Covid - We blew it

I think it is a bit late for finger pointing, but I do hope that we collectively learn from this go-round and are better prepared for the next one. I suppose that reviewing what happened and went wrong can be a good thing if it helps us understand how to improve our response to the next virus pandemic. In engineering, we typically would hold what we called a "post mortem" at the end of a project to determine how well we handled situations that came up and what we could do to handle it better and more efficiently the next time. These were not finger pointing sessions, but instead constructive means of learning from our mistakes.

The VA called me today to follow up on some things. They said that I should not come in because they have so many COVID-19 patients, but rather they have their own zoom type application and I can visit with a doctor using it. The person I talked to said that our VA has 9 beds set aside for civilians because of the sheer number of COVID-19 patients the civilian hospitals around our area are having to handle. He said that all 9 beds are full, and that this COVID-19 situation is far more serious than many people seem to understand.

Tony
 

Personally, I'm not sure that death per million is a legitimate way of deciding how the virus has been handled. We have no idea how other countries are determining a death a covid death. Heck we don't know how the US is determining a covid death. And frankly, comparing the US to island nations or even Asian nations doesn't make much sense. Andorra (where in H is Andorra?) is way worse than we are. Who cares? I'm not even sure comparing us to South American countries is fair. Argentina. Peru, Chile, Brazil are all worse than the US and Ecuador is basically the the same. Again, so what?
I'd be most likely inclined to compare the US to European nations where the lifestyle and healthcare are more similar. UK, Belgium, and Spain are worse than the US and France is just marginally better. Germany is way better.
There are too many other factors like culture, climate, and even the strain of virus etc that effect the numbers to really say who's "doing better".
 
garyt1957 said:
Simply not true.
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Agreed, but "most countries have done better than we have" would be an accurate statement.

It's also difficult to assess how well or poorly countries have done because they each had their own initial exposure date. Also we have to take into account the medical infrastructure in each country. Is it fair to say a country did better than another simply because it has enough medical resources to prevent people from dying?

However if we just go by deaths per million based on the info at https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-data the following countries have done worse than we have. In a list of 200 countries we are the 13th worst country

Belgium - 1248.01
San Marino - 1237.55
Peru - 1069.73
Andorra - 983.63
Spain - 882.23
Argentina - 790.09
Brazil - 781.02
Chile - 777.51
U.K. - 768.16
Mexico - 766.76
Bolivia - 758.07
Italy - 756.39

USA - 746.86
 

Sunny said:
Gary, we are leading in the number of deaths. Doesn't that tell you something? There is absolutely no justification or excuse for that.
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Because we have a huge population. As Joe would say "C'mon Man!" That means nothing. At the very least you have to go by per capita deaths. Your going to compare the number of deaths in the US with 330million people to Canada with 30 million people? And yes I know Canada is better in per capita also. The US could have one tenth the death rate we currently have now, which would be amongst the lowest in the world and we would still have more total deaths than Canada.
 
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asp3 said:
It's also difficult to assess how well or poorly countries have done because they each had their own initial exposure date. Also we have to take into account the medical infrastructure in each country. Is it fair to say a country did better than another simply because it has enough medical resources to prevent people from dying?
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Which is basically what I said in the post above yours.
 
asp3 said:
I agree, I was typing in my post while you posted yours so I didn't see it until after I had finished mine.
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Just too many variables to really determine who's doing better in controlling the virus. California supposedly got the less lethal strain from China while NY got the more deadly strain from Italy. CA had less deaths but did they really do a better job or did they get lucky? Were there even two different strains or was that conjecture? Who knows? I tend to agree that our individualism has hurt us in regards to fighting this thing. I'm not into the blame game, I want to know how we best proceed going forward.
 
Sunny said:
Gary, we are leading in the number of deaths. Doesn't that tell you something? There is absolutely no justification or excuse for that.
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Did you see asp3's post 53? It's deaths per % population that you use when comparing rates between nations of vastly different numbers of citizens.
 
About the ONLY information we get with regard to this pandemic is the Sheer Numbers. I would like to see a breakdown of Just Who is more likely to contract this illness. There is strong evidence that Seniors living in crowded care facilities are at greater risk, but WHAT about the rest of the populations?
What is the age of those getting this virus?
What are the living conditions...large numbers living in crowded households or apartment complexes?
What is the financial status....living in or near poverty, or reasonably well off?
Ethnicity....are there minorities who are at greater risk?
Pre-existing Conditions...diabetes, obesity, etc.?

There are just more questions than answers with the information that the media is reporting, IMO. The Mask and Distancing mandates are certainly a help, but it seems to me that if any "groups" could be identified who might be at greater risk, and efforts taken to reduce the risks among those people, we would be far more likely to get a reduction in numbers.
 
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@Don M. - I've seen the information you seek spread throughout various articles and TV news reports I've read and heard but I haven't seen a comprehensive article covering all of your questions. Here are the answers I have based on what I've read and heard. I don't have sources to back up my answers but I could probably find some.

People who have to congregate with others either in transportation or through their work places (healthcare workers, meat processing plants, grocery stores, etc...) have higher chances of being infected than others.

People who attend large gatherings both indoors or outdoors (weddings, official government events, church services, etc...) are also getting infected more than those who don't. They have also been able to trace further infections of others to those events even though they didn't attend them.

There have been some dorms where students didn't socially distance and/or gathered in larger than recommended or allowed numbers passed it to one another.

The age of those getting the virus here in the US has gone down over time with older people getting it more often at first (probably due to nursing home infections) and then getting younger as more young people are exposed through increased exposure or through their own behavior.

I haven't heard about apartment complexes, but folks who live in larger groups have been more affected and as pointed out above students in dorms have been affected.

You have to dig through the info that's there to find these things but the info is there.

People living in the lower economic groups have been affected more than those in higher economic groups but that is most likely due to the ability of higher earning people having more choices about how the travel and how they live.

Covid-19 has been more deadly to minorities, but that may be due to the fact that the incidence of conditions that lead to higher mortality rates (obesity, diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure and other conditions) are more prevalent in those groups.
 
asp3 said:
Agreed, but "most countries have done better than we have" would be an accurate statement.

It's also difficult to assess how well or poorly countries have done because they each had their own initial exposure date. Also we have to take into account the medical infrastructure in each country. Is it fair to say a country did better than another simply because it has enough medical resources to prevent people from dying?

However if we just go by deaths per million based on the info at https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-data the following countries have done worse than we have. In a list of 200 countries we are the 13th worst country

Belgium - 1248.01
San Marino - 1237.55
Peru - 1069.73
Andorra - 983.63
Spain - 882.23
Argentina - 790.09
Brazil - 781.02
Chile - 777.51
U.K. - 768.16
Mexico - 766.76
Bolivia - 758.07
Italy - 756.39

USA - 746.86
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You also have to consider testing per population and accuracy of reporting. Of the countries in your list, Belgium, the UK, the US and Spain are close in testing and I'd imagine close as well in reliability. There are so many nations we know that do not have the health infrastructure to test or track that are much higher in deaths per million than those listed above (much of the Africa, the Middle East, parts of South America). Then there are the liars.

You can get a partial guesstimate of this by flipping the selection criteria to show lowest testing per 1M which gives you a Top 18 of countries that don't even register enough testing to report even with millions+ population. Then you get Yemen, South Sudan, Niger, Haiti, Madagascar, Afghanistan, etc. You have to go all the way to country #117 (Morocco) to get to even 100,000/1M. China's testing rate is only 111,163/1M and I don't for a minute believe that they have 3/1M deaths ...yep 3 ...not a typo.

Tests per 1 million population from the list above:

UK ------- 576,119/1M
US ------- 516,562/1M
Belgium - 473, 787/1M
Spain ---- 443,569/1M
 
Skyped with my good friend in Geneva, who works in WHO...she said in Belgium they classified about every death as covid, no matter what they died from. Long story...seems in France it was about the opposite so honestly, don't know how we could trust the death ratio numbers, period.
 
Liberty said:
Skyped with my good friend in Geneva, who works in WHO...she said in Belgium they classified about every death as covid, no matter what they died from. Long story...seems in France it was about the opposite so honestly, don't know how we could trust the death ratio numbers, period.
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I haven't trusted Covid-19, death numbers from day one, and I'm even less trusting of them now.
 
Aunt Marg said:
I haven't trusted Covid-19, death numbers from day one, and I'm even less trusting of them now.
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Yes, seems in some countries, they classified people that couldn't get in the hospitals and died as automatically having covid. They didn't even test or have tests widely available in some countries. My friend told me the stories and she is in a position to know - she has worked for WHO for many years. It shouldn't surprise us, should it.
 
Liberty said:
Yes, seems in some countries, they classified people that couldn't get in the hospitals and died as automatically having covid. They didn't even test or have tests widely available in some countries. My friend told me the stories and she is in a position to know - she has worked for WHO for many years. It shouldn't surprise us, should it.
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I agree, Liberty.

Numbers (I believe) are skewed and being skewed, and as you say there are certain countries... questionable countries, that I trust nothing about or anything that they say.
 
Aunt Marg said:
I agree, Liberty.

Numbers (I believe) are skewed and being skewed, and as you say there are certain countries... questionable countries, that I trust nothing about or anything that they say.
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Absolutely agree. Think we just have to each one of us assess our own risks, keep safe and keep on keeping on for the present. She also said that many countries are working on vaccines and was skeptical about the efficacy of same. Personally, I'll be really scrutinizing the side effects data of the vaccines that will be available here in America.
 
Liberty said:
Absolutely agree. Think we just have to each one of us assess our own risks, keep safe and keep on keeping on for the present. She also said that many countries are working on vaccines and was skeptical about the efficacy of same. Personally, I'll be really scrutinizing the side effects data of the vaccines that will be available here in America.
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I'll be right there with you regarding scrutinizing the side-effects of any/all vaccines.

To be perfectly honest, I refuse to trust anything related to any Covid-19 vaccine drug that comes out, because as far as I'm concerned it's being pushed and developed too fast. I don't believe any of the trials whatsoever. Nothing but lip-service IMO.

I just heard in the news this morning, Canada is looking to close all travel to and from the Island (Vancouver Island) account the rise in Covid cases and deaths.

I had a feeling things were going to take a grim turn this fall, and my hunch is coming true.
 
And people are waiting in long lines to get tested so they can have Thanksgiving dinners together...like that makes much difference. Please, the false negatives on those tests are so high and even if you'd get a true negative, you are still getting together with others that could be carriers of the virus.

Its like we just are fighting against the facts. Yesterday a nurse told about how some were dying and saying they couldn't have the virus, that it was a "hoax"....those words were a patient of hers - last words.
 
Liberty said:
And people are waiting in long lines to get tested so they can have Thanksgiving dinners together...like that makes much difference. Please, the false negatives on those tests are so high and even if you'd get a true negative, you are still getting together with others that could be carriers of the virus.

Its like we just are fighting against the facts. Yesterday a nurse told about how some were dying and saying they couldn't have the virus, that it was a "hoax"....those words were a patient of hers - last words.
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You said it, Liberty, and so very well!

I have been limiting my outings to once a week for months now, and with the fall season upon us and reports of Covid cases spiking, I've been buying more when I shop in order to try and extend my outings a few days longer.

Anything to be away and stay away from others at this time.
 
peramangkelder said:
This from an Australian News Source 18th November
'The South Australian government has announced an immediate six-day lockdown followed by a further
week of tough restrictions as the state scrambles to avoid a second wave of coronavirus infections.'
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All I can say is, take care of yourself, Peram.
 
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