COVID-19

[Legacy]

Revisiting the 1918 Spanish Flu

Revisiting the 1918 Spanish Flu

The history of the Spanish Flu is worth revisiting. The first known case was at Fort Riley, Kansas, spreading quickly among soldiers there and spread to Europe when soldiers traveled by ship there for WW1. The close contact in the contained environments allowed the rapid spread. France, Britain and China have also been proposed as the origins.
First cases reported in deadly Spanish flu pandemic

(The Swine Flu of 2009 also originated in the U.S.)

The first wave of the "Spanish Flu" was not particularly deadly. The virus mutated and by the fall emerged as a more deadly variant and unlike a normal seasonal flu, which mostly claims victims among the very young and very old, the second wave of the Spanish flu exhibited what’s called a “W curve” with high numbers of deaths among the young and old, but also a huge spike in the middle composed of otherwise healthy 25- to 35-year-olds in the prime of their life.

Victims died within hours or days of developing symptoms, their skin turning blue and their lungs filling with fluid that caused them to suffocate.The virus infected 500 million people worldwide and killed an estimated 20 million to 50 million victims mostly in the second wave. Decades later were scientists able to explain the phenomenon now known as “cytokine explosion.”
Why the Second Wave of the 1918 Spanish Flu Was So Deadly

Cities approached containment in different ways with Philadelphia refusing to cancel a parade that spread the virus and St. Louis and San Francisco adopting stringent The mortality rate in St. Louis was only one-eighth of Philadelphia’s death rate at its worst.
Masks were mandated in SF and people were arrested in they were in public without one.
How U.S. Cities Tried to Halt the Spread of the 1918 Spanish Flu

The third wave of the Spanish flu struck SF in January 1919. Businesses and theater owners fought back against public gathering orders and "flattening the curve" measures and wearing masks. The 2007 analysis found that if San Francisco had kept all of its anti-flu protections in place through the spring of 1919, it could have reduced deaths by 90 percent.

 

[InKellyWeTrust]

I'm already kicking myself for bothering to post this but it felt to me to be one sort of testing the wind of America just now. I read the story about the lady physician who apparently killed herself in (supposed) mentally breaking over the stress of her job in the NYC emergency ward. Firstly, I see no reason to disbelieve that this can happen. People faced with horrible unrelenting negative circumstances almost MUST have breaking points. This in no way demeans this doctor in my eyes. There seem to be many (I must refer to them as utterly unknowledgeable jerks who have never done anything themselves like she was faced with) morons who are criticizing her for "weakness." WAY off base, and completely beyond my ken as to why they are motivated to make these unfeeling comments. But that's not my point here.

After reading the article which has no overtly political commentary in it, I felt that maybe reading the comments (there were over a thousand) might be a simple glimpse of America just now. So I read a couple of hundred (maybe more, I didn't keep count.) The majority of those remarks were THANK GOODNESS simple expressions of praise for the doctor's service and condolences to the family --- if they were all like that I'd have come away with a pretty good feeling about where we're at. But a rather large number of people engaged in denial and conspiracy --- almost as if they were programmed to disbelieve anything in the article. For this sort of article that was a bit disturbing. Worse than that (for me) there were around three dozen comments which got overtly (name-mentioning) political. None of them had any defensible connectivity to the article whether a "right" or a "left" remark. For a while as I read, none of these were left-leaning idiot remarks, but ultimately I stayed at it and found three. There were twenty some right-leaning crazy comments (accusing every well-known blue politician of being behind this, or accusing this to be an anti-Trump plot --- even though no one anywhere had mentioned him about anything.)

ALL of that is sick. In my opinion, it is the outward sign of a sickness much more threatening to our country than the coronavirus (and that's saying a lot.) To those who'd object that these are just a couple dozen morons on the internet, I'd say that they are rather an iceberg tip of many tens of thousands of deranged citizens who can no longer process anything without a weird political lens to color it. ... and, no, I don't believe that it has always been this way.

I can't agree with this enough. We need to end the 2 party political scheme that is tearing our country apart.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

I'm already kicking myself for bothering to post this but it felt to me to be one sort of testing the wind of America just now. I read the story about the lady physician who apparently killed herself in (supposed) mentally breaking over the stress of her job in the NYC emergency ward. Firstly, I see no reason to disbelieve that this can happen. People faced with horrible unrelenting negative circumstances almost MUST have breaking points. This in no way demeans this doctor in my eyes. There seem to be many (I must refer to them as utterly unknowledgeable jerks who have never done anything themselves like she was faced with) morons who are criticizing her for "weakness." WAY off base, and completely beyond my ken as to why they are motivated to make these unfeeling comments. But that's not my point here.

After reading the article which has no overtly political commentary in it, I felt that maybe reading the comments (there were over a thousand) might be a simple glimpse of America just now. So I read a couple of hundred (maybe more, I didn't keep count.) The majority of those remarks were THANK GOODNESS simple expressions of praise for the doctor's service and condolences to the family --- if they were all like that I'd have come away with a pretty good feeling about where we're at. But a rather large number of people engaged in denial and conspiracy --- almost as if they were programmed to disbelieve anything in the article. For this sort of article that was a bit disturbing. Worse than that (for me) there were around three dozen comments which got overtly (name-mentioning) political. None of them had any defensible connectivity to the article whether a "right" or a "left" remark. For a while as I read, none of these were left-leaning idiot remarks, but ultimately I stayed at it and found three. There were twenty some right-leaning crazy comments (accusing every well-known blue politician of being behind this, or accusing this to be an anti-Trump plot --- even though no one anywhere had mentioned him about anything.)

ALL of that is sick. In my opinion, it is the outward sign of a sickness much more threatening to our country than the coronavirus (and that's saying a lot.) To those who'd object that these are just a couple dozen morons on the internet, I'd say that they are rather an iceberg tip of many tens of thousands of deranged citizens who can no longer process anything without a weird political lens to color it. ... and, no, I don't believe that it has always been this way.

From On the Primacy of the Common Good: Against the Personalists by Charles de Koninck:

A society made up of persons who love their private good above the common good, or who identify the common good with the private good, is a society, not of free men, but of tyrants--"and thus the whole people become as it were one tyrant"--who would use force on one another and whose eventual chief would be the shrewdest and strongest of tyrants, his subjects being only frustrated tyrants. Refusal of the primacy of the common good proceeds, at bottom, from the distrust and scorn of persons."

This is a feature, not a bug, of political liberalism.

 

[tussin]

CDC just updated their list of symptoms. Chills, cough, sore throat, headache, and loss of taste/ appetite describes exactly a mysterious illness that knocked me out during December and January. Sickest I've ever been; could barely eat, and ended up losing nearly 20 pounds before I recovered.

So I apparently had the 'Rona before anyone knew what it was. Hoping this means that my family has all been exposed and developed antibodies by this point.

Same thing happened to my Mom -- she was negative for the seasonal flu and they couldn't nail down her diagnosis. Sickest I have ever seen her... I was afraid she was going to need to be hospitalized.

 

[Whiskeyjack]

The Financial Times just published an article titled "Global coronavirus death toll could be 60% higher than reported":

The death toll from coronavirus may be almost 60 per cent higher than reported in official counts, according to an FT analysis of overall fatalities during the pandemic in 14 countries.

Mortality statistics show 122,000 deaths in excess of normal levels across these locations, considerably higher than the 77,000 official Covid-19 deaths reported for the same places and time periods.

If the same level of under-reporting observed in these countries was happening worldwide, the global Covid-19 death toll would rise from the current official total of 201,000 to as high as 318,000.

 

[greyhammer90]

I'd say that they are rather an iceberg tip of many tens of thousands of deranged citizens who can no longer process anything without a weird political lens to color it. ....

This is a feature, not a bug, of political liberalism.

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[GoIrish41]

I

Even in the hardest hit area, NYC, the numbers did not come close to rising to the levels once first predicted.

That's because we shut down the country. If we would have done nothing, those models would likely have been spot on.

 

[Legacy93]

That's because we shut down the country. If we would have done nothing, those models would likely have been spot on.

There is absolutely no way of knowing if the models likely would have / would not have been spot on - that's pure conjecture. You can't validate a "what-if" scenario using that logic. The models also haven't been particularly accurate at projecting what would happen with the shut-down. Don't get me wrong, I am not disagreeing with your point that contemporaneously with the shut down of the country the spread lessened; that can be proven out using the data. I just disagree with the logical leap that the models would have been accurate - I would argue that given the results from the antibody testing in NYC, it is more likely that the models were over-estimating the fatality and hospitalization rates.

 

[GoIrish41]

There is absolutely no way of knowing if the models likely would have / would not have been spot on - that's pure conjecture. You can't validate a "what-if" scenario using that logic. The models also haven't been particularly accurate at projecting what would happen with the shut-down. Don't get me wrong, I am not disagreeing with your point that contemporaneously with the shut down of the country the spread lessened; that can be proven out using the data. I just disagree with the logical leap that the models would have been accurate - I would argue that given the results from the antibody testing in NYC, it is more likely that the models were over-estimating the fatality and hospitalization rates.

Aren’t these models literally a set of predictions based on ‘what-if scenarios?’ Short of Justice letting Roni rip across the United States I’m not sure we have anything more accurate to go by. The high death rates predicted would have been caused by overwhelmed hospitals. That largely was held at bay (so far) because we social distanced. You can’t use the actual numbers that discount those ‘what if scenarios” that were prevented. You are comparing apples and oranges.

 

[NorthDakota]

That's because we shut down the country. If we would have done nothing, those models would likely have been spot on.

It appears millions of New Yorkers had it and didnt even know. I have a hard time believing millions would have died.

Hell I should take the antibody test.

 

[Legacy93]

Aren’t these models literally a set of predictions based on ‘what-if scenarios?’ Short of Justice letting Roni rip across the United States I’m not sure we have anything more accurate to go by. The high death rates predicted would have been caused by overwhelmed hospitals. That largely was held at bay (so far) because we social distanced. You can’t use the actual numbers that discount those ‘what if scenarios” that were prevented. You are comparing apples and oranges.

Yes - the models are 'what-if scenarios' and are informed by the best available knowledge at the time (which in this case is evolving rapidly), which is why I was stating you can't make a credible statement about whether or not as you said, "those models would likely have been spot on". I never discounted the forecasts and did/do not intend to.

I also wasn't saying we currently have a better indication for what might have happened if the spread had been uncontrolled, so I agree with you on that point. Those forecasts are currently the best we can use as a proxy for what might have happened and, as I said before, you can see in the data that the spread slowed with the lockdown - so you can certainly say that the lockdown saved lives, which I think is your ultimate point.

I am not aware of the models adjusting the death rate for hospital overruns; my understanding is that the death rate was informed by the WHO estimates at the time. If the antibody testing in NYC proves to be representative, then that WHO estimate will have been overstated. I could be wrong, but I hadn't heard of mortality rate adjustments in the models.

Ultimately, once more is known about the true hospitalization and mortality rates, you can patch together a better picture of what might have happened so someone can demonstrate how much was saved.

 

[PerthDomer]

The point is, if New York peaked at twice the cases your deaths would more than double due to strain on the system. Additionally, 1/5 new yorkers have had it at best which means conservatively the city has 2 more explosions in them pre herd immunity. It would indicate the NYC burbs have had half the infections and upstate NY has had about 0 exposure.

 

[Circa]

Google and the mainstream are taking down some of his work already.
This guy Is at least speaking about truth.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rnbf9wccdxE" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>


"World War 3 will be a war on vaccinations." That's some heavy shit...

 

[TorontoGold]

Google and the mainstream are taking down some of his work already.
This guy Is at least speaking about truth.

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/rnbf9wccdxE" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>


"World War 3 will be a war on vaccinations." That's some heavy shit...

The "Dr" in the video almost had his medical license taken away for unethical treatment. He's pushing a theory that Fauci is transferring 3.7 mil to Wuhan lol

 

[yankeehater]

That's because we shut down the country. If we would have done nothing, those models would likely have been spot on.

Not sure how you can come to that conclusion. If your theory was correct, would not Sweden's current levels be even remotely close to the original models since they had one of the most lax national policies with regards to mitigation.

If you look at California, where I live, on March 19 NDCrusader posted the tweet from Gov Newson (most of us in Cali s'd ourselves when we read it because of the fear). This was the day he shut down the state. His tweet stated the models showed 25.6 million people in California would contract the virus with the fatalities ranging between the high 300k's to over 800k. That was for the state, not the world, not the country. Thank the Good Lord the models have not been nearly accurate. According to Worldometer, California sits today at just over 48k cases and 1800 deaths. Your claim is this is all due to shutting down everything (which by the way has not happened). Well, today we also have the facts that the first known case of death with Covid dates back to January. That would likely mean that individual likely contracted the virus a week before. So now the fact show that the virus was in the state for two whole months before the lock down. Those two months people went about their normal daily lives. What occurred during that time? The Superbowl which a California team participate meaning bars and parties, Valentine's Day (restaurants full), an elections (news showed lines at a lot of polling places, and we even squeezed in St. Patrick's Day. With all that going on we are still not nearing 1% of the original models forecasts.

Believe me I have taken the virus very seriously. You can see some of my posts back in mid-March. All I know, is thankfully the models were wrong and we can pretty much say mitigation or not they were never going to be right as well

 

[Circa]

Not sure how you can come to that conclusion. If your theory was correct, would not Sweden's current levels be even remotely close to the original models since they had one of the most lax national policies with regards to mitigation.

If you look at California, where I live, on March 19 NDCrusader posted the tweet from Gov Newson (most of us in Cali s'd ourselves when we read it because of the fear). This was the day he shut down the state. His tweet stated the models showed 25.6 million people in California would contract the virus with the fatalities ranging between the high 300k's to over 800k. That was for the state, not the world, not the country. Thank the Good Lord the models have not been nearly accurate. According to Worldometer, California sits today at just over 48k cases and 1800 deaths. Your claim is this is all due to shutting down everything (which by the way has not happened). Well, today we also have the facts that the first known case of death with Covid dates back to January. That would likely mean that individual likely contracted the virus a week before. So now the fact show that the virus was in the state for two whole months before the lock down. Those two months people went about their normal daily lives. What occurred during that time? The Superbowl which a California team participate meaning bars and parties, Valentine's Day (restaurants full), an elections (news showed lines at a lot of polling places, and we even squeezed in St. Patrick's Day. With all that going on we are still not nearing 1% of the original models forecasts.

Believe me I have taken the virus very seriously. You can see some of my posts back in mid-March. All I know, is thankfully the models were wrong and we can pretty much say mitigation or not they were never going to be right as well

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[Circa]

The "Dr" in the video almost had his medical license taken away for unethical treatment. He's pushing a theory that Fauci is transferring 3.7 mil to Wuhan lol

I understand there will be people that say things the mainstream has fed them.
I'm just saying, try hard and listen. He makes some valid points and some.... seem a bit crazy, but not that crazy, In this day and age.

Btw, 'Almost' was once used for horse shoes and hand grenades for a reason....
They are raiding places for giving vitamins out these days....

 

[Legacy93]

Not sure how you can come to that conclusion. If your theory was correct, would not Sweden's current levels be even remotely close to the original models since they had one of the most lax national policies with regards to mitigation.

If you look at California, where I live, on March 19 NDCrusader posted the tweet from Gov Newson (most of us in Cali s'd ourselves when we read it because of the fear). This was the day he shut down the state. His tweet stated the models showed 25.6 million people in California would contract the virus with the fatalities ranging between the high 300k's to over 800k. That was for the state, not the world, not the country. Thank the Good Lord the models have not been nearly accurate. According to Worldometer, California sits today at just over 48k cases and 1800 deaths. Your claim is this is all due to shutting down everything (which by the way has not happened). Well, today we also have the facts that the first known case of death with Covid dates back to January. That would likely mean that individual likely contracted the virus a week before. So now the fact show that the virus was in the state for two whole months before the lock down. Those two months people went about their normal daily lives. What occurred during that time? The Superbowl which a California team participate meaning bars and parties, Valentine's Day (restaurants full), an elections (news showed lines at a lot of polling places, and we even squeezed in St. Patrick's Day. With all that going on we are still not nearing 1% of the original models forecasts.

Believe me I have taken the virus very seriously. You can see some of my posts back in mid-March. All I know, is thankfully the models were wrong and we can pretty much say mitigation or not they were never going to be right as well

Completely agree with what you are saying, but to put a finer point on it.... the models may be just fine, but the models are only as good as the inputs you put into them. If one of the inputs,like R0, fatality rate, hospitalization rate are off reality will be vastly different. Based on the data coming out in NYC, CA, and elsewhere, it seems probable that R0 was understated and the fatality rate / hospitalization rate were overstated. And we shut down so there's no way to truly know what might have been.

 

[calvegas04]

Schools that took money from the small business stimulus

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1QPyaHKEua89fivNJAOilm_lYUJofeqSDhZHMHUYD4CQ/edit#gid=1710526798

 

[Irishize]

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">New York City’s mayor just ordered police to start rounding up Jews. <a href="https://t.co/87IeFFk2yc">https://t.co/87IeFFk2yc</a></p>— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) <a href="https://twitter.com/seanmdav/status/1255339463049457664?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 29, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

 

[Irish YJ]

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">New York City’s mayor just ordered police to start rounding up Jews. <a href="https://t.co/87IeFFk2yc">https://t.co/87IeFFk2yc</a></p>— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) <a href="https://twitter.com/seanmdav/status/1255339463049457664?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 29, 2020</a></blockquote> <script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

 

[notredomer23]

https://www.inquirer.com/news/coronavirus-testing-montgomery-county-jail-asymptomatic-philadelphia-prisons-20200428.html

 

[InKellyWeTrust]

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cn...navirus-drug-trial-shows-quite-good-news.html

Remdesivir shows statistically significant results in RCT involving more than 1000 patients. This is very good news. Specifically reduces hospitalization from 15 days to 11 days which is statistically significant. Decreased mortality trend from 11% to 8% which is not yet statistically significant but may be with larger trial with higher power.

 

[Sherm Sticky]

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/28/nyregion/hasidic-funeral-coronavirus-de-blasio.html

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[notredomer23]

I saw a tweet I can't find anymore so no credit to me, but Di Blasio's tweet reads even worse when you realize his birth name is Warren Wilhelm.

 

[yankeehater]

Newsweek is reporting the NIAID which Dr. Fauci heads funded millions to the lab in Wuhan where the virus may have started.


https://www.newsweek.com/dr-fauci-b...us-dollars-risky-coronavirus-research-1500741

 

[yankeehater]

This is interesting and being studied whether nicotine stops/slows the virus. Data showing it is not hitting smokers as much which seems odd since more than not the virus affects the lungs.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/t...-smokers-from-catching-coronavirus-2020-04-24

 

[Irish#1]

Start popping the Pepcid.

Popular heartburn medicine being studied as treatment for coronavirus

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/popul...udied-treatment-coronavirus/story?id=70356236

 

[Legacy]

Completely agree with what you are saying, but to put a finer point on it.... the models may be just fine, but the models are only as good as the inputs you put into them. If one of the inputs,like R0, fatality rate, hospitalization rate are off reality will be vastly different. Based on the data coming out in NYC, CA, and elsewhere, it seems probable that R0 was understated and the fatality rate / hospitalization rate were overstated. And we shut down so there's no way to truly know what might have been.

A bit more comparing influenza with COVID-19 from the CDC and modeling....

The speed of transmission is an important point of difference between the two viruses. Influenza has a shorter median incubation period (the time from infection to appearance of symptoms) and a shorter serial interval (the time between successive cases) than COVID-19 virus. The serial interval for COVID-19 virus is estimated to be 5-6 days, while for influenza virus, the serial interval is 3 days. This means that influenza can spread faster than COVID19.

The severity of the epidemic and the initial rate of increase depend upon the value of the Basic Reproduction Number or R(0). The R0 of the 1918 pandemic was estimated to be between 1.4 and 2.8). The swine flu, or H1N1 virus, came back in 2009, its R0 value was between 1.4 and 1.6. Initially, the R0 for COVID-19 was thought to be 2.2–2.7. A more recent study in assumed a serial interval of 6–9 days calculated a median R0 value of 5.7 (95% CI 3.8–8.9).

The estimated median incubation time (IT) of COVID-19 was 5.1 days; mean IT was 5.5 days. For 97.5% of infected persons, symptoms appear by 11.5 days. However, with this novel coronavirus the number of asymptomatic individuals who are transmitting the organism is being calculated as testing capabilities increase.

Viral modeling is known as the Susceptible-Infectious-Recovered (SIR) model. The model is analyzed on a computer and one infected individual (I) is introduced into a closed population where everyone is susceptible (S). Each infected individual (I) transmits influenza, with probability β, to each susceptible individual (S) they encounter. Of course, the difference between influenza and COVID-19 is the presence or absence of herd immunity. Without herd immunity and a vaccine, the total population is Susceptible except for the Recovered. A study of the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic found that public health measures, based on social distancing, reduced mortality by 10 to 30% in cities in the US.

 

[dad4aa]

This is a question to the medical people on board as well as anyone else who has facts not opinions regarding false negative results of the Covid test. I have been laid up for almost 2 weeks and have pretty much every symptom. I have been tested twice and both came out negative. Yet I’ve also tested negative for pneumonia, the flu and everything else the doctors thought it could be. What is the chance that I had two false negative tests and I should get tested again? I am back at the doctor again tomorrow to try and figure out what is going on. Any advice would be helpful. Thanks.