California - Coronavirus COVID-19

[10ofRods]

I was going to post with some good news - the sad news above is just heartbreaking.

In my area, InstaCart was back up and running today (after several days of reloading - with no results). Most stores unavailable but Von's came through.

It'll be next Thursday, but that's okay. We took stock of protein in our house and weren't happy with our inability to go a month without basically eating oatmeal all the time. We already had enough eggs for one egg per day for a month, but I seriously think my DH would feel like he was starving with only 1 egg per day.

I bought things I don't usually (bread and bologna). It was very very expensive compared to normal. But, Whole Foods hasn't been able to fulfill orders here for days and days, nor have most stores. Only BevMo has drive up service. The lines at Trader Joe's are 50-60 people long (6 feet apart). Each time one shopper leaves, one goes in - they allow 10-15 at a time. People still have trouble social distancing, but it's pretty peaceful and it works. People are not going into Target much at all, even though it's open, because there are no controls on how many people are there (hardly anyone there though).

We have extras of some things, have started making quick deliveries to family and friends, will see some new work gloves (not medical gloves) delivered today. We are on Day 21 of Stay at Home; have developed a moderately sane way of handling new packages. We see 2 people regularly (daughter and granddaughter - we social distance from Daughter but not granddaughter).

The VERY good news from California (can I brag) is that we are about to roll out an ANTIBODY TEST!

https://www.sacbee.com/news/politic.../article241774351.html#storylink=bignews_main

And I was rooting for my alma mater to be the one to get it in production first (sorry USC). It's MAJOR good news. It will enable hospitals to put people who are already immune into the front lines and save so many lives of doctors, nurses and techs.

 

[10ofRods]

Isolated but at risk: California's Slab City confronts coronavirus pandemic

 

[10ofRods]

California's projected death total drops again, to just under 1800.

Originally projected to be just under 4000. At the peak, the original projection was 122 deaths per day. Now it's 69-70

IHME | COVID-19 Projections

This makes CoVid approximately like a severe flu season in California. Many thanks go out to Gov Newsom, all the scientists and especially the doctors, nurses, EMT's and techs.

It turned out that our community colleges really helped as well, by opening up their supply stores that were in reserve to train EMT's, law enforcement officers, firefighters and RN's/LVN's. Each year the colleges order many extra masks for training in proper usage, as well as for use in their practicums in hospitals and nursing homes.

 

[PommyMommy]

Oakland is closing 74 miles of city streets to make more room for physical distancing

[...]

Mayor Libby Schaaf gave a preview of the new initiative, dubbed Oakland Slow Streets, in a virtual town hall Thursday night.

Parks are too crowded to maintain proper physical distancing, Chief Resilience Officer Alexandra McBride noted, so the city's creative solution is to take advantage of the 20% to 30% of land dedicated to roads.

City streets will close roads to vehicular traffic mostly in and around residential neighborhoods. The official rollout of this emergency and details are expected to be released later today.

Coronavirus pandemic: Live updates - CNN

 

[PommyMommy]

Coronavirus: Los Angeles County extends 'safer at home' order until May 15, issues requirements on face coverings

Health and elected officials on Friday announced the "safer at home" order that has been in effect throughout Los Angeles County since last month will be extended until at least May 15.

... face coverings will be required in public countywide beginning at midnight on April 15.

[...]

The new health order requires each essential business to implement and document a social distancing and sanitation plan, and requires the plan to be visibly posted at the front of individual business locations.

Employers must also provide cloth face coverings to their employees, according to the order, while members of the public must wear such coverings when visiting those businesses or when they are in close contact with others.

[...]

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said people may be cited for not wearing masks in public after the order goes into effect.

[...]

 

[kkdj]

Wasn't there something on here earlier about some grocery store employees in Orange, CA coming down with it? I can't find it now.

 

[PommyMommy]

Wasn't there something on here earlier about some grocery store employees in Orange, CA coming down with it? I can't find it now.

I don't remember that but I found this in Sacramento County:

Dozens of CA grocery store workers test positive for coronavirus, union says

 

[Eleven_11]

Wasn't there something on here earlier about some grocery store employees in Orange, CA coming down with it? I can't find it now.

I found this....
“A Whole Foods employee in Huntington Beach tested positive for the virus last Wednesday and the last day he worked in the Bella Terra location was March 19, according to the OC Register. And a Spouts employee tested positive for the virus.”
Grocery Workers Plea for Virus Safety Measures as Clerks Deal With Crowded Stores and Rising Fears

 

[10ofRods]

We really need to speed up our efforts in protecting all essential workers (including grocery store personnel and instacart employees and USPS and UPS).

We'll get there. Presumably all these workers will have to start wearing masks at midnight on April 15.

 

[katydid23]

For people in Southern Cali, we have had a lot of luck getting fresh produce and meats , SAFELY, in the Vallarta markets. They have senior hour when the store opens at 7 am---5 people in the store at a time. Lines were not long.

We got fresh chicken breasts, chopped sirloin, fresh tortillas, avocados, mushrooms, salad makings, milk eggs, OJ, flour, etc. Almost no other customers in the store, no lines at checkout, and cashiers wore masks.

ETA: we went to the Vallarta in Northridge and my kids went to the one in Camarillo

 

[10ofRods]

SOME Kern County residents need to get their act together.

UPDATE: Around 400 people at party where 6 were shot, wounded in East Bakersfield; Nearly 100 casings recovered, sheriff’s office says

400 people at a house party. House parties are the #1 place in the US where shots get fired. At least, that's what another article said recently. Clubs are second (or outside of clubs on the sidewalk).

Kern County has not yet stepped up its enforcement against house parties in the way that many Los Angeles County communities have done (IMO). Maybe out of fear of reprisals from the partiers? Would be a nightmare - and I'm sure it was a nightmare to have to hospitalize these people during the pandemic.

 

[10ofRods]

For people in Southern Cali, we have had a lot of luck getting fresh produce and meats , SAFELY, in the Vallarta markets. They have senior hour when the store opens at 7 am---5 people in the store at a time. Lines were not long.

We got fresh chicken breasts, chopped sirloin, fresh tortillas, avocados, mushrooms, salad makings, milk eggs, OJ, flour, etc. Almost no other customers in the store, no lines at checkout, and cashiers wore masks.

Ooo, good to know. There's one not too far from me.

 

[Gardenista]

ABC 20/20
JUST IN The first large-scale community test of 3,300 people in Santa Clara County found that 2.5 to 4.2% of those tested were positive for antibodies—a number suggesting a far higher past infection rate than the official count. https://abcn.ws/3bhpLFD

 

[10ofRods]

175 UCLA workers have CoVid.

And here are complete stats for all of Los Angeles County:

LISTING OF DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC HEALTH PRESS RELEASES

 

[10ofRods]

ABC 20/20
JUST IN The first large-scale community test of 3,300 people in Santa Clara County found that 2.5 to 4.2% of those tested were positive for antibodies—a number suggesting a far higher past infection rate than the official count. https://abcn.ws/3bhpLFD

The statisticians and virologists were testing for the old CoVid (2) not 19. Their hope was to compare the numbers, since they know a lot about the time when CoVid-2 swept through the area. There were very few reported cases, and their study shows that way more people had it than doctors realized.

What they're trying to do with that study is figure out sampling techniques that they can use when the CV19 antibody tests become available. They are experimenting with sample size, recruitment and region. Within Santa Clara County, they know now that some populations had more CV in the past than other populations. It's likely to be the same this time. So sampling techniques should try to balance those demographics and not just sample from one population (say, Asians) who might have higher numbers.

Further, the study is predictive. If doctors didn't know the extent of CV-2 as it was unfolding, then they probably don't know that rate now. It was thought to be way, way less than 3%. IOW, only a handful of cases became symptomatic enough to warrant hospitalization and then testing.

Probably the same right now.

 

[10ofRods]

California death projections revised upwards. 61 deaths predicted today, but there were 91. The spike is mostly in Los Angeles, but also other bigger cities.

IMHE data have been revised upward to about 1650 deaths in California, from 1450. While tomorrow's death rate is predicted as 61, the overnight revision of the model will hopefully put it closer to 80 - and let's hope it's 80 and not higher.

IHME | COVID-19 Projections

 

[katydid23]

There has been a sudden upsurge of testing sites in Los Angeles, available the past few days. Could that be the reason for the higher rate of confirmed cases?


Same-Day Coronavirus Testing Now Available Across LA County

April 17,2020
Same-Day Coronavirus Testing Now Available Across LA County

Through Thursday, at least 70,000 people have been tested countywide, 11 percent of which have registered as positive. There are 10,844 cases in the county and 455 deaths from the disease.

 

[MJPeony]

The statisticians and virologists were testing for the old CoVid (2) not 19. Their hope was to compare the numbers, since they know a lot about the time when CoVid-2 swept through the area. There were very few reported cases, and their study shows that way more people had it than doctors realized.

What they're trying to do with that study is figure out sampling techniques that they can use when the CV19 antibody tests become available. They are experimenting with sample size, recruitment and region. Within Santa Clara County, they know now that some populations had more CV in the past than other populations. It's likely to be the same this time. So sampling techniques should try to balance those demographics and not just sample from one population (say, Asians) who might have higher numbers.

Further, the study is predictive. If doctors didn't know the extent of CV-2 as it was unfolding, then they probably don't know that rate now. It was thought to be way, way less than 3%. IOW, only a handful of cases became symptomatic enough to warrant hospitalization and then testing.

Probably the same right now.

Hi 10-

This is interesting. I’ve been following this study for the last couple of days (I’m in Santa Clara County), and I’d not heard of this- the COV2 connection. Do you have any links/articles I can read about it? Very interesting indeed. And disappointing I was hoping this study would give some headwind to progress with the fight against this thing, but I’m seeing a lot of holes are being poked into it.

 

[10ofRods]

It turns out that CoVid -19 is still CoVid-2, so the antibody tests were (kind of) accurate. Now, the real problem with that study seems to be that people self-selected AND that they were mostly upper middle class suburbanites who were already more isolated than people who work in crowded workplaces. The other factor is that participants were disproportionately from the foothills south and west of Stanford - where people live on large properties, there's often only one worker in the household, and a significant amount of work done from home in the first place, as I understand it.

I don't have my links handy - I'll try to post them. I popped in to post this update:

Coronavirus: California hasn't flattened curve — yet

We aren't seeing linear expansion of cases in California, but yesterday we had a bump up, and statewide, cases are up 15% in one week. Good news for the Bay Area - only up by 3%.

But that's still up. The criticism of the IMHE model is that it shows cases going to zero everywhere, which is an artifact of their model - not reality. Cases are not going to go to zero any time soon unless this virus truly is seasonal. California's weather in no way resembles seasonal weather elsewhere, though. The data from Australia (where the virus took strong hold during their autumn) will be interesting. Will it go up in Australia winter? Why was it so virulent in the relatively mild winter climate of Lombardy and Tuscany?

Lots to learn. Anyway, Peony, I do have more links on the Santa Clara study. I forgot I posted that here, and it's too late to correct it. The "19" in CoVid-19 is just shorthand for CV-2-2019 (year of origin).

The overall criticism of the study also spins on whether it was sensitive to all the versions of CoVid-2-19. Here's an article showing the variations in this virus (all of them CoVid-2, known to most of us as CoVid-19):

SARS Coronavirus 2 – LOINC

So I stand corrected and now understand the terminology of that study. Presumably, any immunity to CV-2 is immunity to CV-19.

 

[Herat]

I had criticized this Stanford epidemiology study design about the prevalence of antibody-positive patients in the Santa Clara area.

Here is a decent review of what went wrong: Using a non-FDA validated fingerstick test that has not had rigorous laboratory study review, failing to use an IRB process, "weighting" the data in an unstubstantiated manner.

And having an epidemiologists wife, who happens to be an MD (radiation oncologist, not qualified to administer or review the test, not an investigator in the study) send a misleading email to her friends and her children's school recruiting people for the test with false and unsubstantiated claims.

This is a mess and someone at Stanford needs to be sanctioned for this mess:

Wife's email may have tainted Stanford coronavirus antibody study

you may want to bring this to the general COVID-19 board as I am having technical difficulties posting.