COVID-19/Coronavirus thread

[almagest]

US coronavirus deaths down 87% from high in April - 2693 on April 21 to 363 on June 22 per Worldometers:

 

 

[Kyyle23]

Imagine being a teacher of kids 3rd grade and below and knowing that you will be telling your students they have to be quiet, not touch each other, and keep their masks on all day.  That sounds horrifying

[Quin]

9 minutes ago, Jerksticks said:

“With a positive test”!!!!!!!

 

Now add in all the people over the past 4 months in that age group who never got tested!  Remember when nobody could get a test the first 2 months unless they were basically dying? (Completely unknown number).  Add all those people to the number   

Now add all the asymptomatic people in that group that have had the virus over the past 4 months.  (Completely unknown number).Add those people.  
 

This isn’t rocket science to start thinking that maybe .4 is off by magnitudes.  Multiple, multiple magnitudes.  
 

Don Cooper? Jim Leyland-type guys?  Totally different story.  

Jerksticks, take this here. 

We have a fatality rate from a known sample size. It's what we can act off of at the moment. It is a large sample size. It's much better thought our then throwing your hands in the air and going "but it might be different!"

[ron883]

1 hour ago, Tony said:

Come on, don’t treat the president unfairly. Lot of that going on in this thread. You’ll hurt Ron’s feelings. 

I'm not a Trump fan. All I ask is that the media and others treat him fairly. There's plenty to criticize him over. They just need to do it fairly.

[StrangeSox]

43 minutes ago, Balta1701 said:

The South Korean model was everyone doing lunch silently in classrooms with plastic dividers between each desk. 

Now that's extra supervision time for every teacher, though.

[caulfield12]

2 hours ago, Chisoxfn said:

So we really are just going to stop testing and identifying who is positive?  Is this really what our great nation has came to. We are just going to bury our heads in the sand and give up.  I can't get over how significantly the US has failed relative to the vast majority of developed countries we historically claimed to be superior to.  Unbelievable and just sad. Even if we get lucky and the ignore it and test less strategy works...it will only because of sheer luck of the virus going away. It will not because of any actual skill or strategic insights, it is just because we have demonstrated a clear inability as a nation to come together and actually respond to challenging circumstances.  Instead we have decided that politics matter more than what is right.  

Kates, of the Kaiser Family Foundation, concluded, “You would not look to the United States as a case study of how to do this well. The U.S. has in the past, and could in the future, show/n tremendous leadership in health crises. ... The fact that we couldn't do it in this case — it is depressing, as a global health person.”

Harvard’s Jha, who said he’s long championed some flexibilities in the U.S. health system compared to nations with socialized health care, said he’s come to his own grim conclusion about America’s often scattershot response to coronavirus.

“We may end up being the worst of any country in the world in terms of our response,” Jha said. “Italy… they're going to do way better than us.”

.....

A scorecard issued by the Nuclear Threat Initiative and the Johns Hopkins Center for Healthy Security in October 2019 ranked the United States the most-prepared nation to face a pandemic, citing ample investments in infectious disease detection and response, led by organizations like the Centers for Disease Control. Meanwhile, Italy ranked 31st in preparedness, falling behind nations like Estonia and Indonesia.

But the all-encompassing faith in the U.S. infrastructure turned out to be misplaced, exemplified by the CDC’s early failure on testing, which contributed to coronavirus’ silent spread. Trump’s own vows in February and March that the virus would simply “disappear” put the United States out of step with other developed nations.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/06/22/united-states-italy-traded-places-coronavirus-333122

[caulfield12]

2 hours ago, Balta1701 said:

Yup, swinging...far left by...nominating Biden?

And HRC in 2016, and a “non-conspiracy” led by the DNC and this time establishment politicians like Clyburn in SC to prevent the likes of a progressive Sanders or Warren from winning.
 

To me, it all comes back to the Birther movement, then Tea Party “revolution” over ObamaCare, McConnell’s comments about openly trying to prevent Obama from accomplishing anything and finally denying Merrick Garland, which has led to an imbalance in the SC that seems like is self-correcting in opposition to it being as political as the other two branches of government.

But everything to do with oversight or accountability, Inspector Generals, the Southern District of NY/NJ, violations of the emoluments clause, countless allegations coming out in the Bolton book on transactional/rudderless foreign policy, the complete politicization of military/police/Defense Department and National Intelligence, totally unprecedented.   Nixon doesn’t come close.

We have gotten nowhere or ceded leadership to China on global trade, transportation modernization, climate change/environment, Belt and Road, foreign aid/lending, AI, mobile and 5G technology, science in general, the WHO, the UN, etc.
 

Oh, and our health care system is still the most expensive in the world but ranks 30-35th for effectiveness, just like our K-12 public education system.  And the state of public infrastructure around the country is in shambles.  Our main advantages remaining are the university system, military, creativity/risk-taking/entrepreneurship, rights and freedoms, natural resources, isolation from rest of the world, global finance/reserve currency (HK, Dubai and London taking hits) and Silicon Valley.  But $7 trillion in new spending to fight coronavirus isn’t going to help matters, as income inequality/wealth disparity continues to widen.

Edited June 24, 2020 by caulfield12

[StrangeSox]

1 hour ago, Quin said:

Jerksticks, take this here. 

We have a fatality rate from a known sample size. It's what we can act off of at the moment. It is a large sample size. It's much better thought our then throwing your hands in the air and going "but it might be different!"

Cfr and IFR are different things and unsurprisingly epidemiologists have developed methods for estimating infection rates! Every bit of data we have says this thing isn't very widespread yet at all, and that's backed up by the models.

Pretending it's "completely unknown" is just a way to not admit early ideas that this had already infected tens of millions of Americans was completely wrong, and a way to continue to say we don't need to worry about it going forward

[southsider2k5]

1 hour ago, Quin said:

Jerksticks, take this here. 

We have a fatality rate from a known sample size. It's what we can act off of at the moment. It is a large sample size. It's much better thought our then throwing your hands in the air and going "but it might be different!"

The problem is that it is also a near statistical certainty that we have been under-counting deaths as well.  We know from comparing mortality numbers to historic mortality numbers, that there are a large number of deaths that we can't explain, in states that we know have had outbreaks.  We also know that there are below average mortality rates in states where there haven't been outbreaks so the whole they are committing suicide trope isn't really working there either, otherwise they wouldn't be below normal.  It is very clear in these studies that we are not getting the whole picture for COVID cases or deaths, and that is 100% what the government wants so it has the cover to send everyone back to the slaughter, oops I mean work.

[caulfield12]

1 hour ago, almagest said:

US coronavirus deaths down 87% from high in April - 2693 on April 21 to 363 on June 22 per Worldometers:

 

 

If the trend doesn’t jump back up to 500-750, probably even 1,000/day in the next 2-4 weeks, it would be shocking.
 

A better handle on how to treat critical patients, more protections for vulnerable populations, underreporting and playing games with state numbers and the fact that many of those at the highest risk have already died are all part of this.

Cases in countries that had suboptimal initial reactions are trending way down, across the EU, even the UK and Sweden.

[The Beast]

7 hours ago, southsideirish71 said:

The last semester of education was a joke.  They might as well not have school if this is what its going to be.  My son is taking a bunch of AP classes including Calc, Physics and Robotics.  That will be nearly useless if its a zoom once every few days with a bunch of home work is the schedule just like last semester.  The pass/fail shit is stupid as well because it doesnt help those trying to get academic scholarships when their GPA and all the hard work they have put in gets neutered by randomness.    High School is a sprint to college.  At this point if they close down school again this fall.  I will just pick up and move to somewhere where my kids can actually get an education.  Not glorified babysitting service where the teacher gets to check in every few days.   They are not ready nor will they be for a online curriculum.  

Let me ask you this. Whose fault is it for the experience your son has had? The teachers, the administrators or someone else? Because it damn well better not be the teachers with what they are working with. 

[The Beast]

7 hours ago, NorthSideSox72 said:

We aren't going to eliminate the virus in the US (at least not for years anyway). The goal was, is and still should be, to keep the country safe enough that the medical systems are not overwhelmed. And by keeping it tamped down to that level you also save a bunch of lives and buy time for better treatments and eventually a vaccine.

Illinois has done this, and done it really well. In fact I actually feel some pride when I see how well our state has done compared to others. And what that means is, we are safe enough for this Phase 4 of reopening - and the schools 100% need to open with it. You can't do one without the other for a whole host of reasons. I want to see the schools opened up fully in the fall.

Now, obviously if some massive spike occurs, and ICU beds and ventilators go near maxed out and infection rates are out of control, then you go back a step. Hopefully that doesn't happen but it could. And in that case, you go back a step on ALL of it - if you close the schools, you close down all non-essential services too.

https://www.chicagotribune.com/coronavirus/ct-coronavirus-illinois-reopening-schools-20200623-c64n76ssijf6jccnaqoethe2ce-story.html

“Every school district, college and university will be asked to develop their own reopening plan, Gov. J.B. Pritzker said.”

[The Beast]

3 hours ago, Chisoxfn said:

3 hours ago, Chisoxfn said:

So we really are just going to stop testing and identifying who is positive?  Is this really what our great nation has came to. We are just going to bury our heads in the sand and give up.  I can't get over how significantly the US has failed relative to the vast majority of developed countries we historically claimed to be superior to.  Unbelievable and just sad. Even if we get lucky and the ignore it and test less strategy works...it will only because of sheer luck of the virus going away. It will not because of any actual skill or strategic insights, it is just because we have demonstrated a clear inability as a nation to come together and actually respond to challenging circumstances.  Instead we have decided that politics matter more than what is right.  

“I told them, let’s slow the testing down please.” Don’t care if he said he was joking.

Edited June 24, 2020 by The Beast

[The Beast]

3 hours ago, Chisoxfn said:

I've always said he's a pathetic leader, I've also said the left attacked him for everything he did, vs. focus on the big things that mattered that a dynamic was created that a broader swath of the right could actually believe what Trump says when he leverages the liberal media and the far left conspiracy theory.  That in and of itself was a massive failure of the democratic party and the left which swung so far the other direction they indirectly created a larger pocket than they ever expected which would blindly follow Trump (which has always amazed me - just look at every post I've pretty much made on Trump).  

In the past, he said lots of stupid stuff on CoronaVirus, but it felt more like him trying to say things to detract from the fact that they just couldn't get as much done as they could have or should have. In this case, it really officially sounds like they have totally given up, which I guess as I type this, I don't really know what is worse...neither is good but I always say leadership is a two way street and there is just so little leadership to go around politics these days. Everyone is just using everything to feast on others for their own damn agenda vs. the true good of the people.  

Not with the nominee and most moderates in congress...

[The Beast]

3 hours ago, Yearnin' for Yermin said:

I'm not a Trump fan. All I ask is that the media and others treat him fairly. There's plenty to criticize him over. They just need to do it fairly.

 

Tap & Hold to Copy GIF

Edited June 24, 2020 by The Beast

[NorthSideSox72]

2 hours ago, StrangeSox said:

Not sure how schools do lunches.

No more than 50 kids gathered at a time? My wife's school has multiple lunch periods with 350 kids each. 

All the elementary schools in our district (three of them, District 28) have no cafeterias. They eat their lunches in their classrooms generally, but sometimes in the gym by grade level. I don't think that change is going to be the biggest issue. It's going to be more purely classroom size, I believe.

We are lucky in that our district has pretty small class sizes. Elementary classrooms are ranging 14 to 18 typically in our district, and if you add in that some parents will be keeping kids home for health or other reasons until Phase 5, we are very lucky that our schools can probably do the 15 or fewer thing without a ton of problems. I recognize that in some other districts it will be a very different story.

 

[southsideirish71]

19 minutes ago, The Beast said:

Let me ask you this. Whose fault is it for the experience your son has had? The teachers, the administrators or someone else? Because it damn well better not be the teachers with what they are working with. 

My school district gives out ipads and there is zero paper footprint.  They were submitting homework and taking exams in class via the ipad before Covid.  They had an advantage over most.  So who is at fault?  The one zoom every other day for each class is okay?  Some classes had no tests for the entire quarter?  Some didnt want to give grades besides Pass/Fail? How hard is it to figure that out.  So what is your wifes school district doing right now as we speak to prepare for online education.   You cant just show up in August and go woe is me we are still not prepared.  Are you going to tackle teachers needing to be on video conferencing for the better part of the day.  Are you going to be able to provide adequate testing to validate learning.  Is it going to be engaging and with instruction that is preparing for college.  Because to be honest if this is what we are getting then they can furlough a bunch of the teachers and just have a hall monitor collect homework and take attendance.   The current online education is worthless.  My son was able to do his entire days worth of homework in under 20 minutes.  His lowest grade was a 99 for the quarter.   He slept after he completed his homework until 2pm everyday.  The only time he needed to get up was to attend the occasional zoom.  His GPA was already a 4.  But this is not preparing him for college when he will be challenged and will be behind.  I dont want a participation award medal.  I want him prepared for college to get the best opportunity to be successful in life. My wife works at a school district and they are doing shit right now to prepare for the fall.   I think they believe this is just going to go away.  I dont see anyone preparing an online curriculum.  To do a true online testing program will require some of the students "rights" to be given up when their device is monitored.   And this pass/fail stuff is nonsense.  Challenge for a grade or just extend vacation until there is a cure.  The online side is not education, its a glorified check box to prove that someone is ready for the next grade.   

[StrangeSox]

15 minutes ago, NorthSideSox72 said:

All the elementary schools in our district (three of them, District 28) have no cafeterias. They eat their lunches in their classrooms generally, but sometimes in the gym by grade level. I don't think that change is going to be the biggest issue. It's going to be more purely classroom size, I believe.

We are lucky in that our district has pretty small class sizes. Elementary classrooms are ranging 14 to 18 typically in our district, and if you add in that some parents will be keeping kids home for health or other reasons until Phase 5, we are very lucky that our schools can probably do the 15 or fewer thing without a ton of problems. I recognize that in some other districts it will be a very different story.

 

My wife averaged 35 kids in seventh grade last year.

Her district has 3 or 4 lunchroom supervisors for those 350 kids. If you now put those kids in classrooms, that's an additional 7+ teachers who now have supervisory duty that period but still need their prep and lunch periods. Becomes a huge scheduling challenge, maybe not solvable.

 

There's over 800 districts in this state and each one is unique in some way or the other. The state can't and shouldn't impose a single plan on them all, but it seems like they're all kinda on their own now with minimal actual guidance on what to do in a situation none of them has faxed before. It's a hard challenge for everyone, including students and parents.

[The Beast]

30 minutes ago, southsideirish71 said:

My school district gives out ipads and there is zero paper footprint.  They were submitting homework and taking exams in class via the ipad before Covid.  They had an advantage over most.  So who is at fault?  The one zoom every other day for each class is okay?  Some classes had no tests for the entire quarter?  Some didnt want to give grades besides Pass/Fail? How hard is it to figure that out.  So what is your wifes school district doing right now as we speak to prepare for online education.   You cant just show up in August and go woe is me we are still not prepared.  Are you going to tackle teachers needing to be on video conferencing for the better part of the day.  Are you going to be able to provide adequate testing to validate learning.  Is it going to be engaging and with instruction that is preparing for college.  Because to be honest if this is what we are getting then they can furlough a bunch of the teachers and just have a hall monitor collect homework and take attendance.   The current online education is worthless.  My son was able to do his entire days worth of homework in under 20 minutes.  His lowest grade was a 99 for the quarter.   He slept after he completed his homework until 2pm everyday.  The only time he needed to get up was to attend the occasional zoom.  His GPA was already a 4.  But this is not preparing him for college when he will be challenged and will be behind.  I dont want a participation award medal.  I want him prepared for college to get the best opportunity to be successful in life. My wife works at a school district and they are doing shit right now to prepare for the fall.   I think they believe this is just going to go away.  I dont see anyone preparing an online curriculum.  To do a true online testing program will require some of the students "rights" to be given up when their device is monitored.   And this pass/fail stuff is nonsense.  Challenge for a grade or just extend vacation until there is a cure.  The online side is not education, its a glorified check box to prove that someone is ready for the next grade.   

First of all, given the level of classes he is at and the likelihood of success with that kind of STEM mind, I think he will be successful.

Is it fair that you fault the district and not necessarily the teachers? If so, that is fair. If not, and you blame the teachers, that isn’t entirely fair. They had close to zero time to prepare for online learning. I would agree that video classrooms throughout the day would be better than online exams and homework, but I don’t know if that is up to the district, the school or the department. 

As far as the pass/fail, I think that was mandated by the state if I remember what my wife said correctly. If not, then it had to be the district. I would much rather kids get punished for cheating and take some accountability or actually do their homework, when many of them didn’t until the last few weeks and begged to have their grades rounded up. 

I don’t really know who should be at fault to be honest. But I don’t necessarily think it is the teachers who were at fault in the spring. I would agree with you that some sort of effective plan needs to be in place for the fall, with zoom calls, staggered classes by kids in each level, four day weeks or a hybrid approach being in place.

I can also appreciate a father like you caring about his son’s education. At least you provided some good reasons rather than the usual garbage I see on social media thrown at teachers, usually without any rational, coherent thoughts.

[caulfield12]

3 hours ago, The Beast said:

First of all, given the level of classes he is at and the likelihood of success with that kind of STEM mind, I think he will be successful.

Is it fair that you fault the district and not necessarily the teachers? If so, that is fair. If not, and you blame the teachers, that isn’t entirely fair. They had close to zero time to prepare for online learning. I would agree that video classrooms throughout the day would be better than online exams and homework, but I don’t know if that is up to the district, the school or the department. 

As far as the pass/fail, I think that was mandated by the state if I remember what my wife said correctly. If not, then it had to be the district. I would much rather kids get punished for cheating and take some accountability or actually do their homework, when many of them didn’t until the last few weeks and begged to have their grades rounded up. 

I don’t really know who should be at fault to be honest. But I don’t necessarily think it is the teachers who were at fault in the spring. I would agree with you that some sort of effective plan needs to be in place for the fall, with zoom calls, staggered classes by kids in each level, four day weeks or a hybrid approach being in place.

I can also appreciate a father like you caring about his son’s education. At least you provided some good reasons rather than the usual garbage I see on social media thrown at teachers, usually without any rational, coherent thoughts.

I do fault teachers 50-70 (and I’m on the very bottom end of that spectrum) for just sticking their head in the sand and refusing to adapt to or at least be open to the benefits of modern technology applications (which will be critical to future career success for both students and teachers.)

Having taught four years in the Kansas City, MO, public school district, this might be an issue with a significant number.

It’s up to to every veteran teacher to utilize their experience to help younger teachers with classroom management, and not just mail it in when retirement age is nearing.  The tenure situation provides too much protection in the US, but if that is eroded or negotiated away, there also needs to be some significant “carrots” or in incentives provided as well.  Otherwise, we’ll end up like Russia or a banana republic in the not too distant future, with grade bribes for teachers to supplement low salaries and diminishing pension security.  Of course, the education of wealthy/elites will be continuing pretty much as normal. 
 

I would also argue the downstream learning impact on pre-K, K-6 is even more dramatic.  My son hasn’t been in school since January, and won’t return until late August.  Thankfully, he started full-time KG at age 3, so the effects should be mitigated somewhat.

 

 

Edited June 24, 2020 by caulfield12

[NorthSideSox72]

11 hours ago, StrangeSox said:

My wife averaged 35 kids in seventh grade last year.

Her district has 3 or 4 lunchroom supervisors for those 350 kids. If you now put those kids in classrooms, that's an additional 7+ teachers who now have supervisory duty that period but still need their prep and lunch periods. Becomes a huge scheduling challenge, maybe not solvable.

 

There's over 800 districts in this state and each one is unique in some way or the other. The state can't and shouldn't impose a single plan on them all, but it seems like they're all kinda on their own now with minimal actual guidance on what to do in a situation none of them has faxed before. It's a hard challenge for everyone, including students and parents.

35 kids per classroom? I mean I know the numbers go up in Jr High (my sampling was most recently in 5th and 2nd grades), but that seems insanely high to me.

Anyway, back on the central topic - the schools are going to have a very hard time with all of this, but I just do not think e-schooling is a real solution unless we see some enormous explosion in COVID deaths and have no choice but to shut it all down again. Barring that, get the kids into school, even if their days will be pretty weird for a while.

 

[bmags]

13 hours ago, StrangeSox said:

My wife averaged 35 kids in seventh grade last year.

Her district has 3 or 4 lunchroom supervisors for those 350 kids. If you now put those kids in classrooms, that's an additional 7+ teachers who now have supervisory duty that period but still need their prep and lunch periods. Becomes a huge scheduling challenge, maybe not solvable.

 

There's over 800 districts in this state and each one is unique in some way or the other. The state can't and shouldn't impose a single plan on them all, but it seems like they're all kinda on their own now with minimal actual guidance on what to do in a situation none of them has faxed before. It's a hard challenge for everyone, including students and parents.

This is why I would like to see the state suspend their requirements on PE (I can't remember if it's only high school with the 4 year req). That frees up a huge space to use for additional lunch room but also frees up additional personnel. But I don't know that an individual school district could make that decision.

[Iwritecode]

13 hours ago, southsideirish71 said:

My school district gives out ipads and there is zero paper footprint.  They were submitting homework and taking exams in class via the ipad before Covid.  They had an advantage over most.  So who is at fault?  The one zoom every other day for each class is okay?  Some classes had no tests for the entire quarter?  Some didnt want to give grades besides Pass/Fail? How hard is it to figure that out.  So what is your wifes school district doing right now as we speak to prepare for online education.   You cant just show up in August and go woe is me we are still not prepared.  Are you going to tackle teachers needing to be on video conferencing for the better part of the day.  Are you going to be able to provide adequate testing to validate learning.  Is it going to be engaging and with instruction that is preparing for college.  Because to be honest if this is what we are getting then they can furlough a bunch of the teachers and just have a hall monitor collect homework and take attendance.   The current online education is worthless.  My son was able to do his entire days worth of homework in under 20 minutes.  His lowest grade was a 99 for the quarter.   He slept after he completed his homework until 2pm everyday.  The only time he needed to get up was to attend the occasional zoom.  His GPA was already a 4.  But this is not preparing him for college when he will be challenged and will be behind.  I dont want a participation award medal.  I want him prepared for college to get the best opportunity to be successful in life. My wife works at a school district and they are doing shit right now to prepare for the fall.   I think they believe this is just going to go away.  I dont see anyone preparing an online curriculum.  To do a true online testing program will require some of the students "rights" to be given up when their device is monitored.   And this pass/fail stuff is nonsense.  Challenge for a grade or just extend vacation until there is a cure.  The online side is not education, its a glorified check box to prove that someone is ready for the next grade.   

I remember when I was in HS there were a lot of days I would have zero homework. I got mostly B's and C's so 20 minutes of homework sounds about right. I was there for about 6.5 hours and I'd say at least 50% of it was filled with stuff like lunch, gym class, passing periods, sitting in class taking attendance or in some elective class like shop or keyboarding (early 90's) or a computer class where there was little to no homework.

The other 50% was sitting in a class listening to the teacher and learning/memorizing a few things long enough to pass the test and them forgetting them later on. 

Now in the real world my job is literally pass/fail. Either I do my job correctly or I don't have a job anymore. If I have questions or don't know how to do something I "cheat" by asking someone else for help or looking up a solution online. 

[NWINFan]

Some people heading into the Trump-Phoenix rally said they were not concerned about catching the virus because they thought published statistics were bogus.  Yet, many Trump fans watch Fox News. Recently Fox aired a report of a fast food place supposedly attempting to poison New York City policemen by tampering with their milk shakes. There was no truth to the story, but Fox, as always, didn't fact-check the story and ran with things anyway. And knowing Fox, it didn't care how wrong they were. They accomplished what they wanted with the false report.

Many who cry "Fake News" don't know what fake news really is, especially when it come to the virus. This ignorance only makes things worse.

[almagest]

15 hours ago, caulfield12 said:

If the trend doesn’t jump back up to 500-750, probably even 1,000/day in the next 2-4 weeks, it would be shocking.

The trend shows a slight bump back up is likely so I'd agree on 500-750 short-term, but the overall trend means 1000/day is very unlikely. There's nothing going on that would indicate a return to these numbers. We just had giant outdoor protests with people smushed together a few weeks ago and the death rate didn't climb., plus the infected population is moving away from the elderly and at-risk and to younger, healthier people as the lockdowns lift.

Quote

More protections for vulnerable populations

the fact that many of those at the highest risk have already died

Unfortunately, yes. State and local governments did a TERRIBLE job protecting at-risk populations. Absolutely criminal - for example Minnesota had 81% of their deaths in nursing homes. New Jersey 45%.