https://www.livescience.com/how-long...-surfaces.html

People touch their faces without realizing it. One video went viral of some "expert" telling people not to touch their faces WHILE REPEATEDLY TOUCHING HER FACE.

Interesting sidebar re gym. I was watching some financial show and one participant suggested people can all go out and buy Peleton machines so the don't need to go to the gym. Another person on the show remarked, "Well, people in OUR demographic can do that anyway." Another reminder the rich have more money than the rest of us (or used to).

Unfortunately yea. How often do you use public restrooms? The amount of men (assume women too, but can't speak on it) that don't wash their hands with soap is insane. I have to imagine that if you don't wash your hands in the bathroom, you aren't randomly washing your hands for good hygiene other times throughout the day.

My sisters extended family in Italy was so excited by this "new method" to prevent the spread of coronavirus: sneezing/coughing into your elbow. There its uncommon to keep hand soap anywhere but the bathroom since it's uncommon to wash your hands before/after cooking/eating. Its surprising but not shocking at how it has spread there...

Good thing I'm washing my hands frequently!

You have to be looking for work, yes, but if your company does not dispute that you were laid off or not terminated for cause, then you qualify for unemployment. That's how the California EDD works, anyway (I work in HR).

To be denied unemployment benefits, basically a person has to be terminated for gross negligence or willful misconduct. For example, a person can be terminated if the employer feels they weren't "up to speed," but that doesn't constitute gross negligence or willful misconduct, and wouldn't disqualify them from getting unemployment.

So since we have an expert, I'm worried about my friend. He works for a major hotel chain at a San Francisco location. With all the conventions cancelled and tourism from Asia and now Europe shut off, hotels in the city are empty. So he was not given any "hours". Not fired, not formally laid off. Just no "hours" so he isn't working. He told me he was applying for unemployment. But how does that work since I guess he's still technically employed?

Disturbing images, scene from an Italian hospital - and these are the 'lucky' ones who got access to ventilation machines, while hundreds are dying because of lack of

https://media.apnarm.net.au/media/im...yyt2_t1880.jpg
https://news.sky.com/video/inside-th...ients-11954241

I'm no expert, but anyway, yes, he can apply for unemployment. If you are a full-time employee and your hours were reduced, and you weren't officially made a "part-time" employee, and if you are not being scheduled to work because "things have slowed down," you can apply and be approved for unemployment benefits.

If you are a seasonal worker, a contract worker, or officially signed up for a temporary job with a company where you know the date of when your job will end, you can't apply for unemployment. Well, you can apply, but you'll be denied.

That video looks straight out of Soderbergh's Contagion. Terrifying.

Funny you should say that:

Contagion’s Screenwriter on Watching His Movie Go Viral: Scott Z. Burns on why the coronavirus pandemic is better—and worse—than the one he imagined.

My friend has been working for them for 12 years. He gets (or has gotten) full benefits (which are excellent) so I assume he's officially full time (when I once was a part-time employee I got no benefits so I think that's a "tell" but it's all I know about it).

The scariest thing about that photo is the patients lying on their stomachs. That's a desparation move:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19903918

In other words, they are trying it because there's nothing else they can do for these people but it probably won't work.

Granny's lived a full life. She probably believes in Heaven, too. I'm doing her a favor. :haha:

I'm probably the same age as your "granny". I'm not laughing. Can we not be cavalier about people of any age?

I wish him luck. It's no fun being laid off; I know the experience, I was laid off twice. Very stressful, and can be depressing.

Again, good luck to him!

That is happening already in the West Texas oil patch. There is so much due diligence work happening right now as the big boys prepare to take over assets of smaller debt burdened players.

I just had to fill out a form for a state-mandated training I have to attend next week. One of the questions is "What are potential barriers to course attendance and full participation? What supports will be provided to address barriers?" I answered, "Declaration of emergency, banning of meetings and gatherings, illness among training staff or attendees."

And there's fuck-all you can do about any of that. Also, today I've been receiving a lot of emails from the various restaurants of whose loyalty clubs I'm a member. They've all been reassuring me they're taking steps to keep their staffs healthy and their restaurants clean. That's quite sobering if you think about it. I also saw something that raised the hair on my arms today (and I am hairy like sasquatch, so it was great deal of hair)... When I popped in to look around at the grocery store on my lunch break, I saw a big display of Easter candy and cards and paraphernalia and such... right next to a pilfered, half empty bay of toilet paper and an empty endcap of hand sanitizer. Kind of gave me the creeps.

Wait 5 minutes. It'll be cancelled I betcha.

In CA, people over 70 are supposed to renew drivers licenses in person (because they do a vision test and you have to retake the written exam to be sure you aren't senile). They are talking about waving that until the crisis is over. Every hour more things are done to keep people away from each other.

Duke just pulled out of the NCAA tournament. My guys. Good for them!

My little corner of SW Austin is behaving rather normally. I keep seeing pics posted by friends in other parts of the metro showing empty shelves and aisles devoid of toilet paper, paper towels, and bottled water. The HEB in my neighborhood and the Randall's both had plenty of those things in stock when I made a late night run to the store yesterday. I even found a two pack of "extra strength" Purell just the other day at the HEB. I haven't been to the nearby Costco. I did notice that their parking lot is overflowing, so I guess the bulk buyers are having a field day over there. My membership expired, and I am too cheap (and after the recent market collapse probably too broke) to renew my membership.

"It's not political correctness when I'm the one who's offended!"

Uh, actually it is.

^^Whatever.

From my experience in silicon valley alot of contract workers work 15 month contracts and then collect unemployment for 3 months and then return to that company if they havent moved on anywhere else.

On his lunch break my husband went across the street to the supermarket there, and reported to me the parking lot was so full he had to park at nearby restaurant and walk over. Some lady was coming out of the store with a cart filled with nothing but toilet paper -- he counted five packs of it -- while another one was coming out with all she could carry tucked under each arm.

Seems like a switch has flipped.

BART ridership yesterday was down 35% from one week earlier, in response to the COVID-19 outbreak.

Anecdotally, the usual weekday-evening parade of German steel through my neighborhood failed to appear yesterday. My partner said the downtown Trader Joe's was busy, but a video panorama he took of Market and 4th/Stockton at 6:30 pm showed only a couple dozen people in what would normally be one of the busiest pedestrian hubs in the region. He'll be coming home after lunch and hunkering down with me at home for an indefinite period of time.

joining the NBA and NHL, MLS is now suspended too.

MLB now talking about suspension as well. seems like a forgone conclusion at this point.

NHL is talking about starting playoffs in July based on current standings. Sign me up for summer patio playoff hockey.

How quick this is all moving is pretty incredible

Of course thats how it was going in China 2 months ago and Italy/Iran a few weeks ago.

Just on Monday the Mariners were suggesting playing their first regular season games here in Phoenix for the start of the MLB season. Now I think we are hours away from them cancelling spring training and regular MLB for the time being.

Huge impact for Phoenix as half of spring training takes place in our metro area. (good thing its almost over anyway)

Also went to an AZ Department of Transpiration event this morning. Probably 1/3 of the expected attendees were no-shows.

There was some graph that I was looking at yesterday that said if no measures are taken to control spread, we should expect the number of cases to double per day. So if there are about 1,000 cases in the U.S. yesterday, there could be well over 60,000 in less than a week, if no steps were taken to control the spread.

And there it is:

Officially the biggest impact for us so far. Probably not the last.

https://azbigmedia.com/business/cact...e-of-pandemic/

This from ABC-7 Los Angeles:
https://scontent-fml1-1.xx.fbcdn.net...df&oe=5EA61818

Even Coronavirus knows to avoid San Bernardino.

I'm kidding, I'm kidding!

Ohio just closed all schools in the state until April. https://www.news5cleveland.com/news/...virus-pandemic

* MODERATOR NOTE *

all posts in this thread that touch upon the national political aspects of this event (and all of the attendant toxicity that goes along with it these days) will be moved to the cornavirus thread in the current events shithole.

this thread is more for discussion about the impact of the event on our cities and daily lives.

if you asshats just want to keep screaming at each other about trump all day long, we've already given you a toilet to crawl into to do so. don't spread your stupid cancer over here in the worthwhile parts of this forum.

Hmmm; I'm wondering if they're getting it from a previous full-time employer.

At my company, we've had a number of employees who have voluntarily quit (which disqualifies you from collecting unemployment benefits from the company you quit from) because they got a new job somewhere else. Some of them got laid off from their new jobs, and then our company gets an EDD form, and they qualify, and our reserve account gets charged (either partially or wholly, depending on the qualification). But I would think if it were over a year since their last full-time position with a company, that would disqualify them. I would have to look into this using my own company... but I don't have time for that right now. :P

One time, we let a temp worker go who was working for us temp-to-hire through a staffing agency. We had to let her go because they eliminated the position. We received an EDD form with her name on it. I had to dispute it because she technically was never an employee of ours; she should have listed her staffing agency as her employer, not us.

OK, I actually saw it in real life. I ran to Target on my lunch break, and saw people lined up with shopping carts full of toilet paper.

Me, I used the self-checkout to buy a dispenser of Neutrogena.

I bought one of the last bottles of Lubriderm at Safeway yesterday. :D

I work in the World Trade Center (in NYC).

As of yesterday, World Trade 1 (Freedom Tower) and World Trade 4 (Eataly Building) were rumored to have mandatory closures due to a handful of cases in those buildings. World Trade 4 is location of Port Authority, of which, it's been well publicized the head was diagnosed with corona. Conde Nast (among others) are in WTC 1.

I'm in World Trade 3. WFH was already optional but today we were told WFH is mandatory tomorrow and likely all next week until further notice.

Virtually everyone I know who isn't a service or medical worker is now mandatory WFH.

Stores are cleaned out of anything relating to disinfectant, toilet paper, or NSAIDS.

The subways have been far less crowded than usual and the only people who seem to be out and about in Manhattan are tourists.

Disney closing California parks Saturday through the end of March (and, I'd bet, probably longer).

There will be no madness this march.

On the contrary. We'll have plenty, more than any of us can stand... Just none of the fun kind.

Counties here are starting to declare local states of emergency. Especially in a tourist city like here, I can see a lot of restaurants and shops not being able to financially ride this one out...

Edit: Just saw where the governor of North Carolina recommends that all gatherings of more than 100 people either be canceled or postponed.

Edit, Part 2: Son of Edit -- Also just saw where Buncombe County government is in talks with local hotels about them providing space for people to isolate and self-quarantine. If you know anything about the history of this area, that's pretty eerie when you consider that during WWII, the federal government confiscated all the big hotels around here and used them as prisons and hospitals.

NYC now at 95 cases, 42 discovered in last 24 hours they are saying on CNBC. Deblasio declaring state of emergency and ordering lots of stuff shut.

So, I think most of us agree that the economic impacts of this will FAR outweigh the medical impacts(God willing).

So this weekend I will be going out on a poor man's shopping spree. Gonna get some shoes and maybe some shirts. Then me and the girlfriend will go get some food and tip our waiter well.

That is all.

A post in a local facebook group here is making the rounds, and it's actually one worth considering:

Most restaurants, especially locally-owned ones, operate on a very thin profit margin. A lot of them are going to have a hard time keeping up with this kind of economic hammerblow. If possible, please consider buying gift cards from the restaurants you really care about, and save them for when things settle down. A lot of places, at least around here, will let you purchase such cards online.

Perhaps it's naive, but hope is a cardinal virtue, even when misplaced. If it gets to the point that pretty much no one is eating out anymore, I want to at least try to do my part to show the places I like that I care and that I'll be back as soon as the bad times are over.

I was at the store yesterday buying a six pack of local beer, an acorn squash, some fenugreek, and a reese's egg... and most people around me had carts piled up like they were prepping for the apocalypse. Perhaps I should be more concerned about this... but then again... perhaps those other people should dial it back a bit? I guess the sweet spot is somewhere in between. :shrug:

craziness hasn't quite hit the provincial out-midwest, yet. people are still traveling, even flying to jobsites that arent on coasts or chicago.

it's never a bad idea to have some non-perishable bulk foods on hand (like a 5 pound bag of rice and lots of cans of beans) in case shit truly hits the fan and food distribution is interrupted for a spell, but the 200 rolls of toilet paper nonsense, yeah, that's way beyond over the top.

Well send you a few corpses (don't want you to feel left out of a national phenomenon once again):

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-...ated-allegedly

The province of Ontario, Canada, has just announced all schools will be closed from next week (March Break) to April 6th.

With this and Ohio expect all schools in north america to follow suite.

No schools will want to be perceived as being unsafe so they'll follow pretty quickly

^ yep, these closures seem to be working like dominoes right now.

woo-hoo! now my wife and i get to work from home AND have our 4 and 5 year olds interrupting us all day long.

Will hot weather give us some respite?

... Thought I, staring out my office window at the rain, while contemplating going out for mead and a chicken Cobb salad for dinner...

From Al Jazeera:

Will warmer weather slow the spread of coronavirus?

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/...050819610.html

Hey, I ain’t complaining :D