NorthSideSox72

I think JB knows that if regions are low and staying low, and keeping all the capacity measures high and are able to do contact tracing pretty effectively, he cannot reasonably keep them back in Phase 3 just because they go from 1.5% to 2% positivity or even 5% to 6% in a 14-day period. The result would be the opposite of what the state needs and he knows that. Many who have been very supportive will start throwing in the towel, it would ignore the huge gains made up to this point and start to make him look like he's so dogmatic to the plan written in March that he isn't capable of leading. And then infections will go up anyway. In the end I think bmags is right that he will defer to local control upon Phase 4, or at least be much more flexible about it than the way the positivity rate provision is written. Bolded is spot-on, for me. No one wants kids to go if it looks like a death trap, but if we are more or less where we stand today, the kids need to be back in school full-time. The negative impacts of starting them remotely in August will be huge, much worse than the missed time in April and May. That has to be part of the picture.

I'm a little confused on the Phase 4 determinant around positivity rate. Seems like there is conflicting information. Does it need to be five percentage points down from when we entered Phase 3, which was May 27th? Or does it need to be five percentage points down over the last 14 days (so from June 11th to 25th I guess)? I have this fear that, after Illinois doing so well to go from like 20% range all the way down to the 3-5% range, that we did SO well that it may not even be realistic to push it down any further. Then on June 25th, if the rate has stayed basically the same or maybe gone slightly up even, despite the fact that that is a really good spot to be in (along with the other measures), we won't be able to go to Phase 4.

The Venn diagram of people who vociferously celebrate the sacrifices that our military and public safety personnel have made and still make (which is perfectly fine with me), and the people who refuse to make the comparatively minuscule sacrifice of wearing a mask inside public spaces or follow some simple social distancing guidelines (which is moronic, selfish and dangerous), is a fucking concentric circle. Which is it you nincompoops? Should Americans make sacrifices for our national good, or not? Shit just pisses me off right now because by most accounts, if we could just get 90% of Americans to wear masks and maintain social distance in certain (not even all!) public spaces, along with some protections for vulnerable populations (long term care, some pre-existing conditions), we could probably have like 99% of all businesses back to business now AND have a lot fewer deaths. Alas, apparently for those "patriots", being asked to wear a mask in some public spaces for a few months is an affront to their warped and fact-free interpretations of their Constitutional rights. So instead we are stuck in this uneven, patchwork state of affairs in 50 different modes of operation, playing virus whack-a-mole, with a moribund economy that will take far too long to recover AND a lot more death than is necessary. For that quarter or so of the population (just wild-ass guessing the ratio here) this applies to - the ones willing to shoot themselves in the foot (slow the economic recovery they so desire) and then fire another shot into the air above a crowd (refusing to wear a mask) 'cause it's their freedoms - fuck you and the horse you rode in on.

You are cherry-picking a single day number. Look at the chart. Also, the early May high in general was expected as peak-ish, then it started declining. Now second wave is caused most likely by behavioral changes. That is the problem.

Illinois was the first to hit the CDC reopening guidelines. Our people have kicked some ass on this thing - the citizens AND the leadership. Not often I get to say nice things about IL state government, so this is a good opportunity. Pritzker was not terribly popular upon election, but his ratings are quite good now. I can make a list of imperfections in his response to COVID, but overall he's clearly done good work. As have most governors, really.

IL also has released guidelines for camps and day cares now, the detailed ones. So for those of us with kids awaiting camps or other child care, it's with the providers at this point to see what they can do. Our summer camp (YMCA) had already cancelled until June 29th. Hoping maybe they can open then. But the older kid has an overnight camp in mid-July, downstate. Overnights are Phase 4. So we wait.

Phase 3 pretty much nailed already. And with room to spare, so the new additions to Phase 3 were a good idea. For those of us with families, the confusion around schools, camps and day cares continues. His statement last week about "all" child care opening for Phase 3 (with restrictions) was NOT talking about day camps. But, yesterday they did send THAT guidance out for day camps, which is different than day care or child care. Now the day camps all scramble to see what is possible. But, NO overnight camps in Phase 3. That's Phase 4. Earilest any region could hit Phase 4 is June 25th. By the time that happens, and then camps ramp up, I am not sure any overnight camps will operate in Illinois. They will have lost half their summers or more, even best case. Schools can open in Phase 4, but the restrictions are such that our local school district is struggling to determine what they can or can't do in August, and having to come up with four different plans ready to go.

This article has the feel of being a few weeks behind. While it is all true, the trend recently is that the virus is going much more rural and small town now. Large cities and suburbs are seeing declines in case loads, while rural and small town areas are seeing small increases. The increases aren't even of course, but show up as highly intense blossoms in specific areas. In other words, while the virus hit "blue" areas first and hardest, it is now making it's way towards "red".

Greg Is Still Playing All Of You. STOP RESPONDING TO HIS NONSENSE!

Predications: MLB clubs would rather not see their systems have teams go under at inopportune moments, and mess with the ability to get 2021 going as normal. But, MLB clubs are hurting for cash as it is, and many won't have the money and/or desire to dump millions into funding minor league teams just so they stay afloat for the next year. So, Prediction: MLB teams won't be much help. Some MiLB teams will reach points where they are leveraged out and/or don't have enough operating cash to continue. No one wants to buy a business in that condition, especially given all the questions about the unknown direction of MiLB and the likely slow recovery when there is one. So, MLB teams will monitor their affiliates AND those of other clubs closely. As some of them go into bankruptcy, and then receivership when they can't raise short term cash for the same business reasons, MLB teams will swoop in and buy those affiliates for pennies on the dollar. A club that might be worth $30M will sell for a few million. The MLB teams treat them as part of their portfolio, gain some equity over a few years, buying an asset with costs already stripped down. Any slim operating profit they get from the owned affiliates is icing on the cake, and can be used towards overall system investments. They get to rebuild the teams' business structures as they see fit, to fit within their plan of how they want the systems to run. Plus, the negative conditions lower the value of nearly all teams, so the MLB clubs with the ability to do so, begin buying other clubs that didn't die off. Within 3 years, the percentage of full season clubs owned by MLB teams will go from miniscule to fairly large.

I'm not sure that's true, because gravity (this virus needs droplets to travel upon), but honestly I can't sit here and say I know what the danger is overall. Substantially less than smaller spaces and closer together like a typical gym class space I am sure, and not 100% safe I am also sure. Where in between I don't know. Playing singles tennis, baseline to baseline is 78 feet. Even if you both rush the net to get to the midline, that's like 40 feet of gap and only on those occasions. In a room that is not only big enough for multiple tennis courts wide, but also has ceilings that have to be 30' or more. I would have to think that is nearly as safe as being outside. I am more worried about the ball, as DA pointed out, as it travels and is handled by each player.

There won't be masks for tennis, that just won't work. Masks to get to the open court, then they would come off. Gloves are a good point, because of the ball, yeah. That can work and I probably will do that. And yes, no touching faces!

Not in any state other than Montana (seriously). There are reasons you can't fire someone, particularly due to status in a protected class (can't fire on race, religion, disability, that sort of thing). But as long as it's not one of those things, companies can fire you whenever they want, pretty much. Just like you can quit pretty much whenever you want. And even on disability and religion, there are limits on the hiring side. Companies can require active duty for certain stretches of time, ability to handle certain manual labor, etc., as long as it is directly necessary for the job and cannot be modified with reasonable accommodations.

After Georgia fixed some of their data due to the "mistake" from a few days ago, making the cases more like flat than going down, it has also come out that Georgia is one of the handful of states that are pulling a trick where the denominator (number of tests) includes COVID tests AND antibody tests, while the numerator includes ONLY the positive results from the COVID tests. Thus making it seem better than it is. Texas and Pennsylvania are also doing this. Virginia and Vermont were doing it, but found the issue and fixed it. ETA: If you look at the curve for Georgia, looking at the time it took to bend their curve after the lockdown, and add that time to when Georgia did their broad opening up... I'd say we will know a lot more about Georgia's fate in about 2 weeks. Right around the end of this month.

Oh I am 100% sure it is both. Illinois, so far, has shown that we can keep the curve bent down far enough to give us some nice headroom underneath the capacity lines of the health care system. Which is the whole idea. So I am sure that JB was likely looking for ways to ease more things for a restless public, and asked his experts what the least harmful ways to do that might be. Or something like that. I was thinking that about indoor tennis too. I've seen a few articles recently about how high-intensity exercise makes someone a particularly profound spreader. But it then occurred to me, this is why we see tennis on the list (along with the already-existing outdoor activities with spacing), but not most other gym or indoor facility sports. Think about the inside of a tennis club. These are huge, cavernous spaces, with players very far apart. Compared to most other indoor sports it is much lower risk, I would think.

Newly added to IL Phase 3: --Restaurant OUTDOOR seating with distancing and other rules --Tennis not only outdoors, but now also INDOORS, again with certain precautions in place --ALL state parks will open, camping and related outdoor activities including boating, OK for groups up to 10 (was only some parks before) --Golfing moves up to foursomes All good news, but the real test will be how well businesses and (probably more so) individuals follow the new rules. That will be the crux. The more selfish people who bizarrely think masks and distancing are somehow trampling their rights (they aren't), the more people will die, and then we go backwards again. Really just one adjustment left that I really want them to make for Phase 3: they need to answer for child care. You just can't reasonably open nearly all businesses but leave child care to "limited", not to mention no one knows what "limited" means yet. Supposedly we will get guidance on that this week from JB et al, which paired with the CDC Details released a couple days ago (finally), should give camps and day cares the info they need to make their plans.

Iowa's tactic is to, apparently, do the opposite of what everyone else is doing - they are SLOWING their testing. Since their testing number peaked at around 4500 on the 11th, the testing numbers have been sliding down pretty much daily to now around 2700 per day. Apparently going with the Trump school of "can't have positive cases if you don't test". 5/13 is when they opened up most businesses across all 99 counties, even high-touch businesses, and removed most types of distancing requirements. Let's see where they stand in case count and positivity rate around the end of this month.

Virginia WAS doing that, but then separated them out after people noticed. So their numbers are now doing that correctly.

Florida fired their website portal tech lead, after (reportedly) they asked her to change some things.

So, it's starting to come to light that both Georgia and Texas are including both COVID tests AND antibody tests in their totals (the denominator), but only counting positive test results from the COVID tests as the numerator. So, their positive test rates look lower than they really are. Texas, meanwhile, is seeing spikes even WITH the mathematical "help".

Dissidents have done that. There have been any number of reports leaking out the sides about the bodies being processed and cremated, for example.

I haven't, but feel free to show me. Balta is saying he believes their numbers NOW are pretty low, because of the police state actions they took. And that might be true. But I haven't seen him say that the numbers from Wuhan in the original or early stages were accurate. I haven't seen anyone say that, in fact, other than Chinese state media.

Literally everyone, including people in China, who have been paying attention, are aware that China's death numbers are a vast undercount. Why they keep pretending otherwise is beyond me since the cat is well out of the bag.

Yes, math. Go see my original posts. You forgot the whole time thing. For the record, he didn't "shut down" anything. His China "ban" stopped less than half the travel between them. His Europe "ban" included only parts of Europe, leaving out the UK and other countries that were heavily infected. They were visual moves, not ones that actually accomplished anything. And he did essentially nothing stateside until March, and even then never took anything resembling real actions. People are going after you because you are defending the indefensible. No one is saying the virus is Trump's fault, no one is saying China is without blame, and no one is saying that the entire situation is on Trump's lap. None are true. They are saying that his lack of leadership and any kind of meaningful action, during a period when most other countries in a similar position were taking far more decisive action. Trump's response was, and has been, an abject failure. Worth noting too: I've voted in seven Presidential elections so far, and voted for only three democrats (three GOP, 1 3rd party). I also tend more Republican for state offices here in Illinois. So this is not coming from some dyed in the wool Democrat.

That mobility is another reason why fast action was needed. It was not taken. Trump did next to nothing until March, while the rest of the first world acted. Also, in 1960 (I can't find '57 specifically), the US had a population of 187M, which means it has not tripled since then, it has doubled. If you want to say COVID has so far been only 3 times as deadly, instead of 6 times, OK. Either way it's a huge failure. Semantics. If you want to blame China for things, I agree 100%. They have blood on their hands. China was bad, so was Trump, though for different reasons (I don't think Trump was trying for deceiving the world, so much as he is just a continuous victim of his own magical thinking). Why are you trying to defend one and not the other, other than the very partisanship you seem to be blaming? Also... That. The states stepped up when TrumpCo failed, and it has helped immensely. And even WITH those measures, COVID has been killing people at multiple times the rate of similar previous events. It is far more transmissible, and causing far more death. These really are not disputable facts.