COVID-19 | Effects on Skoolies - No Politics please.

[2kool4skool]

Our county, pop 230,000, tested 1875, neg 1804, 1 death. About 5 hosp. .0005% death rate?

 

[gs1949]

My county has a population of somewhere just over 40,000. I have not yet looked this morning, but as of yesterday Johns Hopkins U had us at 1 confirmed case and 0 deaths.

Obviously, we don't really need a lock-down here, but I hope they don't take it off selectively because that would pull more people in here, the only question is how many, and some of those people will be already infected.

So when these lock-downs should be taken off is a very tough question and I am glad that I do not have to answer it.

 

[EastCoastCB]

Yall should be happy. Folks distancing is working in areas that aren't densely populated.

Has anyone seen the newest numbers and charts for sweden? They've had a huge spike in deaths vs their neighbors in Scandinavia.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/sweden-coronavirus-deaths-lockdown-social-distancing-denmark-finland-norway-a9470771.html

 

[2kool4skool]

"The number of deaths may not be an accurate count of deaths" hahahaha, wtf.

 

[gs1949]

Yall should be happy. Folks distancing is working in areas that aren't densely populated.

Except Idaho, their stats are high for their population, and for some reason they have roughly the same number of confirmed cases as South Dakota, but Idaho has over 6 times as many deaths as South Dakota, according to Johns Hopkins today.

And any effect from the large rallies they have been holding lately to protest lock-down has not yet hit the stats.

 

[gs1949]

"The number of deaths may not be an accurate count of deaths" hahahaha, wtf.

Many places are not counting people who die at home, while most hospitals are counting anyone who has COVID, even if they have severe pre-existing conditions that are actually what killed them.

This could be playing a role in raising Idaho's stats above neighboring states, but I have not been able to find anything on that.

 

[EastCoastCB]

"The number of deaths may not be an accurate count of deaths" hahahaha, wtf.

hard to keep track when the bodies pile up. They're using reefer trailers as makeshift morgues in many places. In a death spike such as shown on the graph its standard to have such a disclaimer. That graph is four days ago. They're at 1500+ now. Thus the asterisk.
Glad its so easy for folks to laugh at this stuff, though. Laughter is good medicine and a good coping mechanism for a lot of folks.

 

[PNW_Steve]

I thank God that I have been fortunate enough to be in a rural area that has seen very little Corona virus activity. We had one confirmed case in a person who has self quorentined after a trip out of the country. As far as we know, we are Corona virus free. So far..... This could change in
A moment.

I am afraid that many folks here have decided that we dodged the bullet and everything is ok now.

I have been leaning heavily on Amazon and City Lumber to deliver in order to reduce trips. I still have to get groceries and prescriptions.

I went out Saturday for groceries and prescriptions. I had not ordered enough screws for my deck project so I called the lumber yard and asked them to have a couple pounds at the front counter for me and charge them on my account. Make it a quick low contact stop. Right?

Three stops. I did not see another person wearing a mask. The pharmacy folks are all about safety and social distancing. The grocery store put in sneeze guards at the checkstands but no masks for employees. No effort to manage distancing. The lumber yard was packed. 10 deep in line. No distancing, no masks. I got dirty looks for going to the front of the line, grabbing my bag and heading for the door.

Maybe I am overreacting? I am still concerned that, without proper precautions, we are still vulnerable. We don't have the kind of healthcare infrastructure here that more urban areas tend to have. Back in December I went to the hospital here. They put me in an ambulance and sent me 70 miles to the nearest hospital with an open bed. If we got hit heavy here it could be pretty bad.

Things are definitely improving but we are not out of the woods yet.

Rant: As best I understand, wearing a (non N95) mask does much more to protect the people around me than it does for me. Others wearing masks helps keep them from infecting me. So as good caring folks, all of my neighbors are participating, right? **** no!

It really isn't that difficult. Put on mask and stay 6+ feet away. You can do it!

 

[EastCoastCB]

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/

That's sweden^ 1580 deaths as of last update.

This is denmark, their neighbor-
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/denmark/

364 deaths^

further sources of the same numbers-
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in_Sweden
https://www.thelocal.se/20200414/swedens-coronavirus-strategy-sparks-fierce-debate-as-deaths-pass-1000

 

[EastCoastCB]

I thank God that I have been fortunate enough to be in a rural area that has seen very little Corona virus activity. We had one confirmed case in a person who has self quorentined after a trip out of the country. As far as we know, we are Corona virus free. So far..... This could change in
A moment.

I am afraid that many folks here have decided that we dodged the bullet and everything is ok now.

I have been leaning heavily on Amazon and City Lumber to deliver in order to reduce trips. I still have to get groceries and prescriptions.

I went out Saturday for groceries and prescriptions. I had not ordered enough screws for my deck project so I called the lumber yard and asked them to have a couple pounds at the front counter for me and charge them on my account. Make it a quick low contact stop. Right?

Three stops. I did not see another person wearing a mask. The pharmacy folks are all about safety and social distancing. The grocery store put in sneeze guards at the checkstands but no masks for employees. No effort to manage distancing. The lumber yard was packed. 10 deep in line. No distancing, no masks. I got dirty looks for going to the front of the line, grabbing my bag and heading for the door.

Maybe I am overreacting? I am still concerned that, without proper precautions, we are still vulnerable. We don't have the kind of healthcare infrastructure here that more urban areas tend to have. Back in December I went to the hospital here. They put me in an ambulance and sent me 70 miles to the nearest hospital with an open bed. If we got hit heavy here it could be pretty bad.

Things are definitely improving but we are not out of the woods yet.

Rant: As best I understand, wearing a (non N95) mask does much more to protect the people around me than it does for me. Others wearing masks helps keep them from infecting me. So as good caring folks, all of my neighbors are participating, right? **** no!

It really isn't that difficult. Put on mask and stay 6+ feet away. You can do it!

 

[banman]

hard to keep track when the bodies pile up. They're using reefer trailers as makeshift morgues in many places. In a death spike such as shown on the graph its standard to have such a disclaimer. That graph is four days ago. They're at 1500+ now. Thus the asterisk.
Glad its so easy for folks to laugh at this stuff, though. Laughter is good medicine and a good coping mechanism for a lot of folks.

Yes it's a bit of a shame that more media attention is given to politicians spouting mis-information than is given to showing and explaining the actual reality of mass burials; reefer trucks and cold storage sheds stacked with bodies -- the sort of grimness that can momentarily wake even the stupid...

Regarding social distancing...
"It's akin to saying, 'The parachute has slowed our rate of descent, so it's now safe to take it off,'" State Rep. Julie Johnson, D-Dallas, said of Abbott's eagerness to reopen businesses.

 

[gs1949]

We had to go shopping Saturday too. There were more people wearing masks than the previous time, but not many. Actually I saw almost as many people wearing bandanas on their faces as had masks.

Stores here have been apparently required by the state to put some kind of marks 6 feet apart on their aisles. One store in a small local chain had red stickers with 6 ft in black letters all over the floor. In that store I saw one employee wearing a mask. Another store in the same chain, but in a different town, had little signs 6 feet apart all along the second shelf of each aisle. In that store all the employees I saw except the assistant manager were wearing masks, and it looked like he was buying groceries rather than working.

At the local Safeway, all employees were wearing masks, they had fairly large red stickers on the floor 6 feet apart. And also at the Safeway store there were 2 young female employees who were doing nothing more than managing the number of customers in the store at one time, keeping it to a maximum of 94. They had only one entrance and one exit open to facillitate this.

So they are trying, and unlike a lot of places they started trying before there was more than one case in the county. Personally, I hope they don't stop this anytime soon, but I expect they will because it will look like we have this thing pretty much under control. But I also think that will be illusory.

There will be reservoirs of the virus, and there will be a surge in new cases in the late fall and early winter. The only question is how big those reservoirs will be and how strong the resulting surge will be.

I will be out of masks soon. I have been unable to find more so far, but I have a few thin, old bandanas which I will double if I have to use them before the arrival of the large batch of brand new ones that I have on order. I intend to keep protecting myself the best I can through next winter and I strongly suggest everyone do the same.

 

[Booyah45828]

I will be out of masks soon. I have been unable to find more so far, but I have a few thin, old bandanas which I will double if I have to use them before the arrival of the large batch of brand new ones that I have on order. I intend to keep protecting myself the best I can through next winter and I strongly suggest everyone do the same.

I'd recommend to you to re-use the masks. I have a supply of about 20, when I use one, It is marked with the date and is put in a box.

After 7 days, the virus on ppe is supposedly inactive, so it can no longer infect a person, and the ppe is then safe to reuse.

I read somewhere that an N95 mask or better is the only thing to fully protect a person. Handkerchiefs, shirts, etc. are better then nothing, but they're more for the prevention of you spreading it to others, then it is for your own protection.

I went to menards last week for some paint/primer for some brake parts I was redoing. 6 foot x's on the floor, one way in/another way out, and I believe they had a max capacity but I didn't see anyone enforcing it. Also the employees were all wearing cloth masks and some even had on gloves.

I myself wore an N95 mask and had a clorox wipe in my pocket to clean everything before I touched it. I also had hand sanitizer too. What was disappointing was the number of elderly that had no protection. Every person using the mobility scooters had nothing on as far as ppe, and most had knick knack crap in their baskets that, IMO, was unnecessary. I didn't ask if their lack of ppe was due to a lack of it or a lack of concern, but it was disheartening nonetheless seeing the most vulnerable unprotected.

 

[gs1949]

I have been thinking about putting my used masks in the freezer, but instead what I have been doing is just leaving them in the car, since it's usually about a week before I use it again. Except today, when it hadn't been a week, so I used a new mask.

I do have a 3M P95 Organic Vapor mask that I bought from Amazon when I was painting the inside of the bus with oil-based enamel, which completely kills the paint smell when wearing it. It uses cartridges which are fairly expensive, but there are dust filters you put over the outside of the vapor cartridges. I have no idea if it would work for COVID, but I think it should probably work better than a paper dusk mask. The dust filters are like multiple layers of gauze.

I tried to find the same mask on Amazon a couple of weeks ago to ask if anyone had any idea how effective it would be, but Amazon doesn't seem to carry it anymore. I couldn't even find the usual out of stock notice, even though it was less than a year ago that I bought it.

Today I saw a few more people with masks, but I saw plenty of people older than me who were not wearing masks, including several who looked at me like there was something wrong with me.

I even saw a long-time acquaintance, a little older than me, his sister was in my class, and he and I have mutual friends. We talked a bit in the parking lot from about 20 feet away. I didn't have my mask on because as usual I only remembered it when I got close to the door, so I was on my way back to the car. This guy has heart and lung issues that are much worse than mine, but had no mask. I know masks are not 100 percent effective, but I also know they are much better than nothing. And I want as many of the odds in my favor as possible.

 

[Booyah45828]

I do have a 3M P95 Organic Vapor mask that I bought from Amazon when I was painting the inside of the bus with oil-based enamel, which completely kills the paint smell when wearing it. It uses cartridges which are fairly expensive, but there are dust filters you put over the outside of the vapor cartridges.

I believe that those will work. They still have the 95% filtration rating, the difference is the R or P masks are good for oil vapors, where as the N ones aren't.

I have a few r95 masks from when I painted my bus. I think the R masks are daily use, where as the P masks/cartridges are like all week use, and are definitely much more expensive. I have some p100 cartridges for a powered air respirator and tyvek suit that I bought at an auction several years ago. I'm not sure why the company had it, but I feel it might have been for asbestos clean up. I bought it because it was dirt cheap, and I thought I'd use that to paint my bus instead. Never ended up using it though.

 

[gs1949]

That's good to know, thanks. People will stare at me even more if I wear that mask, but I intend to monitor what Johns Hopkins says about my county, and if we get a second case I will start wearing it.

I have a couple of tyvek suits I bought from Amazon for ospho and painting. One is still new in the package, but the other was still in very good condition when I finished, so I saved it.

I guess I could use that suit to make a sort of fashion statement that I don't think people around here are doing enough to protect each other.


But I just checked with Johns Hopkins to see if the stats for my county changed, and they have not. I thought for a bit there the tally went down from one confirmed case to zero, but I wasn't setting it up right. We still have only one confirmed case reported April 15, so I will leave my tyvek suit hanging in the storage room for now.

 

[PNW_Steve]

As best I understand it:

The Corona virus spreads throug droplets of moisture that we expell when we sneeze or caught and to a lesser extent, when we talk.

The most common method of infection is an infected individual sneezes or coughs depositing virus carrying droplets on surfaces that another may touch and subsequently touch their face and get the virus Inc the nose or eyes.

Wearing a typical mask today will not do a whole lot to keep me from contracting Corona virus. It will contiain the majority of the "spray" if I should sneeze. It for more to protect others from me.

If you are wearing a mask and maintaining 6'-10' seperation, THANK YOU for being considerate of the rest of us.

To the rest.... WTF is wrong with you?

 

[PNW_Steve]

I have been out of disposable masks for a while. I have five washable ones that I am cycling through. Take them off and throw them straight into the washer to be washed with the next load. That and my infrequent trips out have kept me in masks.

 

[gs1949]

Fortunately, there aren't very many infected individuals around here. I don't believe that it is only one like the official stats say, but there can't be many just yet or they would have found more than one.

Of course, we don't know how many we don't know about, which is the really concerning thing right now.

And yes, I know about the touching part. I am learning not to touch things unnecessarily, and not to touch my face. I keep a bottle of rubbing alcohol in my car to wash my hands with, but I do have to put my hands in my pocket to get my keys. So I wash my clothes when I get back from shopping.

 

[EastCoastCB]

We ordered some of these over the weekend-