From a first responder with emergency department experience

a reply to: whereislogic

What is the obsession with testing for a virus that isn't treatable?

If you have symptoms stay home. Practice social distancing whether you're sick or not. Do not go around sick people for any reason. Do not go near people who have had contact with sick people for any reason. Wash your hands and don't touch your face.

There is no possible way to communicate or become infected with this or another virus if you follow these very basic and year-round commonplace measures.

There's no cure for this disease. All the testing in the World won't help because a presumptive positive is just as good as a lab confirmed positive. The result is the same: isolate, support and monitor for severe (ie: breathing compromising) symptoms.

originally posted by: JBurns
a reply to: whereislogic

What is the obsession with testing for a virus that isn't treatable?

If you have symptoms stay home. Practice social distancing whether you're sick or not. Do not go around sick people for any reason. Do not go near people who have had contact with sick people for any reason. Wash your hands and don't touch your face.

There is no possible way to communicate or become infected with this or another virus if you follow these very basic and year-round commonplace measures.

There's no cure for this disease. All the testing in the World won't help because a presumptive positive is just as good as a lab confirmed positive. The result is the same: isolate, support and monitor for severe (ie: breathing compromising) symptoms.

Because Corona is so tricky to differentiate from the cold, flu or just a regular cough, meaning people with symptoms will often not self-quarantaine if they are not tested positive (especially when the media keeps telling them they are desperately needed such as health care workers, or grocery store employees). And because the disease is contagious before symptoms appear. If you want to protect the vulnerable groups, you absolutely need to test those who work with them along with proper PPE (N95 masks included).

Not to mention that testing (in particular search & contain) has clearly proven to have positive results in the fatality rates and speed at which the virus spreads. Which helps with flattening the curve, way more than any lockdown measures. The biggest spreaders of the disease are still those who don't know they have it and are working in health care. The numbers are clear from Europe. Germany tests, tests, tests (most in Europe per million pop); Italy tests the same people over and over and started too late, also fewer people tested per million. Belgium tests a bit more than the Netherlands and has flattened the curve also a bit more than the Netherlands (Germany, Belgium, France and the Netherlands all started out on the same trajectory, now their deaths/1M pop are 8, 44, 46 and a whopping 50! respectively. Austria, Norway and Switzerland, testing like crazy, had a worse problem than the Netherlands early on in March (where the most restrictive testing policy of Europe has been activated on March 12), now they're at 12, 6 and 41; all doing much better in flattening the curve than the Netherlands with their ridiculously restrictive testing policy.

Btw, the symptoms they are describing for Covid-19 in my country are things I do all year long, every year. Then again, they were never very clear about it starting with a dry cough rather than a wet cough (had to figure that one out from the WHO). Or whether or not a sore throat is a decent indicator. For me, I can't tell the difference because I often have a sore throat and I'm always coughing and sneezing, and after I've been sneezing, I get a runny nose (which was given as a symptom to stay home for by our prime minister although he used a very vague description regarding sniffing, being sniffy as we call it here, yet the WHO says a runny nose is extremely rare and the main indicators of Covid-19 are a fever, a dry cough or a nasal airway that is completely blocked so you can't even sniff, like when you have a cold) and a sore throat. I will not self-quarantaine if I don't get a noticeable fever or anything indicating a difference with my normal crappy lung operation (coughing up stuff all the time and always having stuff blocking my airways until I do, or sneeze it out).

Then again, at the moment I'm having my groceries delivered anyway so I'm not going out.

I would also argue that "not treatable" is not the right description for the Corona virus given the rather effective treatments that are already being tested in clinical trials and where these treatments are approved on a compassionate basis as they call it when the FDA (or similar organizations in other countries) haven't approved of that treatment for general use yet. "Not treatable" is just a phrase they like to use in the media for various purposes (usually to cover for some political or organizational failure to properly prepare or do something useful now, like implementing these treatments on a much wider basis and bending the rules a bit*). *: for example, if someone in the Netherlands with Corona would be aware of the treatments given in clinical trials in New York which seems to show great promise in increasing a patient's chance to survive, and were to ask to be given the same treatment, they would not get it in the Netherlands because of the rules here. Those same rules are preventing the same clinical trials here. And I suspect that even after more and more positive numbers are coming in, it will take much longer for the Dutch organization that is the equivalent of the FDA, to approve these treatments for general use than it will take for the FDA to do so.

Oh, seems I was right (or at least it's already heading that way):

FDA authorizes emergency use of unapproved drugs to treat coronavirus - The Washington Post
Malaria Drugs Get FDA 'Emergency Use Authorization' For COVID-19 : Coronavirus Live Updates : NPR
Could Chloroquine Treat Coronavirus? - Scientific American (March 27)

Five questions are answered about a promising yet problematic and unproved use for an antimalarial drug

Note that the first 2 articles about the approval of the FDA are from 12 hours ago whereas the article from Scientific American is from March 27.

How long will it take until lives are saved in the Netherlands by doing something similar to what the FDA apparently did approx. 12 hours ago (that at least makes those drugs available to those patients who ask for it on compassionate basis or want to be part of a clinical trial; if you read the details, you will see you can't quite describe it as an approval for general use just yet, but that's besides my point)? We haven't even started clinical trials and administering the treatment on compassionate basis here yet. And you can't even get it if you're aware of it. Your physician won't even tell you about it when they're discussing possible treatments. Next thing you'll know, they'll be talking about scarcity for those 2 drugs again in the Netherlands (read second article thinking about preparedness to get an idea what made me think of that excuse for failure to prepare properly again, which I've heard endlessly now in the media here, even though we need only a fraction of what other countries around us need, have, use or are getting; as I tried to demonstrate with my ventilators example in my previous comment, although I'm thinking more of Germany, France and the UK now).

a reply to: JBurns

Ahh, sniffly was the word I was looking for in English, which was the one our Prime Minister said we should stay home for. I'm always sniffly after I've been sneezing. And I'm always sneezing when my airways are somewhat blocked with stuff. And my airways are always blocked regardless if I have a cold or not. They already get blocked after eating something hot, just like a runny nose will develop for me then.

According to the WHO, a runny nose was not one of the major signs of Covid-19. And for me, it's business as usual. So I''ll take my information from the WHO rather than our Prime Minister, thank you very much.

a reply to: whereislogic

I wonder how Theresa May would have coped with this event.... Ah that's why that quivering old lady made way for someone of the eccentricity to play along nice, no wonder that sociopath Hilary Clinton was so gutted to lose the election she would have been in her element being a figurehead in this chaos.

a reply to: Iconic

My sister works in Operating Theatres. Some have been closed for operations and moved towards extra care space for Covid-19 - which seems reasonable, considering all that is going on.

Chatting to her, it is surprising the sheer amount of PPE required. For example, something simple like gloves. Over here in Blighty, staff dealing with this have gloves on. Then they have to use another layer of gloves over the top to reduce the chance of contamination. In ICU, this could also lead to another layer of gloves which then need to binned immediately before treating another patient. Multiply this by every health care worker and in gloves alone you are talking about astronomical numbers of PPE.

As an aside, the thing they seem to be struggling with is full face masks. They don't have anywhere near enough to go round. They have advised using goggles where possible but if you wear glasses, the goggles don't fit. This means a proportion of health care staff will not have proper safety equipment and yet still be expected to care for sick patients.

Seems they have similar problems with getting tested as a health care worker with symptoms in New York as in the Netherlands:

a reply to: Iconic

I'm hoping warmer weather will slow things down.. what you think?

In my area people and companies who make other things are chipping in to make ppe equipment. Like one small company started making full face visors.

Another thing - I hear facial hair is no good for these N95 masks and you are compromised if you have any significant facial hair.

I say don't use other masks and keep reusing the 3M N95 mask. When you get home, you can spray inside with alcohol and sit it outer side up in place nobody will touch.

Hope you get right equipment soon.

a reply to: whereislogic

Its not much, but you will have 1000 N95 and 200 P100 masks coming your way via overnight to

79-01 Broadway, Elmhurst, NY 11373

Hang in there, packages are marked "URGENT medical PPE C/O your friends ATS". Shipping out first thing in the AM, thanks for taking the risk to care for others

ALL have been sealed and untouched since roughly 2014

originally posted by: JBurns
a reply to: whereislogic

Its not much, but you will have 1000 N95 and 200 P100 masks coming your way via overnight to...

I don't know you but you are #ing amazing. Nothing but love.

a reply to: whereislogic

Package is on its way as of 12:40 EST

Hang in there dear, we need you all more than ever

a reply to: CharismaticNerd

Thank you, got a sizable stockpile from the Antrax/Swine Flu scares, old school prepper here with one too many forays on Wish.com/Ebay/Cheaper than Dirt over the years

I tried contacting the DOJ about it after their announcement RE: hoarding supplies but they said I didn't have enough for the national stockpile but that reaching out to hospitals and ems providers was a good idea

a reply to: JBurns

You're AMAZING!

That is all.

a reply to: JBurns

Thats awesome. Thank you for helping our hospitals!

Dude. Effin A.

a reply to: JBurns

You rock!

originally posted by: nOraKat
a reply to: Iconic



I say don't use other masks and keep reusing the 3M N95 mask. When you get home, you can spray inside with alcohol and sit it outer side up in place nobody will touch.

Spraying with alcohol may degrade the mask's protective abilities. Sterilizing in an oven or over steam were better.

www.webmd.com...

Hillary would have been a sniveling idiot. She would have exploited this worse than we think is happening now. We will bless God that DJT, a no BS guy in a crisis, was POTUS>

originally posted by: ManyMasks
a reply to: whereislogic

I wonder how Theresa May would have coped with this event.... Ah that's why that quivering old lady made way for someone of the eccentricity to play along nice, no wonder that sociopath Hilary Clinton was so gutted to lose the election she would have been in her element being a figurehead in this chaos.

Way to be a Patriot Mr Burns!