10023 is stone cold. Colder than an addict feels going through opioid WD. Colder than the Polar Vortex.

Just cold man.

Speaking of cold, its 37 F in my part of NJ. Its going to rain next few days, it hasn't rained in a while. Hopefully the rain mitigates the virus. IDK, like on surfaces or something. Maybe the rain will dilute any virus particles on surfaces. :shrug:

If you think you wouldn't be affected because you're aged under 60, beware, though.

Northeastern France has been the most severely hit so far in this country, and nurses over there report about a few odd cases of young people with no particular health condition, yet stuck in resuscitation services. Some in their 20s or 30s may not survive.

That virus is the most vicious thing you could think of. it's double-faced like many of us will go infected without even realizing, while some will die. They can't explain why yet, because it's a brand new disease, so to say.

There you get statistics on the global stage.

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

I'll tell you what, if you believe in God, take a little minute to say a prayer for Italy for it's been appalling over there.
They can't even bury their dead in a decent manner any longer. Those losing a love one of theirs can't attend any burial.
Believe it or not, the northern provinces of Italy (that are by far wealthier than the south) would enjoy some of the most modern and efficient hospitals in the world; still, they are completely distressed, overwhelmed by the epidemic.

The situation of northeastern France (especially Alsace) is turning the same, and we're expecting the next couple of weeks to be terrible here.
In Alsace and Corsica, some seriously infected people have to be moved to hospitals of other regions, because theirs are in a shortage of resuscitation beds already.
The Germans are also receiving some sick from Alsace, helping us.

Speaking of Germany, you'll notice their lower death rate. 2 reasons for that.
1 - The 1st case of the virus in Europe was detected in their country a couple of months ago, and they had the very good idea to take it seriously. So they were early in taking some necessary action.
2 - They have 25k resuscitation beds in their country, while mine has only 5k... then sometimes I wonder what the French taxpayer money is used for. Inept and useless bureaucracy, I guess.

Fact is the Germans must be more disciplined and serious than most of us are for real. It sounds like some dumb stereotype, but their lower death rate is a bit of an evidence.

Press conference at moment. I'll update as it proresses.


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Yeah, this is getting scarier. I know there is a 12-year-old fighting for her life in Atlanta. In LA 5 young healthy men returning from a ski trip from Italy ended up in the ICU. We're starting to hear now that younger people are getting really sick too.

Why would you even go to a large store for that few items? I’ve been revising meals to use what I have and ordering necessities for delivery (either locally via instacart or from sources like Amazon, Walmart.com or Target.com).

Rate of testing. New York is, by far, testing the most people. New York tests 5,000 people per day, which (last I checked) is more than twice as many as California tests. California is two times the size of New York, btw.

Now, just because California has much fewer confirmed cases DOES NOT mean that California has fewer infections than New York.

This is not an overreaction. Even young healthy people are ending up in the hospital in large numbers putting a ever increasing burden on things. This virus spreads easily and nobody is immune. Our hospitals are going to be and already are overrun with these measures we're taking. Have you not heard about shortages of protective gear ventilators and beds yet? Do you think keeping business open is going to help the situation?

Political bullshit moved to the politics toilet.

Because I thought I could just run in and out; it was 8am. But I only waited in line for about 10 or 15 minutes. There's a Vons across the street, which didn't have a line to go in, but I was thinking there would be more people INSIDE the store, possibly not practicing social distancing, and their produce usually isn't as good. The bananas at Pavilions are always better than the ones at Vons, for some reason, even though both stores are owned by the same company.

And when I went inside the Pavilions, there were hardly any shoppers inside, so social distancing was possible, and checkout was a breeze---no lines. I don't know what the situation was like as the day went on, though.

I thought that was already established; it was always my understanding that the official numbers for people who are infected will go up as more people get tested, and what we really want to see is more testing, and the flattening out of the numbers.

I saw this happening in other cities on TV this morning.

Yeah, we still appear to be way behind the curve here with testing. Additionally, the City of Los Angeles is only testing those admitted to the hospital according to CNN and not testing anybody else apparently to conserve protective gear. Additionally, LA is a bad example regarding density since it is also a high density city.

FOR REALS. It amazes me that there are still some people who are NOT taking this seriously; these are the people who are still in the selfish denial stage, and are talking about this like "It's all just an overreaction that's ruining the economy, all because of the fear of catching a cold."

It's not the same as catching a cold.

These are dire times, like we are at a war, and there are sacrifices we have to make for everyone's well being.

So does that mean you're declining Obadno's invitation to the kegger in his backyard tonight?

;)

There is bound to be lots of talk about the varying number of acute care and other hospital beds in different nations with criticism for those with fewer.

In fact, before this crisis, fewer beds (as long as it was sufficient to meet needs) was considered a mark of an efficient health care system. Excess bed capacity doesn't come free. Those beds are "staffed" (and I believe I once read that the average hospital employs 3 people for every bed or something like that). So a large bed capacity is expensive and largely unnecessary until some "black swan event" like coronavirus comes along, which NOBODY expected.

In the US, in recent years our bed capacity has been decreasing and those aware of the situation have been congratulating themselves because they saw this as a mark of increasing efficiency in the system, working away on the better known figures about how much more the US spends on health care than the rest of the world. Now, of course, what was seen as an advantage, may turn out to be a problem but you can't really blame other countries for being inept and the Germans for being "serious". 2 months ago the Germans were being critcized for an excess bed capacity and it's not like they were doing it out of some foreknowledge of what was to come. They were just running an inefficient health care system.

600 cases in Georgia, with majority around Greater ATL, 23 deaths as of today...

I suspect Georgia and Louisiana are drastically undercounted. Georgia has more deaths than New Jersey (20 NJ vs 23 GA), while (supposedly) having just 1/3 the number of infections as of right now (1,917 vs 600).

I agree....

I agree. Reports of and photographic evidence of many in town predominantly black churches full this morning....astounding and disheartening to see. I took a 4 mile walk this morning from my in town house and walked past several churches with full parking lots. :(