COVID19 Factors We Should Consider/Current Events

[Rob Waskis]

where are you? Northern? Central? South? i know 2 people in Bergen who contracted it but are fine.

Northern - Morris County.

[FlamingoDeFranc]

I'm almost positive I had it in January/February. I was in Boston for new years in a hot sweaty nightclub. By the end of the month, I was noting that I couldn't smell anything (which is really weird when one has a bunch of smelly plants) and I plateaued hard during this time. I remember asking myself if I was overtrained, but it didn't seem likely as I had recently missed so many days over the holidays. During this time a few people got pretty damn sick at my gym, I remember worrying that I was going to catch whatever they had...

I also don't know anyone who has died from it. And I know a bunch of unhealthy people who mingled with hundreds of people during the lockdown in Boston. A friend in the DJ/party crowd also claimed to know 4 people to have died from it. Curious that the number was also 4. I didn't question his integrity directly, but I'm also not convinced by it. I've had too many bald-faced lies spewed directly into my face by new englanders over the years to readily believe anything they say.

People also like to change definitions according to their point. I'm curious how the word 'know' is being defined. Because it might be I 'know' one person who has supposedly died from it, too.

[Matt Jackson]

I'm in a UK city with around a million people. I've continued to work throughout this and the only person I know of is a co-worker's father who was taken into hospital dying of cancer, got chronically dehydrated and then showed symptoms, tested positive and died. He was in his 80's. Should his death be recorded as statistic pushing up the CFR? I don't think so.

Another co-worker was taken into hospital and put in a high dependency unit with all the symptoms back in late February, was suspected to have it, and tested negative in mid-March. Remained hospitalized with pneumonia and other stuff until the start of April. She was in her late 40's, obese and sedentary.

I'm pretty sure I, plus my mum and dad (both 70) who were visiting just before Christmas, caught it in the second week of December. Mum had chest infection and coughed up sputum until mid Feburary and it was cleared up with antibiotics. We had all the symptoms and I would put in on par, in terms of unpleasantness, with a really nasty case of the flu.

Our experts' computer models predicted 500,000 deaths - and despite figures being revised downwards in line with reality, no attempt has been made to return to normalcy. This, in itself, is enough to be suspicious about their motives. This is clearly not a health crisis.

In the UK, on average, 150,000+ people die in the first quarter of the year. 650,000+ people die here every single year. Our whole society IS a fucking health crisis and neo-liberal capitalism has greatly profited from our bad lifestyles. Low information voters who consume a lifetime's worth of toxic corporate product, and whose consumer choices will inevitably require them to need prolonged access to the heath care service industry, is not a bad situation for the system. That is, if the only overall goal is unending economic growth. Those who hold money power, and political power, do not, and never have, prioritized our health and well-being over GDP and economic productivity.

If I was the caretaker of an economic system akin to a purulent, soon-to-explode boil of debt, and if back in 2008 the festering boil wasn't actually lanced and drained but merely had pretty make-up applied to its surface, then I would surely be relieved if COVID-19 came along at a timely moment and became the scapegoat for my historical negligence, mismanagement and greed.

This has also come at the moment of rising nationalism, populism and national consciousness - as seen all over the world at the ballot box and in culture. Trump is a failure for nationalism, but the spirit behind why people voted for him has only grown stronger. It would be better for neo-liberal system is this trend died off, otherwise you might get a society motivated by other things than materialism and bodily gratification, and that could be dangerous. Ironically, I think these measures will have precisely the opposite of a chilling effect on nationalism - especially once the working and middle classes start to notice the economic pain.

I'm just waiting for officialdom to herald the second and third waves of this, so they can justify and fix the idea firmly in our minds that certain aspects of lock-down misrule is indeed the "new normal" for the long-term. Stef's point about their use of language linked to violent death ("remain in place") is mirrored here, but our collective consciousness hasn't been brainwashed with "shooter" fear related terms, but we have already had the phrase "new normal" massaged into our minds. It was used to describe how modern Britains should envision a future with increasingly more Islamic terror attacks in British cities. It was all over the media after the deaths in 2017, and we're being bombarded with the words again now.

[Rob Waskis]

~100 NJ gyms are moving to open June 1st. This situation is going to escalate:

The Atilis Gym in Bellmawr was closed today after state and county officials issued a notice of embargo.

During yesterday's press conference, the NJ Superintendent of Police said there were "additional actions that can be taken that fall under the purview of the State Department of Health."

Right after that press briefing (what a phenomenal fucking coincidence), the gym had a sewage backup that forced the gym to evacuate.

Overnight, the windows of the gym were plastered with notices from the Board of Health etc.

The owners hired a cleaning crew and are going to be holding workouts in the parking lot today.

All this after that piece of shit Murphy had the temerity (I won't give him the courtesy of saying "the balls") to say "This is not just a point of principle".

[Ryan Arnold]

I dunno, from the posts of the folks from NYC here, it seems that the five boroughs have bigger problems in the consciousness of the occupants of those spaces far more serious than the mere Kung Flu. Blind obedience being foremost among them.

It is full blown insanity here in Manhattan. I would say 90% of people wear masks at all times everywhere. At least 30-40% of people driving cars by themselves wear a mask, including cops. I was sitting by the water at Hudson River Park yesterday and the park cops were driving up the promenade with a megaphone announcing they were handing out free masks. I was sitting on a bench, they stopped in front of me and offered me one. I refused and they moved on. Here is some sanity from of all places, the New York Post:

Doctors raise alarm about health effects of continued coronavirus shutdown

End New York City's lockdown now!

[Mark Rippetoe]

Those of you who are hungrily swallowing the shit your government tells you about, really, anything need to read these:

The CDC and States Are Misreporting COVID-19 Test Data - The Atlantic

CDC now says coronavirus '''does not spread easily''' via contaminated surfaces | Fox News

Despite toll, nursing homes are still taking in infected patients - StarTribune.com

[muntz]

Those of you who are hungrily swallowing the shit your government tells you about, really, anything need to read these:

The CDC and States Are Misreporting COVID-19 Test Data - The Atlantic

CDC now says coronavirus '''does not spread easily''' via contaminated surfaces | Fox News

Despite toll, nursing homes are still taking in infected patients - StarTribune.com

Yep. its a shit show. No one knows anything. The CDC has been particularly incompetent.

[darrowdisciple]

You have to be more specific about which "government," and which part of the government you're referring to. The national administration has not reported a true fact about the pandemic since they knew about it in at least December. The science agencies tried, but far-right politics has made the job of genuine scientists nearly impossible. It's fun, and kind of satisfying to rail at the "government!" but scattershot approaches to real problems usually leave a lot of holes, but don't hit much of the target.

Close your eyes a national government in January, aware that a novel virus had started to spread, hadn't removed its epidemiologists from China, used the gene map published by the Chinese, worked with the WHO to implement a test, immediately began testing, tracing, and isolating everyone coming into the U.S., calmly informed the nation that certain temporary sacrifices would be necessary, but that they'd be supported financially, and personally, to protect each other and our health care system while we planned for the near, mid, an distant futures. Our economy would be affected until we had sufficient protective gear at least for health care workers, and we'd have a testing and tracing system to minimize reinfection when we reopened. Imagine we were told that our shared sacrifices, significant, though relatively minor in the overall scheme of things, were our commitment to one another as a nation, and that together we'd be stronger and more unified as a result.

Then open your eyes, and compare it to what you see. And try to keep your fingers out of your throat.

[Bluefan75]

Those of you who are hungrily swallowing the shit your government tells you about, really, anything need to read these:

The CDC and States Are Misreporting COVID-19 Test Data - The Atlantic

CDC now says coronavirus '''does not spread easily''' via contaminated surfaces | Fox News

Despite toll, nursing homes are still taking in infected patients - StarTribune.com

Isn't the Atlantic pretty left leaning? Its actually a bit shocking they would publish that, all things considered. May want to get that copied here before some genius takes it down there.

[Dillon Spencer]

I can't speak for RKC's intent. But I can respond to your plea for "unity." As I already said, rural people prefer to be left alone. But urban voters in the US elect True Progressive Believers whose interests and passions and goals are inimical to many of the values rural people hold dear. At least in Illinois, the lockdown of churches has not been opposed by urban pastors and churches. But several rural pastors and congregants have attempted to bring suit or get restraining orders against the rule by executive edict that should have been done by the legislative branch.

I'll take you at your word when you say YOU don't go to the ballot box to elect officials and representatives that intend to screw over rural people. But you do elect those who represent your own interests. Which often as not, come at the expense of rural life. After all, why should you have any interest in voting for someone who has concerns about hog or milk production distribution or infrastructure? That's just one example. People vote their interests. Elections have consequences.

Oh I wasn't making the plea for unity, although I feel like it's generally a desirable thing, if not always possible. it sounded like RKC was suggesting people should look past all those fault lines along which "they" seek to divide us, and then fell immediately into the trap of villifying urban voters.

And yes I agree that the interests of urban voters are often at odds with with those of rural voters and vice versa. The same way I have little interest in hogs and milk as anything other than delicious, delicious protein sources, I'm sure you're similarly disinterested with public transportation expansion in a major metropolitan area of nearly 8 million people. Doesn't mean they're not both important. You hit it on the head when you said people are just voting their interests. That's the same point I was trying to make. Urban voters vote what they consider to be their interests, just like rural voters. We're not on some mission to "trample rural ways of life", and if it seems like we are, it's just because there are a lot of us so we tend to get our way (for better or worse) in a lot of places. Not that urban voters are a unified group either. My province recently elected our own Trump-lite as Premier, despite more than half the population living in the aformentioned 8 million person major metropolitan area. Hell, we even elected his even further right, less competent brother mayor of Toronto, and he was such a shit show he he made YOUR news at times.

All I'm saying is that I think there's a lot more common ground and common sense to be found on most issues than some people think, but it sure is hard to do if you consider anyone on the other side of one of these dividing lines to be literally evil.

I also disagree with your assertion that rural people just want to be left alone, but that's another story