SARS II: Respiratory Boogaloo

Is this the point where I admit that the reason I started this thread because of all the tweets I was seeing about the outbreak in China? Because it feels like that’s the case.

Fuck you and the tweet you rode in on.

Wait, you started this with a CNN article. I was wrong. Sorry.

I only just realised I've completely lost my sense of smell.

I've spent the last twenty minutes quite systematically trying to stimulate it using different household items, from aftershave, thick bleach and air freshener to the contents of the bin and I simply cannot smell ANYTHING.

Earlier today I'd made a cup of coffee and the milk had curdled but I hadn't noticed until trying to stir it in, which in retrospect makes perfect sense.....

Some of the same things have changed in Europe as in the USA:
- People are tired of restrictions and have a hard time believing a polite conversation with a known friend, neighbor or family member could hurt anything.
- Schools and universities have opened up again.
- Colder weather has more and more people inside, where the virus spreads wider.

Couple that with 2 factors that make Europe ripe for infection anyway:
- A much higher population density than in the US.
- Significantly more people who use public transportation than in the US.

What is different here is that one country after another is imposing tighter and tighter restrictions, something Trump has failed to do because "we have rounded the corner" and "it will go away on its own".

Here in France, President Macron is going to be making a big announcement this evening. People are expecting widespread lockdowns (probably not actually national), as well as national curfews and mask mandates.

Have you lost your sense of taste as well? There's one good way to test it, and administer yourself a powerful treatment for the virus at the same time...

This could be your new superpower. Able to clean up the crappiest messes without wrinkling your nose! Often an ordinary infection results in superpowers.

Captain Cat Litter?

My old high school opened up with a special schedule (I think it was 2 days in class, 2 days zoom class per week). They very quickly got 5 covid cases and closed down again.
A lot of parents are saying 5 cases wasn't bad enough to close down again.

Yeah, I think a lot of parents just want their teenagers out of the fucking house.

Now apostle83 can't get that lengthening and widening procedure he's desperately wanted for so long

Lengthening maybe, but he can always come back here if he needs stretching out.

If anyone needs a lesson in how NOT to give a pandemic briefing, well, here ya go!

I notice no-one has posted the White House "COVID Santa" plan yet.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-54686844

It's possible you just blanked it because sanity would cry "no more!" if you didn't. In which case I am truly sorry, but this needs to be dragged into the harsh light of day.

Is this a sketch?

No it's clearly a photograph.

It's kinda sketchy...

^I don't know which one of you I want to first.

I've been through about 60cl of spiced rum so I could use the slap.

No. They actually did this.

Germany as well, some kind of vaccine can't come soon enough.

Based on these two things, there is absolutely no excuse for the U.S., and particularly the rural parts of the U.S. that are getting hit right now, to not be doing way better than Europe.

It just underscores how fucked-up our response has been.

I thought about posting this when I saw it, but I couldn't come up with a comment snarky enough for the occasion.

The excuse is rural America's attitude toward big cities.

They've never been there (with the exception of @evenflow, who was so pleased with himself for having ventured out of Oklahoma to visit NY to see B'way theater and to San Francisco for reasons I don't recall except to bitch about the BART ticket system [which, having experienced it, I will agree is a clusterfuck]).
The Big City (translation: NYC, SF, LA, or anyone city larger than the largest city in their state/region) is a BIG SCARY PLACE populated with criminals of every stripe and PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT THE SAME COLOR AS/RELIGION OF THE REST of us Ordinary People and who don't SPEAK THE SAME LANGUAGE AS the rest of us Ordinary People and therefore WE NEED ORANGE MAN TO SAVE US!!!!!

What's wrong with BART? Well, what was wrong with BART back then? Lately it's been super nasty, but that's relatively new.

I just want to point out that average density is not that helpful when discussing the US. Such a high percentage of our country is uninhabited that the average is really skewed. Median Density is harder to get but actually useful.

And if you look, even in the rural areas most clusters are around super dense hotspots like prisons, light manufacturing, meat packing and agricultural workers. Most workers are poor migrants living 8-10 in a single wide.

[edit] This isn’t to say that the US hasn’t totally fucked up our handling of the virus. Just that using average density of the US to make an argument isn’t how to go about it.

If you've got an old cathode ray tube monitor laying around and don't might playing with high voltages, that is. However, the second half of the article does have some very promising developments using the technology.

Trump's pet scientist Dr. Scott "Not in any way an epidemiologist" Atlas seems to have been linked to a drop in testing in a state now facing a renewed surge, just because of Trump's "slow down the testing, please!!" comments:

Atlas said the rationale is that tests should be limited to those with symptoms. This, of course, means less shutdown of schools and workplaces because of a positive test among a student/staffer who is asymptomatic.

An epidemiologist (which, again, this guy pointedly IS NOT) would very accurately state that asymptomatic carriers CAN STILL INFECT OTHERS.

We're not dealing with the fucking Walking Dead here people. You can't just avoid bites from pallid, rotting shambling corpses. Someone can seem perfectly healthy and still pass this fucking thing on.