Ohio is Closing Bars and Restaurants at 9pm
Why? I’d like to find out that multiple millions of people have it - we know the number of deaths, what we don’t know is the denominator.
Yep - the larger the denominator the better.
We chatted in another thread, but that "at least 1%" number various state health directors have quoted is definitely sourced from the CDC models. It may not be precise, but its directionally correct and as best informed as we have.
What we desperately need are some serology results from somewhere.
Still doesn’t get you everything, You need to know. In fact in the short term that might mean some underestimate the number as you don’t know how many of the active cases might lead to deaths.
I am mostly in the alarmist crowd, but that was just a BS interpretation of the model she was using. Undoubtedly, where she went wrong was defining the population as the state of Ohio, which is a fairly arbitrary boundary. She probably should have used the municipality or local region where community spread occurred (times 1%).
I have seen other experts respond to that statement, and they seemed to think the number of cases in Ohio were closer to 2-3,000. That's still a factor of 100 times what's been reported.
The thing is, if the number of cases in Ohio is 100k+, then we should reopen everything. That would imply the fatality rate is less than the regular flu.
But there's not 100k cases in Ohio. It was just a stupid number for their health director to throw out.
I like you’re thinking. Most wont have this view, so good by you
Eh, I mean, yes, I think we should reopen everything, but no, it doesn't mean what you're saying it means. COVID-19 isn't instantly fatal. The fatality rates from the best-tested, most self-contained regions I've seen -- the Diamond Princess cruise ship, and the Daegu region of South Korea, are around 0.6%. Both of those outbreaks were long enough ago that most of the fatalities have likely occurred, so let's use that for a planning number. (By contrast, influenza A has about a 0.1% fatality rate).
If there are 100K cases in Ohio, and the disease has a 0.6% fatality rate, we should expect to see about 600 people die from COVID-19 in Ohio -- over the next four to six weeks. That's about how long it would take for the disease to incubate and then progress through to the point that the patient is killed.
You can't really tell the fatality rate from an epidemic until it's over, or at least nearly so.
You seem to be suggesting that Ohio might have magically gone from close to zero cases to 100k in a couple days. If the number really is 100k, there should be at least a dozen deaths already.
It was just a dumb number to throw out, and only served to confuse people.
No, I'm definitely not suggesting that they've gone from 0 to 100K cases in a couple of days. If the 100K number is right, and the growth patterns they have are correct, there would have been ~5K cases in Ohio four weeks ago. It's X% of those are the people that we'd be expecting to see die around this time.
So, yes, there would probably be a couple of dozen deaths by now if that number were accurate -- good point. But I don't know that it's that far off. We'll know more in a few days, I'd say.
Much better than my cursory response above. Thanks.
100k would be on the high end of estimates, I would think, because even if those cases were early and not advanced you'd see many more people showing up at hospitals with symptoms being tested under CDC protocols so that the reported #s would be much, much higher.
But to me the bigger issue is whether you can keep from going from 100k to something more like 10m, in which case the results would be just catastrophic.
We can’t assume a 0.6% fatality rate. Italy is over 7% right now, with more than double the cases of South Korea. It comes down to whether a health system can handle the surge of Covid-19 patients. I know people working in the ER now and they have serious concerns that we could be another Italy.
You assume that all 100,000 cases (if that is the true number) have been resolved, which is clearly not the case.
Given how people very clearly don't follow the whole concept of social distancing, I think this is smart if we don't want to end up like Italy
I just hope that when we tally up the count of people affected by this disease, we remember to count the people who are going to be bankrupted or even killed by the preventative measures being put into place. We're on the verge of putting the entire word's economy into recession, voluntarily.
Furthermore, whatever freedom people give up during this crisis will never come back. Humanity isn't at an existential crossroads here, but liberty might be.
Couldn't agree more with you here. They finally found a way.
Who the fuck is they, Paul?
We're on the verge of putting the entire word's economy into recession, voluntarily.
Better to have this done than a virus involuntarily doing it, over a longer period of time, and with far greater consequences.
Maybe. Maybe not. We'll never know, because the die has been cast. If this turns out to be a relative nothingburger, the politicians and public health officials will take credit, and we'll never know to what extent, if any, this has all helped.
The death rate for 2019 was 7.6 deaths per 1000 people worldwide, or about 60 million people. Assuming that people's deaths are spaced out relatively evenly around the year, we can estimate that 5 million people die per month, so just over 10 million since the start of 2020.
We're currently putting the world into recession due to a virus that is responsible for approximately 6,000 of those, or about 0.06%. Furthermore, there is no way to know how many of those deaths are incremental, vs. deaths that would have happened anyway during 2020. I don't mean to be callous; it's just that the people most at risk for death from COVID-19 are the same people who are most at risk for death overall.
I mean, nobody should be having "COVID-19 parties" to hang out with an infected person and try to get sick. But I personally believe that the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction.
It appears we are going to run one of the greatest social experiments of all time. As you alluded to, we don't have a "test and control" here, so "success" will be a bit nebulous to measure.
And it's not callous to talk about "incremental deaths." That is a thing. We all will die eventually, and that is tragic. But some of us are simply more likely to die in a given year than others.
One thing I know --- people will be talking about this for decades to come.
I keep hearing this generic fear. It would be interesting to hear what you mean more concretely. I’d suggest that we gave up way more liberties in the fight against terrorism than we have here and the ones we’ve given up here don’t seem like ones that we’ll lose permanently. I’m pretty sure restaurants and schools will open back up.
I'm no fan of the fight against terrorism either. However, after the initial shock wore off, nobody talked about keeping the airlines shut down for months out of fear, or putting checkpoints in place to prevent terrorists from moving from one part of the country to another.
That's very instructive, though. The threat of terrorism on planes was solved literally by the end of the day on 9/11 (UA93 went down in a field because people now understood the danger). The TSA, completely ineffectual though it may be, is still here today, and when's the last time you heard anybody seriously ask whether or not we needed it?
But what us the equivalent of the TSA that you are worried about springing up here? Better tracking of the number of people with a new illness, more focus on having infrastructure for testing of novel illnesses? A better understanding of the impact that washing hands has on transmitting diseases, more pressure not to go to work sick?
The primary concern I have is the idea that, upon presidential order, the National Guard can be called out to set up checkpoints and prohibit people from passing through. The very scenes from Hubei that I said Americans would never accept -- I fear Americans are about ready to accept, because the population has been sufficiently panicked.
Not an expert, but I thought Governor’s had that authority and that it was actually already used during natural disasters like hurricanes or earthquakes. Not really convinced we will see some tipping point because if this that the authority starts to get regularly used.
You're correct, but their authority is relatively limited. For example, I don't remember hearing anyone called out to prevent people from leaving a dangerous area. And they've always been very localized; nothing like what would be required to quarantine a large city or a state. And, they're called out by the state governments, which worries me slightly less than a callout by the federal government.
Appreciate the reasonable back and forth. While we are on different sides on this, I can see your point. The case that would really concern me would be government using this type of power to round up everyone involved in a peaceful protest because a small number gets out of hand. This already happens pretty regularly so the horse may already be out of the barn on this one.
March 16th, 2020 at 12:10 AM ^
I'll have to take your word for 'pretty regularly' but I can agree on this: one peaceful protestor roundup is one too many, whatever cause they support. (And I rarely support the cause of any protests. :)
March 16th, 2020 at 12:17 AM ^
I could amen pretty regularly to “enough that it doesn’t surprise you any more when it happens”
Recessions aren’t a bad thing though. Economic contraction happens all the time
Tell that to the people who are going to be thrown into economic turmoil as a result.
That's easy to say when you have a comfortable job, some savings, and a severance plan. It's a little tougher when you don't.
Everybody has bootstraps.
Until they don't.
Illinois just followed suit. Michigan probably gonna do it today
While I tend to agree with you, here was Michigan’s response earlier today....
“Please continue to frequent bars and restaurants during this time as they follow lower capacity orders”
Message from Scott Ellis with MI licensed beverage association
Things change quickly. That may have been the message this morning. But by tonight or tomorrow they may reverse course
Right. I suspect the directive will change as of 6pm tonight.
Uhh, you do realize the the MI licensed beverage association is a lobbyist group, not a government organization. They advocate on the behalf of MI liquor licensees.
Uhh, no I don’t. Uhh, is this different than Illinois, Ohio, and California? Uhh, why do you treat people like idiots?
Alright then...
Ironically it is groups like this encouraging people to go to bars and restaurants that helps lead to the more draconian measures.
So is illinois by end of day tomorrow
I have to think this is in reaction to the idiots that didn't heed the advice of doctors and every public health official.
Now that privilege is being taken away. If only we operated like that in other aspects of society.
Ohio and Michigan have been two of the more proactive states in trying to fight this. Been impressed by DeWine especially.
I didn't vote for DeWine but I likely will next time around. This is going to hurt the pocketbooks of a lot of folks, but man, better than dying. Those in charge in DC could learn a thing or two here.
its good to know in times of crisis you come here instead of 11w.
you sure you don't want to try on some nice maize and blue clothing?
Rumors that Michigan will do the same. I am glad I got out of food service. I was a shift manager but was not on salary. I was an hourly employee and did not get paid if I didn’t work. It was an awful job that has left me with no faith in humanity. This and some other factors led me to almost killing myself. In a much better place now. Hope everyone can scrape together enough money to survive this whole thing.
As fellow we mgobloger to another, glad to hear you are in better spirits
Mental health will be an underreported aspect of this crisis. People in isolation can get squirrelly pretty quick. Remember to take a daily walk outside, keeping your distance from others of course.
here in MN, the governor gave a pretty comprehensive news conference this morning with a lot of salient points made by the respective commissioners from departments of commerce, education and health. The next month will be interesting, but I do think grounding flights is only stage one. There may need to be wage and price freezes at some point.
California is closing all bars and nightclubs now, and encouraging home isolation for anyone above age 65.