The Coronavirus Thread

[Seabass]

Scot siding with Trumpists on pandemics and mask-wearing. Now I've seen everything. What a crazy world we live in.

[laklak]

Lol, anyone believing China has had only 85, 000 cases and 4,600 deaths is about as gullible as the most inbred redneck Trumpist out there.

[Scot Dutchy]

Scot siding with Trumpists on pandemics and mask-wearing. Now I've seen everything. What a crazy world we live in.

My government uses common sense. We dont side with anyone. Give your evidence that masks work. There is none. Do you have any? Keep drinking the kool-aide.

[JimC]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-07-23/ ... a/12480190

Hundreds of Australian flu deaths have been avoided because of the lockdown measures used to prevent the spread of COVID-19, experts say.

Australia has not recorded any flu deaths since April, with only 36 deaths recorded this year compared to 430 in the same period last year
Experts say school closures, physical distancing, hand hygiene and border closures all played a part in reducing the number of flu cases
There was also an uptick in influenza vaccinations this year, with 2 million more doses being administered
The latest national statistics, obtained by the ABC, reveal from January to June 2020, there were just 36 deaths from the flu.

That compares to 430 deaths in the same period for 2019.

So, 394 less deaths from the flu, and 128 deaths from Covid (the real number might be a bit higher, but not a lot)

A cruel irony...

[pErvinalia]

That looks suspiciously like data, Jim. As you know, we can't trust data. All we can trust are feelings.

[JimC]

I do find the flu thing interesting, though. It would be interesting to see an analysis as to how much the reduction is down to increased vaccination rates (because of the Covid scare) or simply reduced transmission due to the various Covid measures...

Some lunatic somewhere will say that, because of these numbers, Covid is a net benefit!

[rainbow]

But you don't trust the numbers Scot - so you can't really rely on that argument can you?

[rainbow]

I do find the flu thing interesting, though. It would be interesting to see an analysis as to how much the reduction is down to increased vaccination rates (because of the Covid scare) or simply reduced transmission due to the various Covid measures...

Some lunatic somewhere will say that, because of these numbers, Covid is a net benefit!

Covid is a nett benefit. This is a good practice run for the Real Pestilence Event.

[pErvinalia]

I do find the flu thing interesting, though. It would be interesting to see an analysis as to how much the reduction is down to increased vaccination rates (because of the Covid scare) or simply reduced transmission due to the various Covid measures...

Some lunatic somewhere will say that, because of these numbers, Covid is a net benefit!

I wasn't able to get a flu vaccine this year. They were always out of stock. I could have got one eventually, but decided with everyone else getting them and the fact that I don't leave the house much in winter it's probably unlikely I'll get it. So far so good.

[NineBerry]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-07-23/ ... a/12480190

Hundreds of Australian flu deaths have been avoided because of the lockdown measures used to prevent the spread of COVID-19, experts say.

Australia has not recorded any flu deaths since April, with only 36 deaths recorded this year compared to 430 in the same period last year
Experts say school closures, physical distancing, hand hygiene and border closures all played a part in reducing the number of flu cases
There was also an uptick in influenza vaccinations this year, with 2 million more doses being administered
The latest national statistics, obtained by the ABC, reveal from January to June 2020, there were just 36 deaths from the flu.

That compares to 430 deaths in the same period for 2019.

So, 394 less deaths from the flu, and 128 deaths from Covid (the real number might be a bit higher, but not a lot)

A cruel irony...

It's difficult to compare those numbers. Covid is actively being tested for currently while Influenza isn't. In most countries, the number of influenza deaths confirmed by laboratory tests is therefore a lot lower than the real number of influenza deaths which is usually estimated based on excess mortality rates at the end of the flu season. So, that could mean that with 400 less laborary-confirmed influenza cases, the actual number of less influenza deaths could be much much higher.

[NineBerry]

According to media reports, Australia had an especially bad flu season in 2019. The report of this woman sounds terribly like Covid-19:

Three weeks ago, the Toowoomba businesswoman feared she might not live to celebrate the occasion after coming down with the flu.

"I had lots of aches and pains and a fever. In the end due to my breathing problems, I had to call the ambulance," Ms Williams said.

She was so sick doctors considered putting her in an induced coma.

"Initially it felt to me like a normal cold, the difference was, it escalated quite quickly," she said.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-08-18/ ... d/11406980

What if the Rona is not a Chinese virus but emerged in Australia?

[JimC]

Probably from some idiot eating wombats...

[Brian Peacock]

I had to kind of tell my mum off for spraying bleach on her single-use face masks to sterilise them. She insisted that she hung them up to dry before using them again. I reminded her that chlorine is 'pretty toxic' stuff (it's actually phenomenally toxic) and the moisture from her breath could (would) reactivate it so she might (would) end up breathing it in a bit - which wasn't good for her general respiratory health. She just thought that it would 'kill the germs' like it says on the bottle and she could use it to make the masks go further. I told her to not worry about frittering away my inheritance on masks and then phoned my cousin who's going to 'just happen to have some extra masks and I thought you might like some just in case' for her.

[Scot Dutchy]

Just an example of the misuse of a mask. We are not going there at present the minister in charge told us. Some shops are trying to impose them, well good luck to them. Commercial suicide is unusual when natural commercial deaths are happening with little effort.

[Sean Hayden]

I wonder how this might impact research funding over the next few years.

I found this thinking about what might be an easy way to track that:

Estimates of Funding for Various Research, Condition, and Disease Categories (RCDC)

The table below displays the annual support level for various research, condition, and disease categories based on grants, contracts, and other funding mechanisms used across the National Institutes of Health (NIH), as well as disease burden data published by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) at the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC).

At the request of Congress, the NIH embarked on a process to provide better consistency and transparency in the reporting of its funded research. This new process, implemented in 2008 through the Research, Condition, and Disease Categorization (RCDC) system, uses sophisticated text data mining (categorizing and clustering using words and multiword phrases) in conjunction with NIH-wide definitions used to match projects to categories. RCDC use of data mining improves consistency and eliminates the wide variability in defining the research categories reported. The definitions are a list of terms and concepts selected by NIH scientific experts to define a research category. The research category levels represent the NIH's best estimates based on the category definitions.

https://report.nih.gov/categorical_spending.aspx

It may not ultimately prove helpful to anyone here, but I'm impressed that this data is available to us, and is so easy to access.