COVID-19 thread

[Pabappa]

Seen on the Internet somewhere:

"I wonder how long it'll take until I start social distancing in my dreams"

I'm a heavy dreamer. I've been in a slump lately, but still dream enough to say corona virus hasn't really tampered with my dreams. I've had only four dreams involving coronavirus, and only one of them was actually about the virus. And no social distancing anywhere.... just last night I dreamt I was in a crowded movie theater within a shopping mall, then squished into a crowded car with strangers, then watching small children perform a comedy routine, then helping a stranger with his business' front sign. The car ride was unpleasant but it didn't even occur to me in the dream that I might get sick.

_____________

if anyones still looking for hand sanitizer, i found a company that's selling some:
https://www.bulkapothecary.com/hand-san ... with-pump/

I trust this company as Ive ordered from them before, but i suspect this product has an unpleasant smell, as they're targeting DIYers who are expected to know how to add in the fragrance on their own. There may be a version of it that also has the fragrance added in, ... I havent checked. I still have a big bottle left from a few months ago when I went down to the local brewery, but it too has quite an unpleasant smell.

[Linguoboy]

Also, on the off chance that terrible homespun does become the badge of identity for those who can't or won't go shopping after the pandemic, I vote we call those people "frumpen proletariat." This is very important.

I'm just going off what I've already seen happen with knitting. It seems to have exploded in recent years. Far from being considered dowdy, clever designs in quality yarns go for top dollar on Etsy and other sites. I haven't seen people passing around patterns like this since the 70s.

[chris_notts]

On another corona habit change topic, I was quite shocked by this BBC article:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/newsbeat-52728957
‘I’m very aware of my body changing in lockdown’

Given the title, I was expecting something about weight gain, but instead had to google "fillers". I was aware of plastic surgery and botox and lipo etc., of course, but I didn't know that women had now moved on to regularly injecting padding into their faces instead of just small quantities of neurotoxin.

If you asked me whether I wanted a medically untrained beauty "technician" to regularly stick a needle into my face and inject fairly large volumes of a supposedly inert substance and then leave it there to break down, the answer would be hell no. What is wrong with people? I mean, I absolutely support people's right to do stupid things, it just constantly shocks me how stupid some of the things are. I guess people do it because it helps them get jobs and partners, but it seems insane that that's what's required.

[Moose-tache]

The article actually does a nice job of highlighting the absurdity of it all:

"Without them I just felt so ugly," she says. "It's almost like training yourself to get used to what you actually look like."

But it's also given Katy time to reflect.

"It's sort of helping me realise that I don't actually need them as much as I think."

But yes, I agree with you that fillers are the dumbest thing ever. It's like Tina Fey's comment about women having "pointy elbows:" we will always find something to hate about ourselves.

[chris_notts]

But yes, I agree with you that fillers are the dumbest thing ever. It's like Tina Fey's comment about women having "pointy elbows:" we will always find something to hate about ourselves.

It's human nature. As a man, I guess I'm under less pressure from others to conform to some kind of ideal, but even so there are plenty of things I don't like that much about my own appearance. But instead of trying to fix them I went down the more fatalistic "I can't fix it in a reasonable way so I'll just give up completely" route. It certainly costs a lot less time, money and pain than the alternative!

[Nortaneous]

I was meaning to get into DIY clothes before the pandemic -- it's hard to buy shirts when you're 6'5", and most of the ones that aren't too short fit me like a parachute... but I've only gotten busier during the lockdown, so I haven't gotten around to it.

[Pabappa]

Chile and Peru might be part of the next big rise in numbers, as they have surprisingly high prevalence rates for their respective population sizes. But now the US, Iran, Russia, Brazil, and every country I checked in Europe are at least showing a decline in new cases after accounting for the pulsed nature of reporting numbers (e.g. US seems to have a 7-day spike-trough cycle).

[Linguoboy]

Chile and Peru might be part of the next big rise in numbers, as they have surprisingly high prevalence rates for their respective population sizes. But now the US, Iran, Russia, Brazil, and every country I checked in Europe are at least showing a decline in new cases after accounting for the pulsed nature of reporting numbers (e.g. US seems to have a 7-day spike-trough cycle).

Yeah, I saw that in the data and was wondering what accounts for it.

[chris_notts]

In the case of the US though, a fall in the big outbreak states like NY is hiding an increase elsewhere. Don't think the numbers are going to keep going down if states keep rolling back lockdown measures while they're still on the upward slope

[chris_notts]

Two studies recently have suggested that the majority of COVID infected people are asymptomatic (up to 80%). BUT many other studies are consistent with ~1% mortality, with asymptomatic patients developing antibodies, and in most countries with <10% of people having antibodies.

All of this suggests that the distribution of symptoms has a very sharp tail: most get almost no symptoms, 5% - 10% end up in hospital, and 1% die.

[Pabappa]

Hand sanitizer may be returning to store shelves in the USA .... i found some in a supermarket that's similar to what I was going to buy online .... $6.49 for 16 oz, so higher than what I would have paid online but not b y much. it's smelly but that's pretty much what I was expecting because there is no fragrance in. I might still buy the online version anyway.

edit: i found *another* hand sanitizer which is $4.99 for a similar sized bottle so as much as i love bulkapothecary.com I think Im not gonna buy their hand sanitizer unless the price goes down in the near future. Their prices on fragrances are apparently very good compared to brick-and-mortar stores, however.

[Linguoboy]

I guess this thread died out along with the Coronavirus?

For a couple brief beautiful weeks, Illinois was actually posting a decline in the number of new cases. (I'll admit, I cheered a bit when we dropped out of the top five states by total cases, though this was more due to Texas and Florida shooting up the charts than anything else.) So we went to Phase 4 and reopened gyms, bars, and restaurants. And now we're back up to 1000+ new cases per day. Who could have foreseen this? (Except, you know, epidemiologists.) At this rate, we'll pass New Jersey before Arizona or Georgia can catch up to us.

I feel like everyone around me is slacking off because we're just so goddamn tired of this. If only viruses cared about that, but they so very much do not. A lot of people treat their masks as a ticket for entry, grudgingly wearing it (often with their noses exposed) just long enough to be allowed into an establishment. Best practice is six feet of distance and a mask, but the general consensus seems to be that one or the other is enough (and a lot of folks apparently struggle with the concept of "six feet").

I'm still self-isolating but it's gotten a bit more complicated with the addition of a roommate. He's very responsible--he has a medical background and a long history of breathing problems, so he's good about taking precautions--but he doesn't seem interested in limiting trips outside the house. I see every one of these as a roll of the dice and try not to run an errand more than once a week, whereas he's gone out almost once a day. I'm hoping that settles down before our numbers really get bad again.

What's it like where you are?

[Raphael]

What's it like where you are?

Very much like your description of people slacking off "because we're just so goddamn tired of this", I'd say. If only the virus cared.

[zompist]

For a couple brief beautiful weeks, Illinois was actually posting a decline in the number of new cases. (I'll admit, I cheered a bit when we dropped out of the top five states by total cases, though this was more due to Texas and Florida shooting up the charts than anything else.) So we went to Phase 4 and reopened gyms, bars, and restaurants. And now we're back up to 1000+ new cases per day. Who could have foreseen this? (Except, you know, epidemiologists.) At this rate, we'll pass New Jersey before Arizona or Georgia can catch up to us.

On July 10, the red states pulled ahead: 1.63 million to 1.59 million cases. It was easy to predict that 'reopening' before the first wave was done would be disastrous, and mirabile dictu, it was.

Just today: Florida +10K, Texas +6K, Arizona +3K, Georgia +4K, Louisiana +2K. Among the blue states only California is really working at keeping up: +6K.

Deaths lag cases by a month or more, so we'll see a surge in those numbers later.

Meanwhile, the expanded unemployment benefits run out at the end of July, and the GOP doesn't feel any need to extend them. Maybe they're still working on spending the $500 billion they were allowed to hand to their friends with absolutely no records?

One third of US households did not make their full housing payment last month.

Worldwide, Brazil is doing its damnedest to catch up, with 1.9 million cases.

Meanwhile, daily new cases have been about 5K in the EU, 60K in the US.

It's the new American exceptionalism! "We could fight the virus like every other First World country, except..."

[Ares Land]

What's it like where you are?

Pretty weird, really.

Some people were screaming bloody murder over masks, taking pictures of people going outside to share on whatsapp groups for Two Minutes Hate, scrubbing elevator with bleach.
Also, while media treated us to non-stop live footage from ER units.
And now it's almost like nothing happened. Virus? What virus?

Other than those bits of all too human behavior, I can't really complain. People aren't too bad at following the health guidelines. Could be worse, really.
We're waiting for the second wave and crossing fingers that it happens after summer vacation.

I caught a cold which left me with some pretty torn feelings: on the one, it's just a runny nose and probably just allergies anyway, on the other hand, what if I contaminate everybody on the way to work?

[Linguoboy]

Just today: Florida +10K, Texas +6K, Arizona +3K, Georgia +4K, Louisiana +2K. Among the blue states only California is really working at keeping up: +6K.

California may be blue overall, but it still contains vast tracts of red. This site gives county-by-country data and you can see that most of the highest growth rates over the last two weeks are in the redder counties. This is partly because they're generally starting from a lower base than more urbanised blue counties like Alameda or Los Angeles, but even so it's striking that Orange County's growth rate is 81.2%, more than double LA County's 35.3%. (Huntington Beach in Orange County was the epicentre of anti-lockdown protests in the LA metro area.)

Deaths lag cases by a month or more, so we'll see a surge in those numbers later.

Ugh, this is my least-favourite right-wing talking point. "Where are the deaths?" Like have you read anything at all about the progress of the disease? Even Ebola takes at least a week to kill you on average.

[zompist]

On a more personal level, Oak Park is probably... middling compliant? People wear masks to get in stores, but many don't if they go for a walk. Restaurants can re-open with outdoor seating, and a lot of places sure don't look like the tables are 6 feet apart.

Our gym is supposed to re-open later this month. Probably a terrible idea, but we are tempted to go, with masks, because our muscle tone by now can be called at best "al dente". Maybe shower at home, because showering at the gym really sounds like a bad idea.

Oh, a factoid I learned just the other day: you know how masks get humid inside? That's a feature, not a bug. It makes breath particles heavy, so they stop at the mask rather than breezing on through.

[Moose-tache]

Oh, a factoid I learned just the other day: you know how masks get humid inside? That's a feature, not a bug. It makes breath particles heavy, so they stop at the mask rather than breezing on through.

Yeah, there's no commercially available mask that wont let a virus pass through; viruses are about a hundred and fifty times smaller than the width of a cotton fiber. But luckily, you're not really shooting viruses onto other people's faces. It's the droplets in your breath that drift across the room in a fine mist (related: ick!), and that mist can be stopped with plain old sack cloth. Breathing is actually the body's primary cause of water loss, more than sweating, and that moisture goes into the air. If there was some way to color the droplets that drift out of people's faces when they breathe, I'll bet mask compliance would shoot to 100% and stay there forever.

[Kuchigakatai]

From what I hear from people I know in El Salvador, including a relative who is a doctor, the country has entered this month into a stage where case numbers are exploding, people are dying left and right, and as usual the people in government continue to be more interested in flinging poop at the other parties to get future votes than else. My aunt, the doctor, tells us to (of course) not believe at all the numbers reported, as many more people are dying from the virus, who go unreported by authorities who refuse to count them on a variety of technicalities, for political reasons.

My mother was just on the phone with a friend of hers who was crying as she told my mother of the many people from her little town that have recently died from the respiratory virus. The mood is pretty depressing.

Meanwhile, here I haven't really gone out since early March except in some weeks for groceries. Pretty much still camping it out, avoiding the outside to what would be an extreme degree in other circumstances: it is of no reassurance that one or two members of my family could possibly get hit hard by the virus if they catch it. I feel it is taking a certain mental toll on me though. Haven't even seen the asphalt at the corner 200 metres away except from inside a car.

I've no idea how long it's going to take. The problem of joining the rest of the city opening up is that then that can create an upsurge in infections again. It continues to be a bit unclear whether or how people get infected with it more than once, and whether getting infected once leaves your body in a worse state. I notice that news sources in Chinese tend to state such things sometimes, but seeing the ridiculous claims I've seen journalists around the world making, I don't know what to believe. There was a huge thing in the Spanish-speaking world around February where journalists were saying, fully confidently, that the virus could not be transmitted if the temperature was higher than 28 Celsius (some said 25 Celsius), based on what I knew at the time was a very tentative paper. Let's not forget that much of the English media belittled the importance of the virus and any even half-suggested utility of masks for months. The scientists aren't much better in terms of confidence, although one thing that's clear is that, from random population sampling, all around the world where there have been such studies the official case numbers are a lot lower than the real ones (but to different degrees).

I've told myself I may end up camping it out till late 2021 if necessary, maybe even mid 2022. May the Gods be thanked for the illuminated minds and workers that have brought the Internet alive (and keep working to make it remain going).

[alynnidalar]

Truthfully, I'm one of the people who's become a bit lax. I stopped paying that much attention to Michigan's numbers once they started consistently going down; they've come up a bit again in July but certainly nowhere near the highs of April/May. I still wear my mask outside the house and keep my distance from people, of course, and I limit how often I go out, but I've started socializing with family on a limited basis without a mask. Sue me.

The problem is that you always think what you're doing is fine and reasonable, and what everyone else does is either dangerously irresponsible or over-the-top hypochondria. I have a friend who nearly had a panic attack at the thought of visiting her parents for the Fourth of July, which seems excessive to me. But I'm sure she'd say that I'm being reckless and taking too many risks. And maybe I am.

ETA: my job continues to be work from home for the foreseeable future, which is a mixed bag. I'm often deeply unproductive when I work from home, but I've come to appreciate being able to work more or less whenever I want, and the idea of going into an office right now, even if we're seated at a distance and wear masks, sounds absolutely awful. And I'm on a remote project anyway (in that our clients are in a different state) so it'd be a lot of phone calls and remotely connecting to networks regardless of where my laptop is located.