The linked article goes into more satirical depth."You’ll be pleased to know that, rather than double down on our containment efforts, we’ve decided to dissolve the velociraptor containment task force altogether, and focus instead on how we can get people back into the park as quickly as possible."https://t.co/wpH7Ny6Dqu— Dr Alexandra Phelan (@alexandraphelan) May 7, 2020
Avoid misinterpreting the nursing home data. Rough estimates suggest that 1/3 of the people who have died in the U.S. were living in a nursing home at the time of infection. It's easy to conclude from this that age is an important risk factor (and I'm not saying it isn't, just that we should not overdo it). Anyway, think about it: people in nursing homes often have multiple pathologies beside age that might lead to a COVID-19 death. Let me add another one: merely living in an institution may be a risk factor. In short, if someone is talking about age as a risk factor, and they're not also talking about all the covariates that they corrected for ... you should probably stop listening. Yes, that advice targets just about all the legacy media. We are also starting to get some data in from countries with little or no nursing home industry (for example, Belarus), and they are not noting high death rates amongst seniors.
On a related note, it's also time to start thinking about what risk factor has made New Yorkers so likely to become infected. The obvious one they are looking at is widespread use of public transportation.
I have a lot of personal connections to Ghana, so I get emails. The growth rate there hit 29% per day last Friday. Today their president reported that a single infected worker in a fish market has been linked to over 500 cases. I have also gotten reports that food is starting to get scarce in the stores. And, I've noted a couple times over the last few months that crises are often used to shift the balance of political power, and I have first hand reports of decisions from Ghana which use the outbreak to shift resources towards favored groups.
Seoul has also seen a super-spreader event: a man who went clubbing last weekend has been linked to over 100 positive cases.
The city of Shulan in northeastern China is on lockdown. Also, Wuhan had its first case in about a month.
New York City reported this week that they are having trouble figuring out how a majority of new cases were transmitted: no exposure, social distancing, no public transportation, etc. This means it is circulating in the open air in sufficient quantities to infect people.
Here's the Iran news:
Do keep in mind that this is from a site opposed to the current regime. BTW: that disturbing video that came out about 2 weeks ago from Tehran does not show a field of graves ready to be filled. It's worse than that: those are crypts. The narrow trenches are for worker access to place many shrouded bodies on shelves all at once, then the whole thing can be bulldozed with dirt and covered with flagstones. That's a surprising degree of scale and efficiency for a regime that says they don't have much of an outbreak.#Iran: #Coronavirus death toll exceeds 40,700 in 316 cities— Mohammad Mohaddessin (@Mohaddessin) May 11, 2020
Regime officials admit increase in number of infections in Khuzestan, Tehran, Gilan, Semnan, and Kermanshah#COVID19 https://t.co/088uIj1lzv
Of course, I'm writing this in the week where the outbreak has penetrated the White House, with a valet for the President, and a spokesperson for the Vice President testing positive, two members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and 3 top public health officials all on quarantine.
But it's worse in Russia. Putin is holed up at his country home, and hasn't been seen outside in weeks. Meanwhile, several top aides there have tested positive, including the figurehead prime minister, and Putin's longtime personal spokesman (who has been hospitalized). Russia passed the UK for the 2nd worst outbreak in the world yesterday.
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