Coronavirus

[alwaysdrawing]

For people who are saying that everyone should wear mask: where should people get these masks from? Masks are not available for purchasing over a month now. They were out of stock in February and the situation has not improved.

 

We are woefully unprepared w/r/t PPE.  First we need masks for front line HCWs, then for the general public.  The amount needed in hospitals is staggering, and it will be months before they have an adequate supply, because production increases are linear, and virus spread will be exponential.

 

This is one more reason why the curve must be flattened--HCWs will refuse to work without PPE, and if that happens, we are talking about total collapse of the health care system.

[gary17]

Saying only sick people can wear mask stigmatizes them - this makes those who are mildly sick to not even want to wear a mask! 

If we are like asia where EVERYONE wears mask, then you do both protection of healthy people and prevention of droplets spreading from sick people !

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/17/opinion/coronavirus-face-masks.html?smid=fb-share&fbclid=IwAR1XxGheyMqYzyDWcAvF3YyNznjJbZBHY4Hsk6tCAg4_WjkJFyR93Pdu97E

 

It's nice to have a theoretical debate whether mask work or don't work, but fact is they're in very short supply in virtually every IC, at least in Europe, right now. There was even a report today in which the Czech Republic supposedly confiscated a shipment of hundreds of thousands of masks which were supposed to be send to Italy, only to use it in their own hospitals. Encouraging regular folk to start hoarding them now amid a shortage seems irreponsible to me;  even if they do the job to some extent, hospitals need them more.

It's not a theoretical debate - it's  a fact that it works.  You look at those Asian countries - yes, their economy got hit hard too - but they are not shutting down small businesses. 

 

Where should the masks come from - so for the most powerful country that makes Teslas, sending robots to Mars, got the best schools on earth - they can't figure out how to make masks? 

 

Gary 

[mcliu]

Capacity during non-pandemic times is low to begin with since there’s little demand. But also the entire global supply chain was outsourced to China. China is requisitioning all the masks made in China.. So there’s inadequate domestic industrial capacity to ramp up production.

[Cigarbutt]

This is a golden opportunity to work outside, at a 6 ft distance from each other, and repair roads when there is no traffic.  Makes the cost of fixing roads much cheaper if it can just be banged out quickly.

If there's enough political will, we should honestly put an infrastructure bill to work. We missed our chance in the last crisis and the state of our infrastructure is pretty pathetic.

Honestly - this would be the only deficit spending I would be supportive of as it is a true investment in the long-term productive capacity of the country.

Using objective data, common sense and biases ???, infrastructure spending makes sense and is intuitively appealing in certain scenarios but:

-public spending is inherently somewhat inefficient, is associated with private crowding out and is associated with a significant lag (these are +NPV projects but the payback is long)

-the effect (positive, neutral or negative) is related to:

      -where we are in the economic cycle (positive correlation with nadir conditions)

      -the way the projects are financed (similar to a company facing a restructuring, the extent of leverage going in is correlated to unproductive debt)

      -for those suggesting issuing public 100-yr 1% bonds, the Japan experience suggests that the duration of the bond may correlate with the duration of anemic GDP numbers

      (BTW, Japan already announced another umpteenth major stimulus last December (in part due to poor business investments...), before the virus and is probably trying to figure out how to push more on the string)

 

When growing up, I was told that, frequently, healing somebody required to distract the person until the natural history follows its course. So, I'm all for infrastructure spending because it is necessary but nature will have to run its course.

https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/R44896.pdf

[Castanza]

A good read about charity and governments role as we enter this time of lockdown and economic stagnation.

 

https://fee.org/resources/not-your-to-give/

[John Hjorth]

Here are a few predictions, based on what I'm experiencing right now here in tiny Denmark :

 

A new sentiment will grow, called "showing societal mindset" ["marketing tool", for the future] :

• Large companies etc., who have the financial resources, start paying their creditors "early" [at approval of invoice, instead of at agreed payments terms], especially the small creditors, who seem doomed. [Domestic examples - relative to me : Novo Nordisk A/S, municipalities, Salling Group A/S [retailing : Bilka, Føtex, Netto]],
  
• Shut down hotels [or parts of them] etc. will get equipped to take care of patients,
  
• Infrastructure projects, where the project costs are at the expense of municipalities, are speeded up, to keep the wheels spinning.
  

[gary17]

Capacity during non-pandemic times is low to begin with since there’s little demand. But also the entire global supply chain was outsourced to China. China is requisitioning all the masks made in China.. So there’s inadequate domestic industrial capacity to ramp up production.

 

That's known facts

but US is/was a manufacturing powerhouse  - it won't take long to catchup.  It's about people's will.  Rollup the sleeves  and get to work! 

 

i think big companies will rethink supply chain moving forward - China is holding too many cards - the manufacturing, and the intellectual properties!

[Castanza]

Capacity during non-pandemic times is low to begin with since there’s little demand. But also the entire global supply chain was outsourced to China. China is requisitioning all the masks made in China.. So there’s inadequate domestic industrial capacity to ramp up production.

 

That's known facts

but US is/was a manufacturing powerhouse  - it won't take long to catchup.  It's about people's will.  Rollup the sleeves  and get to work! 

 

i think big companies will rethink supply chain moving forward - China is holding too many cards - the manufacturing, and the intellectual properties!

 

Good luck with the mobster unions around

[KCLarkin]

Capacity during non-pandemic times is low to begin with since there’s little demand. But also the entire global supply chain was outsourced to China. China is requisitioning all the masks made in China.. So there’s inadequate domestic industrial capacity to ramp up production.

 

Entire economies are being locked down due to supply of $.30 masks and swabs. Incredible. Even with our limited manufacturing abilities, we could easily scale up production if their was any urgency and leadership from our federal governments.

 

It's fine to say there is a shortage, so we will only supply PPE to frontline workers. And ration tests. But you need to put all the resources of the government, military, and industry to overcome those shortages.

[minten]

SMH at people who think azithromycin, an antibiotic that works against bacteria and hydroxychlorquine, an agent that works against a parasite, is likely to fight a virus.

 

Trials using this exact drug combo will start on Tuesday in NYC. But I guess you know better. We'll see if you're right.

[Viking]

US cases have just ballooned to almost 40,000. An increase if 15,000 in less than 24 hours. Wow! Yes, we are seeing ‘pent up’ cases. This is alsp providing some clarity as to just how large and wide spread the outbreak really is. Containment is clearly no longer a viable strategy.

 

Full lock down coming to the entire US in the next week or two. Exploding case numbers and limited medical supplies is not a good combination. Mnuchin said this morning lockdown will likely last 10-12 weeks. Family of 4 will get a one time payment of $3,000. That should cover it.

 

In terms of how long this is going to least and the economic damage it is going to inflict all estimates so far have proven to have been wildly optimistic.

 

Mnuchin says Trump administration, Congress nearing agreement on financial rescue package

- https://www.washingtonpost.com/

 

 

[ERICOPOLY]

Rand Paul has it.

[Guest Schwab711]

 

Trump lying about the severity of the virus, in part due to the ongoing impeachment, will go down as one of the biggest economic mistakes made by a POTUS in history. Similar to Hoover pushing austerity at the onset of the Great Depression.

 

The China travel ban was good. The idea that we are short certain pharmaceuticals is not Trump's fault. There was widespread support for further exporting of pharmaceuticals as recently as 6 months ago. Moving supply chains away from China was going to lower returns (and stock prices) over time, regardless of a shock. Corporations were already highly susceptible to widespread defaults in a shock event because interest rates were so low. I don't blame Trump for any of those (he's not the first POTUS to ask for lower rates when we don't need them).

 

The lying was a monumental blunder that is going to have a huge marginal economic cost imo.

[Castanza]

 

Is this not also a disservice? Trump isn’t wrong that China was not very cooperative in the beginning. Not saying he isn’t guilty of any “coverup” himself. Simply saying misinformation and lack of accurate information was rampant from the start.

[LC]

Billions, trillions of dollars in healthcare, and we've come to this:

 

 

 

[Mephistopheles]

https://www.en24.news/a/2020/03/hydroxychloroquine-would-be-effective-according-to-professor-raoult-of-the-ihu-in-marseille-after-a-first-limited-test.html

 

Bayer and Sanofi seem to have huge supplies of this stuff and seem to have offered donations to whatever country wants it.

 

Too early to tell obviously, but if approved, existing and widely available (combo of) medicines turn out to decrease the severity of the virus (at least for a large number of patients) obviously that would be a quick and complete game-changer.

 

some random dude on twitter wrote some interesting (and very bullish) comments on the French study I linked here yesterday: https://twitter.com/boriquagato/status/1240630279301033986 and posts below that. It's just one person's thoughts so who cares, but I found them interesting, and I'd like to be an optimist these days and tweets like these help.

 

what I and others had missed yesterday in this study was that it might have been remarkably succesful because of the combo of two seperate drugs working together, not just the hydroxychlorquine.

 

SMH at people who think azithromycin, an antibiotic that works against bacteria and hydroxychlorquine, an agent that works against a parasite, is likely to fight a virus. Same as anti-HIV drugs for this which are anti-retrovirals (hint: COVID-19 is not a retrovirus).

 

Hydroxychloroquine also fights lupus and rheumatoid arthritis.

 

Are you saying lupus and rheumatoid arthritis are caused by viruses? Because if you're not, than the comment you made is stupid.

[Cigarbutt]

SMH at people who think azithromycin, an antibiotic that works against bacteria and hydroxychlorquine, an agent that works against a parasite, is likely to fight a virus.

Trials using this exact drug combo will start on Tuesday in NYC. But I guess you know better. We'll see if you're right.

Nobody knows better. We're learning as we go.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/therapeutic-options.html

[mcliu]

Wow:

 

Castanza's link: WHO (Jan 14): "Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission of the novel #coronavirus (2019-nCoV) identified in #Wuhan, #China."

 

Was Trump lying or was he following WHO guidance like the rest of the world?

Is every European government also lying? Clearly the outbreak and response is much worse in Europe..

[Guest Schwab711]

 

Is this not also a disservice? Trump isn’t wrong that China was not very cooperative in the beginning. Not saying he isn’t guilty of any “coverup” himself. Simply saying misinformation and lack of accurate information was rampant from the start.

 

That could also be true and we could avoid blaming him for any delays prior to that. Pretty unrealistic to assume Trump's only info on COVID-19 prior to 1/14 was directly from China but it doesn't actual affect my argument so I'll concede the point.

 

10 days later the Senate was briefed by Fauci and others. By the end of January there was more than sufficient public information to begin preparing the US. During February, the standard line was that this was a Democratic hoax. I'm mostly referring to late-January to the end of February period. Senators accused of insider information said public information by January 24th convinced them that it was worth selling stocks (including CNBC's coverage of China). There must have been more than sufficient info for Trump, who has more non-public information than any human on the planet.

 

The odd thing about the Dem hoax argument at the time was most Dems were less worried about CV before Trump called it a hoax than Reps because many media outlets were dismissive. Trump yelled hoax and opinions flipped, which caused the issues I'm talking about. The political rhetoric in general is a big part of why this is so bad in the US (imo) but Trump is ultimately in charge.

https://twitter.com/wesyang/status/1241598924516986881

 

 

I no nothing about Europe so I can't begin to guess. There are a lot of things that all of Europe does but the US doesn't. The general setup of your logic is easily countered. I'm open to more nuanced counter-arguments.

[LC]

New York state has more coronavirus cases than France or South Korea as infections soar to 15,168

 

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/22/new-york-state-has-more-coronavirus-cases-than-france-or-south-korea-as-infections-soar-to-15168.html

 

New York state now has more coronavirus cases than France or South Korea.

 

The number of confirmed infections soared to 15,168, according to new data released by Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

 

“New York is testing more people than any state in the country and, per capita, more than any country in the globe,” Cuomo said, adding that the state has tested 61,000 people.

 

 

[Castanza]

 

Is this not also a disservice? Trump isn’t wrong that China was not very cooperative in the beginning. Not saying he isn’t guilty of any “coverup” himself. Simply saying misinformation and lack of accurate information was rampant from the start.

 

That could also be true and we could avoid blaming him for any delays prior to that. Pretty unrealistic to assume Trump's only info on COVID-19 prior to 1/14 was directly from China but it doesn't actual affect my argument so I'll concede the point.

 

10 days later the Senate was briefed by Fauci and others. By the end of January there was more than sufficient public information to begin preparing the US. During February, the standard line was that this was a Democratic hoax. I'm mostly referring to late-January to the end of February period. Senators accused of insider information said public information by January 24th convinced them that it was worth selling stocks (including CNBC's coverage of China). There must have been more than sufficient info for Trump, who has more non-public information than any human on the planet.

 

I don't disagree, there probably could have and should have been action sooner. But to go along with this, there has to be some weight given to the discretion taken to shut down the US economy. When the US shuts down the whole world will feel it much more than if Italy shuts down. I'm just saying it's not an easy decision to make and it's certainly not a binary as some on here would like to proclaim.

[Guest Schwab711]

 

Is this not also a disservice? Trump isn’t wrong that China was not very cooperative in the beginning. Not saying he isn’t guilty of any “coverup” himself. Simply saying misinformation and lack of accurate information was rampant from the start.

 

That could also be true and we could avoid blaming him for any delays prior to that. Pretty unrealistic to assume Trump's only info on COVID-19 prior to 1/14 was directly from China but it doesn't actual affect my argument so I'll concede the point.

 

10 days later the Senate was briefed by Fauci and others. By the end of January there was more than sufficient public information to begin preparing the US. During February, the standard line was that this was a Democratic hoax. I'm mostly referring to late-January to the end of February period. Senators accused of insider information said public information by January 24th convinced them that it was worth selling stocks (including CNBC's coverage of China). There must have been more than sufficient info for Trump, who has more non-public information than any human on the planet.

 

I don't disagree, there probably could have and should have been action sooner. But to go along with this, there has to be some weight given to the discretion taken to shut down the US economy. When the US shuts down the whole world will feel it much more than if Italy shuts down. I'm just saying it's not an easy decision to make and it's certainly not a binary as some on here would like to proclaim.

 

Don't disagree but so far it's been a location-based decision to shut down in the US. I'm sure those are simultaneous because of pressure from the federal government. Further, that all of Europe was simultaneously shutdown made it prudent for the US to act now if it was ever going to do it. It would be most effective in concert. Europe was likely waiting for US until Italy became overwhelmed and could no longer delay. Maybe US was waiting on Europe though? If we had all addressed this early, it would've been a short 2 weeks with a lot of optimism on the other side.

 

To clarify: In 1918-1919, many large cities in the US had similar shutdowns to right now for weeks at a time. Many nations had shutdowns as the virus arrived. I don't think it's shocking that a shutdown was coming or necessary. For that reason, I don't blame Trump for pushing for a shutdown at all. I criticize the delay and the additional costs and time associated with that delay.

 

That we still don't have a plan 7 weeks later is why I feel comfortable suggesting Trump will ultimately face much of the blame (no idea about politics, this is purely a history guess).

[Castanza]

 

Is this not also a disservice? Trump isn’t wrong that China was not very cooperative in the beginning. Not saying he isn’t guilty of any “coverup” himself. Simply saying misinformation and lack of accurate information was rampant from the start.

 

That could also be true and we could avoid blaming him for any delays prior to that. Pretty unrealistic to assume Trump's only info on COVID-19 prior to 1/14 was directly from China but it doesn't actual affect my argument so I'll concede the point.

 

10 days later the Senate was briefed by Fauci and others. By the end of January there was more than sufficient public information to begin preparing the US. During February, the standard line was that this was a Democratic hoax. I'm mostly referring to late-January to the end of February period. Senators accused of insider information said public information by January 24th convinced them that it was worth selling stocks (including CNBC's coverage of China). There must have been more than sufficient info for Trump, who has more non-public information than any human on the planet.

 

I don't disagree, there probably could have and should have been action sooner. But to go along with this, there has to be some weight given to the discretion taken to shut down the US economy. When the US shuts down the whole world will feel it much more than if Italy shuts down. I'm just saying it's not an easy decision to make and it's certainly not a binary as some on here would like to proclaim.

 

Don't disagree but so far it's been a location-based decision to shut down in the US. I'm sure those are simultaneous because of pressure from the federal government. Further, that all of Europe was simultaneously shutdown made it prudent for the US to act now if it was ever going to do it. It would be most effective in concert. Europe was likely waiting for US until Italy became overwhelmed and could no longer delay. Maybe US was waiting on Europe though? If we had all addressed this early, it would've been a short 2 weeks with a lot of optimism on the other side.

 

To clarify: In 1918-1919, many large cities in the US had similar shutdowns to right now for weeks at a time. Many nations had shutdowns as the virus arrived. I don't think it's shocking that a shutdown was coming or necessary. For that reason, I don't blame Trump for pushing for a shutdown at all. I criticize the delay and the additional costs and time associated with that delay.

 

That we still don't have a plan 7 weeks later is why I feel comfortable suggesting Trump will ultimately face much of the blame (no idea about politics, this is purely a history guess).

 

I think some (not all) but some of the slow response and lack of leadership in the US is a result of the degradation of the state’s responsibilities. When all is said and done, I hope state examine themselves and how they responded.

[ERICOPOLY]

1). I have two kids that spend a week at my house and a week at mom's.  They go back and forth every 7 days.

2).  My wife also has two kids that go back and forth to her ex's household every 7 days on the same schedule, except one of them comes back to our place after only 3 days..

3).  My wife's ex is also remarried, and his new wife has a child that goes back and forth to her ex's household every week, and he is a laid-off painter. 

4).  My wife's ex is going into work still (the only adult amongst us all who is still working at the office).

5).  My ex-wife has rented out the downstairs of her house to a family of 3 and only a curtain seals off the upstairs from the downstairs.  The HVAC return downstairs recycles the air back to the upstairs where my ex lives with my kids.

 

Currently my kids are with my ex, and my wife's kids are with her ex.

 

The current custody arrangement of back and forth every week is risky.  What custody arrangement makes sense?  Yikes. 

 

[rb]

I think some (not all) but some of the slow response and lack of leadership in the US is a result of the degradation of the state’s responsibilities. When all is said and done, I hope state examine themselves and how they responded.

This is utter bullshit. This situation is why you have federal/national governments. In order to have a large coordinated response to large scale problems that don't care about borders or your political views. It doesn't get more textbook than a pandemic.