Daily WHO Reports for the Coronavirus Outbreak (Link)

[Keihan]

hey there is no silly job ... in fact this one seems quite useful

It's like I told the doctors, I much prefer being on the political side of things, where I can run my mouth all day long and not really have to know what I'm talking about.

 

[Keihan]

To my understanding antibody tests aren't supposed to check who has it, but rather who had it. So they solve a different purpose.
Are there any indications so far of covid-19 actually being seasonal? Afaik for flu that's contributed to weather conditions, but covid-19 so far doesn't seem to care if it's hot or cold or anything

Those are questions for people much smarter than myself. I'm just summarizing what I'm barely grasping at these meetings. We brief the governor and a Senate legislative committee tomorrow. Lucky for me, I get to hide in the back room and not be held accountable for anything I wrote.

 

[just4fun]

Coronaviruses tend to be more infectious but less deadly with every generation of the virus. If Covid mutates like others, then in ten years it could be mutated to the point of being a nasty variant of the common cold (which is itself a bunch of different coronavirus strains).

As we all know, there is no cure for the common cold so this is something we'll have to live (or die) with.

 

[Frenchy]

where I can run my mouth all day long and not really have to know what I'm talking about.

yeah, THAT job is already taken

 

[Acid Burn]

That's the dilemma we find ourselves in. Very smart people (doctors) are trying to communicate some very complex and negative ideas to very dumb people (politicians, bureaucrats) who don't want to hear it...

This is what gets me, dumb people. People don’t want to hear the truth unless it’s positive. They don’t want to hear we may get multiple waves of the virus even after the current “flattening” of the curve. They don’t want to hear vaccines are 12+ months out even if ALL the current trials end up being a success as production and distribution of said vaccines worldwide would have some logistical hurdles to overcome. Of course HCW’s and first responders would get it first. Not joe public.

Feels like the public doesn’t want to hear the truth unless it involves “we’re reopening everything and we won’t get any new COVID19 cases because because “We got this!! Good job everybody!!! Here’s your jobs back! Oh, and here’s the $100’s of k’s you lost in your retirement accounts back!!””

I’m wondering if our new normal will include no visitors in the hospital. Or perhaps an ICU type super restrictive visitation criteria but across all departments and floors. Sounds horrible no visitors but remember how for the US, pre-9/11, you could see off your friends and family at the airport gates but after 9-11 you couldn’t. That change suuuuucked. But now, that’s the norm and nobody thinks twice about it. Kids nowadays don’t even realize the tears, fun, and memories that was had at airports seeing off a friend to college with your other friends and their families.

And antibody testing. Shit. People seem to be pinning their hopes and dreams on it but us in the field are like wtf? How the hell does that help anything. Does course of action/treatment/quarantine change with antibody testing? No. All it says is you were exposed at some point. Big whoop. A rapid antigen test would be what we need but false negs, just as with rapid flu or rapid strep type antigen testing would need a reflex to PCR or other more sensitive test to truly rule out the organism as causative agent for the presenting illness, which takes a little extra time at that point but at least a pos says hey, patient has it, treat accordingly.

On a side note, new positives are decreasing in my area but the CFR is oddly increasing. And without an overwhelmed hospital system yet. I’m thinking we have a bunch of hidden positives in my area. People sick with the organism but due to our high cost of living don’t want to get tested for fear of being sidelined from work and losing even more household income as a result of any quarantine. Life in the time of COVID19. Sigh.

I’m fine with new norms as long as I can still fly to Japan and visit my soap princesses.

 

[Keihan]

This is what gets me, dumb people. People don’t want to hear the truth unless it’s positive. They don’t want to hear we may get multiple waves of the virus even after the current “flattening” of the curve. They don’t want to hear vaccines are 12+ months out even if ALL the current trials end up being a success as production and distribution of said vaccines worldwide would have some logistical hurdles to overcome. Of course HCW’s and first responders would get it first. Not joe public.

Feels like the public doesn’t want to hear the truth unless it involves “we’re reopening everything and we won’t get any new COVID19 cases because because “We got this!! Good job everybody!!! Here’s your jobs back! Oh, and here’s the $100’s of k’s you lost in your retirement accounts back!!””

I’m wondering if our new normal will include no visitors in the hospital. Or perhaps an ICU type super restrictive visitation criteria but across all departments and floors. Sounds horrible no visitors but remember how for the US, pre-9/11, you could see off your friends and family at the airport gates but after 9-11 you couldn’t. That change suuuuucked. But now, that’s the norm and nobody thinks twice about it. Kids nowadays don’t even realize the tears, fun, and memories that was had at airports seeing off a friend to college with your other friends and their families.

And antibody testing. Shit. People seem to be pinning their hopes and dreams on it but us in the field are like wtf? How the hell does that help anything. Does course of action/treatment/quarantine change with antibody testing? No. All it says is you were exposed at some point. Big whoop. A rapid antigen test would be what we need but false negs, just as with rapid flu or rapid strep type antigen testing would need a reflex to PCR or other more sensitive test to truly rule out the organism as causative agent for the presenting illness, which takes a little extra time at that point but at least a pos says hey, patient has it, treat accordingly.

On a side note, new positives are decreasing in my area but the CFR is oddly increasing. And without an overwhelmed hospital system yet. I’m thinking we have a bunch of hidden positives in my area. People sick with the organism but due to our high cost of living don’t want to get tested for fear of being sidelined from work and losing even more household income as a result of any quarantine. Life in the time of COVID19. Sigh.

I’m fine with new norms as long as I can still fly to Japan and visit my soap princesses.

That's basically why I was called in. Politicians by nature only want to report glowing, feel-good bullshit to their constituents and then take credit for it (e.g., daily WH press briefings). Try explaining to a mayor or state representative that he/she will have to go on TV and tell voters that more people are going to die and you'll see backlash like you've never seen before. It's happening here, where epidemiologists are appearing before legislative committees, are asked tough questions, give realistic answers and the process quickly devolves into legislators screaming at the poor doctors and then trying to pin the blame for it on someone occupying a seat they hope to run for in the future (in our case, the governor's office). So, SOMEBODY needs to coach these poor doctors on how to get these elected "officials" how to accept reality. Unfortunately for them, at the moment that's me.

And like I mentioned before, it doesn't help that you have all these jagoff celebrities with their bullshit PSAs telling the public that this is "almost over." Around here you've got the brilliant dropout Billie Eilish, who is all of 18 years old and can probably barely spell her fucking name, on the radio every day promising millenials that things will be back to normal soon. And naturally, they all believe her.

Most of the doctors I'm hearing from are expressing pretty much the same fear--that the next wave of COVID-19 infections will hit just as the regular flu season starts in fall, and that idiots who didn't adhere to recommended hygiene/distancing protocols are going to be taking up unnecessary space in the hospital when the inevitable wave of flu-infected senior citizens or folks with underlying respiratory conditions start rolling in needing ventilators and ICU beds. And that's where the real body count is going to come from.

But I'm basically where you are. As long as the Tokyo government can flatten that curve by fall and the restrictions get lifted, I'm rocking up to Shinjuku with a shit-ton of spare cash and then it's off to Bangkok for the trip I had to cancel last month. And after a month of lockdown with nothing but cheap Costco vodka, Netflix and frozen pizza, I've got envelopes full of "discretionary cash" stuffed into a ziploc bag under my desk (germophobe, won't touch paper money until I Lysol that shit) and I've got enough down there to put me into three or four fine tailored suits and another nice watch from Nakano Broadway once I fly back into town. I just hope they reopen Spa Laqua or Odaiba Monogatari, as it wouldn't be a proper vacation if I didn't offend some middle-aged Korean lady by getting hard under the modesty towel while lying on the akasuri shower table.

 

[Danbo]

I think it's understandable that everybody tells themselves that things will be normal soon.....but we all kinda know that it won't be the same. Even if a lot of countries are able to flatten their curves and keep the whole thing managable on a national level, travel, travel restrictions will probably still be in place for months to come. No country that has it under control wants to risk reimporting it from somewhere else.

I like to travel a lot, imagining being stuck somewhere for a year or longer really sucks.

 

[Frenchy]

I think it's understandable that everybody tells themselves that things will be normal soon.....but we all kinda know that it won't be the same. Even if a lot of countries are able to flatten their curves and keep the whole thing managable on a national level, travel, travel restrictions will probably still be in place for months to come. No country that has it under control wants to risk reimporting it from somewhere else.

I like to travel a lot, imagining being stuck somewhere for a year or longer really sucks.

true. time to discover all those places in Japan we never visited and many probably for good reasons.
A tour of abandoned factories in Shikoku , anyone?

 

[MikeH]

true. time to discover all those places in Japan we never visited and many probably for good reasons.
A tour of abandoned factories in Shikoku , anyone?

Well, who hasn't done that already? But we could visit the home towns of all the Japanese girls who dumped us, probably for good reasons, to check out if the kids they now play in the park with look like us.

 

[just4fun]

Well, who hasn't done that already? But we could visit the home towns of all the Japanese girls who dumped us, probably for good reasons, to check out if the kids they now play in the park with look like us.

EEEEeeHHHHHhhhhhhhhhh

 

[split]

To my understanding antibody tests aren't supposed to check who has it, but rather who had it. So they solve a different purpose.
Are there any indications so far of covid-19 actually being seasonal? Afaik for flu that's contributed to weather conditions, but covid-19 so far doesn't seem to care if it's hot or cold or anything

Those antibody tests are not even confidently reliable to base previous exposure on. 9 minute mark cbsnews.com/video/042720-cbs-evening-news/

 

[majimekun]

My take from all the above is that every rich country should take the following actions:

- Remove lockdown for people who aren't at risk and who don't live with those at risk
- Concentrate care (money, time, etc) only on the people who are at risk
- Give more funds to programs and organizations that fight chronic diseases or ageing
- Accept the fact that a new seasonal virus now exists and live with it just like we do with the flu

The current mass-hysteria is totally counter-productive as we are witnessing the following situations:
- People who aren't at risk AND who live alone live in illogical fear and reclusion without being productive
- Policies that are just trying to buy time
- Unrelated deaths that are the result of to much focus on corona (ie: people with various chronic diseases who don't have access to their usual care anymore)

 

[Frenchy]

That's basically why I was called in. Politicians by nature only want to report glowing, feel-good bullshit to their constituents and then take credit for it (e.g., daily WH press briefings). Try explaining to a mayor or state representative that he/she will have to go on TV and tell voters that more people are going to die and you'll see backlash like you've never seen before. It's happening here, where epidemiologists are appearing before legislative committees, are asked tough questions, give realistic answers and the process quickly devolves into legislators screaming at the poor doctors and then trying to pin the blame for it on someone occupying a seat they hope to run for in the future (in our case, the governor's office). So, SOMEBODY needs to coach these poor doctors on how to get these elected "officials" how to accept reality. Unfortunately for them, at the moment that's me.

And like I mentioned before, it doesn't help that you have all these jagoff celebrities with their bullshit PSAs telling the public that this is "almost over." Around here you've got the brilliant dropout Billie Eilish, who is all of 18 years old and can probably barely spell her fucking name, on the radio every day promising millenials that things will be back to normal soon. And naturally, they all believe her.

Most of the doctors I'm hearing from are expressing pretty much the same fear--that the next wave of COVID-19 infections will hit just as the regular flu season starts in fall, and that idiots who didn't adhere to recommended hygiene/distancing protocols are going to be taking up unnecessary space in the hospital when the inevitable wave of flu-infected senior citizens or folks with underlying respiratory conditions start rolling in needing ventilators and ICU beds. And that's where the real body count is going to come from.

But I'm basically where you are. As long as the Tokyo government can flatten that curve by fall and the restrictions get lifted, I'm rocking up to Shinjuku with a shit-ton of spare cash and then it's off to Bangkok for the trip I had to cancel last month. And after a month of lockdown with nothing but cheap Costco vodka, Netflix and frozen pizza, I've got envelopes full of "discretionary cash" stuffed into a ziploc bag under my desk (germophobe, won't touch paper money until I Lysol that shit) and I've got enough down there to put me into three or four fine tailored suits and another nice watch from Nakano Broadway once I fly back into town. I just hope they reopen Spa Laqua or Odaiba Monogatari, as it wouldn't be a proper vacation if I didn't offend some middle-aged Korean lady by getting hard under the modesty towel while lying on the akasuri shower table.

I wonder how it is to be at the same time germophobe and p4p-hobbyist? Seems to me a bit contradictory , but then again no judgment : in a way I’m bitchophobe and still keep up meeting them

 

[Keihan]

I wonder how it is to be at the same time germophobe and p4p-hobbyist? Seems to me a bit contradictory , but then again no judgment : in a way I’m bitchophobe and still keep up meeting them

I just subconsciously separate P4P from every single other thing I do during the day that could possibly get me dirty/sick. It's easy to turn off any flavor of neuroses when you've got your penis inserted somewhere in a hot female.

 

[Frenchy]

I just subconsciously separate P4P from every single other thing I do during the day that could possibly get me dirty/sick. It's easy to turn off any flavor of neuroses when you've got your penis inserted somewhere in a hot female.

Yeah, I see what you mean

 

[thenoobsay1]

With the emergency declaration expected to be extended to may 30th looks like we better get well acquainted with our 1 handed girlfriends

 

[Danbo]

With the emergency declaration expected to be extended to may 30th looks like we better get well acquainted with our 1 handed girlfriends

If the emergency declaration is in place or not doesn't mean anything to be honest........that's just wording. All the matters are the active cases and the number of new infections per day, because that has an influence on spread and treatment. Of course it's problematic that these numbers here in Japan are very unreliable. Just checked the them today and it's laughable.....European countries checked 25x as many people. The intentional downplay is risky and helps no one in the long run. A scientific approach needs good data.

 

[TAG Manager]

Of course it's problematic that these numbers here in Japan are very unreliable. Just checked the them today and it's laughable....

Care to backup that statement? It's fine to make jokes... but have some concrete info to claim that the numbers are unreliable. In that sense, every country is reporting "unreliable" numbers.

 

[rikkun]

It's easy to turn off any flavor of neuroses when you've got your penis inserted somewhere in a hot female.

Hot is the important word here, because if she isn’t, germs and STDs are pretty much the only things you think about.
... and maybe your loss of self-pride if you still have some.

 

[MikeH]

Care to backup that statement? It's fine to make jokes... but have some concrete info to claim that the numbers are unreliable. In that sense, every country is reporting "unreliable" numbers.

If I can guess what he meant is Japan is not testing basically at all. The number of tests per million people are there on par with Jamaica and the likes.

But then again all data we get is suspect in every country. They haven't even figured out a standard way to report deaths so everything else is even worse. And we cannot even say if the numbers are under or over reported.

Some countries report all deaths with patients having "corona symptoms" as corona deaths. Except you cannot diagnose corona by symptoms. Some countries report only tested hospital deaths as corona related. So people dying at home or even elderly care homes don't get included in the stats.

So it's pretty much GIGO and that's why even the mortality estimates have been from 0.1% to 7%. That's a big difference if you start simulating the deaths per country.

 

[MikeH]

... and maybe your loss of self-pride if you still have some.

Come on, everyone who has mongered even semi-regularly has had to check his self-esteem at the door at one point.

 

[Danbo]

Care to backup that statement? It's fine to make jokes... but have some concrete info to claim that the numbers are unreliable. In that sense, every country is reporting "unreliable" numbers.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
Here you can see exactly how many tests were performed by each country per 1M population. Japan is really very far off in comparison to other countries. Is it possible that Japan's testing is so perfectly efficient that they managed to verify most cases with so little tests? Probably, but very unlikely. If you want a realistic image of the situation, you need as much data as possible.

 

[Ken1988]

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
Here you can see exactly how many tests were performed by each country per 1M population. Japan is really very far off in comparison to other countries. Is it possible that Japan's testing is so perfectly efficient that they managed to verify most cases with so little tests? Probably, but very unlikely. If you want a realistic image of the situation, you need as much data as possible.

Oh, please. We now know that there are a lot of asymptomatic and subsymptomatic cases. The confirmed cases are naturally a tip of iceberg anywhere, not only in Japan. We cannot test everyone. Even in Germany, it will take 3 years to complete testing all residents at the rate of today's testing capacity, which is perhaps the best in the world.

The principle of testing regime is not different among countries actually. The purpose is essentially to improve clinical responses to the patients and to isolate them in the process. No country provides the test to healthy individuals unless they are close-contacts of the already infected. The confirmed cases are not a result of random sampling. Those countries that test a lot needed to test a lot. Simple. The testing regime in the US is actually much stricter than Japan - for example, in New York State you have to be hospitalized to be tested. No tests are given otherwise unless you are health care workers.

Compared to the total mess in where I live right now, Japan is a paradise. Lucky you guys being in Japan.

 

[Danbo]

Of course the asymptomatic cases are a problem and testing can only be seen as a rough estimate....but testing more people still helps to draw a more accurate picture.

Testing in Japan is too low, but the amount of hospitalized or dead people is still pretty low, so of course the current situation here is still pretty good in comparison to other countries.
Still not really possible to judge how things go......most countries are trying their best, but nobody has a real clue which measurements are really helping, what was over/underestimated. We all will have to sit this out

 

[RandomTokyoGuy]

Of course the asymptomatic cases are a problem and testing can only be seen as a rough estimate....but testing more people still helps to draw a more accurate picture.

Testing in Japan is too low, but the amount of hospitalized or dead people is still pretty low, so of course the current situation here is still pretty good in comparison to other countries.
Still not really possible to judge how things go......most countries are trying their best, but nobody has a real clue which measurements are really helping, what was over/underestimated. We all will have to sit this out

There are a lot of things that are wrong with testing here, like the process, the time it takes and the very low capacity, etc., but as stated by Ken, the criteria aren't so much different from other countries. If you have lower numbers, the number of tests will also be lower