Shrug. I'm working off of our predictive models, not expert interviews. I would much rather be wrong and thousands of people not die. We're seeing the same smattering of ranges, just anything below 200k doesn't seem credible at this point (assuming the spread isn't magically halted). Again, the rates we're operating off of are 1 in 5 infected needs hospitalization, and 1.5 in 100 dies. We think that the death rate will increase as hospitals get overwhelmed. How much? We don't know, but we think no more than 3%, with 5% being the outward boundary of totally fucked. Screen shot of one of our models below that's purely exponential growth. I am happy to be wrong about this, I just want proof. Most of the assumptions for models predicting less than 200k rely on a lot of things we're currently seeing remain in place at a much broader scale, which we think is unlikely. Most of the scenarios I have seen with a lower death rate are based off of countries already containing outbreaks (China, SK, Japan) with measures that we couldn't hope to replicate. Spoiler: Image Size We know 330m infections isn't likely, but as we get closer to May we think the actual cause of deaths for some folks is going to be lack of healthcare, so we're successfully preventing mortality now that we won't be able to prevent in 3-4 weeks based on availability of care/resources. Real simple math: 50% infection rate times 330M people=165M infected (Assumption 1. Could be as low as 30%, or as high as 70%) .01% mortality rate of 165m=1.65m (Assumption 2: Could be lower or higher, but most countries at our scale of cases are not lower). Add in anywhere from .001=.01 for mortality rate when the system is overwhelmed, and the range of estimates widens. The easiest thing to control is the infection rate by slowing the spread. Right now, we're comfortable planning and warning folks that if we do nothing, this is going to be the mortality rate. I'd be a lot more comfortable if we were demonstrably wrong, and I'm all ears if anyone can prove how we're not going to get 2m dead from this.
Their profession is literally infectious disease modeling, and they work at places like Harvard and Johns Hopkins. That doesn't mean they're going to be right, but they're not laymen on this subject.
one of the only lasting side-effects I have from the brain tumor is a complete inability to do math. My ceiling is addition and subtraction with single digit numbers. I know this is my ceiling, because in recent days I've been asked to perform certain basic functions at work that revolve around basic math, and I am embarrassingly incompetent. Fortunately my wife works at the same company, and we are now both working from home, so she's able to take over the math-related stuff. I say all this to explain why I have to ask what I think is a very elementary question with an obvious answer, but for which that lack of math ability to confirm myself: are we -- the US -- starting to hit that really steep part of the climb on the exponential growth graph of COVID deaths? Last night it had barely hit 1000 deaths. This morning it was at like 1100. Now it's around 1300.
Depends on your definition of steep. A pure exponential function always gets steeper, so it's mostly a question not of whether we're in the steep part, but rather when will reality break with a pure exponential function and we come out of the steep part.
And where are you getting that? I looked in that article and saw nothing. They only referred to a nebulous group called "experts". If you have more details, I'd love to see it. I'm not trying to shit on your point, I'm just saying that the term "expert" in reporting is thrown around a lot and means nothing without credentials and details.
My brain was turned off I think. In my head I had a picture of a line graph, and how it looks like there's that bend. But then I remembered that's just a matter of perspective. I'm not thinking clearly right now, and that's probably for the best. Because I'm terrified as is, and if I were to understand the numbers behind this I think that would only add to my growing sense of dread. @downndirty and @Nettdata, thank y'all so much for your work. I can't even imagine what the stress is like knowing that people are using your data to take action to save lives. But you are directly saving lives. And that's beyond incredible.
https://works.bepress.com/mcandrew/2/ If you scroll to the bottom of the PDF it lists all the experts, and their credentials. It was basically implied by the stupid shit he was doing, but I don't think it was outright said.
Anyone else’s pets having way too much fun with quarantine? Our little rat dogs must think this is heaven
Well, they've officially cut our business hours at work due to the "shelter in place" order, but since we're still an essential business, we aren't closing. We even got permission slips/ hall passes in case cops pull us over. I actually just hope I catch this soon, that way I have time to recover before all of the medical resources get used up down here.
....and that’s going to mean that everyone will need to contribute to even more aggressive fundraising IN THE NAME OF JESUS, AMEN LORD.
Cool story on the local grocery store's response to COVID. They're getting national attention now, which sucks, because this means after this all goes away even more people are gonna move to Texas.
Jesus Christ. This lunatic will scorch the fucking earth. https://amp.theatlantic.com/amp/article/608926/ ....that’s not some tiny nation. That is Brazil. It will run through them like wildfire.
Made my own hand sanitizer today... Nobody in town had any, or isopropyl alcohol, so I did some digging. FYI, high grade iso alcohol (99.9%) is used to clean electronics (PCB's), so I called a few electronic supply shops, and yep, lots of stock. Showed up next day via UPS. Dug out some H2O2 from the cat's "anti-skunk kit" we had tucked away for that time we hope never comes. Dug out some aloe gel from the back of the medicine cabinet. Diluted the Iso with some distilled water, mixed in some H2O2, added the Alo gel, and BAM... hand sanitizer. Strong... and it works, and doesn't rip apart the skin. Colour me impressed with the results.
Also, I used up the last of the Aloe gel, so I ordered some food-grade glycerine from Amazon, and it'll be here Monday. So in case you're looking for some and can't find any, maybe this can help.