Unraveling of America? Is the decline of our "empire" a given at this point?

[Jeff R.]

Well, Not sure how much they did or didn't do. Perhaps they are more disciplined on their own?
We as a whole didn't lock down nationally, really. It was helter skelter. One only has to see all the crowds without masks, etc.
What did Norway and Finland do? Most likely a hell of a lot more. Why don't we have their rates? Or better? That would be 20k death in the US.

No reason to be confused. We didn't do enough obviously, period.

Or it may be more complicated as to how it spreads and how easy it actually spreads. I still see a lot odd situations where the virus seems like it should have spread within a house or place of work and it did not. Then I see people get it and have no idea where it came from. No friends or family or coworkers have had it.


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[mtrycrafts]

Wait until Nov 4th.

We may not be here by then.

 

[Swerd]

Yes, where is Herbu?

I'd like to think he's home barbecuing everyday, while trying his best to ignore all the election campaign news. It can't be fun watching your boy in a flaming tailspin.

 

[mtrycrafts]

Or it may be more complicated as to how it spreads and how easy it actually spreads. I still see a lot odd situations where the virus seems like it should have spread within a house or place of work and it did not. Then I see people get it and have no idea where it came from. No friends or family or coworkers have had it.


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Well, that too can be explained by the pros. You only know if you have symptoms, firstly. So, if you have it with no symptoms you are a carrier and pass it on to others. You may have immunity. As to not knowing how one gets it, that is why that tracker group would talk with the person to remember all their contacts to investigate and test them. Perhaps they passed by someone close by while they had an exhalation. Again, all this needs to be investigated by that team. It doesn't come out of thin air.

As you stated, more complicated, well that is a very good reason to not exercise personal freedoms so loosely in this kind of an emergency.

 

[mtrycrafts]

... It can't be fun watching your boy in a flaming tailspin.

Did you hear that sonic boom?

 

[Swerd]

I've been keeping up with the latest from TLS and Swerd as I'm able. I'm aware.

My biggest concern lately, is once we have an effective vaccine, or several of them, how many years will it take before we get this damn virus under control? I'm worried about all those trendy young moms, in their $400 yoga pants, who won't get their kids vaccinated.

 

[Alex2507]

My biggest concern lately, is once we have an effective vaccine, or several of them, how many years will it take before we get this damn virus under control? I'm worried about all those trendy young moms, in their $400 yoga pants, who won't get their kids vaccinated.

The vaccine protects you.

F^%& them.

Right?

 

[Swerd]

The vaccine protects you.

F^%& them.

Right?

I'm not concerned for the anti-vaxxers themselves. However, if they really have a death wish, there are faster ways to accomplish that.

My concern is that if enough people avoid vaccination, we will take a long time before we reach herd immunity. Ultimately Darwin is right – Natural Selection always wins out. But how long will we be in the Pandemic Panic?

 

[Alex2507]

if enough people avoid vaccination

We could have sent them all to Greenland ... but nooooooooo!

 

[Jeff R.]

Well, that too can be explained by the pros. You only know if you have symptoms, firstly. So, if you have it with no symptoms you are a carrier and pass it on to others. You may have immunity. As to not knowing how one gets it, that is why that tracker group would talk with the person to remember all their contacts to investigate and test them. Perhaps they passed by someone close by while they had an exhalation. Again, all this needs to be investigated by that team. It doesn't come out of thin air.

As you stated, more complicated, well that is a very good reason to not exercise personal freedoms so loosely in this kind of an emergency.

That is not what I have been told, and I believe the CDC states that exposure to an infected person can take roughly 10-15 minutes. I can’t remember which off the top of my head.


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[Jeff R.]

So I just read this on Portugal. Not sure what we did so different than them and we reacted much sooner than they did. We did not have those percentages yet when the US started shutting down society.

Portugal’s Response to COVID-19 | The Regulatory Review

Timely and extensive interventions have facilitated Portugal’s success in addressing COVID-19.

www.theregreview.org

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[Jeff R.]

Here is some data on the budget cuts that we are blaming on Trump. The overall budget was reduced. Strange that one group that would support this response actually saw the only increase....

It shows a 3% increase for the department.

https://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/our-work/pubs_archive/pubs-pdfs/2017/hs.2017.0047.pdf

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[mtrycrafts]

Here is some data on the budget cuts that we are blaming on Trump. The overall budget was reduced. Strange that one group that would support this response actually saw the only increase....

It shows a 3% increase for the department.

https://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/our-work/pubs_archive/pubs-pdfs/2017/hs.2017.0047.pdf

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OK. it wasn't in CDC but personnel in the White House’s National Security Council .
That was the one to conduct the exercise as well at transition.

Dems Misconstrue Trump Budget Remarks - FactCheck.org

After President Trump said, "I don't know anything about" the disbanding of a White House pandemic response office, the Democrats claimed that he “lied” and pointed to Trump's earlier remarks about "some of the people we cut" as evidence. But those remarks were in response to a question about...

www.factcheck.org

 

[Jeff R.]

OK. it wasn't in CDC but personnel in the White House’s National Security Council .
That was the one to conduct the exercise as well at transition.

Dems Misconstrue Trump Budget Remarks - FactCheck.org

After President Trump said, "I don't know anything about" the disbanding of a White House pandemic response office, the Democrats claimed that he “lied” and pointed to Trump's earlier remarks about "some of the people we cut" as evidence. But those remarks were in response to a question about...

www.factcheck.org

Ok so why did the department not replenish the reserves as indicated earlier. I guess Trump needs to cut the purchase orders for them also?? Really.


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[Mr._Clark]

That any Canadian would admire Trump. I don’t understand their admiration at all.

I'm guessing they have the color balance way off on their TVs so they think he has a great tan.

 

[mtrycrafts]

Ok so why did the department not replenish the reserves as indicated earlier. I guess Trump needs to cut the purchase orders for them also?? Really.


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Here is the full story on this:

Trump Falsely Claims He Inherited 'Empty' Stockpile - FactCheck.org

More than once, President Donald Trump has falsely claimed that the federal stockpile of emergency medicine and supplies he inherited from his predecessor was an “empty shelf.”

www.factcheck.org

I guess he needed the funds for the border wall since it was not in any budgets from congress so he stole from others?

Great website. Hundreds of facts checked.

 

[Jeff R.]

So here what I found....no cuts took place.

Democrats' Misleading Coronavirus Claims - FactCheck.org

Democrats have criticized President Donald Trump for his administration's response to the new coronavirus, making claims about cuts to public health programs and the silencing of government experts. But they haven’t always gotten their facts right.

www.factcheck.org

Not to mention article clearly states that the reserves were not brought back during the Obama admin. They spent it on vaccines. So not really sure what we should believe. Politics at its best.


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[GO-NAD!]

I’m not down playing any numbers. I’m saying the numbers that include these are still on the low end of projections. I also think is is not realistic to say none of the people would have died over the past 6 months.


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Those worst case projections are really a straw man that I won't get into, as they aren't really relevant. I agree that we couldn't expect every one of those 205,000+ people to still be alive if it weren't for COVID. To get a better sense of the true mortality impact of COVID, we would need to compare the total number of deaths within any particular area/demographic over the period of the pandemic and compare that number with the same period of time/area/demographic over the average of the past...5?...10? years. Whatever the differential is will give us a better understanding of the impact.

Of course, nobody in past years died of COVID-19 and there's no question that these past few months have given us an "excess" of deaths. I'm not an actuary or statistician, so I don't know how such things are calculating. But, with fewer people commuting, there may have been fewer car accident/pedestrian deaths, which might reduce the differential. Has there been an increase in suicides because of the impact on mental health. A change in homicide rates? Those numbers would all have to be taken into account, I would think.

I don't think it's fair to dump all the blame in the US on Trump, as there have been failures on the part of the individual states, responsible federal agencies, as well as the populace at large. There have been failures on the part of many country's governments, including Canada's.

We were also slow to implement masking. Federal and provincial emergency stockpiles of N95 masks that were created after the SARS outbreak in 2002/03 expired on the shelf. Although Canada has done a better job in reducing the spread than the US, other countries, such as New Zealand and South Korea, have done better.

Canada was slower to ban travel from China than the US, because - I believe - it was seen as simplistic and racist. We restricted travel from the US last of all, despite the fact that the vast majority of our COVID cases originated from...the US.

 

[highfigh]

Not sure if you have seen it, but many manufacturers are pulling out of China and having goods made elsewhere. They'll be hurting in ways they never imagined.

KEW- why did you rate this as optimistic? Do you know what the manufacturers are saying or have you had any conversations with any of them or electronics distributors about this? I have and nobody has returned to normal stock levels, nor do they know when things will return to normal. Things come in a few pieces at a time, to most companies. Parts and accessories are hard to find unless they're made in Malasia, Vietnam or a few other places that don't make the bulk of the equipment. Go to Best Buy and you'll see that they not only have less in stock, they have removed a lot of the displays and shelving- this is happening at distributor locations, too.

Try doing business in an industry that came to rely on one country for most manufacturing and see how freaking optimistic you are.

 

[highfigh]

Sounds like you would recognize the value in having, oh, say, some kind of central authority buying the masks in bulk and prioritize distribution to those who's activities are in the best interest of our nation!
Instead, Trump left states and companies in a "free for all" fighting it out for PPE!

Does anyone else see the irony in the fact that most PPE are made in China?