2019 Novel Coronavirus Covid-19 Discussion

Forums › Health and fitness › 2019 Novel Coronavirus Covid-19 Discussion

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#2624524 20-Dec-2020 07:35

Spine universe: Could COVID-19 Be Causing This Rare Spinal Cord Disorder?

Can COVID-19 cause a rare spinal condition called transverse myelitis, "TM"? Learn what TM is and see the evidence connecting the two conditions.

One nuance that researchers continue to focus on is the so-called long haulers—people dealing with the lingering effects of COVID such as chronic lung disease, cognitive decline, and psychological effects.

There’ a possible connection between COVID-19 and a rare spinal cord disorder known as transverse myelitis (TM). To date, there have been three known cases of acute transverse myelitis due to COVID-19; and, although these three case reports are not necessarily enough to prove that COVID causes TM, researchers are delving into the possibility of a connection between the virus and this rare spinal condition....

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freitasm

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#2624529 20-Dec-2020 08:29

Meanwhile, London going to a Level 4 lockdown this weekend now.

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#2624533 20-Dec-2020 08:40

"Covid-19: Christmas rules tightened for England, Scotland and Wales"

The planned relaxation of Covid rules for Christmas has been scrapped for large parts of south-east England and cut to just Christmas Day for the rest of England, Scotland and Wales.

From midnight, a new tier four will be introduced in areas including London, Kent, Essex and Bedfordshire.

Those in tier four cannot mix indoors with anyone not from their household.

Elsewhere in England, Scotland and Wales, relaxed indoor mixing rules are cut from five days to Christmas Day.

In Scotland, Covid restrictions will only be relaxed on Christmas Day, with mainland Scotland being placed under the tightest restrictions from Boxing Day.

In Wales, First Minister Mark Drakeford announced that the country will be placed under lockdown from midnight.

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#2624537 20-Dec-2020 09:14

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Fred99

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#2624546 20-Dec-2020 09:33

Not good news about the "70% more transmissible strain" circulating in the UK (and probably elsewhere by now)

From BBC:

The steep increase in the proportion of coronavirus cases linked to this new variant is strong evidence that it is driving transmission.

In London, 28% of cases were as a result of this new mutation in mid-November, but that has now increased to more than 60%.

If that's accurate, then it's pretty good evidence that it's the second significant mutation giving the virus increased infectivity.

IIRC, data from NZ from our initial cluster growth suggested that the R0 was actually ~7 in the naive population (at the time - people's behaviour / rules changed after that). With several subsequent "close calls" that we've been able to contain - by keeping the R0 below 1 - increased infectivity as per the new mutation may have made that impossible.

From a "pre-print" paper:

The rapid growth of this lineage indicates the need for enhanced genomic and epidemiological surveillance worldwide and laboratory investigations of antigenicity and infectivity.

Sure - but the important thing for NZ is to simply keep this out of NZ.

The failure of countries to contain C-19 - thus many tens of millions of cases - increases the chance of new strains appearing.

This new strain is not expected to be able to evade antibodies / vaccines, but the more people infected the greater the chance that a mutation that does help it evade existing vaccines will appear.

Even if the risk of that is very very small, the growth rate in cases in the US and Europe is going to outrun the ability to vaccinate the population.

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#2624553 20-Dec-2020 10:01

The Washing Post published a story "The inside story of how Trump’s denial, mismanagement and magical thinking led to the pandemic’s dark winter".

Leaving the politics aside (if you want you can read the article), this is one of the most important comments:

“Words matter a lot, and what we have here is a failure to communicate — and worse than that, the effective communication of policies, of myths, of confusion about masks, about hydroxychloroquine, about vaccines, about closures, about testing,” said Tom Frieden, a former CDC director in the Obama administration. “It’s stunning.”

...

Kennedy said that Brad Smith, the director of the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services and a friend of Kushner, asked him and another volunteer to make a coronavirus model for 2020 that specifically projected a low casualty count. When Kennedy noted that he had no training in epidemiology and had never modeled a virus before, he recalled, Smith told him that it was just like making a financial model. The other models made by the health experts, Smith explained, were “too catastrophic.”

“‘They think 250,000 people could die and I want this model to show that fewer than 100,000 people will die in the worst-case scenario,’ ” Kennedy said Smith told him. “He gave us the numbers he wanted it to say.”

Kennedy and the other volunteer refused to make the model. But he said the incident left him discomfited.

“[Smith] said, ‘Look around. Does it look like 250,000 people are going to die? I don’t think so,’ ” Kennedy recounted. “And I remember thinking it was a weird thing to say because we were surrounded by military officers in the [Federal Emergency Management Agency] basement and it did look like a lot of people might die.”

...

“Compared to other countries, the biggest mistake we made was in testing,” said Katrina Armstrong, a physician and chief of Massachusetts General Hospital who has been treating coronavirus patients. “It’s not even a hard test, and we whiffed it. There should be central leadership bringing everything together. For the clinical side, not having access to testing early on and through the summer was the biggest tragedy of what got us here.”

The best chance to control an outbreak is at the very beginning. But U.S. officials squandered that opportunity in February for two key reasons. The first was the CDC’s failure to deploy a working coronavirus test, and the second was the task force’s almost singular focus on repatriating Americans from China and cruise ships, rather than on preparing the United States for an inevitable outbreak.

The New Zealand approach was always of clear communication. Don't let magical thinking and conspiracy stupidity get in our way.

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Fred99

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#2624559 20-Dec-2020 10:14

freitasm:

The New Zealand approach was always of clear communication. Don't let magical thinking and conspiracy stupidity get in our way.

But we still had our share of stupidity, the myth of "herd immunity" being a more desirable path was being pushed by "business friendly" (despite it being the opposite) opinion writers, there were plenty of "just the 'flu" believers here.

Incessant machine-gunning of abject BS about Covid by "leaders" has had serious global consequences. Not just Trump.

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#2624560 20-Dec-2020 10:19

Fred99:

freitasm:

The New Zealand approach was always of clear communication. Don't let magical thinking and conspiracy stupidity get in our way.

But we still had our share of stupidity, the myth of "herd immunity" being a more desirable path was being pushed by "business friendly" (despite it being the opposite) opinion writers, there were plenty of "just the 'flu" believers here.

Incessant machine-gunning of abject BS about Covid by "leaders" has had serious global consequences. Not just Trump.

Yes, and this didn't come from the government - as you said it came from "business friendly" people who have always shown to put their interests ahead of the others.

I am pretty sure that in terms of government communication and action, New Zealand's is still pretty up there in the list.

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Fred99

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#2624594 20-Dec-2020 13:21

30 new cases in Sydney, 28 (so far) traced back to the Northern Beaches cluster.

This will probably keep increasing in the next few days before (hopefully) they have it under control.

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#2624597 20-Dec-2020 13:34

Six new cases in isolation today. This is interesting... Still want ten days MIQ folks?

"One arrived on December 8 from South Africa. This person tested positive at routine testing around day 12 and has been transferred to the Auckland quarantine facility.

One case arrived on December 8 from Australia. This person tested positive at routine testing around day 12 and has been transferred to the Auckland quarantine facility."

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KrazyKid

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#2624615 20-Dec-2020 15:31

I don't want a shorter MIQ period, but to be fair, the person was possibly asymptomatic and might have been picked up at day 8 if they had done testing then.

Not a fair argument against shortening the isolation period.

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#2624625 20-Dec-2020 16:06

KrazyKid: I don't want a shorter MIQ period, but to be fair, the person was possibly asymptomatic and might have been picked up at day 8 if they had done testing then.

Not a fair argument against shortening the isolation period.

Not a fair argument? So if the person were to be released on day 10 and develop symptoms on day 11 with positive on day 12 would you argue it was afault in the MIQ system? Or just say "Tough luck, there was no argument to make it longer"?

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KrazyKid

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#2624694 20-Dec-2020 20:06

All I'm saying is that one example drawn from a press release, and an example with incomplete details as well, does not make an argument.

If you provided some decent evidence that 14 days is required then I'd be happy with your point.

But as I said before I do actually think 14 days is the right call and have seen no evidence to the contrary at this stage.

I just like seeing evidence based arguments.

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#2624930 21-Dec-2020 12:50

DailyMail UK: Pariah Britain: France, Germany, Ireland, Italy and The Netherlands are among nearly a dozen countries banning ALL flights from UK as Eurotunnel closes and French block British lorries after discovery of '70% more infectious' mutant Covid strain

France, Germany, Israel, El Salvador, Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, Austria and Ireland have banned all flights from Britain
Boris Johnson will chair a meeting of the Government’s Cobra civil contingencies committee on Monday after a series of countries announced they were stopping flights from the UK, Downing Street has said
Eurotunnel Le Shuttle has said that the UK-France border will close at 11pm tonight and last train at 9.24pm
Southern England was plunged into a Tier 4 lockdown in a bid to suppress a 'mutant' strain of coronavirus
US authorities are looking 'very carefully' into the Covid-19 variant while indicating that a ban on UK travel was not currently on the cards

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#2624934 21-Dec-2020 13:03

kingdragonfly: DailyMail UK: Pariah Britain: France, Germany, Ireland, Italy and The Netherlands are among nearly a dozen countries banning ALL flights from UK as Eurotunnel closes and French block British lorries after discovery of '70% more infectious' mutant Covid strain

France, Germany, Israel, El Salvador, Bulgaria, the Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, Austria and Ireland have banned all flights from Britain

Boris Johnson will chair a meeting of the Government’s Cobra civil contingencies committee on Monday after a series of countries announced they were stopping flights from the UK, Downing Street has said

Eurotunnel Le Shuttle has said that the UK-France border will close at 11pm tonight and last train at 9.24pm

Southern England was plunged into a Tier 4 lockdown in a bid to suppress a 'mutant' strain of coronavirus

US authorities are looking 'very carefully' into the Covid-19 variant while indicating that a ban on UK travel was not currently on the cards

The new variant will be in those places already. Stable door and shutting comes to mind.

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