CORONA Main Coronavirus thread

SouthernBreeze said:

Only two? I never thought of putting anyone on ignore, until this thread started. My list is still growing.

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Ragnarok said:

Quit being a douchebag, 2DEES...

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mzkitty said:

Back in NY at that time, they used to have this really beautiful nightclub called Heaven. It used to be a Masonic Temple or something. Gorgeous inside, and vast dance floor. This was when trance first started happening and you could dance the night away. Lighting was fab too. Well..... anyway sometimes muzzies would show up. I was dumb and didn't know about them back then. They never danced. They just skulked around, mostly hanging at one of the bars and scoping things out. Used to make me nervous. I didn't know why then but now I do. You're right, they do not know how to dance.

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Heliobas Disciple said:

Coronavirus ‘may have been quietly spreading long before pandemic’

Virus may have jumped from animal to humans long before the first detection in Wuhan, according to research by an international team of scientists.

www.scmp.com

(fair use applies)

Coronavirus: pathogen could have been spreading in humans for years, study says
Stephen Chen in Beijing
Published: 4:30pm, 29 Mar, 2020
Updated: 2:06pm, 30 Mar, 2020

• Virus may have jumped from animal to humans long before the first detection in Wuhan, according to research by an international team of scientists
• Findings significantly reduce the possibility of the virus having a laboratory origin, director of the US National Institute of Health says

The coronavirus that causes Covid-19 might have been quietly spreading among humans for years or even decades before the sudden outbreak that sparked a global health crisis, according to an investigation by some of the world’s top virus hunters.

Researchers from the United States, Britain and Australia looked at piles of data released by scientists around the world for clues about the virus’ evolutionary past, and found it might have made the jump from animal to humans long before the first detection in the central China city of Wuhan.

Though there could be other possibilities, the scientists said the coronavirus carried a unique mutation that was not found in suspected animal hosts, but was likely to occur during repeated, small-cluster infections in humans.

The study, conducted by Kristian Andersen from the Scripps Research Institute in California, Andrew Rambaut from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, Ian Lipkin from Columbia University in New York, Edward Holmes from the University of Sydney, and Robert Garry from Tulane University in New Orleans, was published in the scientific journal Nature Medicine on March 17.

Dr Francis Collins, director of the US National Institute of Health, who was not involved in the research, said the study suggested a possible scenario in which the coronavirus crossed from animals into humans before it became capable of causing disease in people.

“Then, as a result of gradual evolutionary changes over years or perhaps decades, the virus eventually gained the ability to spread from human to human and cause serious, often life-threatening disease,” he said in an article published on the institute’s website on Thursday.

In December, doctors in Wuhan began noticing a surge in the number of people suffering from a mysterious pneumonia. Tests for flu and other pathogens returned negative. An unknown strain was isolated, and a team from the Wuhan Institute of Virology led by Shi Zhengli traced its origin to a bat virus found in a mountain cave close to the China-Myanmar border.

The two viruses shared more than 96 per cent of their genes, but the bat virus could not infect humans. It lacked a spike protein to bind with receptors in human cells.

Coronaviruses with a similar spike protein were later discovered in Malayan pangolins by separate teams from Guangzhou and Hong Kong, which led some researchers to believe that a recombination of genomes had occurred between the bat and pangolin viruses.

But the new strain, or SARS-Cov-2, had a mutation in its genes known as a polybasic cleavage site that was unseen in any coronaviruses found in bats or pangolins, according to Andersen and his colleagues.

This mutation, according to separate studies by researchers from China, France and the US, could produce a unique structure in the virus’ spike protein to interact with furin, a widely distributed enzyme in the human body. That could then trigger a fusion of the viral envelope and human cell membrane when they came into contact with one another.

Some human viruses including HIV and Ebola have the same furin-like cleavage site, which makes them contagious.

It is possible that the mutation happened naturally to the virus on animal hosts. Sars (severe acute respiratory syndrome) and Mers (Middle East respiratory syndrome), for instance, were believed to have been direct descendants of species found in masked civets and camels, which had a 99 per cent genetic similarity.

There was, however, no such direct evidence for the novel coronavirus, according to the international team. The gap between human and animal types was too large, they said, so they proposed another alternative.

“It is possible that a progenitor of SARS-CoV-2 jumped into humans, acquiring the genomic features described above through adaptation during undetected human-to-human transmission,” they said in the paper.

“Once acquired, these adaptations would enable the pandemic to take off and produce a sufficiently large cluster of cases to trigger the surveillance system that detected it.”

They said also that the most powerful computer models based on current knowledge about the coronavirus could not generate such a strange but highly efficient spike protein structure to bind with host cells.

The study had significantly reduced, if not ruled out, the possibility of a laboratory origin, Collins said.

“In fact, any bioengineer trying to design a coronavirus that threatened human health probably would never have chosen this particular conformation for a spike protein,” he said.

The findings by Western scientists echoed the mainstream opinion among Chinese researchers.

Zhong Nanshan, who advises Beijing on outbreak containment policies, had said on numerous occasions that there was growing scientific evidence to suggest the origin of the virus might not have been in China.

“The occurrence of Covid-19 in Wuhan does not mean it originated in Wuhan,” he said last week.

A doctor working in a public hospital treating Covid-19 patients in Beijing said numerous cases of mysterious pneumonia outbreaks had been reported by health professionals in several countries last year.

Re-examining the records and samples of these patients could reveal more clues about the history of this worsening pandemic, said the doctor, who asked not to be named due to the political sensitivity of the issue.

“There will be a day when the whole thing comes to light.”

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marsh said:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk42BCVErQw
7:21 min
Fake COVID-19 tests seized by border patrol
•Mar 28, 2020


Fox News

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naegling62 said:

I could always just not share his information from now on. I don't need negative conjecture on his conversations. I'll just keep it to myself.

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coalcracker said:

Random stuff:

Somebody needs to tell 20 gauge that we are closing in on page 1,000. That's right, 1K, baby, and only one person can get their name on the top of that page.

And Old Archer, my friend. Love you, bro. You seem a little more animated than usual. I think we need to blow off a little steam. If you, OA, were here in my AO, to the shooting range, the two of us would go. I have menus from the Chinese restaurant that we could use as targets.

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marsh said:

I knew that there was something different in moral values, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. The Chinese seem not to have any qualms in taking advantage of people, holding things like pharmaceuticals as leverage, etc. They will find that Westerners are not going to trust them any more and take their business elsewhere. There is no gentleman's handshake in China. They are predatory in business.

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Mixin said:

These are the Indiana stats beginning Mar 19. Considering who is being tested, when we started testing and when social distancing and the shutdowns began, I have no idea how to interpret them.

Mar 19: 56, 2, 380
Mar 20: 79, 2, 554
Mar 21: 126, 3, 833
Mar 22: 201, 6, 1494
Mar 23: 259, 7, 1960
Mar 24: 365, 12, 2931
Mar 25: 477, 14, 3356
Mar 26: 645, 17, 4651
Mar 27: 981, 24, 6936
Mar 28: 1232, 31, 8407
Mar 29: 1514, 32, 9830
Mar 30: 1786, 35, 11,658

From today:

View attachment 189655View attachment 189656

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Mary Contrary said:

Ever hear of Tupperware?

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OldArcher said:

Rondaben, please ignore the assholes... We NEED you!

OA

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raven said:

the reason they cannot overcome this virus is that the "social justice warrior" has turned everyone into both a victim and a perpetrator and you are all instructed to hide in your homes from the invisible enemy.
personally, I believe that most people truly want to help one another. My proof? Civilization. Cities, Towns. People naturally congregate for economy and for pleasure.
What is the quickest way to stop this virus? Science. The science of stopping a virus is "quarantine".
How would it work? When someone gets sick, they get quarantined and their contact list is quarantined. And we have the technology to do it through cell phones, GPS tracking and social media.
This people get quarantined to their homes and everyone around them are notified.

Social Justice Warriors will not allow this because their stock in trade is fear. You must fear that YOU will be discriminated against if you are different, if you are quarantined.
But this fear is manufactured. In our natural state, we truly care about our neighbors. There are some bad people out there, but we would not be able to organize ourselves into communities if the majority of us were not peaceful and cared about our neighbors. The social justice warrior has you believing that if someone was identified as a corona person and quarantined they would be "left to die or taken advantage of".

The evidence is exactly the opposite. Doctors and nurses are working themselves to death. People are delivering food at risk to their health. Go look for yourself. You will see people helping people. The reality is this. If someone were quarantined in their home, their neighbors would deliver food to them. They would chip in and pay their electric bills. Paying their mortgage might be a stretch, but I could see that happening.

If people were quarantined, the disease would evaporate in 6 weeks. The only thing required for quarantine to work is for us to be . . . Americans . . . It is why social justice warriors are so repugnant, they want us all to be at each others throat.

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Troke said:

The thing that fascinates me about the Conspiracy Geeks is the larger number of entities involved in the conspiracy, they more they believe it. That list above has to have 1000's of people in it. And not a single one has talked.

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Weft and Warp said:

How about using pony tail holders.

Lets learn to be creative. You did not like my pantyhose on the head idea, well here is an article found in the prestigious Journal Pubmed:

Paediatr Anaesth. 2005 Sep;15(9):793-4.
Surgical face mask as a nappy!
Sood D, Tewari A, Katyal S, Narula N, Garg S, Kaul TK.
PMID: 16101714 DOI: 10.1111/j.1460-9592.2005.01668.x
[Indexed for MEDLINE]

prepare for the rush, the Kardackians approve of this new style, sarc.

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TorahTips said:

Some of you may know that I work as a manager at Macy's. Macy's just furloughed everybody except upper mgmt

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TorahTips said:

You're really late. That was my virgin IGNORE.

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BassMan said:

Indeed!! I do advocate a hearty debate on the issues, but when personal attacks arise, that is VERY DISRUPTIVE!

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TorahTips said:

Plus, he said that there would be between 100k and 200k deaths. There are only 2500 now (say 3000). According to his math, that means that over 8000 will start dying A DAY starting today. ...And then later in the 90 minute news conference he said MAYBE THIS WILL BE OVER BY JUNE.... Oops. The truth came out...

The 100000 figure is non-sense if we look at these stats:
* A minimum of 40% of all people in the US get it. 132 million
* 1% death rate (far, far under any death rate anywhere else): 1.3 million.

Remember that the medical people said that we could see between 1 and 2 million die. Then they said if we socially isolate aggressively we can cut it down 90% -- the 100k to 200k figure.

Somebody's numbers somewhere just don't make sense.

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NCGirl said:

The Chinese have no morals. None. They might be individuals who are good people but as a culture they care only about themselves and their family. Watched an old lady fall in the street in Tianjin and not one person stopped to help, they all just walked around her as if she were a bag of trash on the ground. I could give many examples but won't bore folks.

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TorahTips said:

Some of you may know that I work as a manager at Macy's. Macy's just furloughed everybody except upper mgmt

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Altura Ct. said:

Not sure if this has already been posted.

Unmasking the Truth: CDC and Hospital Administrators Are Endangering Us All

An opinion piece exposing the revolting truth about current frontline conditions in healthcare.

What we have currently in America in 2020, is the perfect storm.

COVID-19 has turned the world upside down, but nowhere feels quite as surreal as the frontline of healthcare in America. Healthcare workers everywhere have been too shocked or fearful of retaliation to expose the risks that we, and by consequence, all of you, are currently facing. It’s time for the dirty secrets and inconvenient truths of what is really happening behind the scenes to come to light.

Currently, few employees feel their hospital is stepping up and doing the right thing amidst our woefully unprepared situation. The exceptional hospitals are letting staff wear protection brought from home, encouraging them to wear masks around all patients, etc. But the voices of these employees are getting drowned in a sea of those from hospitals that are sending them to the slaughter. If you want to know how your local hospital is faring, ask the first employee you see in the emergency room what their current mask policy is. You may realize you don’t have an “emergency” after all.

TL;DR — Do not go to the hospital for the foreseeable future unless your life truly depends on it. Visiting most ERs right now is akin to playing Russian Roulette. Think I’m being dramatic? Please read on.

The Atrocities of the CDC
According to their own website, “CDC is responsible for controlling the introduction and spread of infectious diseases, and provides consultation and assistance to other nations and international agencies to assist in improving their disease prevention and control, environmental health, and health promotion activities.” Ironically, this is the antithesis of what they are currently doing. Their actions are directly contributing to the rapid spread of this deadly virus. The CDC has turned away from research and guidelines from other nations and international agencies that have more experience with this pandemic.

The Coronavirus, or COVID-19, is known to be airborne. China, Italy, and South Korea know it. The World Health Organization knows it. Studies conducted in America have shown it can be airborne for up to 3 hours. Our CDC knew it was airborne when it first started to be addressed in our country as they listed it as such on their website. Within 24 hours, they had downgraded their precaution guidelines from airborne to droplet, to reflect the paltry supply of personal protective equipment (PPE) available for healthcare workers.

In response to this mockery of science and our public humiliation to the world, our hospitals quickly downgraded the protection available for workers that were knowingly being exposed to Covid-19 positive patients. With no shame, a few days later the CDC amended their recommendations to now also include bandanas or scarves as a last resort option for protection. Other countries are having their healthcare employees suit up in full Hazmat gear, and our expert infectious disease government organization is offering the recommendation of a bandana. The street cleaners in China are far, far better protected in their PPE than what is being offered to some of the brightest minds in America that are being directly exposed to this virus daily.

With workers being given equipment that is not even remotely close to adequate protection across every state, they are not only risking their own health, but also that of every patient, coworker, and person with which they come into contact in their community. Employees are being instructed to reuse disposable items for days with multiple patients, something that “way back” in 2019 would have had you fired on the spot with possible disciplinary action against your license.
This is directly contributing to the spread of the virus to other patients and staff. Healthcare employees have lost respect for the sell-outs behind the CDC. Meanwhile, there has been no outcry from OSHA or JCAHO. All we hear from these organizations is the sound of crickets, and even that sound is muffled from a far off distance.

The Dirty Secrets Behind the Frontline
Below are accounts that doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists, CNAs, medical assistants, NPs, PAs, speech therapists, dietitians, pharmacists, radiology techs, housekeeping staff, scrub techs, CRNAs, occupational/physical therapists, phlebotomists, unit secretaries, paramedics, transporters, lab technicians, supply management, and sterile processing techs have shared with one another in online healthcare forums. There are so many American workers affected by this, and their exposure becomes your community’s exposure.

Every day, the outpouring continues regarding what farcical new policies are being implemented in their workplace. Every day, I think the bar has been lowered to the ground and it is impossible for the quality of care and protection to fall even further, but I am continuously proven wrong.

This is the reckless reality that is actually happening behind the scenes at hospitals all over our country today:

• Most winters, a large portion of emergency room staff choose to wear a mask at all times due to flu season. Now they are being told by management, “that’s not necessary”, in the middle of a global pandemic. Many healthcare workers are forbidden to wear masks at all unless they are with a patient that is suspected or confirmed of having COVID-19. Meanwhile, studies show that a large percentage of patients that have the virus are asymptomatic. We do not recommend for people to only utilize condoms with partners that are suspected or known to have STDs, because you cannot always tell by how they look. The same logic applies to the coronavirus. During a pandemic, you should be utilizing standard precautions, and assume that everyone has it.
• Repeatedly, workers are reporting that they were belatedly informed of being exposed to a positive COVID-19 patient, up to a week after the lab results were known. Meanwhile, if they contracted the virus but are not yet symptomatic, they have been caring for other patients, likely spreading the virus to them as well. Less ethical administrations are telling their healthcare workers that it is a HIPPA violation to inform them if patients that they previously took care of unprotected, end up resulting positive for the virus. This is untrue, negligent and criminally reckless.
• “Lucky” employees are being given surgical masks that are meant to be worn for a single procedure with a single patient for up to 3–4 hours. They are being instructed to wear this same mask for several days, the same mask across all of their patients. It is practically impossible to remove these masks and then reuse them without contaminating them. From the first time it is removed, only an illusion of protection remains at best. At worst, there is a direct exposure from contamination for the employee, patient, and coworkers.
• Many hospitals are only issuing surgical masks to providers that are working with suspected COVID-19 patients. In the worst hospitals, these masks are only given to employees working with known positive coronavirus patients. These do not provide protection against airborne exposure. For airborne, at minimum, staff should have N-95 masks, or optimally, PAPR devices.
• PAPRs are meant to be reused and are equipped with disposable hoods. Typically a hood is used by one person for one shift with one patient. Hoods are now being used at some facilities for “the season” across all their patients. There are not nearly enough PAPRs to protect all of our providers.
• Many workers are being issued a paper or plastic bag and instructed to store their mask in them between shifts for a week or longer. Which is better, paper or plastic? It doesn’t matter as it is absolutely impossible to do this without contaminating the mask, which is designed for one-time usage. This practice is akin to reusing infected needles during an AIDs epidemic on staff and patients. Whoever originally came up with this “save your disposable mask in a contaminated bag idea” should consider dropping out of the medical workforce altogether for the better good of society.
• Particularly for the more protective N95 masks, some hospitals are going a step further in their multiuse plan. At the end of the week, they gather up the one-time usage masks that have been utilized all week long with COVID-19 patients and claim to be “disinfecting” them prior to reissuing them for further use. Some staff report that their facility is planning to use UV lights, which the manufacturer 3M states will compromise the integrity of the masks, removing the element of protection. Others are spraying them down with Lysol, of which one of the main disinfecting ingredients is isopropyl alcohol. Stanford has released a study showing isopropyl alcohol significantly degrades the filtration of N95 masks. But let’s be honest, the protection these masks provide was compromised the first time they were used and removed. So what’s a little more compromise going to hurt?
• At least one facility has ruled that with patients that are positive for the virus, only doctors are allowed to use N95 masks. Other staff members are offered PPE that does not provide the needed airborne protection.
• A housekeeper was erroneously informed by the administration that they did not need to wear masks or PPE while disinfecting rooms after coronavirus patients were discharged, because “there was no risk”. The virus has been proven to live on surfaces for days and can be airborne for up to 3 hours. Thankfully, their medical coworkers informed them otherwise and fought back to support them.
• An OR nurse reported that their hospital has instructed the operating room staff to use a single disposable surgical mask all day, across all of their surgical patient cases.
• Many doctors and other OR staff report that despite the surgeon general’s proclamations, their CEO’s instructed them to continue with elective cases. Under no circumstances were they to cancel the hospital’s moneymakers. If the doctors canceled their cases, they would risk their jobs.
• A doctor at a large healthcare organization shared that its administrators have locked up all the masks and are issuing them on a case by case basis, at the discretion of the administration. Business “professionals”, rather than the medical experts are determining who gets a mask.
• In many places, to conserve PPE, nurses are being given all the extra tasks that ancillary staff normally complete: breathing treatments, labs, and to clean the rooms upon patient discharge. With all this extra work, they are still taking care of the usual amount of patients. Nurses are not taught the Environmental Services room turnover policies. This is implemented with isolation patients that have a highly contagious virus that is known to live on surfaces for days. How’s that going to work for infection control?
• Faced with employers that are unable or unwilling to offer proper protection to their staff, many have sought out their own PPE and brought it to work. MANY hospitals are forbidding workers to provide their own masks with punitive measures. One doctor even reports an administrator forcefully removed the mask off of their face. Management claims it is “spreading fear to our customers”. Meanwhile, our government preaches social distancing, advising that going out in public is dangerous and to stay 6 feet away from others at all times.
• The last straw and prompt for me to write this article, was what was reported by a Seattle nurse yesterday. At her place of employment, temperature screeners at the front door are being told to give anyone symptomatic, including employees, a “napkin” in lieu of a mask. Why are they not being sent home? To add insult to ignorance, the new policy also included stern language to remind staff that it is their responsibility to ensure social distancing is being followed, 6 feet apart at all times. Maybe I’m struggling with this concept because I’m only 5’4”, but how exactly does one take another’s temperature from 6 feet away?

leo2014 / Pixabay

Money, Masks or Morgue
In 2014, the threat of EBOLA in America caught hospitals with their pants down. It was a wakeup call that we were not prepared or stocked well enough to handle a widespread outbreak. What did administrators learn from this? Nothing, apparently. That should have been a learning moment with emergency PPE held in reserves, but the overwhelming majority of administrators across the country chose instead to use money that could have bought surplus PPE, to fund their gigantic annual bonuses. These bonuses are frequently in the millions of dollars each year, while your frontline staff is making isolation gowns out of trash bags.

In recent years, administrators have used masks as a punitive measure against employees that decline to get a flu shot (no matter the reason), under the guise of “for public safety.” If you refuse to get the flu shot, you must wear a surgical mask all day for 3–6 months. That policy went out the window about five minutes into this coronavirus debacle, public safety be damned.

When questioned regarding the absurd and woefully inadequate new policies regarding substandard PPE protection for workers, they blame the global shortage. Then why are so many hospital executives refusing to allow workers to wear their own self-provided masks in a desperate attempt to protect themselves? Administrators are unable to provide even an illusion of protection for their staff and are refusing to allow employees to provide for themselves.

Administrators, how can you sleep at night when you put forth policies that require of your staff what you are too fearful to do yourself? Why aren’t you standing with us at the front doors scanning temperatures, armed in only a cloth mask sewed and donated by the grandmas in the community? Why aren’t you walking around the ER, unmasked, to help “alleviate the fear of our customers?” At best, you are too foolish and ignorant regarding science to realize how many lives you are placing in danger. But many of you do know, and deserve to face criminal charges — you know who you are.

In the past few weeks, across our country doctors and other healthcare workers have spoken up about the current hazardous conditions and substandard care being provided. Many have been met by administration with disciplinary actions, including forced leaves of absence or dismissal. Employees that are symptomatic and highly suspected to have the virus and even a few that have tested positive, are being instructed by management to keep working. “Just throw a mask on.”

China saw many of their frontline healthcare workers die from COVID-19 before they determined the means of transmission and properly equipped staff. Italy too has tragically seen the loss of many doctors and nurses. The coronavirus is just getting started in America, and we too have already lost the lives of healthcare workers that cared for acute COVID-19 patients, including young healthy workers cut down in the prime of their life.

Healthcare workers typically have a more severe episode of sickness than the average patient due to being exposed to a higher viral load. Administrators are already starting to deflect blame, “How do we know you didn’t acquire it in the community,” they scream down from their ivory towers. Meanwhile, I keep reading heartbreaking accounts of people seeing their coworkers succumb to the virus, become intubated, be coded multiple times, and ultimately some die. These stories will keep coming and at a more rapid pace if things do not drastically change immediately.

Frontline workers are given bonuses of appreciation that consist of pens, keychains, lunch boxes, pizza, and I kid you not, sometimes a Little Debbie cake. Meanwhile, administrators are given millions of dollars for a job well done in crippling our healthcare system nationwide. Their lack of foresight and planning contributed heavily to the current healthcare crisis. We are chronically kept at staffing levels that are “just enough” with a meager supply provision that is, under normal situations, “just enough”. Each year we are squeezed tighter to maximize productivity with less because it’s “just enough” for their profit goal.

Dear hospital executives, we’ve had “just enough” of you. We are done with your elementary intimidation tactics to keep employees quiet and subservient. We are done with the ludicrous afterthought note at the end of these ghetto protocols to “KEEP SAFE!!” after being instructed on how to reuse disposable equipment. As a matter of fact, effective immediately, all hospital administrators should stop using the word “safe”. It does not mean what you think it means.

Healthcare Reboot
I keep hearing that America is the greatest country on Earth, but with a CDC that is knowingly endangering the frontline and most healthcare organizations being run by nonmedical executives that have more greed than compassion, how can we honestly claim it?

It’s been made clear that being proactive is beyond the capabilities of those currently at the helm. We’ve tried having healthcare run by business professionals and bureaucrats that don’t know a liquid from a gas. They have failed horribly, atrociously. They need to go.

Firemen are true American heroes that are known to be willing to risk their life for another. But I have never seen a fireman run into blazing flames without fire-resistant gear on. This is what is currently being asked of our healthcare workers every single day now. Every. Single. Day. Healthcare workers are passionate about saving lives, but they will save far more people if they are kept alive versus dying to save one.

I look around at this new foreign, dystopian landscape and everything has changed. Policies, protocols, even science apparently has changed because healthcare administration and the CDC were not prepared. It’s time for America to change as well, starting with a healthcare reboot.

Other than discussing these stressful changes with one another, healthcare workers are scared to go public with what is going on due to intimidation tactics. Administrators love to retaliate when their employees speak out about inconvenient truths, but the public needs to know their dirty secrets. By blowing this whistle to let you know what’s happening behind the frontlines, I am risking my job. All I ask in return is that you spread the word and push for change. We must defend our frontline.

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NCGirl said:

The Chinese have no morals. None. They might be individuals who are good people but as a culture they care only about themselves and their family. Watched an old lady fall in the street in Tianjin and not one person stopped to help, they all just walked around her as if she were a bag of trash on the ground.

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Hfcomms said:

The only thing that fixes stupid is a lot of pain. As I don‘t like pain I try not to be stupid. Their pain is enroute. And it’s so unnecessary.

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Altura Ct. said:

Not sure if this has already been posted.

Unmasking the Truth: CDC and Hospital Administrators Are Endangering Us All

An opinion piece exposing the revolting truth about current frontline conditions in healthcare.

What we have currently in America in 2020, is the perfect storm.

COVID-19 has turned the world upside down, but nowhere feels quite as surreal as the frontline of healthcare in America. Healthcare workers everywhere have been too shocked or fearful of retaliation to expose the risks that we, and by consequence, all of you, are currently facing. It’s time for the dirty secrets and inconvenient truths of what is really happening behind the scenes to come to light.

Currently, few employees feel their hospital is stepping up and doing the right thing amidst our woefully unprepared situation. The exceptional hospitals are letting staff wear protection brought from home, encouraging them to wear masks around all patients, etc. But the voices of these employees are getting drowned in a sea of those from hospitals that are sending them to the slaughter. If you want to know how your local hospital is faring, ask the first employee you see in the emergency room what their current mask policy is. You may realize you don’t have an “emergency” after all.

TL;DR — Do not go to the hospital for the foreseeable future unless your life truly depends on it. Visiting most ERs right now is akin to playing Russian Roulette. Think I’m being dramatic? Please read on.

The Atrocities of the CDC
According to their own website, “CDC is responsible for controlling the introduction and spread of infectious diseases, and provides consultation and assistance to other nations and international agencies to assist in improving their disease prevention and control, environmental health, and health promotion activities.” Ironically, this is the antithesis of what they are currently doing. Their actions are directly contributing to the rapid spread of this deadly virus. The CDC has turned away from research and guidelines from other nations and international agencies that have more experience with this pandemic.

The Coronavirus, or COVID-19, is known to be airborne. China, Italy, and South Korea know it. The World Health Organization knows it. Studies conducted in America have shown it can be airborne for up to 3 hours. Our CDC knew it was airborne when it first started to be addressed in our country as they listed it as such on their website. Within 24 hours, they had downgraded their precaution guidelines from airborne to droplet, to reflect the paltry supply of personal protective equipment (PPE) available for healthcare workers.

In response to this mockery of science and our public humiliation to the world, our hospitals quickly downgraded the protection available for workers that were knowingly being exposed to Covid-19 positive patients. With no shame, a few days later the CDC amended their recommendations to now also include bandanas or scarves as a last resort option for protection. Other countries are having their healthcare employees suit up in full Hazmat gear, and our expert infectious disease government organization is offering the recommendation of a bandana. The street cleaners in China are far, far better protected in their PPE than what is being offered to some of the brightest minds in America that are being directly exposed to this virus daily.

With workers being given equipment that is not even remotely close to adequate protection across every state, they are not only risking their own health, but also that of every patient, coworker, and person with which they come into contact in their community. Employees are being instructed to reuse disposable items for days with multiple patients, something that “way back” in 2019 would have had you fired on the spot with possible disciplinary action against your license.
This is directly contributing to the spread of the virus to other patients and staff. Healthcare employees have lost respect for the sell-outs behind the CDC. Meanwhile, there has been no outcry from OSHA or JCAHO. All we hear from these organizations is the sound of crickets, and even that sound is muffled from a far off distance.

The Dirty Secrets Behind the Frontline
Below are accounts that doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists, CNAs, medical assistants, NPs, PAs, speech therapists, dietitians, pharmacists, radiology techs, housekeeping staff, scrub techs, CRNAs, occupational/physical therapists, phlebotomists, unit secretaries, paramedics, transporters, lab technicians, supply management, and sterile processing techs have shared with one another in online healthcare forums. There are so many American workers affected by this, and their exposure becomes your community’s exposure.

Every day, the outpouring continues regarding what farcical new policies are being implemented in their workplace. Every day, I think the bar has been lowered to the ground and it is impossible for the quality of care and protection to fall even further, but I am continuously proven wrong.

This is the reckless reality that is actually happening behind the scenes at hospitals all over our country today:

• Most winters, a large portion of emergency room staff choose to wear a mask at all times due to flu season. Now they are being told by management, “that’s not necessary”, in the middle of a global pandemic. Many healthcare workers are forbidden to wear masks at all unless they are with a patient that is suspected or confirmed of having COVID-19. Meanwhile, studies show that a large percentage of patients that have the virus are asymptomatic. We do not recommend for people to only utilize condoms with partners that are suspected or known to have STDs, because you cannot always tell by how they look. The same logic applies to the coronavirus. During a pandemic, you should be utilizing standard precautions, and assume that everyone has it.
• Repeatedly, workers are reporting that they were belatedly informed of being exposed to a positive COVID-19 patient, up to a week after the lab results were known. Meanwhile, if they contracted the virus but are not yet symptomatic, they have been caring for other patients, likely spreading the virus to them as well. Less ethical administrations are telling their healthcare workers that it is a HIPPA violation to inform them if patients that they previously took care of unprotected, end up resulting positive for the virus. This is untrue, negligent and criminally reckless.
• “Lucky” employees are being given surgical masks that are meant to be worn for a single procedure with a single patient for up to 3–4 hours. They are being instructed to wear this same mask for several days, the same mask across all of their patients. It is practically impossible to remove these masks and then reuse them without contaminating them. From the first time it is removed, only an illusion of protection remains at best. At worst, there is a direct exposure from contamination for the employee, patient, and coworkers.
• Many hospitals are only issuing surgical masks to providers that are working with suspected COVID-19 patients. In the worst hospitals, these masks are only given to employees working with known positive coronavirus patients. These do not provide protection against airborne exposure. For airborne, at minimum, staff should have N-95 masks, or optimally, PAPR devices.
• PAPRs are meant to be reused and are equipped with disposable hoods. Typically a hood is used by one person for one shift with one patient. Hoods are now being used at some facilities for “the season” across all their patients. There are not nearly enough PAPRs to protect all of our providers.
• Many workers are being issued a paper or plastic bag and instructed to store their mask in them between shifts for a week or longer. Which is better, paper or plastic? It doesn’t matter as it is absolutely impossible to do this without contaminating the mask, which is designed for one-time usage. This practice is akin to reusing infected needles during an AIDs epidemic on staff and patients. Whoever originally came up with this “save your disposable mask in a contaminated bag idea” should consider dropping out of the medical workforce altogether for the better good of society.
• Particularly for the more protective N95 masks, some hospitals are going a step further in their multiuse plan. At the end of the week, they gather up the one-time usage masks that have been utilized all week long with COVID-19 patients and claim to be “disinfecting” them prior to reissuing them for further use. Some staff report that their facility is planning to use UV lights, which the manufacturer 3M states will compromise the integrity of the masks, removing the element of protection. Others are spraying them down with Lysol, of which one of the main disinfecting ingredients is isopropyl alcohol. Stanford has released a study showing isopropyl alcohol significantly degrades the filtration of N95 masks. But let’s be honest, the protection these masks provide was compromised the first time they were used and removed. So what’s a little more compromise going to hurt?
• At least one facility has ruled that with patients that are positive for the virus, only doctors are allowed to use N95 masks. Other staff members are offered PPE that does not provide the needed airborne protection.
• A housekeeper was erroneously informed by the administration that they did not need to wear masks or PPE while disinfecting rooms after coronavirus patients were discharged, because “there was no risk”. The virus has been proven to live on surfaces for days and can be airborne for up to 3 hours. Thankfully, their medical coworkers informed them otherwise and fought back to support them.
• An OR nurse reported that their hospital has instructed the operating room staff to use a single disposable surgical mask all day, across all of their surgical patient cases.
• Many doctors and other OR staff report that despite the surgeon general’s proclamations, their CEO’s instructed them to continue with elective cases. Under no circumstances were they to cancel the hospital’s moneymakers. If the doctors canceled their cases, they would risk their jobs.
• A doctor at a large healthcare organization shared that its administrators have locked up all the masks and are issuing them on a case by case basis, at the discretion of the administration. Business “professionals”, rather than the medical experts are determining who gets a mask.
• In many places, to conserve PPE, nurses are being given all the extra tasks that ancillary staff normally complete: breathing treatments, labs, and to clean the rooms upon patient discharge. With all this extra work, they are still taking care of the usual amount of patients. Nurses are not taught the Environmental Services room turnover policies. This is implemented with isolation patients that have a highly contagious virus that is known to live on surfaces for days. How’s that going to work for infection control?
• Faced with employers that are unable or unwilling to offer proper protection to their staff, many have sought out their own PPE and brought it to work. MANY hospitals are forbidding workers to provide their own masks with punitive measures. One doctor even reports an administrator forcefully removed the mask off of their face. Management claims it is “spreading fear to our customers”. Meanwhile, our government preaches social distancing, advising that going out in public is dangerous and to stay 6 feet away from others at all times.
• The last straw and prompt for me to write this article, was what was reported by a Seattle nurse yesterday. At her place of employment, temperature screeners at the front door are being told to give anyone symptomatic, including employees, a “napkin” in lieu of a mask. Why are they not being sent home? To add insult to ignorance, the new policy also included stern language to remind staff that it is their responsibility to ensure social distancing is being followed, 6 feet apart at all times. Maybe I’m struggling with this concept because I’m only 5’4”, but how exactly does one take another’s temperature from 6 feet away?

leo2014 / Pixabay

Money, Masks or Morgue
In 2014, the threat of EBOLA in America caught hospitals with their pants down. It was a wakeup call that we were not prepared or stocked well enough to handle a widespread outbreak. What did administrators learn from this? Nothing, apparently. That should have been a learning moment with emergency PPE held in reserves, but the overwhelming majority of administrators across the country chose instead to use money that could have bought surplus PPE, to fund their gigantic annual bonuses. These bonuses are frequently in the millions of dollars each year, while your frontline staff is making isolation gowns out of trash bags.

In recent years, administrators have used masks as a punitive measure against employees that decline to get a flu shot (no matter the reason), under the guise of “for public safety.” If you refuse to get the flu shot, you must wear a surgical mask all day for 3–6 months. That policy went out the window about five minutes into this coronavirus debacle, public safety be damned.

When questioned regarding the absurd and woefully inadequate new policies regarding substandard PPE protection for workers, they blame the global shortage. Then why are so many hospital executives refusing to allow workers to wear their own self-provided masks in a desperate attempt to protect themselves? Administrators are unable to provide even an illusion of protection for their staff and are refusing to allow employees to provide for themselves.

Administrators, how can you sleep at night when you put forth policies that require of your staff what you are too fearful to do yourself? Why aren’t you standing with us at the front doors scanning temperatures, armed in only a cloth mask sewed and donated by the grandmas in the community? Why aren’t you walking around the ER, unmasked, to help “alleviate the fear of our customers?” At best, you are too foolish and ignorant regarding science to realize how many lives you are placing in danger. But many of you do know, and deserve to face criminal charges — you know who you are.

In the past few weeks, across our country doctors and other healthcare workers have spoken up about the current hazardous conditions and substandard care being provided. Many have been met by administration with disciplinary actions, including forced leaves of absence or dismissal. Employees that are symptomatic and highly suspected to have the virus and even a few that have tested positive, are being instructed by management to keep working. “Just throw a mask on.”

China saw many of their frontline healthcare workers die from COVID-19 before they determined the means of transmission and properly equipped staff. Italy too has tragically seen the loss of many doctors and nurses. The coronavirus is just getting started in America, and we too have already lost the lives of healthcare workers that cared for acute COVID-19 patients, including young healthy workers cut down in the prime of their life.

Healthcare workers typically have a more severe episode of sickness than the average patient due to being exposed to a higher viral load. Administrators are already starting to deflect blame, “How do we know you didn’t acquire it in the community,” they scream down from their ivory towers. Meanwhile, I keep reading heartbreaking accounts of people seeing their coworkers succumb to the virus, become intubated, be coded multiple times, and ultimately some die. These stories will keep coming and at a more rapid pace if things do not drastically change immediately.

Frontline workers are given bonuses of appreciation that consist of pens, keychains, lunch boxes, pizza, and I kid you not, sometimes a Little Debbie cake. Meanwhile, administrators are given millions of dollars for a job well done in crippling our healthcare system nationwide. Their lack of foresight and planning contributed heavily to the current healthcare crisis. We are chronically kept at staffing levels that are “just enough” with a meager supply provision that is, under normal situations, “just enough”. Each year we are squeezed tighter to maximize productivity with less because it’s “just enough” for their profit goal.

Dear hospital executives, we’ve had “just enough” of you. We are done with your elementary intimidation tactics to keep employees quiet and subservient. We are done with the ludicrous afterthought note at the end of these ghetto protocols to “KEEP SAFE!!” after being instructed on how to reuse disposable equipment. As a matter of fact, effective immediately, all hospital administrators should stop using the word “safe”. It does not mean what you think it means.

Healthcare Reboot
I keep hearing that America is the greatest country on Earth, but with a CDC that is knowingly endangering the frontline and most healthcare organizations being run by nonmedical executives that have more greed than compassion, how can we honestly claim it?

It’s been made clear that being proactive is beyond the capabilities of those currently at the helm. We’ve tried having healthcare run by business professionals and bureaucrats that don’t know a liquid from a gas. They have failed horribly, atrociously. They need to go.

Firemen are true American heroes that are known to be willing to risk their life for another. But I have never seen a fireman run into blazing flames without fire-resistant gear on. This is what is currently being asked of our healthcare workers every single day now. Every. Single. Day. Healthcare workers are passionate about saving lives, but they will save far more people if they are kept alive versus dying to save one.

I look around at this new foreign, dystopian landscape and everything has changed. Policies, protocols, even science apparently has changed because healthcare administration and the CDC were not prepared. It’s time for America to change as well, starting with a healthcare reboot.

Other than discussing these stressful changes with one another, healthcare workers are scared to go public with what is going on due to intimidation tactics. Administrators love to retaliate when their employees speak out about inconvenient truths, but the public needs to know their dirty secrets. By blowing this whistle to let you know what’s happening behind the frontlines, I am risking my job. All I ask in return is that you spread the word and push for change. We must defend our frontline.

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Trivium Pursuit said:

I'm thinking real social isolation and shelter may drop from 480,000 deaths that the HA predicted down to Maybe 200,000.

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20Gauge said:

File that unemployment claim asap..... the kicker is to last only 16 weeks...

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marsh said:

[First it was tests that don't work. Now it is masks. ]

China is supplying masks that don’t work, and countries all over the world are using them

The media just loves the fact that the U.S. was experiencing a shortage of some coronavirus medical products, while China was appearing to sell and donate those supplies to many countries. — Chris …

therightscoop.com

China is supplying masks that don’t work, and countries all over the world are using them
MAR. 28, 2020 6:06 PM BY SOOPERMEXICAN •

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hiwall said:

It well be extended. Remember the last recession Congress extended unemployment to 99 weeks.

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Kris Gandillon said:

130,000 were furloughed according to the news pop-up I just received.

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mudlogger said:

She lost 7 patients in 10 hours last night. ARDS. Bubbling pink foam. It’s not normal. Tell me it’s fake....

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