An Anecdotal COVID-19 Saga

[Yaktop]

Originally Posted by 16ACE27

I haven't looked at the actual prices, but I feel like I should have bought stock in Amazon, Lowes, and Homedepot a month ago

One of the smarter things I did do.

[MJC62]

N95 respirators are available if you know where to look. The construction trades have used N95’s for years. Everybody that worked a jobsite since the 90’s probably has a box or two in their garage. I do. Never thought they would be worth their weight in gold.,
My local union hall donated all their stock of N 95’s to Chicago hospitals

[bry899]

NYC and New Orleans Hospitals are reaching ICU Capacity, Stay isolated and healthy.
As these hospitals become overcrowded with COVID-19 patients, healthcare professionals might be forced to make tough choices. They’ll decide who will get access to a ventilator, and therefore, who lives and dies.

The decision is made as follows (an example of one used in some Hosp):
It’s a point system meant to determine a patient’s likelihood of benefiting from ICU care that takes two things into account: Saving the most lives and greatest number of years.

The lower the patient scores, the higher their prioritization for care. In the system’s eight-point scale, the first four points illustrate the patient’s likelihood to survive hospitalization, and the last four points assess whether, assuming they survive hospitalization, they have medical conditions associated with a life expectancy of less than one year or less than five years.
This framework directs doctors to prioritize life cycle in case of a tie, and treat younger patients.

[CaptnJohn]

Cuomo stayed today unlikely to need all the beds and ventilators he thought and Trump sent 600 to LA with more if needed. Less hospitalization and deaths in NY today. Those dieing now caught 2 weeks ago. More coming to NY but not the numbers they expected

[MJC62]

Originally Posted by bry899

NYC and New Orleans Hospitals are reaching ICU Capacity, Stay isolated and healthy.
As these hospitals become overcrowded with COVID-19 patients, healthcare professionals might be forced to make tough choices. They’ll decide who will get access to a ventilator, and therefore, who lives and dies.

The decision is made as follows (an example of one used in some Hosp):
It’s a point system meant to determine a patient’s likelihood of benefiting from ICU care that takes two things into account: Saving the most lives and greatest number of years.

The lower the patient scores, the higher their prioritization for care. In the system’s eight-point scale, the first four points illustrate the patient’s likelihood to survive hospitalization, and the last four points assess whether, assuming they survive hospitalization, they have medical conditions associated with a life expectancy of less than one year or less than five years.
This framework directs doctors to prioritize life cycle in case of a tie, and treat younger patients.

I spent my entire working life as a skilled union tradesman and it was drilled into my head from the first day of my apprenticeship that we take care of the old timers.
Now after a life of hard work the old timers get tossed into the trash in the end, ain't that grand...

[ducksface]

Originally Posted by MJC62

I spent my entire working life as a skilled union tradesman and it was drilled into my head from the first day of my apprenticeship that we take care of the old timers.
Now after a life of hard work the old timers get tossed into the trash in the end, ain't that grand...

Any old timer who doesn't understand their position in the chain of things might need some understanding done for them.

I think your trash statement was absurd and insensitive to those making tough decisions.

[CaptnJohn]

Originally Posted by MJC62

I spent my entire working life as a skilled union tradesman and it was drilled into my head from the first day of my apprenticeship that we take care of the old timers.
Now after a life of hard work the old timers get tossed into the trash in the end, ain't that grand...

2 tours in Nam and 100% combat vet. There would be no need to go to a hospital in NY or LA. I'll stick with the VA, treated with respect there always. I have no intention of ever being in NY again anyway.

[MJC62]

Originally Posted by ducksface

Any old timer who doesn't understand their position in the chain of things might need some understanding done for them.

I think your trash statement was absurd.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion. I will leave it at that and use the block feature for yours from here on out

[Dilley Dilley]

Originally Posted by bry899

NYC and New Orleans Hospitals are reaching ICU Capacity, Stay isolated and healthy.
As these hospitals become overcrowded with COVID-19 patients, healthcare professionals might be forced to make tough choices. They’ll decide who will get access to a ventilator, and therefore, who lives and dies.

The decision is made as follows (an example of one used in some Hosp):
It’s a point system meant to determine a patient’s likelihood of benefiting from ICU care that takes two things into account: Saving the most lives and greatest number of years.

The lower the patient scores, the higher their prioritization for care. In the system’s eight-point scale, the first four points illustrate the patient’s likelihood to survive hospitalization, and the last four points assess whether, assuming they survive hospitalization, they have medical conditions associated with a life expectancy of less than one year or less than five years.
This framework directs doctors to prioritize life cycle in case of a tie, and treat younger patients.

This is all so unfortunate. We need to understand that ventilators are not the cure all for the coronavirus pandemic. The outcomes for patients requiring mechanical ventilation for extended timeframes are not good. The goal for people in regards to this pandemic should be to avoid having to rely on a mechanical ventilator to save their life. Short term mechanical ventilation is great for recovery from surgery or some illnesses because they assist the body to heal and recover. Many of the seriously ill coronavirus patients in ICU are requiring mechanical ventilation for 20 plus days. If those patients survive then the quality of life after that is poor. Exacerbating all of this is the fact that infected person has to die without their loved ones. There is also added exposure to the healthcare workers that are needed to provide the care. Please take the Stay at Home and Social Distancing precautions seriously.

[Hugh.vines@att.net]

Originally Posted by 16ACE27

Been busy in our county: we went from 4 cases to 10 cases in 24 hours - none hospitalized.
County to the west is at 17 with 4 hospitalizations now. Seems like 16 of those 17 are related to a long term care facility, the other one is someone who traveled to NY.
County to the east got 2 new cases for a total of 11 but still only 2 hospitalized.

Current numbers for the State are:
Confirmed Cases: 11,545
Deaths: 195 = 1.7% same as last spot check
Hospitalized: 1470 = 16.9% up by 4%

I haven't looked at the actual prices, but I feel like I should have bought stock in Amazon, Lowes, and Homedepot a month ago

Wife has been busy this weekend making masks.

It boggles my mind the number of people out and about wearing N95 masks? Where did they get them? How many went out the back door of our hospital?

Gear best . Com

[bry899]

Originally Posted by CaptnJohn

2 tours in Nam and 100% combat vet. There would be no need to go to a hospital in NY or LA. I'll stick with the VA, treated with respect there always. I have no intention of ever being in NY again anyway.

As much as you hate NY this has nothing to do with NY:
If the VA hospitals get overwhelmed they will also treat younger Vets first!
Also
In a statement, department leaders have promised “an aggressive public health response to protect and care for veterans, their families, health care providers, and staff in the face of this emerging health risk.”

That includes work with the CDC and the possibility of accepting some non-veteran patients at VA medical centers to provide relief to overtaxed local health care systems.

On Wednesday, the department announced it would accept 20 non-veteran patients at its medical facility in East Orange, N.J., as part of that responsibility, but pledged it would not negatively impact veterans access to care.

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/p...eaths-near-70/

[Yaktop]

Tough choices but when its an either or situation you have no choice but to save the one most likely to survive. In many cases its the younger of the two. Bush warned of something of this but budgets and priorities kicked the can down the road. We’ll have a big ramp up of supplied that will likely go out of date before we ever have to use them again.

[Kim G]

Our numbers are all distorted because Blaine County is a major ski/tourist area that had an international ski event right before all this started happening which started it off there. It accounts for almost 1/2 of our case numbers at over 1100. My county is 43 with no deaths. We’ve only added about 10 new cases in last 10 days.

[ducksface]

I sent my excellent, real live, certified, boilermaker help home.
He travelled here for four days work(the mine is on strike) a week.
He's as isolated as we are. He's in the sonoran desert 50 miles from a stoplight, I'm at the grand canyon 47 miles from the nearest stoplight.

No stops for gas, no food stops, straight up here, straight back.
I went ahead and pulled the plug on a mutually beneficial arrangement.

Too much travel not easily justified and there's no way to explain how it works to some goof who thinks everyone lives in Tucson or Phoenix. Even a local goof. Once again, I am beaten by those who haven't had a thought outside of their mundane life and mundane job... Ever.


Our little gated seven household community is officially locked down now. I don't think there's less than half a mile between the houses. About as safe a place as you can get.

He'll be tightening his financial belt, I'll never get such talented labor again.

It was voluntary on both our parts.
Hate it. We Understand is salve that soothes those who need soothed. Hate it. Did it for others, certainly not for ourselves.

Side note:
Update/locate/carry your dnr/heroic effort document if you're of that type.
My bed goes to someone else the first chance(actually the last chance) I get to give it up.
Odds still say donkeys will kick more people to death this year worldwide, but as long as I'm soothing, I'll remind you of the very slim potential need.

[Muggs]

We have 37 cases in Highlands county overall. We are staying home. We both got cabin fever to a degree but thought of being able to see son/grandkids (4) makes us behave. On the medical points system, we are of a mind that we will just take no risks. If was choice between one of us or young person, we understamd young come first.

We are fortunate to have two homes. We are in North because we are old, young ones in South. We went down and dropped masks off. Wife made set of upgraded with HEPA material and we mailed.

Cannot wait to be free again. Everybody stay safe.

[Bob Denman]

We're hiding out in a serious fashion! The Missus has got so many underlying issues that she's the poster child for all of them, and I've got a couple of good ones as well...
But pretty soon: we're gonna start staging "Old West one on one showdowns" in the living room!
Live ammo or blanks?

[Muggs]

Paintball would be fun here. 1.5 acres of oak trees. The laser tag stuff would also be fun.

[ducksface]

Originally Posted by Muggs

Paintball would be fun here. 1.5 acres of oak trees. The laser tag stuff would also be fun.

I picked up about $2,000 worth of paint ball stuff for $50 at a yard sale. They threw out their basement dweller son and was selling the stuff he petulantly left behind.
Older stuff, now worth little to any real paintballer. A mix of older one shot and cock pistols on Co2 cartridges but damn! How much of that stuff does a minimum wage 20hr a week guy need? We instantly had armor and masks and guns, all the equipment for six people.
It lasted for two fights, I kept it for two years just in case, then gave it away.

Anyway,
Paint ball sucks and paint ball hurts and it makes a mess.

The grandturds didn't like it and I didn't either.
But
We have nerfed their little butts to oblivion.
We're about to move up to lasers.

Skip the paintball
Skip the airsoft
Buy the lasers (even if you were only casually thinking about it)

We went straight from marshmallow guns to paint balls.
Big jump, bad landing.

[16ACE27]

Time for an update on our little corner of the CV19 world:

Our county now has 16 confirmed cases including a 1 year old baby, 2 are hospitalized with no deaths.

The county to the left is up to 33 cases, all but 2 from a long term care facility but only 5 hospitalized with no deaths. I gotta interject here as someone who has been trained in contamination control: either workers in these facilities are not being properly trained or they are blowing off their training for expediency in their daily tasks/interactions. Everybody has got to act like they have the crud and anybody they interact with has a different crud because in reality nobody really know who is is carrying the virus: too many cases of asymptomatic carriers.

Another peeve while I'm at it: I've never been a fan of carrying your dog/cat/emotional support animal into stores, especially not grocery stores. But Saturday I went to Lowes and saw at least 6 shoppers dragging their dogs along with them, and of course stopping and letting people pet them. How was that dog sanitized? And then the story came out about the tiger that got the crud. It's time to ban these fake support animals completely and leave that ban in place when this is over. There is absolutely no reason to bring your dog to a store at this time.

Lotsa media discussion the last couple of days about "curve flattening" working because the daily number of deaths have decreased for a couple of days. Let's not say anything about curve flattening until the daily increas in confirmed cases is waaaaay down. Otherwise semi-intelligent people will decided it's time to relax the precautions and we'll be right back where we were.

Current numbers for the State are:
Confirmed Cases: 14,747
Deaths: 296 = 2.0% up from 1.7% last 2 spot checks
Hospitalized: 1892 = 12.8%, down from 16.9% last spot check and about the same as the first spot check

Here's the statewide new case curve:

[Kim G]

Most hardware and home improvement stores allow people to bring their dogs (not just emotional support dogs) we like to walk our dogs when we shop there. However, I agree with you. People should only be going to these stores out of necessity now, and should not be taking pets along and encouraging interaction.