CORONA Main Coronavirus thread

Trivium Pursuit

Has No Life - Lives on TB
I noted by looking at the very good infection2020 map, that the highest per capita caseload is not New York City, but in adjacent Westchester County which includes the city of White Plains. As of today, New York City had one case for every 205 residents. Westchester County has, if the map can be believed, one case for every 105 residents. Why aren't we hearing anything about Westchester County or White Plains?
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Bps1691

Veteran Member
Seen this yet? I've generally thought of Michael Snyder as a bit of an excitable fellow, but that doesn't make him wrong.

My wife and I are planning our veggie garden now: a few fast-growing, leafy vegetable/nutritions things, but mostly fleshy things with 'mass'. I've ordered some fresh seed.

I am also considering what we need to have on-hand if we should need to grow a little indoors in the fall/winter if things get bad. I also ordered a coupe 50 lb. bags of sunflower seeds for sprouting indoors (in addition to various other sprouting seed that I already have on-hand). Some of it is older, and some only a little -- we've started testing the various bags to see what will germinate, and how well.


If this pandemic stretches on for an extended period of time, food supplies are inevitably going to get even tighter.
So what can you do?
Well, perhaps you can start a garden this year if you don’t normally grow one. Apparently this pandemic has sparked a tremendous amount of interest in gardening programs around the country…


Food is only going to get more expensive from here on out, and growing your own food is a way to become more independent of the system.

But if you don’t have any seeds right now, you may want to hurry, because consumer demand is spiking

For years, I have been warning people to get prepared for “the perfect storm” that was coming, but of course most people didn’t listen.

But now it is upon us.

Desperate people have been running out to the grocery stores to stock up on toilet paper only to find that they are limited to one or two packages if it is even available.

And now that “panic buying” of seeds has begun, it is probably only a matter of time before many stores start running out.

We have reached a major turning point in our history, and things are only going to get crazier.

Unfortunately, the vast majority of Americans still have absolutely no idea what is ahead of us…

If you have the room in your garden or on your property, you might want to include several winter staples. Winter Squash, Rutabagas, Parsnips, Carrots, turnips, Winter Storage Onions, potatoes, etc.

Open Pollinated seeds have become much tighter with the online suppliers I use, but by buying what they have you can piece out an entire garden that will give you summer eats fresh and process (can, dehydrate, Freeze) for winter. 50-day Green beans being one of the best because in most areas of the country you can get two pickings off each planting and do two plantings. Many things are sold out for the season at one source, but with searching on the internet can be found from another.

Don't forget the herbs! A good selection of herbs can be easily dried and stored (small Ball jars with lids, plastic tubs, freezer bags, small bottles with tight lids, etc.) and they will make a boring winter meal much tastier.

Canning jars and lids are very short in my AO, but you can still pick them up by checking several sources. Worst case you can buy them on the internet but the shipping cost will be a killer.

Canning equipment (pressure canners, racks, tools) is short in my AO as well, but that usually sells out around here in a good year, no telling what happens this year.
 

mzkitty

I give up.
Sources at two US hospitals say they're running out of sedation drugs
From CNN’s Paul Murphy and Lauren DelValle

Two nurses at St. Joseph's Hospital in Denver, Colorado, have told CNN that they're running out of proper sedation drugs because they've had to intubate so many patients since the coronavirus epidemic began in the US.

A nurse at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland, tells CNN that their hospital is running out of fentanyl, which they used to sedate intubated Covid-19 patients.
"We are starting to run out of proper sedation medication like propofol and fentanyl," one nurse says.
"It’s hard to watch when you have to flip these people onto their bellies and use oral medications to sedate them through their feeding tubes."
SCL Health Vice President of System Communications Nikki Sloup said that their hospital system, which includes St. Joseph's Hospital, currently has an adequate supply to meet patient needs. But Sloup warns that if they experience a patient surge, it could see shortages.
"We have put in place numerous conservation programs and continue to work with public and private partners to secure the supplies we need to provide safe and appropriate care to our patients and ensure the safety of our caregivers," Sloup told CNN in a statement.
CNN reached out to Johns Hopkins Hospital for comment but did receive a response.

One nurse said they've never seen so many ventilators being put to use.
"Being on a ventilator is a package deal -- it typically comes with the addition of sedation in order to tolerate being ventilated and that’s where fentanyl comes into play," they said. "It is being used in such high doses to appropriately sedate these patients."
===
.
 

Quiet Man

Nothing unreal exists
If you have the room in your garden or on your property...
Thank you very much for your thoughtful guidance. I have most of the items you referred to in storage after years of prepping (I even have supplies to do hydroponics). I do, though, have only modest gardening experience; helping my wife over the past 7+ years (I work full-time). It will be time to bone-up.

We live in the high desert, at 7000 feet -- our growing season is short, so short-season beans and root vegetables are important (and I have largely overlooked the latter, other than carrots, and will attempt to rectify that).

Gratefully.
 
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Bps1691

Veteran Member
Thank you very much for your thoughtful guidance. I have most of the items you referred to in storage after years of prepping. I do, though, have only modest gardening experiencing; helping my wife over the past 7+ years (I work full-time). It will be time to bone-up.

We live in the high desert, at 7000 feet -- our growing season is short, so short-season beans and root vegetables are important (and I have largely overlooked the latter, other than carrots, and will attempt to rectify that).

Gratefully.
Don't know if it is applicable, but this site is Alaska based and sells seeds it test plots there.

 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

As expected, the current shelter-in-place order for the Bay Area has been extended for nearly a month, and with it comes new regulations for the restaurants and grocery stores still in operation during the pandemic.

According to a joint announcement from the six participating counties: Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo, and Santa Clara, as well as the city of Berkeley (which operates its own Department of Public Health), the new end date for the order is Sunday, May 3 — a change from the Friday, May 1 extension that was previously touted, and a far cry from the initial April 7 end date.

Also new are restrictions on businesses termed essential that are therefore allowed to remain open. Under the new order (here’s Santa Clara’s, the language other than the county name is the same for all), which goes into effect as of 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday, March 31, restaurants may remain open for takeout and delivery as they have been since the initial order on March 16.

However, now those places — as well as grocery and food stores, which are also allowed to remain open — must prepare and post a “Social Distancing Protocol,” using this document as a template. As part of that plan, businesses must post signs at each public entrance “to inform all employees and customers that they should: avoid entering the facility if they have a cough or fever; maintain a minimum six-foot distance from one another; sneeze and cough into a cloth or tissue or, if not available, into one’s elbow; and not shake hands or engage in any unnecessary physical contact.”

Another new development is a per-person limit on “goods that are selling out quickly,” such as grocery store staples like beans. Stores are asked to place “per-person limits” on those items, with the goal of reducing crowds and lines. Stores must also “post an employee at the door to ensure that the maximum number of customers in the facility...is not exceeded.”

Finally, there are formal codifications of procedures most places are (one hopes) already following: For example, restaurants and grocery stores (as well as other businesses that might have lines) must now place “tape or other markings at least six feet apart in customer line areas inside the store and on sidewalks at public entrances with signs directing customers to use the markings to maintain distance.” And now it’s official: The new rules say that stores and restaurants may not allow “customers to bring their own bags, mugs, or other reusable items from home.”

Every restaurant, grocery store, and other Bay Area essential business must fill out and display this document is 11:59 p.m. on April 2, 2020, the order reads, and business owners must be ready and able to show “evidence of its implementation to any authority enforcing this Order upon demand,” which means that restaurants must prove to officials that even in tight quarters like kitchens, the six-foot rule is being officially observed.

Finally, don’t assume that you can grab some takeout and enjoy it during a nice, socially distant meal at a local park. As part of the new order, all “playgrounds, dog parks, public picnic areas, and similar recreational areas” have been closed to the public.

“What we need now, for the health of all our communities, is for people to stay home,” San Francisco Department of Public Health head Dr. Grant Colfax said via statement. “Even though it has been difficult, the Bay Area has really stepped up to the challenge so far, and we need to reaffirm our commitment. We need more time to flatten the curve, to prepare our hospitals for a surge, and to do everything we can to minimize the harm that the virus causes to our communities.”
 

nebb

Veteran Member
My daughter is an RN in the Er at OHSU Portland, she’s part time and yesterday she said picking up shifts was getting difficult.....lots of RNs from other units available. Today she texted they want her to go full time.....local news says 12 staff at OHSU are positive for Covid with 51 waiting for results.

In tears she also asked my wife and I if we would raise our grandsons if anything happens to her and SIL, he’s an RN there also. Of course we would, upped my praying for them.....

Turned down the full time.......5&7 yr old boys at home
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Pentagon Confirms Over 1,000 COVID-19 Cases Among Military, Orders Bases To Stop Public Reporting
Mon, 03/30/2020 - 21:05

The Department of Defense (DoD) announced a grim milestone Monday — it's total number of COVID-19 cases among US service members, civilian contractors, on-base civilian staff, and family dependents of troops has surpassed 1,000.

“Total DoD Cases (current, recovered and deaths) is 1,087,” according to DoD fact sheet released on Monday. The numbers are as follow:
  • 569 military cases
  • 220 civilian cases
  • 190 dependent cases
  • 64 contractor cases
Defense Secretary Mark Esper, via Reuters.


The Pentagon said 569 service members have been infected, among these 26 hospitalizations, and 34 have recovered.

The remainder of total cases involve civilian contractors working on military bases and/or at the Pentagon, as well as dependents. This number is up significantly from Friday's total DoD number of 600.

But it appears we are fast heading toward a near total reporting blockage in terms of DoD-wide cases, and specifically where they originate, and in what branches of the US armed services. As Stars & Stripes reports:
The Defense Department has ordered commanders at all of its installations worldwide to stop announcing publicly new coronavirus cases among their personnel, as the Pentagon said Monday that more than 1,000 U.S. military-linked people had been sickened by the virus.

The order issued by Defense Secretary Mark Esper on Friday is meant to protect operational security at the Defense Department’s global installations, Jonathan Hoffman, the Pentagon’s chief spokesman, said in a statement Monday. He said Defense Department leaders worried adversaries could exploit such information, especially if the data showed the outbreak impacted U.S. nuclear forces or other critical units
This constitutes perhaps the clearest admission thus far throughout the crisis that the coronavirus pandemic is a serious threat to US defense readiness and national security.

USS Theodore Roosevelt, via US Navy
Currently at least two aircraft carriers are battling outbreaks in their midst - both are in the Pacific Ocean and likely have seen their operational readiness deeply compromised as commanders try to contain the spread, with the USS Theodore Roosevelt already being diverted to Guam days ago.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Military Field Hospital on its way to Redding
by Mike Mangas, Adam Robinson
Friday, March 27th 2020

The Army Corps of Engineers is working on plans to bring a field hospital to Redding, (Mike Mangas)

REDDING, Calif. — KRCR learned, on Friday, that a Military Field Hospital is on its way to Redding, and soon.

It would relieve overcrowding in Northstate hospitals if there's a surge of coronavirus (COVID-19) patients.

The United States Army Corps of Engineers was in Shasta County, Tuesday, checking out three possible sites for the field hospital: Shasta College, the Shasta District Fairgrounds in Anderson, and the Redding Civic Auditorium.

The Army Corps is making the decision and the field hospital should be in place in a matter of days.

Shasta County Health and Human Services Director Donell Ewert told KRCR it will be for less serious cases possibly including Covid-19 patients.

Donell says it will serve 13 northern California counties, including all of the Northstate.

It will be ready to go soon, he's just hoping it won't be needed.

And he says it won't be manned by military personnel. Instead, it will probably be medical providers from the 13 counties it will serve.

Watch the story on KRCR at 5:30 p.m. for a report from Mike Mangas.
 

bsharp

Veteran Member
Thank you very much for your thoughtful guidance. I have most of the items you referred to in storage after years of prepping (I even have supplies to do hydroponics). I do, though, have only modest gardening experience; helping my wife over the past 7+ years (I work full-time). It will be time to bone-up.

We live in the high desert, at 7000 feet -- our growing season is short, so short-season beans and root vegetables are important (and I have largely overlooked the latter, other than carrots, and will attempt to rectify that).

Gratefully.
Could you consider hoop gardening to extend your season? This is a method of covering the garden over hoops when needed. I have seen articles about people using this method in Alaska for a longer season.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Captain of Aircraft Carrier Pleads for Help as Virus Cases Increase Onboard
“We are not at war,” the captain of the carrier Theodore Roosevelt wrote. “Sailors do not need to die. If we do not act now, we are failing to properly take care of our most trusted asset — our sailors.”



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The aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt arriving in Vietnam this month.Credit...EPA, via Shutterstock

By Thomas Gibbons-Neff and Helene Cooper
  • March 31, 2020Updated 7:13 p.m. ET
WASHINGTON — The captain of an American aircraft carrier deployed to the Pacific Ocean has pleaded with the Pentagon for more help as a coronavirus outbreak aboard his ship continues to spread, officials said Tuesday. Military officials say dozens of sailors have been infected.

In a four-page letter dated Monday, first reported by The San Francisco Chronicle on Tuesday, Capt. Brett E. Crozier laid out the dire situation unfolding aboard the warship, the Theodore Roosevelt, which has more than 4,000 crew members. He described what he said were the Navy’s failures to provide him with the proper resources to combat the virus by moving sailors off the vessel.
“We are not at war,” Captain Crozier wrote. “Sailors do not need to die. If we do not act now, we are failing to properly take care of our most trusted asset — our sailors.”

The carrier is currently docked in Guam.

Thomas B. Modly, the acting Navy secretary, told CNN in an interview that the Navy was working to move sailors off the ship — but that there were not enough beds in Guam to accommodate the entire crew.

“We’re having to talk to the government there to see if we can get some hotel space, create some tent-type facilities there,” Mr. Modly said. “We’re doing it in a very methodical way because it’s not the same as a cruise ship.”

Speaking to reporters Tuesday night, the commander of the Pacific Fleet, Adm. John C. Aquilino, said that “we’re welcoming feedback” regarding the requests outlined by Captain Crozier.

Admiral Aquilino said that crew members would be rotated off the carrier for testing and quarantine before returning aboard. The intent, he said, was to keep the ship ready to carry out its missions. He said that no crew members had been hospitalized thus far, but he declined to specify the number of infections.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
Coronavirus Live Updates: White House Projects Grim Toll for Americans

Image
Medical workers transferred the bodies of people who had died after contracting the virus to a temporary morgue in Brooklyn on Monday.

Medical workers transferred the bodies of people who had died after contracting the virus to a temporary morgue in Brooklyn on Monday.Credit...Justin Lane/EPA, via Shutterstock

Models predicting expected spread of the virus in the U.S. paint a grim picture.
The top government scientists battling the coronavirus estimated Tuesday that the deadly pathogen could kill between 100,000 and 240,000 Americans, in spite of the social distancing measures that have closed schools, banned large gatherings, limited travel and forced people to stay in their homes.

Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, and Dr. Deborah L. Birx, who is coordinating the coronavirus response, displayed that grim projection at the White House on Tuesday, calling it “our real number” but pledging to do everything possible to reduce those numbers even further.

The conclusions generally match those from similar models by public health researchers around the globe.

As dire as those predictions are, Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx said the number of deaths could be much higher if Americans do not follow the strict guidelines to keep the virus from spreading, and they urged people to take the restrictions seriously.

President Trump, who on Sunday extended for 30 days the government’s recommendations for slowing the spread of the virus, made it clear that the data compiled by Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx convinced him that the death toll would be even higher if the restrictions on work, school, travel and social life were not taken seriously by all Americans.

The data released on Tuesday was the first time that Mr. Trump’s administration has officially estimated the breadth of the threat to human life from the coronavirus, and the disease it brings, known as Covid-19. In the past several weeks, Dr. Birx and Dr. Fauci have resisted predicting how many people might die in the pandemic, saying that there was not enough reliable data.

That is no longer, the case, they said. As of Tuesday afternoon, at least 173,741 people across every state, plus Washington, D.C., and four U.S. territories, have tested positive for the virus, according to a New York Times database. At least 3,433 patients with the virus have died.

President Trump strikes a somber note as he warns of a “painful two weeks ahead.”

‘The Mitigation Is Actually Working,’ Fauci Says

On Tuesday, the coronavirus task force used models to deliver an update on the expected spread of the disease. They projected that Covid-19 could kill up to 240,000 Americans, but pledged to do everything possible to reduce that number.CreditCredit...Erin Schaff/The New York Times

President Trump said at his daily White House coronavirus briefing that “this is going to be a very painful, very very painful two weeks,” but that Americans will soon “start seeing some real light at the end of the tunnel.”

“I want every American to be prepared for the hard days that lie ahead. We’re going through a very tough few weeks,” Mr. Trump said, later raising his two weeks to three.

Striking perhaps his most somber tone on the subject to date, Mr. Trump said the virus is a “great national trial unlike any we have ever faced before,” and said it would require the “full absolute measure of our collective strength, love and devotion” in order to minimize the number of people infected.

“It’s a matter of life and death, frankly,” he said, officially calling for another month of social distancing and offering a sober assessment of the pandemic’s impact in the United States. “It’s a matter of life and death.”

Dr. Deborah L. Birx, the White House’s coronavirus response coordinator, urged Americans to follow the guidelines: no groups larger than 10 people, no unnecessary travel, no going to restaurants or bars.

“There’s no magic bullet, there’s no magic vaccine,” she said. “It’s just behaviors.”
Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said that social distancing measures across the nation are slowing the spread of the virus, but he made clear that the national death toll will continue to rise.

“The 15 days that we’ve had of mitigation clearly are having an effect,” Dr. Fauci said. But, he added: “In the next several days to a week or so we are going to continue to see things go up.”

Mr. Trump, who spent weeks downplaying the threat of the virus — and who has retreated from his recent suggestion that social distancing could be scaled back in mid-April — congratulated himself for projections showing that public health measures may dramatically limit the national death toll.

“What would have happened if we did nothing? Because there was a group that said, ‘Let’s just ride it out,’” Mr. Trump said, without saying what “group” he was referring to.

Mr. Trump said that as many as 2.2 million people “would have died if we did nothing, if we just carried on with our life.”

“You would have seen people dying on airplanes, you would have seen people dying in hotel lobbies — you would have seen death all over,” Mr. Trump said. By comparison, he said, a potential death toll of 100,000 “is a very low number.”

Asked how current casualty estimates might differ had Mr. Trump called for social distancing measures weeks earlier than he did, in mid-March, almost two months after the first confirmed case of coronavirus in the United States, Mr. Trump insisted that he had acted decisively.

“I think we’ve done a great job,” Mr. Trump said.

Asked about his repeated assurances to Americans in recent weeks that the virus would peter out with minimal impact, Mr. Trump insisted, as he has before, that he was trying to reassure the nation.

“I want to be positive; I don’t want to be negative,” Mr. Trump said. “I want to give people in this country hope.”

“We’re going through probably the worst thing the country’s ever seen,” he added. “We lose more here potentially than you lose in world wars as a country.

As many as 25 percent of people infected with the new coronavirus may not show symptoms.


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Image

The high level of symptom-free cases is leading the C.D.C. to consider broadening its guidelines on who should wear masks.Credit...Marian Carrasquero for The New York Times

A startlingly high number of people infected with the new coronavirus may not show symptoms, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said, complicating efforts to predict the pandemic’s course and strategies to mitigate its spread.

In particular, the high level of symptom-free cases is leading the C.D.C. to consider broadening its guidelines on who should wear masks.

“This helps explain how rapidly this virus continues to spread across the country,” the director, Dr. Robert Redfield, told National Public Radio in an interview broadcast on Tuesday.

The agency has repeatedly said that ordinary citizens do not need to wear masks unless they are feeling sick. But with the new data on people who may be infected without ever feeling sick, or who are transmitting the virus for a couple of days before feeling ill, Mr. Redfield said that such guidance was “being critically re-reviewed.”

MASKS
The advice from public health officials has been confusing, leaving us to decide whether a D.I.Y. mask is better than nothing.


Researchers do not know precisely how many people are infected without feeling ill, or if some of them are simply presymptomatic. But since the new coronavirus surfaced in December, researchers have spotted unsettling anecdotes of apparently healthy people who were unwitting spreaders.

“Patient Z,” for example, a 26-year-old man in Guangdong, China, was a close contact of a Wuhan traveler infected with the coronavirus in February. But he felt no signs of anything amiss, not on Day 7 after the contact, nor on Day 10 or 11.
Already by Day 7, though, the virus had bloomed in his nose and throat, just as copiously as in those who did become ill. Patient Z might have felt fine, but he was infected just the same.

Researchers now say that people like Patient Z are not merely anecdotes. For example, as many as 18 percent of people infected with the virus on the Diamond Princess cruise ship never developed symptoms, according to one analysis. A team in Hong Kong suggests that from 20 to 40 percent of transmissions in China occurred before symptoms appeared.

The high level of covert spread may help explain why the novel coronavirus is the first virus that is not an influenza virus to set off a pandemic.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

East [San Francisco] Bay face shield to add extra protection to healthcare workers masks
BAY AREA
by: Michelle Kingston
Posted: Mar 31, 2020 / 08:23 PM PDT / Updated: Mar 31, 2020 / 08:23 PM PDT

BRENTWOOD, Calif. (KRON) – “It may seem like it’s not much but for somebody who has nothing or just a cloth mask it could be the difference between getting a spray of someone who is infected right to your face and being protected,” Jeremy Coleman said.

An East Bay couple is stepping up and adding extra protection to the homemade face masks being made by so many people across the country right now for our healthcare workers.

Jeremy and Kelly Coleman of Brentwood are now making face shields that attach to a mask to hopefully help save lives during this coronavirus outbreak.

“It just felt good to try to help any way we could,” Kelly Coleman said.

Jeremy and Kelly Coleman are making dozens of face shields every day with their four children in Brentwood to attach to the cloth masks they’re also making at home.

“Having a barrier between a patient and a cloth mask is a good thing especially if it’s going to stop direct spray or any other particulates that could come out,” Jeremy said.

The design is simple.

“So it’s just a laminated sheet,” Kelly said.

They stitch velcro onto the sides of a laminated sheet that attach to the velcro on the homemade cloth masks.

The shield can also be added to any mask using pins or clips.

The cost of these laminated sheets are about five cents, they’re reusable and can easily be cleaned.

“They are lightweight, don’t add weight to masks and they are sturdy enough that they can take a direct hit without compromising the wearer of the mask,” Jeremy said.

So far, they’ve donated hundreds of masks to three hospitals in the Bay Area and the phone calls keep coming.

Hospitals are now reaching out to them to say they’re in need.

“We heard some really scary stories from nurses and that helps motivates us to keep going and it may seem like its not much, but for somebody who has nothing or just a cloth mask it could be the difference between getting a spray of someone who is infected right to your face and being protected for five cents so why shouldn’t everyone have it and why cant they have enough to cover everybody and protect everyone we need right now,” Jeremy said.

If you’re interested in making these face shields for your healthcare workers:
1585715056024.png
 
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Texican

Live Free & Die Free.... God Freedom Country....
My daughter is an RN in the Er at OHSU Portland, she’s part time and yesterday she said picking up shifts was getting difficult.....lots of RNs from other units available. Today she texted they want her to go full time.....local news says 12 staff at OHSU are positive for Covid with 51 waiting for results.

In tears she also asked my wife and I if we would raise our grandsons if anything happens to her and SIL, he’s an RN there also. Of course we would, upped my praying for them.....

Turned down the full time.......5&7 yr old boys at home

Nebb,

You have our prayers for your daughter, sil, grandkids and you and your DW.

God bless you and your family.

Hang in there.

Texican....
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Medical professionals discuss whether general public should be wearing masks

by: Dan Kerman
Posted: Mar 31, 2020 / 07:25 PM PDT / Updated: Mar 31, 2020 / 07:25 PM PDT

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (KRON) – To mask or not to mask when you leave the house.

At this time it’s a personal choice but the federal government is considering whether to encourage people to wear them.

“The idea of getting a more broad community wide use of masks outside the health care setting is under very active discussion,” Dr. Anthony Fauci said.

Bay Area infectious disease specialists say the only advantage of wearing a mask would be to prevent giving the virus to someone else, especially if you don’t know you have it.

“The masks don’t protect you, they protect others from you,” Dr. George Rutherford said.

And while UCSF Infectious Disease Expert Dr. George Rutherford says that may be enough of a reason to recommend it, other medical experts say the costs may outweigh the benefits.

“It gives you a false sense of security, you may think I have the mask, I don’t have to be 6-feet from somebody else, not true. Not a lot of great evidence the mask will protect you in the first place and if you get within 6-feet can get COVID or at least there’s a good chance,” Dr. John Swartzberg said.

UC Berkeley Infectious Disease Specialist Dr. John Swartzberg fears those wearing a mask touch their face more often, which is exactly not what you want.
He also says health care workers must remain first in line for masks.

“If people start wearing those and start hoarding them they won’t have them for people in the hospital,” Swartzberg said.

“If there are enough great, if not enough they need to go to the place we need them the most first,” Rutherford said.

Most medical experts agree the supply of masks must increase before there is a move to recommend for the public to wear them but we could reach that point in a month or so.

“As we move away from shelter in place a month from now or whenever this could be one of the transitional interventions we put in place,” Rutherford said.

At this point though, experts say nothing tops staying at home, washing your hands and staying 6-feet apart from people when you do have to go out.
 

Countrymouse

Country exile in the city
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i7U2pkeysXI
14/:16
How to Treat Coronavirus Patients in the ICU (Intensive Care Unit) | Covid-19
•Mar 30, 2020


Doctor Mike Hansen


How to Treat Coronavirus Patients in the ICU (Intensive Care Unit) | Covid-19 Coronavirus (COVID-19) has brought unprecedented challenges regarding the ability to generate timely evidence, all while this pandemic overwhelms hospitals and health care workers. About 5% of patients with coronavirus require admission to the intensive care unit and mechanical ventilation. Based on the recent epidemiological models, Coronavirus is going to hit all the areas in the USA. Every ICU is preparing for the surge, there are a number of changes that intensive care units are making, including ours. We are preparing anesthesiologists (who are not CCM trained) and nurse anesthetists, to help us manage patients with COVID-19. Even though they are not CCM trained, we have a lot of overlap of knowledge, especially when it comes to managing ventilators, and we have a lot of overlap with certain procedures. By allowing anesthesiologists and nurse anesthetists to help in this manner, it will help other intensivists like myself handle the surge of patients coming our way. And because they are helping us, that is the main reason for me making this video, so that they can watch this and be better equipped to handle the surge with us. “Knowing, and implementing all of the info in this video does not guarantee you save a COVID-19 patient living in the ICU, but, it will give you the best chance of doing so” If a patient with COVID-19 is coming to your ICU, they most certainly have pneumonia, and they probably have acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) as well. Patients with severe disease who require ICU admission are likely to have high oxygen requirements. Although both High flow oxygen and noninvasive positive pressure ventilation have been used for COVID-19, the safety of these is uncertain, and they are considered aerosol-generating procedures that warrant specific isolation precautions. Most patients who require ICU admission have ARDS, and they will likely have a better outcome if intubated sooner rather than later. That is another reason why it likely better to skip Hi-Flow oxygen and NIPPV and jump straight to intubation. Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (ARDS) ARDS is a clinical diagnosis, based on non-cardiogenic pulmonary edema, with bilateral patchy infiltrates on chest imaging and a PaO2/FiO2 ratio of less than 300. In ARDS, there is this crazy, chaotic inflammatory response within the lungs, with damage to the alveoli and surrounding capillaries, which leads to excess protein and fluid accumulation in interstitial and alveolar spaces. That means decreased lung compliance, increased V̇/Q̇ mismatch, and increases in shunt and dead-space ventilation. Patients with ARDS are at high risk of mortality, which increases with ARDS severity. With that said, mortality is usually the result of the underlying disease that triggered ARDS, rather than refractory hypoxemia. The severity of ARDS is important because it’s going to determine how we manage patients with ARDS. With ARDS, the alveoli fill up with protein and fluid. This leads to at least partial alveolar collapse, and decreased lung compliance, with shunt physiology. Increasing the PEEP minimizes the repeated opening and closing of distal airways and alveoli. It also improves the homogeneity of the lung parenchyma by reducing drastic differences in regional lung compliance. It also improves V̇/Q̇ mismatch and shunt by maintaining alveolar recruitment. You’re essentially “popping open” as many collapsed alveoli as possible. What is the ideal level of PEEP? No one knows for sure. Typically for ARDS, we set the initial PEEP between 10 to 15. Sometimes all the way to 20 if they have severe disease. You don’t want to go too high though, because this increases the risk of pneumothorax. The recommendation is to give COVID-19 patients steroids only if they have ARDS. Critically ill patients with coronavirus often develop septic shock. And for shock, we give IVF and vasopressors. But ARDS patients generally do better when you keep them in a negative fluid balance state. COVID-19 patient, who is in shock and ARDS, what should you do? Based on my experience of treating ARDS patients who are in shock, my recommendation would be to use minimal fluid possible and to start vasopressors early. In my experience, patients tend to respond better to albumin than crystalloids, especially if they have low albumin levels. Either way, you’re going to want to assess fluid resuscitation responsiveness, and if they don’t respond well to fluids, just stick with the vasopressors. 1st line vasopressor is always going to be norepinephrine, aka levophed, with 2nd line being vasopressin, especially if they’re tachycardic. In critically ill adults with fever, the use of medications for temperature control is sometimes needed. Note: To get the proper details please watch the video from first to last without skipping.


Thank you Marsh for an excellent video / article.

SHOUT OUT QUESTION to our medical / herbal folks:

There were many good comments below the video if you go to the You Tube site. One of these, in a long summation of the video and latest reccomendations written by "deenycest10710" was this---

Zinc - Again, check levels with your physician. Zinc interrupts the RNA synthesis of COVID 19, but taking it orally does nothing to that effect. There needs to be an ionophore to attach to the virus.

I have heard repeatedly here that Zinc "IS" a good preventative measure----is this untrue? If so, then are ALL forms or oral Zinc (dissolving tablet OR liquid) worthless? How else can we (as lay people) get Zinc "into" our systems? Is the only truly viable way by an IV or some such?
 

Doomer Doug

TB Fanatic

As expected, the current shelter-in-place order for the Bay Area has been extended for nearly a month, and with it comes new regulations for the restaurants and grocery stores still in operation during the pandemic.

According to a joint announcement from the six participating counties: Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo, and Santa Clara, as well as the city of Berkeley (which operates its own Department of Public Health), the new end date for the order is Sunday, May 3 — a change from the Friday, May 1 extension that was previously touted, and a far cry from the initial April 7 end date.

Also new are restrictions on businesses termed essential that are therefore allowed to remain open. Under the new order (here’s Santa Clara’s, the language other than the county name is the same for all), which goes into effect as of 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday, March 31, restaurants may remain open for takeout and delivery as they have been since the initial order on March 16.

However, now those places — as well as grocery and food stores, which are also allowed to remain open — must prepare and post a “Social Distancing Protocol,” using this document as a template. As part of that plan, businesses must post signs at each public entrance “to inform all employees and customers that they should: avoid entering the facility if they have a cough or fever; maintain a minimum six-foot distance from one another; sneeze and cough into a cloth or tissue or, if not available, into one’s elbow; and not shake hands or engage in any unnecessary physical contact.”

Another new development is a per-person limit on “goods that are selling out quickly,” such as grocery store staples like beans. Stores are asked to place “per-person limits” on those items, with the goal of reducing crowds and lines. Stores must also “post an employee at the door to ensure that the maximum number of customers in the facility...is not exceeded.”

Finally, there are formal codifications of procedures most places are (one hopes) already following: For example, restaurants and grocery stores (as well as other businesses that might have lines) must now place “tape or other markings at least six feet apart in customer line areas inside the store and on sidewalks at public entrances with signs directing customers to use the markings to maintain distance.” And now it’s official: The new rules say that stores and restaurants may not allow “customers to bring their own bags, mugs, or other reusable items from home.”

Every restaurant, grocery store, and other Bay Area essential business must fill out and display this document is 11:59 p.m. on April 2, 2020, the order reads, and business owners must be ready and able to show “evidence of its implementation to any authority enforcing this Order upon demand,” which means that restaurants must prove to officials that even in tight quarters like kitchens, the six-foot rule is being officially observed.

Finally, don’t assume that you can grab some takeout and enjoy it during a nice, socially distant meal at a local park. As part of the new order, all “playgrounds, dog parks, public picnic areas, and similar recreational areas” have been closed to the public.

“What we need now, for the health of all our communities, is for people to stay home,” San Francisco Department of Public Health head Dr. Grant Colfax said via statement. “Even though it has been difficult, the Bay Area has really stepped up to the challenge so far, and we need to reaffirm our commitment. We need more time to flatten the curve, to prepare our hospitals for a surge, and to do everything we can to minimize the harm that the virus causes to our communities.”
Who are these clowns trying to implement this folly. People WILL NOT STAY INSIDE 24/7 for the next six months. They need to and WILL CONTINUE. TO GO OUTSIDE FOR EXERCISE AND WILL CONTINUE TO BUY TAKE OUT FOOD AND EAT THEM AT PARKS ETC. AND IF THE SYUPID MARXIST MORONS TRY AMD EMFORCE THESE BANS THEY WILL TRIGGER A VIOLENT RESPONSE.
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment
Lower than expected rate of new Bay Area cases could suggest social distancing is effective

by: Kate Rooney
Posted: Mar 31, 2020 / 06:40 PM PDT / Updated: Mar 31, 2020 / 06:40 PM PDT

SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. (KRON) – There’s cautious optimism among Bay Area medical professionals on Tuesday as some doctors find promise in the rates of COVID-19 infection in the area.

Since the first diagnosed case of novel coronavirus appeared in the Bay Area on January 31st, healthcare workers have been preparing for a surge in patients but that surge hasn’t quite come yet, at least not as forcefully as expected.

“We have what seemingly looks like a delay in that surge, that we know is still coming, but the more time that we’ve been able to put between now and when that surge is coming, it’s just more time we have to prepare,” Dr. Fajimi said.

That means more time to train staff, more time to refine procedures, and more time to acquire the necessary supplies.

The lower-than-expected rate of new cases isn’t enough to proclaim an official flattening of the curve but it could suggest social distancing in the Bay Area has been effective.

“There’s one thing that we can locally point to that we’ve done different than a lot of other places, and that’s the state of emergency that was called early, the shelter in place and the social distancing all the messaging around that, and that seems to have, it has to have some impact,” Fajimi said.

So far, the sheer number of cases has not risen as rapidly in the Bay Area as initially feared, as compared with other major metropolitan areas that have since adopted similar shelter-in-place orders.

“I believe it is starting to bend the curve, but it’s not enough, and it hasn’t been in place for long enough, and so we need to keep at it. We just need to keep at it,” Dr. Sara Cody said.

Doctors stress that while encouraging, these numbers are not indicative of a definite trend and that the best thing people can do now to help is stay home.
 

Texican

Live Free & Die Free.... God Freedom Country....

marsh

On TB every waking moment

What Happens If Health-Care Workers Stop Showing Up?

Unless the country does dramatically more to provide them with the equipment they need to do their job safely, it risks disaster.

MARCH 24, 2020
Thomas Kirsch
Emergency physician


Doctors in Emilia Romagna

Around the world, health workers are facing dire circumstances as the coronavirus continues to spread. Pictured here are two doctors in the Emilia Romagna region of Italy.FRANCESCO COCO / CONTRASTO / REDUX

The morning before my shift, I try to stay busy with emails, writing, cleaning the house, anything really. If I sit and think about it too long, undisturbed, I get nervous. I’m afraid to go to work, and yet I’m told I must. The flitting anxiety swells as I pull on my scrubs and head to the car. The streets are empty. I drive alone into the epicenter. It peaks when I first step through the door into the jumble of patients in chairs, stretchers, and beds crowded around our cramped workstation, staff jammed together discussing care, writing notes, calling reports.

Then I start, surrounded by my colleagues, and am too busy to think about it. The fear is as much for my family and friends as for me. Probably more. I’m a physician who works in an emergency department in Washington, D.C., and the coronavirus is spreading.

I worked in Liberia at the height of the Ebola epidemic, in the fall of 2014. After only a few months, many nurses, doctors, and community health-care workers grew sick and died; most of the rest quit; and the entire health-care system collapsed. Every hospital and clinic in the country closed. We don’t ever want that to happen, no one does, but we need to act now to protect health-care workers from making that awful decision.

The COVID-19 pandemic is certainly not Ebola—the case-fatality rate is perhaps 1 percent, not 50 percent—but it raises an important practical and ethical question: How much risk do health-care workers have to take? Or, more bluntly: How many of us will die before we start to walk away from our jobs?

This is not a rhetorical question. In the SARS outbreak in Toronto, Canada, in 2003, 44 percent of all infections were in health-care providers. Two nurses and a physician died. In Arkansas, four of the first 12 COVID-19 patients were health-care workers. Last Sunday, the American College of Emergency Physicians reported that two ER doctors with COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, are being treated in intensive-care units.

In China, about 3,000 health-care workers have been infected, and 22 have died providing care for COVID-19 patients. Consider also that “transmission to family members is widely reported.”

This is the dark secret of planning for a pandemic that can also kill health-care providers and their families. When we prepare for disasters, we plan using the mnemonic “Staff, stuff, space, and systems.” We can always make more space by wedging an extra bed in, or by repurposing another building. We can buy more stuff, supplies, and equipment. We can find new supply lines, reboot our computer systems. But we cannot conjure up doctors and nurses and health-care technicians. Physicians take at least 11 years to train after high school. Nurses at least four. Techs take years or months.

The United States needs its health-care workers to see it through this crisis. But there are no replacements on the shelf. They can’t be built, trained, or repurposed from other jobs. Unless the country does dramatically more to provide them with the equipment they need to do their job safely, to assure them they will be cared for if they fall ill, and to provide their family with a measure of security, it risks losing them. What happens when they need to be quarantined? When they start to die? Or don’t come to work?

It’s hard to plan after that happens.

As i settle into the rhythm of work one recent Monday evening, the controlled chaos of the emergency department seems almost normal. Patients come and go; the crowd in the waiting room swells to more than 30 people (and their family) before dinner. The halls are lined with patients on stretchers in various states of dress and discomfort. Twelve patients are waiting for beds, blocking those spaces for the people in the waiting room.

But some things have changed. Many of us are wearing surgical masks or are muffled in N95 respirators; others have on goggles. We have converted our urgent-care section into an infectious-disease screening area. The younger staff work there, shapelessly encased in personal protective equipment (PPE).

Wajahat Ali: Where are the masks?

My colleagues are remarkable. They know the risks. They go to work anyway. No one complains, just like no one says, “Good job!” or “You’re so brave!” They simply buckle down and get things done. Even in normal times, we survive on ironic, dark humor because we deal with death and sickness and the worst parts of society—violence, addiction, abuse—every day. But these days, the jokes are sometimes so sharp as to bite.

I’ve been to disasters all over the world, and I have always seen health-care providers pour in to help. Usually, within an hour, there are more than are needed—nurses, lab workers, X-ray technicians, doctors. No one has to ask; they just show up. And then they work nonstop until someone makes them take a break or they fall exhausted. It’s what we do.

But that sort of bravery, that work ethic, is not boundless. No one is so fearless or stupid as to discount all risks.

Physicians fled epidemics in ancient Greece, the black death in Europe, and the great influenza pandemic of 1918. In Vietnam, when SARS cases showed up in one hospital, most of the staff left, leaving only a few to risk their life providing care. During the West African Ebola epidemic of 2014 and ’15, at least 837 health-care workers were infected, and 490 died. The infection also spread to at least three health-care workers caring for patients with Ebola in the United States and Europe. Providers were up to 32 times more likely to be infected with Ebola than the general population.

Multiple studies have asked health-care providers whether they would go to work during various disaster scenarios. The answer is a resounding yes for earthquakes, floods, and even war. But pandemics are different. One study in 2010 found that 28 percent of the hospital staff said that they would be unlikely to respond to an influenza pandemic if asked, but not required. In a German study, 36 percent of health-care workers said they would not come to work during an influenza pandemic. For some job categories, fewer than 50 percent of workers said they would report to duty. What made workers more likely to say they would show up? Confidence that they were safe at work and getting to work, that their family was safe and cared for, and knowing their colleagues would also respond.

Family is my own biggest issue, and the one I hear most discussed sitting around the nurses’ station. Am I going to bring home an infection to my wife? A disease that could kill my kids? Health-care providers have made remarkable sacrifices to keep their family safe. In Liberia, Ebola-burial-team members moved out of their home and lived in plywood shacks for months. During the SARS outbreak, clinicians in Hong Kong and Toronto lived in their hospital. Emergency providers today have moved into their garage, rented apartments, or sent their family to live with relatives. When I got home that night, I left my shoes and bag outside, stripped just inside my front door, threw all my clothes straight in the basement washing machine set to “sanitize,” and took a 15-minute shower in the guest bath before sitting with my wife.

Sure, with COVID-19, the risk of death is low. But what are the odds that you are prepared to accept for your family? A one in 100 chance of dying? One in 10,000?

I try to live by the oath I took in medical school to treat all patients fairly and equally, even with risk to my own health. But after the West African Ebola epidemic, and now with COVID-19, I know I am not necessarily that strong. The hair stands up on the back of my neck when I hear ethicists, hospital administrators, and politicians, sitting in their safe offices, lecture me on my obligation to die providing health- care. We don’t take these risks because of an abstract “ethical duty”; we take them because it is what we do every time we walk into the chaos and danger of the emergency department. We do it because it is our job.

Yes, physicians and nurses have an ethical duty to provide care. (I have even written about it.) The perspective of medical ethicists is pretty straightforward—health-care providers, especially physicians, should continue to care for the sick even if it puts their life at risk. We have an obligation to treat all patients, because we chose our profession and are well rewarded by society with money and respect. Nurses have a similar professional duty, but have specific exemptions. But there are few, if any, obligations for all the support staff that make my work possible—the techs, clerks, registrars, environmental staff. They don’t take an oath. Some are paid minimum wage, have few benefits, and get none of the societal accolades reserved for doctors and nurses. Why should they die for a $25,000-a-year job and $10,000 worth of life insurance? Who’s going to feed their kids when they’re gone?

When you’re the one wearing a flimsy paper gown and mask in the same room as someone dying from an invisible virus that makes its home in the same air you breathe, nothing is simple.

Our duty is not boundless, and in bad situations, sacrificing providers is not what is best for society. If health-care providers are going to risk their life, then there is a reciprocal obligation—the fairness principle—that society, employers, and hospitals keep them safe and ensure that they are fairly treated, whether they live, get sick, or die.

First, hospitals must provide the resources necessary to protect the staff caring for infected patients—not just PPE, but also training, environmental controls, and policies and procedures to prevent spread. At a minimum, providers should be offered a free place to stay away from their family and be compensated for the time that they may not be able to touch their own children. Who’s going to take care of my wife and kids if I have to sleep on a cot in the hospital for two months? What about single parents whose kids are home because their schools are closed?

If someone is going to risk their life, then they deserve the best possible care to save them. We understood this during Ebola—the first treatment center built by the U.S. government in Liberia was the Monrovia Medical Unit, specifically for Ebola-infected health-care staff. Providers need the reassurance that they will get preferential access to care and medications in exchange for their sacrifice. This is not just fair, but practical—keeping clinicians alive means that they will be able to continue to provide care. Just knowing that the MMU was opening made recruiting providers easier.

Providers who become infected also deserve fair compensation—full pay while they are sick or if they are forced to quarantine to protect their patients. They should all have disability and life insurance. The families of those who sacrifice their life deserve great compensation.

I have seen little evidence of this. Emergency-physician message boards are full of concern about the lack of preparation by their hospitals. Few of these financial arrangements exist. I haven’t received any special training, mostly just a few emails about “the situation.” That doesn’t protect me. PPE is already being rationed, and there are dire predictions that it will run out long before this pandemic is over. Should I still have to go to work knowing I will get infected and have a 5 percent chance of dying? Why do my colleagues have to pay for a separate apartment when forced to self-quarantine away from their families?

Thus far, the attitude has been: What’s the big deal? It’s just COVID-19, with a mortality of less than 1 percent. But tell that to the two emergency physicians in critical care right now, or the infected health-care providers in Arkansas, Washington, New York, and other states. Tell that to their families.

Six months into the 15-month Ebola epidemic, health-care providers stopped coming to work. They had little PPE. They saw their friends die without any special care. Their colleagues began abandoning their jobs, one by one, until there was no one left. There was nowhere for people to obtain treatment for stomach pain, childbirth, heart attacks, car crashes, or any other routine or unpredictable health event. As a result, experts estimate that more people died from illnesses like malaria and diarrhea than Ebola.

When health-care providers get sick, become disabled, or die, they can no longer provide care for anyone, not just infected patients.

In Italy, at least 2,000 health-care workers have been infected and are not providing care. Some have died. Some hospitals cohort, or group, providers so that they care for only infected patients, leaving others to care for the uninfected. Others providers can’t work, because they are quarantined after possible exposures or because of known infections. But that is the way it has to be. The core ethics principle for physicians and nurses is primum non nocere—“First, do no harm”—and the last thing we want to do is spread the infection to our patients or other health-care staff.

The demand for health care is going to increase exponentially over the next few weeks, but there could be fewer and fewer providers available to share the burden. The future I see is bleak—a shift with two physicians on quarantine or sick leave, and the single backup is late. Three nurses have called out, and four techs. The waiting room is jammed, and there are people in masks sitting outside on the curb, coughing. Twenty patients are waiting for in-patient beds, but won’t go upstairs until after their COVID-19 test results return. There really aren’t any in-patient beds, anyway. It’s demoralizing. The emergency department is like an island slowly sinking into the sea, the overwhelmed waypoint between the world and the hospital, but connected to neither.

I am afraid a tipping point could happen with little warning. The loss of providers will come from many causes—quarantine, sickness, caring for their own family, cohorting—but it will be the creeping fear and feeling of abandonment that eats at us the most. A slow drip, drip, drip of attrition. Having colleagues sharing the burden is a crucial predictor for clinicians’ willingness to work despite the risk.

But when the cascade starts, when you are forced to reuse your disposable face mask for the third day in a row, and another nurse doesn’t come in, because of her concern for her daughter, and you know that two of your colleagues are being treated in the ICU and another 10 are home infected, and then another physician calls out sick, and there are no clerks again today? Sooner or later, you look around and see so few standing with you. At some point, the system could break, and we will all be gone.

Igathered my things after sign-out at midnight, demoralized by what I see here and what is ahead. I’m scared. I don’t want to see my friends die, or my family, or even me. I want us to be there to help others through this whole long, painful time. Providers need the support and protection of our society and their employers so that we can meet our obligations, to our patients and to our families. Every effort has to be made and it has to start now. As I walked out of the workstation, a nurse looked up at me, fingers poised motionless over the keyboard, eyes bright above her mask. “We’re going to be all right. Aren’t we?”
We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to letters@theatlantic.com.

Tom Kirsch is an emergency physician, disaster scientist, and writer living in Bethesda, Maryland.
 

Ractivist

Pride comes before the fall.....Pride month ended.
I"ve been thinking......as most here. But the numbers don't make sense. How can we be peaking, when the number of infected is so low? Supposedly, we are in the exponential growth rate of large numbers, which I agree with. But, where are we in this? Last I saw they were under a million or so nation wide infected, and in two or three weeks it will peak? Makes no sense. The rate of infection is said to be RO of 4 or so. It can not peak at four or sixteen million. It peaks when the majority are infected, and we are far from that....six to eight weeks will be the real peak. And then we will see the millions or more die. I guess the plan is to dole out small bites, all along the way, even today. And then they speak of the second wave, and the third wave......in months to come. I shudder to comprehend it all. Come Lord Jesus.

But then again, the antidote is known...if they administer it, life is much better.........as death rates go. I shake my head...
 

Ragnarok

On and On, South of Heaven
Everything will get more expensive in the future. I agree that the road ahead is longer than just beating the virus. It is fascinating as sheeple start realizing that what we want and what need are not the same things. As Hollywood lounges in their plush homes wondering why nobody cares about them, real people with real problems don’t have time to hear them whine and preach.

Which may be the only good thing to come out of this... I see a lot of people turning on the Hollywood types on twitter.

I love it!
 

Texican

Live Free & Die Free.... God Freedom Country....
Thank you Marsh for an excellent video / article.

SHOUT OUT QUESTION to our medical / herbal folks:

There were many good comments below the video if you go to the You Tube site. One of these, in a long summation of the video and latest reccomendations written by "deenycest10710" was this---

Zinc - Again, check levels with your physician. Zinc interrupts the RNA synthesis of COVID 19, but taking it orally does nothing to that effect. There needs to be an ionophore to attach to the virus.

I have heard repeatedly here that Zinc "IS" a good preventative measure----is this untrue? If so, then are ALL forms or oral Zinc (dissolving tablet OR liquid) worthless? How else can we (as lay people) get Zinc "into" our systems? Is the only truly viable way by an IV or some such?

CM,

I use Ziacam in my nose and mouth and it will be absorbed. You could also melt zinc tabs under your tongue.

Texican....
 

marsh

On TB every waking moment

Coronavirus: The Italian COVID-19 hospital where no medics have been infected

Armed guards patrol all the corridors and there are walk-in disinfection machines that look like airport scanners.
Stuart Ramsay
Chief correspondent @ramsaysky
Tuesday 31 March 2020 21:16, UK [Videos on website]
  • e3f6e2894475ce62eeda81b4beb5571bfd8b1c2fe8f18205467d7c89a340222b_4959566.jpg


    Inside Italy's model hospital in Naples
In northern Italy thousands of medical staff are getting sick fighting the coronavirus pandemic and dozens have died - but far to the south, they have had time to prepare.

At Cotugno Hospital, a specialist infectious diseases facility that now only treats COVID-19 patients, armed guards patrol the corridors.

As we walked inside we passed disinfection machines that look like airport scanners, but they clean you down.
Cotugno Hospital


A hospital in Naples is well equipped and prepared to fight coronavirus.
While the speed of the virus storm caught everyone by surprise in the north,
and medical teams were overwhelmed, things at this hospital were different.

We were taken, fully clothed in our protective layers and goggles, into one of their Intensive Care Units (ICU).


Man being struggling for breath due to COVID-19 in Bergamo, Italy.



19 March: The shocking centre of the COVID-19 crisis
This was a whole different level to anything we have seen before.

The staff treating the sickest patients are wearing super advanced masks - much nearer to a gas mask than we normally see our hospital staff wearing.https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-thailand-trials-15-minute-covid-19-test-11966591
Italy's hardest-hit city wants you to see how COVID-19 is affecting its hospitals

They are clad in thick waterproof suits that means the doctors and nurses are effectively sealed in.

Incredibly, so far at least, not a single member of the medical teams has been affected - it seems it can be done, you just have to have the right gear and follow the right protocols.

We sensed a sudden change. A nurse rushed past us desperately drawing medicine in to a syringe. A patient inside one of the treatment rooms is deteriorating fast.

High containment ambulances at the Cotugno hospital in Naples. Pic: Salvatore Laporta/IPA/Shutterstock

Image:High containment ambulances at the Cotugno Hospital in Naples. Pic: Salvatore Laporta/IPA/Shutterstock
As we watched on, he prepared an injection outside the treatment room.He never goes inside but communicated through a window to colleagues with the patient. They never come outside during crisis moments, and this is one.
Coronavirus: The infection numbers in real time


When it's ready, the medicine is passed through a compartment door.

Remember, he's not been inside and hasn't touched anyone or anything - but he immediately removes his gloves and scrubs down. This attention to detail is an absolute constant.

This hospital is the exception in the south of the country. It was already the most advanced, but we began to realise that keeping the medical teams safe is possible.

What they're noticing is that everyone and anyone can get infected, not just the old.

There are many young patients being treated here and interestingly they are finding that the middle classes are being infected the most.

I asked why? The answer is obvious really - they travel.

What is really striking here is that the rules of separating infected environments and the clean areas are followed by everyone.

But armed security guards are on every connecting corridor in case anyone forgets.

Cotugno Hospital

Image:The staff treating the sickest patients wear super advanced masks
We're moved back and the corridors locked down as a new patient is brought in. This happens every time as preparation is the key to stopping the virus.

"This is the first thing to do in this kind of hospital," the head of respiratory medicine, Dr Roberto Parrella, told me as more patients were wheeled past.

"It's very, very important to separate the street [corridor] and so on, to organise how [to] dress and undress, how [to] put a doctor or nurse in the room, how [to] put your mask on right, it's very important."

I asked him if having the right equipment is equally important.

"Yes, we fight for, fight for [it], however now we have," he said.

We are shown into the sub-intensive care unit where the patients are either recovering or haven't deteriorated yet, but the same separation rules as the ICU apply. A red and white tape marks the line that can't be crossed.

Clean area nurses and doctors assist infected area staff across the line. They keep the two absolutely separate.

That separation is the key. It's a separation the doctors here acknowledge was almost impossible for doctors and nurses in the north to observe because the tide of patients arriving was so great.

The medical staff constantly refer to the "tsunami" everywhere we go.

Two of the wards are run by Dr Giuseppe Fiorentino. He is absolutely in control of the staff as they work gruelling hours to contain the spread of the virus.

He walked me through the wards explaining how they treat the patients. The advantage all the staff here have over their colleagues around the country is that they are used to dealing with very serious diseases like HIV/Aids and tuberculosis.

He explains the measures they are following for COVID-19 is second nature to them. That knowledge has protected his staff.

Intensive care ward in hospital in Lombardy, Italy



20 March: Sky visits Cremona Hospital in Lombardy where staff face a fight to save every patient

There is a higher number of infections in the doctors in the north, he told me, because they couldn't keep the separation lines working. He isn't blaming them, it's just a fact.

"In this hospital not one," he said.

He knew that I had been to the most badly affected hospitals in Italy, particularly the hospitals in Lombardy, and was desperate to know what it was like.

I got the sense that the pictures we showed on Sky News and distributed around the world were every doctor's nightmare.

As the pandemic spreads, we are seeing the number of infected and dying jump every day.

Health workers are right on the frontline and they're succumbing to the illness too.

Perhaps, though, it doesn't have to be inevitable. It isn't here, but they have the kit, they don't just hope for the best.
 

Countrymouse

Country exile in the city
WTF is this? The guy is speaking Spanish, I think, but you don't need to understand him.

:shkr:

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Video:



Oh dear God help us---
He goes into a hospital (wearing blue pants so he may be a hospital worker himself) and films the PILES (and I DO MEAN PILES) of BODIES IN BAGS --- on the floor filling entire rooms, in the halls, in the anterooms---EVERYWHERE. They have so many dead in NYC they literally have NO WHERE TO PUT THEM ALL.

I know you all here already knew that from reading the news--but as the saying goes a picture is worth 1000 words.....
 
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