Merged 2019-nCoV / Corona virus

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Dr.Sid said:
Source ?
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Several studies available publicly, like this one or this one.
BMJ said:
Health economic analyses of facemasks are scarce and the few published cost effectiveness models do not use clinical efficacy data. The lack of research on facemasks and respirators is reflected in varied and sometimes conflicting policies and guidelines. Further research should focus on examining the efficacy of facemasks against specific infectious threats such as influenza and tuberculosis, assessing the efficacy of cloth masks, investigating common practices such as reuse of masks, assessing compliance, filling in policy gaps, and obtaining cost effectiveness data using clinical efficacy estimates.
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Dr. David Carrington said:
routine surgical masks for the public are not an effective protection against viruses or bacteria carried in the air.
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Basic hygiene measures, e.g. covering your mouth while sneezing and washing hands are more useful.

There's an NPR piece here.
 
The Atheist said:
Well, it's clearly not harmless - except for kids, which is nice.

It has a fatality rate, as do lots of otherwise non-fatal diseases, like influenza & the common cold. It appears to be killing people with underlying diseases, just as those two do.

The mortality rate for 2019-nCoV* is starting to look somewhere between H1N1 and seasonal influenza.

I'm sticking with 3,000,000 deaths worldwide as the likely harvest.

*needs a better name.
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In a word, bollocks.
 
Trebuchet said:
A tweet from Ken "Popehat" White:
Middle child's school just sent an email about the Coronavirus that said, in very polite school administrator terms, WILL YOU PACK OF GULLIBLE GIBBERING MORONS STOP WETTING YOURSELVES OVER EVERY IMBECILE RUMOR YOU RUN ACROSS ON THE PORN SITES YOU FREQUENT
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Give that school administrator a medal. And ask them to be a moderator on this forum...
 
dudalb said:
The Mayor of Wuhan has admitted he screwed up in the early stages of the outbreak.
His future is probably not bright.
As a sign of how serous this is getting, the Chinese government has ordered all theaters closed until further notice.
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I assume that also means cinemas? Closing the theatres was general practice in Ye Olde Day to prevent plague spreading.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
Interesting this has echoes of the SARS pandemic. I may have mentioned it upthread.

The local governments are the ones that hide things, to save face, to not be blamed. The national government has a tendency to act more reasonably.

When SARS was in the middle of the worst of things, the Shanghai government falsely claimed there were no cases there. I wonder of Roborama remembers that.
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This.
Though there's also the abject misunderstanding of what R0 actually means displayed by many people.
 
catsmate said:
Several studies available publicly, like this one or this one.

Basic hygiene measures, e.g. covering your mouth while sneezing and washing hands are more useful.

There's an NPR piece here.
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All that is about if the mask will protect the wearer. That's (imho) obvious. If anything, you don't have your eyes covered.
Surgical masks are designed so wearer of the mask does not infect other people. That's why surgeons wear them, not the patient.
But what about situation, where everyone is wearing mask ? In other words, every possibly infected person ? Which is actually situation in Wu-han now. That must have positive effect, as long as the virus is spread by droplets.
 
Dr.Sid said:
We're looking at 10k tomorrow. This is so much easier to predict then BTC :boggled:
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When does this go exponential?

I saw 6,000 then up to 7,000 and now 10,000? If this was going exponential then we should now be in the millions.

I mention this because there was talk of exponential spread upthread.
 
William Parcher said:
When does this go exponential?

I saw 6,000 then up to 7,000 and now 10,000? If this was going exponential then we should now be in the millions.

I mention this because there was talk of exponential spread upthread.
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It's going exponential since it's global news. 3 weeks at least. Still around 1.5 factor per day. Last 3 days more like 1.4. But the growth is surprisingly stable.

Check actual numbers here (about 5th mention, but people clearly don't read more than 3 posts back):
https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

See good visualization of exponential nature here, on graph using logarithmic scale (the most actual data are not included though):
https://public.flourish.studio/visu...e=showcase&utm_campaign=visualisation/1292813
 
Something I don´t understand is, according to the John Hopkins data, 170 deaths and 133 recoveries. Does that mean that right now if you have simptoms bad enough to have you hospitalized you are more likely to die than not?
 
Abooga said:
Something I don´t understand is, according to the John Hopkins data, 170 deaths and 133 recoveries. Does that mean that right now if you have simptoms bad enough to have you hospitalized you are more likely to die than not?
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I think recovered means that a person was diagnosed, treated, and no longer has the virus in their body. The balance of diagnoses are still infected and in treatment.
 
Dr.Sid said:
All that is about if the mask will protect the wearer. That's (imho) obvious. If anything, you don't have your eyes covered.
Surgical masks are designed so wearer of the mask does not infect other people. That's why surgeons wear them, not the patient.
But what about situation, where everyone is wearing mask ? In other words, every possibly infected person ? Which is actually situation in Wu-han now. That must have positive effect, as long as the virus is spread by droplets.
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Doctors and surgeons wear a different kind of mask that has far smaller pores than the ones typically available to the public. They are a small enough to keep virus from passing through, but a consequence of that is that they are hard to breath in. Not something that you want to wear while out a d about on the streets, as with gas masks.
 
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I think that the high failure rates associated with masks are the result of people wearing them improperly. All the air one breathes in and out has to go through the mask for maximum protection. Duh. If you look at most people wearing the typical disposable masks (especially the flat kinds that wrap around one's face) there are large gaps at the sides around the nose and chin. Probably over 50% of the air they are breathing in or out is not being filtered. These simple masks can be fitted more effectively but it is difficult to adjust the fit and keep it adjusted correctly. The slightly fancier disposables, which come molded in a shape that better fits the nose, still have to be snugged down carefully to close a gap that typically forms between the nose and eyes.

There are much better that generate a tight fit and are far more effective. But these are much more expensive.

In general people also find masks uncomfortable and sweaty, particularly when fitted correctly, so they don't wear them all the times they should. And as discussed upthread, wearing a mask but not washing your hands is just silly.
 
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