Coronavirus COVID-19 - Global Health Pandemic #45

[PommyMommy]

French President Emmanuel Macron to address the nation Thursday

French President Emmanuel Macron gives a speech during a visit to the Kolmi-Hopen protective face masks factory in Saint-Barthelemy-d'Anjou, France, on March 31.

French President Emmanuel Macron will address the nation Thursday regarding the ongoing coronavirus crisis.

The country has now seen more than 10,000 coronavirus-related deaths and has moved to tighten local confinement measures.

The city of Paris has prohibited any individual sporting activity outdoors between 10 a.m. and 7 p.m. local as of Wednesday, while authorities in the city of Biarritz have prohibited sitting on benches for more than two minutes.

[...]

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN

 

[PommyMommy]

Spain coronavirus deaths rise for second day in a row

Undertakers lower a coffin at La Almudena cemetery in Madrid, Spain on April 7.

[...]

Figures show 757 people died in the past 24 hours, an increase from 743 deaths recorded the previous day. However it was only a 5.5% in relation to the total number of deaths, a slight slowdown compared to Tuesday’s 5.7% rise on the total.

According to the Health Ministry 14,555 people have now died from the novel coronavirus in Spain.

The number of active cases has also gone up from 83,504 to 84,111, an increase of 610, which is the lowest in nearly a month. Percentage-wise, there was a growth of 0.7% on Tuesday’s numbers, the lowest since the outbreak began.

The Health Ministry also reported 48,021 people have now recovered from the virus, 4,813 more than the number reported Tuesday.

[...]

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN

 

[tresir2012]

Seven residents die at London care home

More care home deaths.

7 residents have died, 21 more have symptoms. Total of 48 in the home.

Plus a dozen workers off work self isolating or shielding.

Social distancing, self-isolation and shielding | Coronavirus | Age UK

 

[bluedivergirl]

Some uplifting news:

TJ Kim can’t play lacrosse — COVID-19 took the sport away. And at age 16, he can’t drive alone.

But Kim can fly. And he's turned his flying lessons into missions of mercy, bringing desperately needed supplies to rural hospitals in need.

 

[PommyMommy]

Pet cats in coronavirus-infected or self-isolating households should be kept inside if possible, says UK vet association

Cats from coronavirus-infected households, or those with owners self-isolating, should be kept indoors as a precaution, said the British veterinary association.

But cats should not be forced to stay inside if it causes them stress, it added.

There have been a “tiny” number of Covid-19 cases in animals but it appears the transmission was human to animal, said the association in a statement.

“There is no evidence that pets can pass Covid-19 to their owners,” it added.

[...]

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN

 

[PommyMommy]

Tesla furloughs staff and slashes salaries until June

[...]

Starting next Monday, US employees at the electric car company who hold director and vice president-level roles and above will see pay reductions of 20% to 30%, and "everyone else" will receive a pay cut of 10%, according to an internal email obtained by CNN Business.

The reductions are expected to be in place until the end of June. Pay rises and equity grants will also be put on hold.

Non-US employees will also face similar reductions, according to the email.

Tesla is running "minimum critical operations" at the moment, and expects to resume full operations at US plants in early May "barring any significant changes," the email said.

[...]

Employees who can't work from home and haven't been assigned to critical work on site will be furloughed, and the majority of furloughed staff will receive unemployment benefits "roughly equivalent to take home pay," the email said.

[...]

In the United States, the current epicenter of the pandemic, car sales have plummeted as millions across the country have been told to stay at home except for essentials such as shopping for food, drugs or seeking medical care.

Other major corporations, including automakers like Ford, have also announced executive pay cuts to mitigate the consequences of the outbreak.

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN

 

[PommyMommy]

Covid-19 cases surpass 10,000 in Africa, WHO says

Laboratory technicians test patient samples for coronavirus at the Pathologists Lancet Kenya laboratory in Nairobi, Kenya on April 5.

The number of confirmed Covid-19 cases on the continent of Africa has climbed to more than 10,000 and caused more than 500 deaths, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced Wednesday.

Africa's first Covid-19 case was reported in Egypt in February and the novel coronavirus has spread since then. However the number of cases has grown "exponentially" in recent weeks, according to WHO officials.

[...]

The statement noted that WHO has been working with governments across Africa to "scale up" their response capacities when it comes to coordination, surveillance, testing, isolation, case management, contact tracing, infection prevention and control, risk communication and community engagement during the coronavirus pandemic.

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN

 

[nhmemorymaker]

Indiana

Positive cases 5943
Deaths 203
Tested 30869

ISDH - Novel Coronavirus: Indiana Novel Coronavirus Map

Peak Projection: April 14

IHME | COVID-19 Projections

i hope your death rate goes down. I have been shocked that ours is so low in Florida, given our population....

 

[PommyMommy]

First coronavirus patients being treated in temporary London hospital

[...]

“Our first patients have now been admitted to the NHS Nightingale London, as planned," said a spokeswoman for NHS Nightingale.

"There is also treatment capacity available in other hospitals across London to complement the care being provided at the London Nightingale.”

The facility at the Excel Centre in east London will initially provide up to 500 beds equipped with ventilators and oxygen. It was officially opened by Prince Charles on Friday last week.

[...]

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN

 

[PommyMommy]

Officials in Michigan order four portable refrigeration units to store bodies

Officials in Wayne County, Michigan, have ordered at least four portable units -- equivalent to the size of a semi-trailer -- to help increase capacity to accommodate bodies.

The county morgue has space for 300 bodies, and Wayne County Spokesman Bill Nowling told CNN each portable unit will hold about 40 bodies, increasing storage capacity to 450 total.

[...]

Excluding Detroit there are at least 3,513 cases of coronavirus in the county, and 180 deaths, according to county data.

Michigan has at least 18,970 cases of coronavirus and 845 deaths, according to the Michigan Dept. of Health and Human Services as well as Johns Hopkins University.

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN

 

[PommyMommy]

Switzerland records 547 new cases

Health workers move a coronavirus patient at the Pourtales Hospital in Neuchatel, Switzerland on March 25.

A further 547 people tested positive for coronavirus, taking the total to 22,789 cases, the Swiss Federal Office for Health said Wednesday.

The country has also recorded 705 coronavirus-related deaths, and the incidence rate is 266 per 100.000 inhabitants, the office said.

Public and private events are banned in Switzerland until April 19, and the country has moved to restrict non-essential travel.

[...]

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN

 

[nhmemorymaker]

I thought it was 72 hours on surfaces but only from my memory? Only 1 day on some surfaces. Will have to gen up on it again.

ETA remembering that some posters leave shopping outside for a few days.

I think what my main concern is how long does it remain with asymptomatic carriers.

 

[dixiegirl1035]

RSBM The scientists on alert for second coronavirus wave in China Second wave
The virus would have difficulty reestablishing itself in the community if a significant portion of people, between 50% and 70%, were infected and are now immune, says Leung. But he notes that even in Wuhan — which accounted for more than half China’s 81,000 cases — the number of those people infected and are now immune to the disease is probably less than 10% — which means there are lots of people still vulnerable to infection. A vaccine would increase the percentage of immune people, but no vaccines are expected for at least a year. “These numbers don’t allow a sigh of relief,” he says.

Yes, that figure of 50% - 70% is what is called herd immunity (last figure I saw was at least 70% needed to be infected to get herd immunity with an R0 of ~2-3). But that would take more than months, but in terms of a couple of years or two in many places going all out with no social distancing/shut down (the scenario of letting go wild and all health systems being overwhelmed for a very long time with unbelievable numbers of deaths) By then, with social distancing, we will have a vaccine first.

MOO

 

[Trudie]

Ending 'Social Distancing' For COVID-19 Will Create A Worst-Case Scenario

 

[PommyMommy]

Iran coronavirus death toll exceeds 4,000

People wear protective clothing while carrying the body of a victim who died from coronavirus at a cemetery just outside Tehran, Iran, on March 30.

Iran recorded 121 coronavirus-related deaths in the past 24 hours, bringing the total death toll to 4,003, health ministry spokesman Kianush Jahanpoor said Wednesday on state TV.

There were also 1,997 new coronavirus cases in the past 24 hours, bringing the total to 64,586, said Jahanpoor.

He added that 29,812 patients have so far recovered at home or been released from hospitals across the country. Of those hospitalized, 3,956 are in critical condition.

[...]

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN

 

[Amonet]

If Round 1 modeling projections wind up hugely overstated, few will believe future projections, imo.

I don't think numbers matter as much as the hospitals...too many are having to use regular wards for covid patients, building field hospitals for dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of patients.

The juggling of existing ventilators. The rush to make more.. The struggles to provide high quality PPE for hospital staff.

I felt that there was a bit of a 'washed out' period where we were just hearing projections of numbers and how hospitals were so awesome in our countries with such awesome staff, and of course they're going to cope!

But however awesome they are, there's a limit to how many patients at one time they can cope with. Over here in the UK they have so many more patients at one time who need oxygen than they normally would that they're struggling to get it piped around effectively.

There are nurses in intensive care units who'd normally work one-on-one with patients, and they now have to care for four patients simultaneously, and some of those staff have had to be moved in from other specialties.

When you have that situation, and the social distancing and speediness of reaction in the hospitals means that instead of having 6 million deaths in the USA there's 'only' however many it will be, those are still people who otherwise wouldn't have died at that hour on that day, even this year or decade.

 

[PommyMommy]

NYC mayor unclear if city will have enough ventilators next week

Mayor Bill de Blasio welcomes medical members of the US Navy who have volunteered from across the country to work at the temp Jacob K. Javits Center in New York, on April 5.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio told CNN’s John Berman that the city has enough ventilators to get through this week, but cautions future needs are unclear.

“We can get through this week … We're good for this week, but the future is still unknown," he said.

[...]

Tuesday was the deadliest day of the outbreak so far.

[...]

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN

 

[The Night Watchman]

For each model, there is usually a source page that discusses their model, e.g. this on for the IHME .

http://www.healthdata.org/sites/default/files/files/Projects/COVID/Estimation_update_040520_1.pdf

Why COVID-19 death models have decreased

Why COVID-19 death models have decreased
Apr. 08, 2020 - 2:51 - 'It's going to be less than the original projections,' says Dr. Anthony Fauci explaining why death models have been downgraded and when we can reopen the U.S. economy.

Video at link.

In the video, Dr. Fauci explains today that social distancing is the reason that model numbers keep dropping. This is simplistic and nonsensical, the IHME model already includes social distancing as an input assumption, and he knows that. He thinks Americans are too stupid to know the actual reasons.

Dixiegirl's post has the link to an honest and transparent IHME explanation as to why the models are revised. It is actually a pretty easy read. Four model input changes to the model-

Model update 1: Epidemic peak and its relationship to social distancing policies.

Today’s updates show an earlier predicted date of peak daily deaths, even though at the national level the change is not very pronounced.

Model update 2: Weighting of social distancing policies in the COVID-19 death model.

Starting with today’s release, we use three different weighting schemes to better approximate variation in potential policy impact across social distancing mandates. Our statistical tests suggest that early actions such as school closures may have a larger effect in some communities than expected; in other locations, fully mandated stay-at-home orders may be required for detectable impact. To better capture this community-by-community difference of mandates on social distancing behaviors, we now use an ensemble model of three different weighting schemes.

Model update 3: Uncertainty estimation and out-of-sample predictive validity.

We evaluate model performance both in terms of how many days into the future we estimate and how many data points have been reported for each state. As expected, projection accuracy improves when there are more data on the number of daily deaths in each state and gets worse the farther into the future projections are made. Model projection accuracy is now included in our prediction uncertainty estimates.

Model update 4: Incorporating adaptive priors for states with low cumulative COVID-19 deaths.

In an effort to better capture these locations’ trends amid limited model inputs, we now use adaptive priors in the statistical model estimation. We wish to highlight that we are no longer using the model specification where the social distancing measure was a covariate on the final death rate (i.e., p-model; see original manuscript’s methods section for details) due to its poor performance in out-of-sample predictive tests.

 

[tresir2012]

Fifteen die in care home during virus pandemic

15 dead in a Luton care home.

Getting very worrying now.

"Fifteen residents at a care home have died during the coronavirus pandemic.

Five of those who have died at Castletroy Residential Home in Luton have been confirmed as being positive with Covid-19.

The home has 69 beds for elderly people with nursing or personal care needs.

Dr Sultan Salimee, from Public Health England (PHE) East, said it was "continuing to work closely with the care home, providing public health advice to stop the virus spreading".

The other 10 residents who died have not been tested for coronavirus, a PHE spokeswoman said.

A PHE statement said: "In occasions where some cases have already been tested positive in a care home, we do not advise testing of new cases as it will not change the public health management." "

So what did they die of ? Is it just assumed they died of CV19? Not good enough PHE.

 

[PommyMommy]

HHS announces contract to produce 30,000 ventilators for US national stockpile

The US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced a $489.4 million contract with General Motors (GM) to produce 30,000 ventilators under the Defense Production Act

The ventilators will be delivered to the Strategic National Stockpile by the end of August with a production schedule allowing for the delivery of 6,132 ventilators by June 1, according to a press release.

[...]

By using the Defense Production Act, Azar said HHS is "helping manufacturers like GM get the supplies they need to produce ventilators as quickly as possible, while also ensuring that these ventilators are routed through the Strategic National Stockpile to where they’re needed most."

[...]

Coronavirus live updates: Cases top 1.4 million globally - CNN