This article in Science magazine is one of the most informative I've come across in terms of how COVID might be working once it infects a person:
The virus doesn't focus solely on the respiratory system but seems to use cells that are rich in the enzyme ACE2 (found throughout the body) to get a foothold and begin to replicate.
In my visualizations going forward, I will focus on all the organs and systems working in concert, in the right measure, to heal the body.
I think this article by CNN's Brooke Baldwin is a nice followup to my previous post:
How fighting coronavirus taught me about the gift of connection
Someone's fear of losing their livelihood and not being able to feed their family is just as real as any fear of catching the virus. The problem is not the person or their political viewpoint. The problem is the fear. When we make decisions driven by fear, they are almost never for the Greatest and Highest Good. One way of avoiding this pitfall is to find compassion for your fellow human being, who may not realize that there is no need to succumb to this fear. Instead of succumbing to your own fear of what another person's actions might engender, send those persons love and light and say a prayer that they may find a way out of the fear, as well.
Dying from covid is a real threat - and there is no coming back from it. There are safety nets built into society that stop people from starving- most European countries have much better ones than ours and have shown more willingness to support people during this time regarding shelter and job loss but they do exist. This is an opportunity if we are all willing to see what this virus exposes- both in terms or offering compassion, but also in terms of not watering the seed of fear, this crisis offers the opportunity for The creative re-imagining Of a society that until now seemed fringe but this has exposed the weakness of capitalism and the reality that capitalism makes us miserable and is unsustainable anyway in a world that has finite resources. I know what it’s like to wake up from victim hood and to shift into a different energy- we are the authors of this story and we are not impotent- it’s not happening to us- we are participating in some way everyday. We are all called to act and one way of doing that is offering another lens through which to see our current circumstances- we do not have to succumb to our worst fears or buy into the hype that we face death if our economy doesn’t restart. I am not suggesting that economic loss is not a real concern or that it isn’t scary or difficult- but this is our opportunity to expose the system’s faults and work towards something better.
I might have come across as taking an unfair shot at social safety nets in my previous comment. Yes, many countries do a better job than the US when it comes to providing for the less fortunate. But, as @jaidy pointed out, this is an opportunity to expose the system's faults, and all national institutions as we know them are girded to some extent by the extractive logic of wetiko. So let's identify and remedy international cracks before carbon copying this or that country's welfare infrastructure.
Separately, if you don't think you're at a point where you can send love and light to someone whose behavior repulses you, as @frank suggested, you can at least follow the lead offered by @pikake and focus on loving and working on yourself, which will bring about its own transformations. We can't heal others without first healing ourself.
People keep asking when will it be safe to go out in public again? My gut is that it's going to be at least 1.5 years, and probably 2 years, before I will feel safe going out to public places. And that will depend on whether there is a reliable vaccine at that point. But it is more complex than that because while I can work at home, many cannot. Also I'm high risk, so I am not going to take any chances.
In this ProPublica advice to Governors on what needs to be done before economies should be re-opened, they spoke to experts and frontline officials from Italy, Germany, Spain, Singapore, Taiwan and South Korea.
An Excerpt: They advise:
- Massive, ongoing testing to detect where the disease is spreading,
- a real-time ability to trace contacts of those infected and isolate them, [Jeanne's note: this is quite invasive of people's privacy and I don't think we should do it here.]
- a willingness of people to wear masks in crowded public spaces,
- reserves of personal protective equipment (PPE) and other equipment for hospital workers to handle any surge in cases,
- and reliable, easily administered blood tests to find out the number of people who have been infected. If they work well, such tests could eventually be used to identify people with immunity who could work at higher-risk jobs.
We also asked American experts whether states can meet all or most of these benchmarks. Their answers coalesced around a single point: None of you are close to being ready....
One theme emerged again and again. Experts from across the world said it’s crucial to correctly interpret the recent drop in the rate of hospitalizations and deaths reported by New York City, ground zero for the epidemic. This result was achieved only by a month of slamming the brakes on the economy and banning the most basic interactions (and pleasures) of human society.
The bad news, they said, is that everything we’ve been through so far has merely allowed us to reset the clock to mid-January, when the virus was already seeded in many parts of America and we were on the cusp of the biggest public health crisis in a century. Allow people to return to offices, streets, malls and mass transit without a well-thought-out plan, and you stand a substantial chance of triggering a second wave of infections.
Reopening is essential to save the economy, they said, but don’t kid yourself: The new normal will look nothing like the old normal. Until there’s a vaccine or a reliable treatment, you and your states will be living and working very differently, constantly at risk from a wave of disease that could overwhelm your hospitals." Here's the whole article https://www.propublica.org/article/coronavirus-advice-from-abroad-7-lessons-americas-governors-should-not-ignore-as-they-reopen-their-economies
ProPublica is worth subscribing to; they have top reporters, and they are free, donations only.
Some states have no real plan and just opening again. South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster said Monday he was reopening many non-essential businesses effective immediately and beaches on Tuesday.
The governor announced his decision after other state leaders spoke of tentative plans to reopen the economy in the coming weeks. McMaster's plan included the immediate reopening of retail locations such as department stores, clothing shops and book sellers.
Beaches will be open beginning at noon on Tuesday.
"I've restored public beach access, allowing locals to use their discretion. I've also allowed some retailers that were previously closed to open, but they must follow strict social distancing measures," McMaster said Monday.
Georgia is also opening non essential businesses.
Gov. Brian Kemp announced on Monday that the first phase of reopening Georgia businesses will begin this Friday, April 24.
Gyms, fitness centers, bowling alleys, body art studio, barbers, cosmetologists, hair designer, nail care artists and massage therapists will be allowed to resume business on Friday. Kemp said basic health and sanitation standards must be met before any business can reopen, such as screening employees for fever and wearing masks.
Theaters, private clubs and restaurants' dine-in services will be allowed to reopen Monday, April 27, Kemp said. Bars, nightclubs, amusement parks and live performance venues will remain closed for the time being.
This is a disaster in the making.
Yes, a little 5-year old girl died in Detroit over the weekend. She didn't have any of the typical symptoms - just a mild fever and a really bad headache that got worse and worse. After her parents bought her to the hospital, she was tested and sure enough, she had Covid-19 and she deteriorated after that. She was declared brain dead over the weekend after being on a ventilator for two weeks. It's just heartbreaking.
Here is a link to her story - what a cutie pie she was. Her poor parents.
This should ease some of the fears about covid lethality. I'm not downplaying its danger at all, but the numbers arent as bad as they seem, and they seem scary as hell right now.
An antibody study in Los Angeles was done. Roughly 850 people were tested(small but large enough to give a basic idea) for covid antibodies. The study showed that somewhere between 28-55 times the number of people who tested positive for covid infections had antibodies. It's far from enough to gather herd immunity, but it does show one distinct fact-the number of asymptomatic cases and very mild cases is much higher than previously expected. If you translate the ratio over the entire country you get somewhere between 22-44 million cases of people that have been infected and recovered. Even taking the low end and multiplying the death numbers by 1.5x to adjust for covid deaths that were not recorded as such, you get a 0.27% mortality rate. That means less than 3 out of every 1000 people who contract covid are dying. Those numbers are very close to the seasonal flu(one type is what became of the Spanish flu).
I am not trying to compare it to the flu in danger because there will be rising death numbers and with no immunity at all, it's an entirely different animal. Covid kills indiscriminately versus the seasonal flu killing almost solely those weakened by other issues. What I am saying is that for those of us, myself included, that freak out over every cough, sneeze, and throat tickle we get, the true danger is not to the level we are making it out to be. Please dont let what I say cause you to relax your precautions, because we definitely should not. Just let it serve as a reminder that within the 22 million Americans already affected, many had underlying issues and did not succumb to the disease. I also am fairly confident that many with serious underlying issues are included in the asymptomatic group as well. Covid attacks some gravely and others not at all for a reason and whatever the reason is, it goes much deeper than preexisting conditions. It is something in the cellular makeup, or biochemistry, of everyone that decides who gets affected how. I am sure scientists are actively trying to detect that reason and will use it to fight the disease.