dear, and we are going to assemble no matter what someone says.””

—-

Coronavirus updates in Louisiana: 5,237 COVID-19 cases in state; 239 deaths reported

“According to the Louisiana Department of Health, there are now 5,237 cases in the state. Officials said 60 of the state's 64 parishes are reporting cases.

In New Orleans, 1,834 cases have been reported.”

[...]

“State health officials said Tuesday that 101 Louisianians who died of COVID-19 lived in New Orleans.

Overall, 239 Louisianians have died.”

[...]

“More than 1,000 COVID-19 patients remain in hospitals. Of those, more than 300 people are on ventilators, state health officials said.”

—-

Louisiana Coronavirus Updates: 1,200 new cases, 54 additional deaths reported Tuesday

“NEW ORLEANS — Latest Numbers:

• 239 deaths (+54)
• 5,237 total cases (1,212)
• 1,355 patients hospitalized (+197)
• 438 in need of ventilators (+53)
• 60 of 64 parishes reporting cases (+1)
• 38,967 tests completed (+4,934)
• [...]
• It's been 22 days since the first confirmed case of COVID-19 in Louisiana, and 239 people have died, more than 1,350 have been hospitalized and thousands have become sick in that time.”

—-

New Orleans Saints legend Tom Dempsey has recovered after testing positive for COVID-19

—

New Orleans photographer takes free family portraits, helps local businesses through 'Front Porch Project'

—-

450-person Navy medical unit told to prepare to deploy to Texas and New Orleans to aid in COVID-19 pandemic efforts

“A 450-person Navy medical unit has been put on “prepare to deploy” orders to ship out to Texas and New Orleans over the next several days to help aid in COVID-19 relief efforts, U.S. Northern Command announced Monday.”

I think people who instigate and organize gatherings like that should be prosecuted.

 

[Amonet]

Again, these 'non essential' item rules are bugging e...
My 4 yr old granddaughter is starting to get cabin fever. I was planning to get some more art supplies, like construction paper and glitter glue etc, because my DIL said they were going through all their art supplies fast.

Will they not sell any art supplies or colouring books now? Or children's books? They seem essential to me now.

Could things like that be ordered online and send directly to the recipient's home?

I agree with not getting too caught up in what's essential to each person, but on the other hand other businesses need our custom, too, and even saving one minute going through the checkout and allowing another person into a store that's limiting the number of customers inside is going to make a difference when you add that up.

 

[Anirtak]

Right. But if you try and wear a mask that is too tightly woven, you cannot catch your breath after awhile.

I have been wearing the disposable hospital masks, and putting an extra 'filter' type piece on the inner side, by pinning it with safety pins. When I tried vacuum cleaner filters, it was too hard to breathe. The mask would fill up with my own exhaled breaths, and I didnt get any fresh air and would feel dizzy......

I was in the airport and didnt want to take the mask off but it was hard to breathe and I felt light headed. Since then, I found another material, the type in my husband's mask he used for painting with more toxic type paints...And I used a strip of that on the inside of my mask, and it allows me to breathe...

If you can't catch your breath then it's not usable. You're getting dizzy because you're breathing in C02 from your exhales. Masks aren't as easy to wear as most people are learning. They're uncomfortable. Inside the mask the air gets warm and like you've discovered they may not be good for longer than a few minutes. This is why it's difficult to make effective home made masks.

 

[margarita25]

Italy and Spain Point to Covid-19’s Staggering Oil-Demand Hit

“Oil traders and analysts estimate that the global hit to oil demand from the coronavirus -- and the restrictions it’s caused -- could be anywhere between 20 million to 25 million barrels a day. That’s about 20% to 25% of oil consumption in a normal market.”

 

[katydid23]

Could things like that be ordered online and send directly to the recipient's home?

I agree with not getting too caught up in what's essential to each person, but on the other hand other businesses need our custom, too, and even saving one minute going through the checkout and allowing another person into a store that's limiting the number of customers inside is going to make a difference when you add that up.

Right, but if I am already in the store buying milk and eggs, why not grab some colouring books and markers? How much longer does that take? JMO

I wouldn't go to Walmart just for art supplies---but if I am already there, why not pick pop things that make family life less stressful?

 

[musicaljoke]

Again, these 'non essential' item rules are bugging e...
My 4 yr old granddaughter is starting to get cabin fever. I was planning to get some more art supplies, like construction paper and glitter glue etc, because my DIL said they were going through all their art supplies fast.

Will they not sell any art supplies or colouring books now? Or children's books? They seem essential to me now.

It's not so much about which items are essential or not. But it's absolutely critical to shut down any opportunity for Covid-19 to pass from one person to another. Our ability to control the pandemic depends on how successful we are at starving the virus of new victims. Every second you spend at WMT you are taking a risk, and every day the risks are increasing significantly, so the less time spent shopping, the better the chance Covid can be beat.

 

[Squinchy]

So I was weak and my boyfriend went to the smoke shop today to get me cigs. In the shop there was tape to keep the customers 6 ft apart and there were only 2 other customers. He took and used his hand sanitizer and when he came home I wiped down the packs and doorknobs even tho he didn't touch them He washed his hands and I also wiped his wallet, debit card and keys. Did I miss anything?

 

[Amonet]

Those stores were essential for school supplies and for supplies for school projects and reports and experiments.

I imagine a lot of 'home schooling' uses projects and experiments for their lessons.

And what else can you do with your kids who are locked down but give them arts and crafts and models to build and projects to complete?

I vote for essential. JMO

Considering how long outbreaks are continuing in places like Italy even with stores and schools closing weeks ago, I'd vote for home delivery only on those items and closing the stores to reduce people traveling and coming into contact with each other or the store assistants.

I think we need every edge we can get to minimise the health/medical suffering.

Supermarkets that usually have sections for makeup or paper and pens could even get rid of that stuff cheap and then use the space for toilet rolls and cleaning products .... Over here they reckon they're okay for getting the deliveries to the stores but even with the purchase limits there are still a lot of shelves that are looking quite bare.

In a way, the more stores that are open, the more it acts as an encouragement for a family to go out shopping as if it was normal times....these aren't normal times.

And if the supermarkets take some of those products off the shelves so that they can use the shelves for other products, and then another company can do home delivery on the clothing/note books, reading books, etc, people have more incentive to 'shop around' different stores instead of funelling all the money through the supermarkets.

Maybe the situation is different in some places in the US, but even in the UK the focus is more on 'essential' products being food and medicine, cleaning products, and self hygiene products, and you can't get those from a craft shop, office supplies store, or book store. Maybe for the duration of the pandemic, it wouldn't be a bad idea to have the food stores focus on what they were initially set up to sell (fifty odd years ago) and let the other stores sell by home delivery to reduce the number of outings and human interactions?

 

[musicaljoke]

Do you guys think that cheesecloth would make a effective mask?

Cheesecloth is a very loose weave fabric, much like the white gauze that's used for bandage material. So no, it wouldn't be good to make masks from cheesecloth.

 

[bmacmillan1]

WHAT!? That’s just wrong. Where are you from if you don’t mind me asking?

Where I live we can order booze and it’s delivered in an hour or less. Not sure about cigarettes, I’m not a smoker.

I'm from South Africa. There are also hundreds of millions in tobacco lockdown losses expected. The drug lobbyists are currently fighting a reversal in this decision but so far, no change.

WHAT!? That’s just wrong. Where are you from if you don’t mind me asking?

Where I live we can order booze and it’s delivered in an hour or less. Not sure about cigarettes, I’m not a smoker.

 

[Amonet]

It's not so much about which items are essential or not. But it's absolutely critical to shut down any opportunity for Covid-19 to pass from one person to another. Our ability to control the pandemic depends on how successful we are at starving the virus of new victims. Every second you spend at WMT you are taking a risk, and every day the risks are increasing significantly, so the less time spent shopping, the better the chance Covid can be beat.

Right. And today there might be some towns that don't have cases, but we have to be careful we don't set them up to be tomorrow's epicenter by not taking all possible precautions today.

Right, but if I am already in the store buying milk and eggs, why not grab some colouring books and markers? How much longer does that take? JMO

I wouldn't go to Walmart just for art supplies---but if I am already there, why not pick pop things that make family life less stressful?

Yes, but I still think maybe they should allow those stocks to run down and re-use the shelf space for something else when the products is all sold out. Even if it reduces each person's time in store by 2 minutes browsing and 30 seconds going through the checkout, it's going to help when you multiply that by the total number of people going through the store in a day.

And for craft and office supplies, it might be a minor inconvenience to not go into the store and browse...but that could also end up saving a life by reducing the number of human interactions. And it's not forever.

I don't know if I could have thought this way a few months ago. But those stories like "a message from Italy to the next country" are probably making me have second thoughts about these things and rethinking what is really essential and how we might adapt to reduce the spread of the virus.

 

[margarita25]

Italy:

‘We’re now experiencing the aftershock’: As Italy’s death toll exceeds 10,000, Italians anxiously wait for coronavirus surge to peak

“COMO, Italy — Our world has been turned outside in.

It’s now almost six weeks since the university in Milan has been closed, and three weeks since the official lockdown was announced. We have daily music lessons in the bedroom, English lessons in the kitchen and high-school classes in the living room....”

[...]

“In a few short weeks, everything has changed — people’s habits, their hobbies, their social life, their reality. School corridors lie empty. Paintings in art classes are left unfinished.”

—-

“The number of new coronavirus cases in Italy leveled off at a two-week low, a sign the outbreak in Europe’s virus epicenter may be coming under control, even as neighboring Spain suffered its deadliest day yet.

Italy’s new infections totaled 4,053, civil protection authorities said in Rome on Tuesday. That compares with 4,050 the previous day, the fewest new cases since March 17.

The country “has reached a plateau in the contagion phase,” Silvio Brusaferro, head of the public health institute, told reporters.“

Italy’s New Cases Level Off as Spain Suffers Deadliest Day

—-

Italy Home Quarantine Repeats China’s Mistake, Doctors Say

“Doctors in Wuhan made the same error early on in the outbreak, said Liang Zong’An, head of the respiratory department at the West China Hospital at Sichuan University. While seriously ill patients were admitted to hospitals, doctors at the time recommended that those with mild symptoms isolate themselves at home, in part to reduce the strain on Wuhan’s overburdened health care system.

Back then, it was not well understood how infectious the virus can be even in those who don’t seem very sick. But researchers now know that those with mild symptoms who are told to stay at home usually risked passing the virus to family members, as well as to others outside their homes as some still moved around freely.

“Due to lockdown, most of the transmission that’s actually happening in many countries now is happening in the household at family level,” Mike Ryan, head of health emergencies at the World Health Organization, said in a briefing on Monday. “Now we need to go and look in families and find those people that may be sick and remove them and isolate them in a safe and dignified manner.””

(My man!)

 

[katydid23]

It's not so much about which items are essential or not. But it's absolutely critical to shut down any opportunity for Covid-19 to pass from one person to another. Our ability to control the pandemic depends on how successful we are at starving the virus of new victims. Every second you spend at WMT you are taking a risk, and every day the risks are increasing significantly, so the less time spent shopping, the better the chance Covid can be beat.

Of course we have to. I take very strong precautions. I don't go to Walmart, I go to a smaller local market. ...during senior hours.

I wear a baseball cap, huge 'yellow' lensed sunglasses which surround my eyeglasses, a hospital mask with an inner layer of protection, a scarf around my neck, and rubber gloves.

I move quickly and only pick top exactly what I am going to purchase....and I go during senior hour, when there are very few allowed in the market at once.

Life has to go on. We have to have a smooth, functional quarantine for our stressed families. If I can help make that happen, by giving an energetic 4 yr old something fun to focus on, so her parents can have a less tension filled day, I will try to do so. It's a medical necessity, in my opinion.

I am not throwing a Corona party or going to a speak easy. But I will try and make the best of this stress filled situation and make it as safe but as smooth as possible as well. My husband's birthday is tomorrow and I am baking him a cake and throwing him a Zoom party while we sing and blow out his candles. Life goes on....