Category: Coronapanic

When someone complains about wearing a mask…

by philg

… show them this post from a Facebook breed group:

I am extremely allergic to my golden too. Three or four times a year I was getting sinus infections that turned into pneumonia and kept me sick for MONTHS. We made these changes:

We bought a dyson vacuum and religiously vacuum every other day.

I pull the bed out and vacuum under and behind it because I found her fur actually quickly builds up in those areas “hides” behind places like that and the sofa.

I use a swifter wet jet under the bed and under other surfaces help a LOT because it picks up those micro dust hair particles which affects allergies.

We deep brush her twice a week.

We change the AC filters monthly to the strongest allergic kind.

I’ve not been sick for over a year since we started this routine. (I do still take singulair, levocetrizine and Flonase daily). But this has all really worked. Good luck.

(The gal who posted the above followed up with “I absolutely love love love my dog so much. She’s worth every minute.”)

I feel that this is a contender in the topping competition that one sees regarding coronaplague masks. “Our First Responders do X, Y, and Z, and you can’t simply wear a mask all day?”

Readers: Agree?

Also from this golden retriever group, an owner with a 6-month-old golden and a 2-month old Chihuahua asked how to prevent the two from breeding. I responded

Every Chihuahua should be neutered! No dog should be smaller than a big rat.

The comment attracted 10 positive reactions (like/laugh). I dug into these. All but one reaction was from a Facebook user with a female-associated first name.

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Optimum COVID-19 American lifestyle: Florida in winter; Maine in summer?

by philg

covidexitstrategy.org is the web site that our governor uses to adjust his travel order as to which states are so plague-ridden that a quarantine is required on arrival in our righteous disease-free midst (New York and New Jersey had a higher death rate than #3 Maskachusetts).

Can we use the same map to plan an optimum American lifestyle in the face of coronaplague? My casual inspection of the map reveals that Florida and Texas both have fairly low rates of “cases” (positive tests, potentially from those who actually are not even infected, much less sick), especially given that they didn’t have raging Wave #1 plagues and therefore wouldn’t have the immunity that at least some populations in MA, NJ, NY, CT, etc. would have.

Would the optimum lifestyle right now therefore be to live in a single-family home in a low-density part of Florida during the winter and in a single-family home in a low-density part of Maine during the summer? If 183 days are spent in Florida (for the excellent schools, according to NYT), the optimizer escapes state income and estate tax.

Why not walk unmasked on a wide Atlantic beach in the winter and then walk in the Maine woods (don’t forget a gallon of 100% DEET bug spray!) in the summer while paying only property tax in both locations? Play outdoor tennis and eat in outdoor restaurants all year in both locations.

Who has a better idea for a family of at least moderate wealth?

Atlantic Beach, Florida (near Jacksonville), January 2019:

Jacksonville Beach, also January 2019:

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Win or lose, should Trump hand over everything COVID-19-related to Biden and Harris?

by philg

“With Winter Coming and Trump Still in Charge, Virus Experts Fear the Worst” (New York Times):

Regardless of the election’s outcome this week, President Trump will be the one steering the country through what is likely to be the darkest and potentially deadliest period of the coronavirus pandemic, and he has largely excluded the nation’s leading health experts from his inner circle.

Mr. Trump will still have control of the nation’s health apparatus and the bully pulpit that comes with the Oval Office until Jan. 20, as infections approach 100,000 a day and death rates begin to rise as hospitals are strained to their breaking points.

The article goes on to note Donald Trump’s many deficiencies when it comes to coronapanic and listening to scientists (listening to the Swedish MD/PhDs or the heretics who wrote and signed the Great Barrington Declaration does not count!).

Why is it obvious, though, that Trump needs to deal with this at all? Whether truth, justice, love, and #science win the election or not, Trump has the power to appoint Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to executive positions tomorrow, right? Since Biden and Harris say that they know how to keep Americans safe from coronavirus, why not let them start keeping us safe tomorrow? Trump and the courts, perhaps, can limit Biden and Harris to doing stuff that is within the bounds of the Constitution, but otherwise let them do whatever they want. (Example: Biden and Harris wouldn’t be able to order a state shut down or reopened because those powers are thought to belong to states (though maybe not! If the First Amendment doesn’t prevent governors from locking down a state, maybe the Constitution does not prevent a president from locking down the country?))

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How is my prediction about COVID-19 therapy by October looking?

by philg

From April 6, Best guess as to when the first successful COVID-19 therapy will be widely available?

Keeping in mind that it took months for coronavirus tests to be invented, approved, and manufactured (still not in sufficient quantities except for those who are hospitalized), what’s your best guess as to when you can go into the hospital ED, have the nurse shout out “COVID-19” and then an assistant comes in with some pills or a shot that will keep the symptoms down to some reasonable level of misery?

My guess: between July 2020 and March 2021, with October 2020 as the best single month guess.

How do we rate this prediction? I’m going to go with “Spectacularly wrong.” I started the April 6 post with “I’m a big believer that viruses are smarter than human beings.” Even with that, I was gulled into thinking that all of the world’s humans devoting nearly 100 percent of their energy to fighting coronavirus would actually be able to come up with something.

What do we have? From October 22, “FDA Approves First Treatment for COVID-19”:

Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the antiviral drug Veklury (remdesivir) for use in adult and pediatric patients 12 years of age and older and weighing at least 40 kilograms (about 88 pounds) for the treatment of COVID-19 requiring hospitalization. Veklury should only be administered in a hospital or in a healthcare setting capable of providing acute care comparable to inpatient hospital care. Veklury is the first treatment for COVID-19 to receive FDA approval.

Mission Accomplished?

A second randomized, open-label multi-center clinical trial of hospitalized adult subjects with moderate COVID-19 compared treatment with Veklury for five days (n=191) and treatment with Veklury for 10 days (n=193) with standard of care (n=200). Researchers evaluated the clinical status of subjects on Day 11. Overall, the odds of a subject’s COVID-19 symptoms improving were statistically significantly higher in the five-day Veklury group at Day 11 when compared to those receiving only standard of care. The odds of improvement with the 10-day treatment group when compared to those receiving only standard of care were numerically favorable, but not statistically significantly different.

In other words, you need multiple studies and a Zoom session full of statisticians to tease out any useful effect.

Does GB get the prize for accuracy so far? His comment:

Some of the fat and lung comprised will die and the rest will be cured, by virtue of not already being unhealthy. Medical cure, nope, modern medicine ain’t that good.

Who wants to make a new or revised prediction of when medicine will simply cure us of Covid-19?

Related:

  • A typical failure… “Lilly Statement Regarding NIH’s ACTIV-3 Clinical Trial” (October 26): Based on an updated dataset from the trial reviewed on October 26, no additional COVID-19 patients in this hospitalized setting will receive bamlanivimab. This recommendation was based on trial data suggesting that bamlanivimab is unlikely to help hospitalized COVID-19 patients recover from this advanced stage of their disease. In this updated dataset, differences in safety outcomes between the groups were not significant.
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The CDC and our state public health department tell us how to trick or treat

by philg

From mass.gov, “Halloween During COVID-19” (“Consistent with the Halloween activity guidance released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention”). First some Dos:

  • A costume mask is not a substitute for a face mask or face covering. To protect yourself and others, ensure you are wearing a protective face mask or covering instead of or in addition to a costume mask. [A bandana is legal and effective PPE against coronavirus, but a Batman mask is not?]
  • Hold virtual costume contests or pumpkin carving events.

Now the Don’ts:

  • Attending crowded costume parties held indoors, or any gatherings that exceed indoor or outdoor gathering limits;
  • Going to an indoor haunted house where people may be crowded together and screaming; and
  • Going on hayrides or tractor rides with people who are not in your household.

Related:

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Heated eyeglasses for Age of Faith (in masks)?

by philg

We in the American Church of Shutdown put our faith in masks, for they shall preserve us from the coronaplague, even as they have preserved those in Peru, Spain, France, and other countries with strict mask laws and high compliance rates.

In New England, however, now that the weather is cold, mask+eyeglasses = fog.

What about this idea: heated eyeglasses to prevent fogging. Bose managed to get some batteries into ordinary-looking eyeglasses (“Frames”). Is it hopeless to imagine that sufficient battery power could be mustered to heat the lenses for as much time as people spend outdoors in the fall, winter, and early spring?

Separately, now that #Science tells us that coronaplague is spread via aerosols, will people who directly experience eyeglass fogging begin to develop heretical beliefs that masking the general population might be ineffective against the spread of Covid-19?

Related:

  • battery-powered face mask (to reduce breathing effort) from LG with 8-hour battery life
  • U.S. Patent 5,319,397, “Defogging eyeglasses”: Eyeglasses worn in winter weather conditions are subject to fogging due to condensation of water vapor. A method of removing condensation from eyeglasses is provided. The method involves heating the lenses of the eyeglasses, by making the lenses a part of an electrical circuit. Electric current is supplied to the electric circuit from a power source external to the eyeglasses. The size and weight of the power source may be minimized by utilizing a timer or a power regulator. A smaller power source is also made possible by selectively heating the lenses, applying more power in the area of the lenses most likely to experience fogging. (this guy stole my idea, it seems, with this filed-in-1992 patent, and there is a massive battery dongle)
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Investment Idea: Short snow tires

by philg

People buy snow tires because they are forced to drive in the snow, right? Workers have to get to work. College students have to get to school.

In a cower-in-place Nation of Shutdown, however, we don’t have to go anywhere on a typical day. We can stay home when the weather is nice, when the weather is mediocre, and when the weather is nasty. We can stay home, in short, nearly all of the time.

What is the value of snow tires to a worker when the office is no longer a destination?

This gives rise to my latest brilliant investment idea… short snow tires! Who in their right mind would purchase this product in 2020?

Bonus: Mindy the Crippler using her built-in snow tires…

Related:

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COVID-19 vaccine being tested on the Russian elite

by philg

A Russian IFR student told me that his parents back in Moscow are participating in a Phase 3 trial of a COVID-19 vaccine. I responded that I was informed by the U.S. media that this vaccine development had been rushed, that it was likely extremely dangerous, and that Americans would expect the Russians to be testing this on condemned criminals. How did his parents end up as guinea pigs?

“My dad is the CEO of a big industrial company,” he responded. “And found out that all of the top politicians were getting it. So he managed to get himself and my mom into the trial.”

How about masks? “My parents complain that nobody is wearing them. They’re compulsory in the metro, though, and also disposable gloves. But the gloves are provided.”

(Separately, we did an IFR training trip to Washington, D.C. He and his (Russian) wife walked around the White House and Mall, their first time in the Nation’s Capital. What did they think? “I was amazed at how many police with military weapons there are,” he responded. “Even the Kremlin is not that intensively guarded.” I wonder if the $64 million White House fence is done!)

From a 2017 trip to Moscow:

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Why rich white Americans believe in masks

by philg

It isn’t obvious why rich white Americans should have become Mask Karens. All through the first half of 2020, the World Health Organization told humans that masks for the general public wouldn’t save them from a respiratory virus (archive.org). Looking at infection and hospitalization rates versus mask law dates does not suggest a strong and reliable effect. Some charts:

A friend who is a professor of cognitive science:

It’s the usual causality problem with epidemiology. Upper middle class Northeasterners (like me) are adamant about mask wearing, and they rarely get sick. So it must be working.

In other words, “Coastal Elite” (at home on Zoom) and “Essential Critical Infrastructure Worker” (exposed to dozens or hundreds of strangers each day) seldom overlap. (See also infection/death rates versus race.)

Professor Karen didn’t think that a mistaken belief regarding the efficacy of masks was bad because it would help Biden/Harris defeat Donald Trump. It turns out that a guy whose salary has depended on government funding for four decades is a passionate supporter of the political party that promises to expand government…

A few mask papers:

  • Ahmad, et al (2001). “The Effect of Wearing the Veil by Saudi Ladies on the Occurrence of Respiratory Diseases.” Journal of Asthma, 38(5), 423–426. doi:10.1081/jas-100001497: The most interesting finding in this paper is that wearing the veil is more associated with asthma and the common cold. This is probably related to the means of transmission of respiratory tract infections, with the veil being so close to the face leading to a wet area in front of the mouth and nose that facilitates the growth of microorganisms
  • “Unmasking the surgeons: the evidence base behind the use of facemasks in surgery” (JRSM, 2015): there is a lack of substantial evidence to support claims that facemasks protect either patient or surgeon from infectious contamination. … Masks are a quintessential part of the surgical attire that has become so deeply ingrained in the public perception of the profession. However, even today, it remains unclear as to whether they confer any tangible benefits to surgical outcomes.

Related (things that Americans aren’t doing because they believe that masks will, in fact, stop the plague):

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Why can’t people who’ve previously been infected with COVID-19 clean car interiors?

by philg

One of my favorite businesses here in the Boston area has been shut down since March as part of one of the 50+ orders from the Maskachusetts governor: full-service interior cleaning at the Allston Car Wash.

Most of the folks whom I’ve met working there over the years were native Spanish speakers, i.e., the very folks whom NPR tells us are most likely to have been infected with coronavirus:

MassINC’s survey of Latino results found the infection rates for essential workers is far from the only challenge Latino residents have faced. But it is a major one. Public health data, however incomplete, is clear about one thing: Latino residents have been much more likely to contract COVID-19 and to suffer serious health consequences from it. The poll also documented the devastating economic and health consequences many have felt and showed many Latinos to be among those who have been hit the hardest.

So they’ve very likely been exposed to coronavirus and now it is illegal for them to work because they live in the state that ranks #3 for most coronapanic-related restrictions. [The article didn’t talk about “Latinx” residents of Maskachusetts, so have only partial information.]

I previously asked why people who’d previously been hospitalized for COVID-19 and discharged months earlier couldn’t have enjoyed being spectators at the U.S. Open tennis match. Now the same question for working in these banned industries: Why can’t the car wash reopen for interior cleaning if they employ only those who’ve previously had a COVID-19 positive test result? Indulge in some mask theater as well if we want a “belt and suspenders” approach and have the cleaned cars sit for a couple of minutes with the windows open and the vent blowers turned up to max.

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