OT: Corona virus

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: Scott_USN

I work in IT and now we have this huge panic where everyone thinks they will need VPN to work from home when the apocalypse arrives from China. Even though 20% the organization has had the flu this year because it was really bad. Anyway so that his hundreds of people setup on VPN but they don't even really know what it is. [&:]

That's easy - VPN is obviously a Virus Panic Network!

[Zorch]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

ORIGINAL: Scott_USN

I work in IT and now we have this huge panic where everyone thinks they will need VPN to work from home when the apocalypse arrives from China. Even though 20% the organization has had the flu this year because it was really bad. Anyway so that his hundreds of people setup on VPN but they don't even really know what it is. [&:]

That's easy - VPN is obviously a Virus Panic Network!

At my company all remote work is encrypted. People don't have to understand it to use it.

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: MakeeLearn

Schematic representation of a coronavirus particle.
https://www.futuremedicine.com/doi/10.2 ... -2018-0144

This is the more interesting diagram of the two. Surface protein 1 (S1) is the adhesion point. Most vaccines are targeted to this spike glycoprotein because this is how the virus attaches (and subsequently invades) host cells. If you mount an IgA/IgM/IgG response against S1 that will delay / preclude viral attachment and host cell infection. The rest of the glycoproteins (S2, M, N, E) are less important regarding immunogenicity.

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

ORIGINAL: Scott_USN

I work in IT and now we have this huge panic where everyone thinks they will need VPN to work from home when the apocalypse arrives from China. Even though 20% the organization has had the flu this year because it was really bad. Anyway so that his hundreds of people setup on VPN but they don't even really know what it is. [&:]

That's easy - VPN is obviously a Virus Panic Network!

[:D]

[Zorch]

ORIGINAL: Chickenboy

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

ORIGINAL: Scott_USN

I work in IT and now we have this huge panic where everyone thinks they will need VPN to work from home when the apocalypse arrives from China. Even though 20% the organization has had the flu this year because it was really bad. Anyway so that his hundreds of people setup on VPN but they don't even really know what it is. [&:]

That's easy - VPN is obviously a Virus Panic Network!

[:D]

It spreads by contact with computer mice droppings.

[RangerJoe]

ORIGINAL: Zorch

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

ORIGINAL: Scott_USN

I work in IT and now we have this huge panic where everyone thinks they will need VPN to work from home when the apocalypse arrives from China. Even though 20% the organization has had the flu this year because it was really bad. Anyway so that his hundreds of people setup on VPN but they don't even really know what it is. [&:]

That's easy - VPN is obviously a Virus Panic Network!

At my company all remote work is encrypted. People don't have to understand it to use it.

The voice of experience here? [;)]

[Sardaukar]

ORIGINAL: Kursk1943

ORIGINAL: Sardaukar

I was detained for 3 days for suspected COV-19...our legistlation is bit rude when it comes to that [:D]

Which one? Finland or THe Holy Land?

Finland.

I was cleared to just be an a-hole and not public enemy [8D][:D]

[Orm]

ORIGINAL: Sardaukar

ORIGINAL: Kursk1943

ORIGINAL: Sardaukar

I was detained for 3 days for suspected COV-19...our legistlation is bit rude when it comes to that [:D]

Which one? Finland or THe Holy Land?

Finland.

I was cleared to just be an a-hole and not public enemy [8D][:D]

Did you have to pay for the pleasure?

[RangerJoe]

ORIGINAL: Chickenboy

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: RangerJoe




But who needs to be tested? As far as I know, I've had no contact with anyone who has or had it. I have not traveled. That is the problem, it takes a lot of money to test and without a good reason to do so it will not be done.

One big difference between the US and Europe (and many other places in the world) is the profit oriented healthcare industry in the States.

If containment is improved by testing and self-or-imposed quarantines of known cases, then a profit oriented medical system ends up being very ineffective. It will end up costing more in the long run of course not to splash out on the early stage efforts to test and contain (through increased hospital stays, more missed work time and general panic if numbers go way up, etc).

The large segment of the populace who don't have health insurance will also end up spreading the disease through their reluctance or inability to go in to a doctor and incur fees to be tested. It will also likely hit the poor and uninsured harder due to a higher prevalence of pre-existing conditions.

Meh.

The merits of a profit-oriented healthcare system versus that of a state-run healthcare system are too broad to start a thread about here. There is a role in a public health system / policy system that cannot be filled well by profit-oriented healthcare systems-outbreak disease investigations being a prominent difference in favor of the former.

But you can't look past the 'one size fits all' approach associated with the single-payer systems. These are more prone to rationing of care, decreased expenditures for R&D, decreased expenditures for novel treatment/interventional strategies and overstepping of state rights into individual rights than a more tailored individualistic 'for profit' healthcare system provides.

I gave a government run healthcare system three tries to detect melanoma which I did not know that I had. On the fourth time, they finally took a piece off for a biopsy. That is when they detected the melanoma. Zorch, do you remember what my right foot looks like? I had it on the bottom of my right big toe. It still took over 2 months for the surgery by which time it spread (laterally, thank HIM above) but just the right big toe would have come off if they had detected it in time. You don't want the government payer system when your life may be on the line and speed may be an issue.

[Scott_USN]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

ORIGINAL: Scott_USN

I work in IT and now we have this huge panic where everyone thinks they will need VPN to work from home when the apocalypse arrives from China. Even though 20% the organization has had the flu this year because it was really bad. Anyway so that his hundreds of people setup on VPN but they don't even really know what it is. [&:]

That's easy - VPN is obviously a Virus Panic Network!

That could be it!!!

[JohnDillworth]

So in New York we have a student that has tested positive and attended school on multiple days. There is nothing to be gained by testing the other students in her class?

[RangerJoe]

I suppose that everyone could be tested every day until they test positive. I am sure that there is enough testing supplies, equipment, and staff to do so. And people get to pay for their own tests.

But then what do you do when they finally test positive? Shoot them and cremate the bodies? It sounds like it is a bad cold or influenza that is adapting to the human host to be less deadly.

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

So in New York we have a student that has tested positive and attended school on multiple days. There is nothing to be gained by testing the other students in her class?

For those in her class, what will your decision tree look like in terms of recommendations for self-quarantine and the like? Based upon TEST POSITIVE versus TEST NEGATIVE, will outcomes or recommendations for those students be different? If so, then there is merit in testing the others in her class (and probably others in the school, bus driver, etc.).

If no difference in the lives / outcomes of others (other than curiosity or 'peace of mind'), then I don't know why there would be a rationale for testing.

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: RangerJoe
Shoot them and cremate the bodies?

[/darkhumor mode on]

RangerJoe! That's a terrible idea.[:-][X(] Just think of all the virus you'd spread around by having bullets blow through their bodies. Better to throw them live into a flaming pit. That oughta do it.

[/darkhumor mode off]

[JohnDillworth]

Simple. If you test positive you will be quarantined so you will not infect others. If you repeatedly test negative you will be released from quarantine. The community outcome will be significantly better if infectious people are quarantined. No point in wasting resources quarantining people who do not carry the virus. So yes, testing will offer a much better outcome for the community. There is nothing to be gained by knowingly choosing ignorance.

[Chickenboy]

ORIGINAL: JohnDillworth

Simple. If you test positive you will be quarantined so you will not infect others. If you repeatedly test negative you will be released from quarantine.

OK. If that's your rubric, then that sounds like outcomes are dictated by test results. Then, if that's your decision tree, testing is warranted.

[RangerJoe]

But only if they are kept separate from everyone else who may test positive. Anyone else who has contact with them should also be quarantined until it is past the date where they may test positive.

This is not like the old days where there were leper colonies. The best advice is for everyone to take sensible precautions. For those in a higher risk group, then take even more precautions such as limiting contact with other people who may be carriers of this and any other potentially deadly disease.

[Canoerebel]

Since I posted the Johns Hopkins screengrab earlier today, the number of reported cases worldwide (including China) is up by only 650. That's over a span of about 9 hours. That's not very many, considering what we'd expect if this thing was growing exponentially (or like a culture in a petri dish, as one informed person told me yesterday).

On a drive this afternoon, a nationally broadcast radio program mentioned that the number of new cases reported in China today was something like 120. If true, that's very good news.

It's too early to make sweeping conclusions, yet, but this thing is beginning to look much less serious than expected (not to the people who are suffering from it, but compared to where it seemed like things might be headed - and were/are, according to our breathless media). Here's hoping.

[Scott_USN]

I bought some RangerJoe Anti-Viral medications..

[RangerJoe]

ORIGINAL: Scott_USN

I bought some RangerJoe Anti-Viral medications..

+1