Americans Will Stop Worrying And Love The COVID?

7 thoughts on “Americans Will Stop Worrying And Love The COVID?”

1. So many hoaxes, so few tweets . . .

   . . . so few real patriots.

    

   How FOXamerica learned to stop worrying . . .

   
    

   . . . I mean, fuck, who hasn’t known he was gonna’ destroy it all — one way or another — anyway?

   The question was never “will he,” but “how” and “when”?

   Survival kit contents check. In them you’ll find: one .45-caliber automatic, two boxes ammunition, four days’ concentrated emergency KFC rations, one drug issue containing Propecia, morphine, vitamin pills, pep pills, sleeping pills, tranquilizer pills, one miniature combination “Rooshin” phrase book and Bible, one hundred dollars in rubles, one hundred dollars in gold, nine packs of chewing gum, one MAGA hat, one issue of facial bronzer, three lipsticks, extra-hold hairspray, three pair of nylon stockings, shoe lifts, one girdle size XXXXLarge … Shoot, a fella could have a pretty good weekend in Tulsa with all that stuff!

   In just five months, Ttump has embiggened and greatened America with more that double the casualties she suffered in two Vietnams . . .

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   1. Trump scampaign (and others) are hoping we will accept things are “unchangeable.”

      We’ve learned to live with lots of people dying of other things .. so learn to be numb to COVID-19 like we are numb to 34,200 flu-related deaths.  Or 37,200 gun deaths.  To “Cigarette smoking is estimated to cause more than 480,000 deaths annually (including deaths from secondhand smoke).”  Or to one that hits close to my belt buckle, the 1 in 5 deaths linked to obesity.

      Wishing it was snark … smh in knowing it will appeal to some in America.

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      1. They actually have a response to the annual 37,200 gun deaths. Thoughts and prayers.

         I didn't say it was a particularly effective response.

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2. Trump said that 99% of the Covid cases are harmless.  His FDA Commissioner yesterday refused to say whether that is correct, or not.

   But, just last week the CDC head said that 10 times as many Americans as reported (about 24 million) have already been infected.  That means they didn't have hardly any symptoms or problems.  Is Trump correct?  This is just so fucking confusing….

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   1. Rule of thumb … if Trump says something, it's likely to be hype (at best) or deceptive (frequently).

      COVID-19 cases are a NOVEL disease.  We know more now than we did in January.  We will know a great deal more in another 6 months.

      As best I know, there has not been a broad sampling of the population to know how many have been infected.  There are expert opinions of ranges — based on diseases we know more about.  If the confirmed cases are only 10% of the total infected, then consequences are going to be diminished, too. 

      In confirmed cases, there are differences in impact based on age, gender, race/ethnicity, blood type, other diseases, BMI, and apparently the viral load the patient received.  In Colorado's 5.8 million people, there've been just over 350,000 tests done, with confirmed positives in almost 10% (34,000).  In that 10%, about 16% have been hospitalized (~5,600). Among the hospitalized, half will require some intensive care (~2,800), and slightly more than half of those will die (Colorado's current count:  1,521 deaths due to COVID-19). That is about 4.5% of the positive tests, about a quarter of those hospitalized. 

      I've not seen any study on long term consequences for a disease we've only been tracking for 6 months.  Self-reporting is starting to emerge that long-term, lingering effect appear to happen in about 10% of those who recover. 

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      1. Using Colorado math at a national scale: 325 million x 10% = 32.5 million confirmed positives. 16% of those being hospitalized = 1.95 million.  Half of those will need intensive care = .975 mm. Half of those will die = (roughly) 500,000  (just a few less than all cancer deaths annually)

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      2. Check out this math:  2.9 million reported US infections.  Plus, 29 million unreported infections (10 times reported) = 32 million infections in the US.  130,000 deaths / 32 million infections = 0.4% death rate.  250,000 total hospitalizations to date / 32 million infections = 0.8% hospitalization rate.

         So, about 1% hospitalization rate. (1/2 percent death rate).  I totally agree that the long-term effects of even non-hospitalized patients is very important (lung scarring, organ damage, etc.) and that we know diddly about it.   (BTW – I don't understand the importance of infection rates of those tested since the testing is not done randomly.)

         Let's say 70% of Americans will get infected eventually.  So, @ 0.4% death rate = 921,000 deaths.  But, over 50% of CO deaths are those over 80 years old (happens to be the expected life expectancy).  The remaining potential deaths are probably those in their 70s and others who have underlying conditions.  And, many deaths/infections may be avoided with an effective vaccine and/or therapeutics and/or better treatment of patients.

         I'm not making any conclusions — just saying that there might be a way to look at this without going apocalyptic. (?) 

         The reporting on this has been as bad as the reporting on the economy.  For example, did you know that in addition to 4.8 million new jobs added last month, there were 1.4 million new unemployment claims just last week?  Almost no media outlet highlighted the new claims.  It's maddening I tell ya!

          

          

          

          

          

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