Is Covid-19 Impacting You, Your Carving or Your Local Mtn.?

[lowrider]

Unless your state is practicing isolation to the point of restricting groups of 5 or more you are in for a whole lot of hurt coming your way. We are at the point where gov't is instructing people not to pack up and head to their summer homes as infrastructure will not support them should they need medical care in the near future. Curve has not flattened yet but the worst may be 2-3 weeks after the return of spring break travelers. Everything up until now has been an effort to mitigate what experts have modeled. If spring break numbers don't flatten the curve we are only practicing for a much longer period of isolation Transportation by train and domestic travel now  requires 2 weeks isolation and you are allowed travel only if proved healthy. Bus transport is under provincial gov't so like many of your states they are behind in implementing stricter rules. I'm hopeful people will fallow the simple rule to self isolate because although it's pretty boring as time goes on it will prove to be the cheapest and simplest way to end this.

[ursle]

Let's get something straight, China stopped the spread by first taking everyones temp, the people with elevated temps were blood tested, if the virus was detected they were cat scanned, if they were infected they were put in isolation, China found that if they were cared for by their families, 2-3 family members then got the virus, so, China locked down, seperated the infected and three months later flattened the curve,  social distancing is a pipe dream, this isn't going to stop growing for a year or two unless strict measures are taken, test everyone, separate the infected, stop interacting, and encourage those that don't understand.

[John Gilmour]

In larger populations isolation simply is not possible. Like forget it.. shared ventilation systems in high rises,  even the bathroom vents.... just forget it.

The very things that gave NYC THE LOWEST CARBON FOOTPRINT per capita, electric elevators , skyscrapers, vertical population density, mass transit are the very same things that make containment impossible. You aren't going to walk up 40 flights of stairs and even if you did, you'd be walking through other people's vapor clouds.

Every single major walkable  city in the USA will become overwhelmed in hospital capacity. The single driver commuter bedroom communities have a much better shot. They can accumulate enough supplies to reduce exposure. 

In 3 months there will be a lot fewer male smokers over the age of 75 in our city centers. And a lot smaller populations in retirement communities and assisted living which will almost become like assisted dying centers with weaker immune systems spreading this like wild fire, Dr. Kevorkian is obsolete.

The real question is , can older people self isolate until,most of the herd has it and hospitals have ventilators? Or self isolate until a vaccine is found?  If I was a senior and had a boat I'd be sailing to places with single palm trees until,hurricane season. And I'd take my chances with the hurricanes over this.

 

we can not manage a lock down like this.

 

Edited March 29, 2020 by John Gilmour

[Topboost]

I went to the grocery store here in NoCo NH.   I was shocked with how many out of state cars were in the parking lot & on the roads.   MA, CT, RI, NY.   Actually lots of NY & RI.   More than I ever normally see.    My friend in VT says she has also seen more New Yorkers than she has ever seen.  

[lowrider]

Topboost do you have a personal game plan and or you are willing to share ? Govt's don't want to do a hard lock down but it would be helpful to lay out a plan that we could at least make an effort to comply with. Large chain grocery stores seem to  have adopted an SOP to handle customers. Plexiglass screens for tellers  limit in and out traffic wash down carts between customers no loitering and distance rules for que.  Limiting purchases and gov't  threatening huge fines for price gouging .Everyone seems to be quite good at fallowing rules and courteous as well. 

[Corey]

3 hours ago, John Gilmour said:

you'd be walking through other people's vapor clouds.

That's not how this virus travels from person to person. It's liquid droplets of saliva that are briefly airborne after someone coughs/sneezes that drive the 6' spacing. They don't stay airborne for long. 

Completely unrelated - This is an awesome guide to disinfecting your groceries and/or take-out food: 

https://youtu.be/sjDuwc9KBps

[softbootsurfer]

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/prevent-getting-sick/how-covid-spreads.html?CDC_AA_refVal=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.cdc.gov%2Fcoronavirus%2F2019-ncov%2Fprepare%2Ftransmission.html

[bobble]

 

2 hours ago, Corey said:

That's not how this virus travels from person to person. It's liquid droplets of saliva that are briefly airborne after someone coughs/sneezes that drive the 6' spacing. They don't stay airborne for long. 

it's not just saliva. there's been tests where they found the corona virus exists in stool samples too. can't find the original article i read but there was speculation that the corona virus might also be spreading via fecal-oral route due to china's use of squat latrines. there was previous history with SARS. 

"SARS spread through poop, too. During the 2002-2003 SARS outbreak (SARS is also a coronavirus), researchers documented an instance in which one sick person had diarrhea in a Hong Kong apartment building, and the virus then traveled through the pipes to infect other residents. (300 people)

In that instance, an issue with the drainage pipes caused a situation in which running exhaust fans with the bathroom door closed created enough negative pressure to suck fecal droplets out of the sewage system and into the bathroom. Those virus-laden droplets then landed on floor mats, towels, and toiletries that residents touched."

source: https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-may-spread-via-poop-2020-3

but here's another article...

"Coronavirus: pathogens linger in toilet for hours if you flush without closing lid – and some may still sneak through even if it is down, Hong Kong study finds. Polluted droplets can follow air flow and be carried to other rooms in a home. Running exhaust fan for 15 minutes will remove vast majority of airborne pathogens, study leader says."

source: https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/health-environment/article/3050502/coronavirus-hong-kong-study-shows-pathogens-can

 

[Topboost]

7 hours ago, lowrider said:

Topboost do you have a personal game plan and or you are willing to share ? Govt's don't want to do a hard lock down but it would be helpful to lay out a plan that we could at least make an effort to comply with. Large chain grocery stores seem to  have adopted an SOP to handle customers. Plexiglass screens for tellers  limit in and out traffic wash down carts between customers no loitering and distance rules for que.  Limiting purchases and gov't  threatening huge fines for price gouging .Everyone seems to be quite good at fallowing rules and courteous as well. 

Hi Lowrider.   I'm just following the guidelines.   Social distancing & washing hands.  I feel bad that we're not getting take-out from our local restaurants, but we're just not going to risk it.  I did buy a couple of gift cards from some of them online to help support them.   We are just trying to lay low & keep away from people.    It sucks...     Stay well!    

[lordmetroland]

2 hours ago, bobble said:

it's not just saliva. there's been tests where they found the corona virus exists in stool samples too. 

Good god. First no kissing, now no playing with feces!? The world is truly a cold and pleasureless place...

[lowrider]

Life sort of doesn't change much as I farm and have daily chores to keep things real. Keeping my distance isn't hard on 140 acres but when we need supplies both farm and household you need to plan it out and change regular routines. I personally think it's important not to hoard but also not demand too much from the  people who work to keep supply chain moving . Best of all internet providers are extending coverage to help everyone stay informed. Hard to imagine how this would have been handled 20 years ago. Keep safe as well !

I play with feces all the time have loaders and spreader just for that purpose. Might be starting that job in a week or two when things dry up  a bit.

[JRAZZ]

Problem is that people hear "it only kills old people". While that might be statistically true it can and does kill everyone, including kids.

Also, if the hospitals are full or don't have enough ventilators the morbidity goes up. Full hospitals have a hard time treating other emergency cases like car accidents, cancer, and even the flu!

And finally even if it doesn't kill you it can definitely damage your lungs. Hospitalization rate is very high across all age groups.

 

This mentality of "it only kills old people" is not only immoral, it's also stupid and wrong! 

[bumpyride]

We're in for a long ride.  No guarantees for anyone, anywhere.  Keep to yourselves, keep in contact, but remember you can't be sure of anyone other than the people in your household.  This may go on for a year or more.  It depends on how your neighbors get serious or just get it. 

There is no concrete proof of a waning during the summer seasons.  Luckily I have a partner that knows how easily these things can go wrong, and how easily they can spread.  She was in charge of the Microbiology in a large hospital, and was the person to make sure the lab was not compromised.  She keeps me in check, and I do her.  Follow all protocols and we have a better chance of getting out of this much sooner than if you don't.

 

Some people hope that outbreaks of the new coronavirus will wane as temperatures rise, but pandemics often don’t behave in the same way as seasonal outbreaks. BBC Future looks at what we know.

By Richard Gray

23rd March 2020

M

Many infectious diseases wax and wane with the seasons. Flu typically arrives with the colder winter months, as does the norovirus vomiting bug. Others, such as typhoid, tend to peak during the summer. Measles cases drop during the summer in temperate climates, while in tropical regions they peak in the dry season.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, many people are now asking whether we can expect similar seasonality with Covid-19. Since it first emerged in China around mid-December, the virus has spread quickly, with the number of cases now rising most sharply in Europe and the US.

Many of the largest outbreaks have been in regions where the weather is cooler, leading to speculation that the disease might begin to tail off with the arrival of summer. Many experts, however, have already cautioned against banking too much on the virus dying down over the summer.

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And they are right to be cautious. The virus that causes Covid-19 – which has been officially named SARS-CoV-2 – is too new to have any firm data on how cases will change with the seasons. The closely related Sars virus that spread in 2003 was contained quickly, meaning there is little information about how it was affected by the seasons.

But there are some clues from other coronaviruses that infect humans as to whether Covid-19 might eventually become seasonal.

There is some hope that as temperatures warm up in the Northern Hemisphere, cases of coronavirus will start to fall (Credit: Getty Images)

A study conducted 10 years ago by Kate Templeton, from the Centre for Infectious Diseases at the University of Edinburgh, UK, found that three coronaviruses – all obtained from patients with respiratory tract infections at hospitals and GP surgeries in Edinburgh – showed “marked winter seasonality”. These viruses seemed to cause infections mainly between December and April – a similar pattern to that seen with influenza. A fourth coronavirus, which was mainly found in patients with reduced immune systems, was far more sporadic.

There are some early hints that Covid-19 may also vary with the seasons. The spread of outbreaks of the new disease around the world seems to suggest it has a preference for cool and dry conditions.

An unpublished analysis comparing the weather in 500 locations around the world where there have been Covid-19 cases seems to suggest a link between the spread of the virus and temperature, wind speed and relative humidity. Another unpublished study has also shown higher temperatures are linked to lower incidence of Covid-19, but notes that temperature alone cannot account for the global variation in incidence.

Further as-yet-unpublished research predicts that temperate warm and cold climates are the most vulnerable to the current Covid-19 outbreak, followed by arid regions. Tropical parts of the world are likely to be least affected, the researchers say.

Pandemics often don’t follow the same seasonal patterns seen in more normal outbreaks

But without real data over a number of seasons, researchers are relying upon computer modelling to predict what might happen over the course of the year.

Extrapolating data about Covid-19’s seasonality based on endemic coronaviruses – meaning viruses which have been circulating in human populations for some time – is challenging. That's not least because endemic viruses are seasonal for a number of reasons that might not currently apply to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Pandemics often don’t follow the same seasonal patterns seen in more normal outbreaks. Spanish flu, for example, peaked during the summer months, while most flu outbreaks occur during the winter. (Read more about what Spanish flu can teach us about Covid-19.)

“Eventually we would expect to see Covid-19 becoming endemic,” says Jan Albert, a professor of infectious disease control who specialises in viruses at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm. “And it would be really surprising if it didn't show seasonality then. The big question is whether the sensitivity of this virus to [the seasons] will influence its capacity to spread in a pandemic situation. We don’t know for sure, but it should be in the back of our heads that it is possible.”

We need to be cautious, therefore, when using what we know about the seasonal behaviour of other coronaviruses to make predictions about the current Covid-19 pandemic. But why are related coronaviruses seasonal, and why does that offer hope for this outbreak?

Coronaviruses are a family of so-called “enveloped viruses”. This means they are coated in an oily coat, known as a lipid bilayer, studded with proteins that stick out like spikes of a crown, helping to give them their name – corona is Latin for crown.

There are currently few studies that look at the impact the weather has on Covid-19 (Credit: Getty Images)

Research on other enveloped viruses suggests that this oily coat makes the viruses more susceptible to heat than those that do not have one. In colder conditions, the oily coat hardens into a rubber-like state, much like fat from cooked meat will harden as it cools, to protect the virus for longer when it is outside the body. Most enveloped viruses tend to show strong seasonality as a result of this.

Research has already shown that Sars-Cov-2 can survive for up to 72 hours on hard surfaces like plastic and stainless steel at temperatures of between 21-23C (70-73F) and in relative humidity of 40%. Exactly how the Covid-19 virus behaves at other temperatures and humidity has still to be tested, but research on other coronaviruses suggests they can survive for more than 28 days at 4C. (Read more about how long Covid-19 can survive on surfaces.)

A closely related coronavirus that caused the Sars outbreak in 2003 has also been found to survive best in cooler, drier conditions. For example, dried Sars virus on smooth surfaces remained infectious for over five days at between 22-25C and with a relative humidity of 40–50%. The higher the temperature and humidity, the shorter the virus survived.

“Climate comes into play because it affects the stability of the virus outside the human body when expelled by coughing or sneezing, for example,” says Miguel Araújo, who studies the effects of environmental change on biodiversity at the National Museum of Natural Sciences in Madrid, Spain. “The greater the time the virus remains stable in the environment, the greater its capacity to infect other people and become epidemic. While Sars-Cov-2 has quickly spread all over the world, the major outbreaks have mainly occurred in places exposed to cool and dry weather.”

A recent analysis suggests that this pandemic coronavirus will be less sensitive to the weather than many hope

His computer models certainly seem to match the pattern of outbreaks around the world, with the highest number of cases outside of the tropics.

Araújo believes that if Covid-19 shares a similar sensitivity to temperature and humidity, it could mean cases of coronavirus will flare up at different times around the world.

“It is reasonable to expect the two viruses will share similar behaviour,” he says. “But this is not a one-variable equation. The virus spreads from human to human. The more humans at any given place and the more they get into contact with each other, the more infections there will be. Their behaviour is key to understanding the propagation of the virus.”

A study from the University of Maryland has shown that the virus has spread most in cities and regions of the world where average temperatures have been around 5-11C (41-52F) and relative humidity has been low.

But there have been considerable numbers of cases in tropical regions, too. A recent analysis of the spread of the virus in Asia by researchers at Harvard Medical School suggests that this pandemic coronavirus will be less sensitive to the weather than many hope.

They conclude that the rapid growth of cases in cold and dry provinces of China, such as Jilin and Heilongjiang, alongside the rate of transmission in tropical locations, such as Guangxi and Singapore, suggest increases in temperature and humidity in the spring and summer will not lead to a decline in cases. They say it underlines the need for extensive public health interventions to control the disease. (Read more about why social distancing is so important.)

Laboratory research and computer modelling suggest Covid-19 will be less able to survive in warm and humid conditions (Credit: Getty Images)

This is because the spread of a virus depends on far more than simply its ability to survive in the environment. And this is where understanding the seasonality of diseases becomes complicated. For a disease like Covid-19, it is people who are now spreading the virus, and so seasonal changes in human behaviour can also lead to shifts in infection rates.

Measles cases in Europe, for example, tend to coincide with school terms and decrease during the holidays when children are not spreading the virus to one another. The enormous migration of people around the Chinese Lunar New Year on 25 January has also been suggested to have played a key role in the spread of Covid-19 out of Wuhan to other cities in China and around the world.

The weather can also mess with our own immune systems to make us more vulnerable to infections, too. There is some evidence to suggest the vitamin D levels in our bodies can have an affect on how vulnerable we are to infectious diseases. In the winter our bodies make less vitamin D from sunlight exposure, mainly because we spend more time indoors and wrap ourselves in clothing against the cold air. But some studies have found this theory is unlikely to account for seasonal variation seen in diseases like flu.

More controversial is whether cold weather weakens our immune systems – some studies suggest it does, but others find the cold can actually boost the number of cells that defend our bodies from infection.

There is stronger evidence, however, that humidity can have a greater impact on our vulnerability to disease. When the air is particularly dry, it is thought to reduce the amount of mucus coating our lungs and airways. This sticky secretion forms a natural defence against infections and with less of it, we are more vulnerable to viruses.

Stopping contact between people should also bring down the infection rates

One intriguing study by scientists in China suggests there is some sort of relationship between how deadly Covid-19 can be and the weather conditions. They looked at nearly 2,300 deaths in Wuhan, China, and compared them to the humidity, temperature and pollution levels on the day they occurred.

Although it has yet to be published in an academic journal, their research suggests mortality rates were lower on days when the humidity levels and temperatures were higher. Their analysis also suggests that on days where the maximum and minimum temperature ranges were greater, there were higher levels of mortality. But this work is largely also based on computer modelling, so the exact nature of this relationship, and whether it will be seen in other parts of the world, is still to be explored.

As the virus causing the Covid-19 pandemic is new, it is unlikely many people, if anyone, will have immunity against it until they have been infected and have recovered. This means the virus will spread, infect and cause disease in a way quite unlike endemic viruses.

Air travel has been the main route by which the virus has spread around the world so rapidly, says Vittoria Colizza, director of research at the French Institute of Health and Medical Research. But once it starts spreading within a community, it is close contact between people that drives the transmission. Stopping contact between people should also bring down the infection rates. This is exactly what many governments have been attempting to do with the escalating lockdown of public places around the world.

Even if cases of Covid-19 do fall over the summer months, it is unlikely to disappear entirely and will return later in the year (Credit: Getty Images)

“There’s no evidence yet for a seasonal behaviour of Covid-19,” says Colizza. “The behavioural component may play a role, too.” But she warns it is too early to know if the measures put in place will be enough to stall the spread of the virus. “By itself, it may partially reduce effective contagiousness due to the reduction of contacts along which the disease could be transmitted.”

And if cases of Covid-19 do indeed tail off over the coming months it could be for a number of reasons – prevention measures such as isolation and lockdowns are being successful; there is growing immunity in the population; or it may be an effect of the season, as Albert’s models suggest.

“If there is a seasonal effect, it could mask the true impact of the other two,” warns Albert. “In countries where a strong lockdown has meant not many people have been exposed, then I wouldn’t be surprised that we will see a second wave come the fall and winter.”

Even if Covid-19 does show some seasonal variability, it is unlikely to disappear entirely over the summer months, as some have suggested. But a dip in cases might bring some benefits.

“The steps we are taking to flatten out the curve are expensive in economic terms, but they could help us push this pandemic into the summer,” says Albert. “If there is some seasonality, it might buy health systems the time they need to prepare.”

And in a world scrambling to cope with the rapidly rising number of cases, it might just be time we desperately need.

--

[John Gilmour]

8 hours ago, Corey said:

That's not how this virus travels from person to person. It's liquid droplets of saliva that are briefly airborne after someone coughs/sneezes that drive the 6' spacing. They don't stay airborne for long. 

Completely unrelated - This is an awesome guide to disinfecting your groceries and/or take-out food: 

https://youtu.be/sjDuwc9KBps

They likely settle quickly, but they could settle on stairs or handrails ( which you should not be touching) but if someone were to sneeze at the top of a stairwell and a  minute later you enter from the next landing down , you could still be within falling droplets . Also the air currents in stairwells in high rises can be gusty.  If we were just talking about level ground with only 6 feet to travel to ground I would be less anxious . i do look at urban centers with high rises as being  especially problematic. You have a main lobby entrance with many people entering and exiting the same space . 

[bumpyride]

 

With the rapidly spreading coronavirus in Washington State in early March, leaders of the Skagit Valley Choir debated whether to rehearse weekly.
The virus was already killing people in the Seattle area, about an hour’s drive south.

But Skagit County has not reported any cases, schools and businesses have remained open, and bans on large rallies have yet to be announced.

On March 6, Adam Burdick, choirmaster, informed 121 members in an email that, in the midst of “stress and tension from concerns about the virus”, the practice would take place as planned at the Presbyterian Church from Mount Vernon.

“I plan to be there on Tuesday March 10, and I hope many of you will be too,” he wrote.

Mount Vernon Presbyterian Church in Mount Vernon, Wash.
(Karen Ducey / for the Times)

Sixty singers showed up. A receptionist offered hand sanitizer at the door, and members refrained from the usual hugs and handshakes.

“It seemed like a normal rehearsal, except that the choirs are huge places,” said Burdick. “We were making music and trying to keep some distance between us.”

After two and a half hours, the singers separated at 9 p.m.

Almost three weeks later, 45 were diagnosed with COVID-19 or ill with symptoms, at least three were hospitalized and two died.

The epidemic stunned county health officials, who concluded that the virus was almost certainly transmitted by air from one or more people without symptoms.

“That’s all we can think of right now,” said Polly Dubbel, county communicable disease and environmental health manager.

In interviews with the Los Angeles Times, eight people at the rehearsal said that no one coughed, sneezed, or looked sick.

Everyone came with their own score and avoided direct physical contact. Some members helped install or remove folding chairs. Some used mandarins which had been placed on a table in the back.

Experts have said the choir epidemic is consistent with a growing body of evidence that the virus can be transmitted by aerosols – particles less than 5 microns in size that can float in the air for minutes or more.

The World Health Organization has minimized the possibility of transmission in aerosols, noting that the virus is spread by much larger “respiratory droplets”, which are released when an infected person coughs or sneezes and quickly falls to the surface. .

But a study published March 17 in the New England Journal of Medicine found that when the virus was suspended in a fog under laboratory conditions, it remained “viable and infectious” for three hours – although the researchers said that the period of time would probably not be more than half an hour under actual conditions.

One of the authors of this study, Jamie Lloyd-Smith, a researcher in infectious diseases at UCLA, said that it was possible that the powerful breathing action of the song had dispersed viral particles in the church hall which were largely inhaled.

“You would imagine that really trying to project your voice would also project more droplets and aerosols,” he said.

With three-quarters of the choir members testing positive for the virus or showing symptoms of infection, the epidemic would be considered a “mass event,” he said.

Linsey Marr, environmental engineer at Virginia Tech and specialist in airborne virus transmission, said that some people are particularly good at exhaling fine materials, producing 1,000 times more than others.

Marr said the hatching of a choir should be seen as a powerful warning to the public.

“It can help people realize that, hey, we really have to be careful,” she said.

***

The Skagit Valley Chorale attracts members from northwest Washington and often sells its winter and spring concerts at the 650-seat McIntyre Hall in Mount Vernon.

Amateur singers interested in choral music tend to be older, but the group includes a few young adults. Burdick worked on hip-hop in one issue last year.

The next big representation of the group’s schedule took place at the end of April, during the tourist season, when the annual Skagit Valley tulip festival attracts more than a million people to see brilliant colors in the meadows surrounding the Mont Vernon.

The festival will soon be canceled, but nothing has been announced yet and the choir continues to prepare.

Carolynn Comstock and her husband Jim Owen carpooled for the nearby town of Anacortes’ March 10 practice with their friends Ruth and Mark Backlund.

Carolynn and Jim, who ran a home improvement business together, have been singing with the choir for 15 years and see it as a central force in their lives. They had presented the Backlunds to the choir.

Jim Owen and Carolynn Comstock, singers of the Skagit Valley Choir, are seated in front of their house in Anacortes, Wash.

(Karen Ducey / for the Times)

The two couples entered the hall of the rented church – about the size of a volleyball court – and offered their hands for the disinfectant.

The upholstered metal chairs extended into six rows of 20, with about one foot between the chairs and an aisle in the center. There were twice as many seats as people.

Comstock, a soprano, and Owen, a tenor, took their usual seats side by side in the third row. The front rows and the center filled around them.

Burdick, 49, stood in front of his choir, with an accompanist to his right seated at a grand piano.

Given the anxiety over the coronavirus, the conductor decided to start with a play called “Sing On”.

The singers took a deep breath and sang the refrain with enthusiasm: “Sing! Whatever your path, sing! Sing! ”

The choir has moved on to other issues, including a popular spiritual piece written by gospel legend Thomas A. Dorsey: “If we have ever needed the Lord before, we certainly need him now. ”

At one point, the members split into two groups, each standing around separate pianos to sing.

When it was time to leave, Burdick’s wife Lorraine, a contralto who also sang professionally, refrained from her custom of kissing friends.

Instead, she bowed out.

***

Three days later, Comstock felt chills. A sweater didn’t help. She took her temperature: 99.3.

She and Owen canceled their dinner plans that night with the Backlunds.

At 9 p.m., she received an SMS from Ruth Backlund. Ruth, 72, and Mark, 73, had a fever.

Burdick woke up the next day, March 14, with a fever. As his temperature rose to 103, he began to hear other choir singers.

They felt tired and sore. Some had fever, cough and shortness of breath, which they said were symptomatic of COVID-19. Some had nausea and diarrhea.

On March 15, Comstock, 62, noticed something strange when she made pasta. She couldn’t taste the sauce, a spicy Italian sausage. She would soon learn that loss of taste and odor was also a common symptom.

When Owen, 66, first felt sick that day, he found that his temperature was below normal, a symptom that persisted. The same day, the Backlunds tested negative for the flu.

Their clinic sent their samples for coronavirus tests, which would come back four days later showing that they both had COVID-19.

On March 17, a member of the choir alerted Skagit County public health to the epidemic.

Working from the choir membership list, a dozen health workers rushed for three days to contain the epidemic. They called each member to determine who attended the rehearsal.

They asked each person with symptoms to list their close contacts during the 24 hours before the illness started. Then they called these people, telling anyone who felt sick to quarantine.

“We think it was just a really very unfortunate and high risk event,” said Dubbel, the county health official.

Mark Backlund felt like he was slipping, but not as bad as a 10-year-old friend, a runner, who was rushed to hospital with pneumonia. The two men would eventually recover.

On March 18, Burdick received a message from Nancy “Nicki” Hamilton, an 83-year-old soprano known for her political activism and international travel stories. She was worried about a colleague.

Three days later, he received another call. Hamilton had been taken to hospital shortly after he spoke with her and now she was dead.

The news quickly spread among the choir members, many of whom were sick and left to cry at home alone.

Health officials said that the 28 choir members tested for COVID-19 were infected. The remaining 17 with symptoms were never tested, either because the tests were not available or – like Comstock and Owen – the singers felt that only people in critical condition were eligible.

The youngest patient was 31, but averaged 67, according to the health department.

In their two-story house, Burdick and his wife kept the distance between them for a week. But Lorraine still fell ill.

The Burdicks had been encouraged to learn that another woman in the hospital – a viola in her forties – seemed to be getting better.

But last Friday, the conductor received another call. She was dead. Another woman, a tenor, had been rushed to the hospital.

Others felt that the disease was decreasing. A fortnight after the rehearsal, Comstock injected shampoo into his hand and felt a strange and pleasant sensation.

It smelled. Like coconut.

***

Marr, the Virginia Tech researcher, said the hatching of the choir reminded her of a classic case study on the spread of infectious diseases.

In 1977, an Alaska Airlines flight returned to Homer, Alaska, after experiencing engine problems and sitting on the tarmac for four hours with the ventilation system turned off.

Of the 49 passengers on board, 35 developed flu symptoms and five were hospitalized. The researchers eventually traced the epidemic to a woman who felt good when she got on board, but then fell ill.

The case prompted epidemiologists to realize that the flu could spread through the air.

Research has already shown that coronavirus is almost twice as contagious as the flu and much more deadly.

There is still a lot to learn about the choir epidemic, starting with the source of the virus.

Dubbel, the county official, said she hoped that a study would one day be carried out to determine how the infection was spreading. But for now, his team is overwhelmed trying to contain additional epidemics.

Marr said the researchers will ask the choir members many questions.

Did the singers sit in the usual seats, allowing them to remember their location that night and help rebuild the layout of the hall and its occupants?

Could the 15 people who didn’t get sick sit together?

On Sunday, 99 people tested positive in Skagit County.

It could take months before the choir meets again. The Backlunds, however, started to sing again – a viola and a bass together in their living room.

The couple, and Comstock and Owen, would like to know if they have antibodies to the virus, so it would be safe for them to deliver meals and find other ways to help as the infection spreads.

Comstock marveled at the randomness of it all.

“These are just normal random people doing things they like to do, and suddenly some people are dead,” she said. “It is very disappointing. ”

[lowrider]

Ontario Gov't announced today school won't resume till May at earliest. Supplies for protective equipment still not available to meet increased demand but industry is ramping up production with anticipation peak is still two to three weeks away. All political parties are together and on message deferring to medical advice in all decisions as well as allocation of supplies. Provincial Gov't is praising the efforts of Federal gov't and vice versa. Amazing to see from rival political parties. Flour yeast and thermometers seem to be in great demand.

[big mario]

I have been really looking forward to making this post, and thankfully I can.  Fourteen days from exposure and a whole lot of nothing to report.  To say I am overjoyed would be an understatement

[JRAZZ]

Stay safe!

[JRAZZ]

At least some good news...

Yes, the efforts do seem to make a difference. We have not seen the worst yet but most states trajectories seem to be diverging from the diagonal (diagonal = exponential growth). So whatever we are doing is working!

 

Worldwide you can see that China seems to have very little new cases, Europe is doing better and although it's hard to see, even the US is doing better.  Nobody can see the end just yet and there will be a danger of resurgence for quite some time but at least it looks like somethings are starting to change!

 

[johnasmo]

On 3/27/2020 at 1:22 PM, JRAZZ said:

This is not going to be over this year. I would consider this over only when a vaccine is available and proven effective.

Totally agree.  But, shelter-in-place directives could be relaxed as soon as an effective treatment is found that reduces rates of mortality and hospitalization, which could happen sooner.  That's my hope for 20/21 ski season, assuming I'm lucky enough to see it.

[Jack M]

Do you believe numbers reported by China?

[JRAZZ]

16 minutes ago, Jack M said:

Do you believe numbers reported by China?

Do you believe the numbers reported by the US government?

 

Any number in a vacuum is just a number. The reporting that I have seen including scientific (peer-reviewed) papers seem to hold water. They have had longer to deal with this so it's not surprising to me that they are closer to stopping it.

[Jack M]

10 hours ago, JRAZZ said:

Do you believe the numbers reported by the US government?

 

Any number in a vacuum is just a number. The reporting that I have seen including scientific (peer-reviewed) papers seem to hold water. They have had longer to deal with this so it's not surprising to me that they are closer to stopping it.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries

81,000 cases and 3,000 deaths in a country of 1.4 Billion just defies all reason.

Some estimates put the number of deaths in Wuhan alone over 40,000:

https://www.rfa.org/english/news/china/wuhan-deaths-03272020182846.html

The US (pop 327M) is now over 245,000 reported cases and 6,000 deaths.  Those numbers are reported by state CDC agencies to the federal CDC, these are not political organizations.

But the numbers for the US and probably many other nations aren't the full picture because tests are relatively scarce.  They are only being administered to people with serious to severe symptoms.  This causes selection bias when calculating the mortality rate from those numbers, 2.5% for the US.  The US rate when estimating for people not tested is closer to 1%:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/30/health/coronavirus-lower-death-rate/index.html

 

[Jack M]

And,

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/02/us/politics/cia-coronavirus-china.html?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_NN_p_20200403&instance_id=17311&nl=morning-briefing&regi_id=86209147&section=topNews&segment_id=23741&te=1&user_id=392947cc309b066efd0ac2a784e84d5c

[BXFR70]

11 hours ago, Jack M said:

Do you believe numbers reported by China?

No, the numbers do not line up with what other countries have experienced. Particularly with how long this was known to be a problem in China before they even acknowledged it publicly. 

On the subject of China, interesting how people that were critical or first sounded alarms have now disappeared.