OT: Corona virus

[Kull]

Here's an update on the state of test kit availability in the US. Those focused on the number of kits made and distributed by a government agency are seeing a few trees and drawing the wrong conclusions. This is from factcheck.org:

FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn provided the clearest answer about testing capacity on March 7, when he said that the CDC had shipped enough kits to state and local public health labs to test 75,000 people for COVID-19.

In addition, more than 1.1 million tests manufactured by Integrated DNA Technologies had been shipped as of March 6 for non-public health labs to use, with another 400,000 possibly shipping by March 9. A separate manufacturer had also produced 640,000 tests that could have shipped as early as March 9, once quality control testing was complete.

“The actual number of tests that have shipped is larger than the number of patients that can be tested,” Hahn explained, noting that the approximately 2.1 million tests from IDT and another company would allow roughly 850,000 Americans to be tested.

On top of those tests, he added, would be any testing by commercial or academic labs, plus an expected additional 4 million tests from IDT and the other company by the end of this week. The CDC itself also can test approximately 350 specimens per day.

It appears the test kit bottleneck in the US has been solved.

[Kull]

On the purely anecdotal front, I flew from West Texas to southern Florida on March 3rd and returned yesterday. 3 of the 4 flights were packed to the gills (no open middle seats) and the terminals seemed moderately busy. Not quite as full but miles away from echo chambers. Saw one mask on the entire trip going down, and more on the way back - but very few, maybe 1%, if that. LOTS of people using portable hand sanitizer on the return (I was the only one I saw using it on the way down).

It's also funny how your ears become sensitized to the sound of a cough. There was a screaming baby on the first leg from Florida, which I barely noticed. On the same flight I DO recall hearing exactly 3 coughs and trying to figure out what part of the plane they were coming from.

[RangerJoe]

I try not to let screaming babies bother me. At least they can scream, not all can. That said, their inner ear may be blocked and sucking on something [;)] may relieve it.

[Erik Rutins]

No politics please and let me define that clearly. We all no doubt have political views on this crisis. Within this forum, please stick to criticizing the policy (i.e. problems with testing, poor communication, misinformation) rather than calling out specific political figures. It is in everyone's best interest to just solve any issues now and improve our response both in the US and globally rather than focus on assigning political blame.

This is worth a read as well:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/13/opin ... ponse.html

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: CaptBeefheart
One of the interesting things I recently read is a lot of lessons were learned in Korea from the MERS outbreak in 2015. That one hit Korea hardest outside the Middle East. One of the lessons? Keep potential carriers out of the hospitals, hence drive-through testing or setting up tents outside the hospital where people can walk up to get tested. Another lesson? It took too long to get approval to make test kits. Hence the test kit development and approval process was greatly streamlined, with the result that Korea has a higher percentage of testing than anywhere. The U.S. has seriously dropped the ball (read: CDC and FDA) on that.

Very interesting points and helps understand why they were so on the ball with this compared to many other countries.

I'm hopeful that we will be able to catch-up now that the US is fully awake to the threat and private industry and government are marching to the same beat, but I expect there will be some very tough months ahead before we turn the corner.

Regards,

- Erik

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: Chickenboy
We're taking the family to camp at a regional renaissance faire-the same one we've been to every year we've been here. It's fighting the panicker tide by specifically announcing that they're going to be open this weekend. So I'll be enjoying the bawdy songs and the mead come what may.

I hope all goes well for you and your family, Chickenboy. Also, no offense, but this is disappointing. They should not be going ahead with a large gathering at this point and I don't understand your logic at this point in still thinking this is no big deal.

[RangerJoe]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

No politics please and let me define that clearly. We all no doubt have political views on this crisis. Within this forum, please stick to criticizing the policy (i.e. problems with testing, poor communication, misinformation) rather than calling out specific political figures. It is in everyone's best interest to just solve any issues now and improve our response both in the US and globally rather than focus on assigning political blame.

This is worth a read as well:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/13/opin ... ponse.html

A nice, informative article. Thank you for posting the link.

[Macclan5]

Just want to reassure all my international friends on this forum - things are looking okay !

Hockey at most levels shut down in Canada March 13

The response from University of Saskatchewan ( Saskatoon Saskatchewan Canada)

"We got this" - bring back Hockey !

--

Kelvin’s said his colleague, Chris Richardson, is currently working on a vaccine that places a SARS protein inside the measles vaccine. Testing is now underway at the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization – International Vaccine Centre (VIDO-InterVac) at the University of Saskatchewan.


https://globalnews.ca/news/6666876/coro ... 9-vaccine/

[Kull]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

ORIGINAL: CaptBeefheart
One of the interesting things I recently read is a lot of lessons were learned in Korea from the MERS outbreak in 2015. That one hit Korea hardest outside the Middle East. One of the lessons? Keep potential carriers out of the hospitals, hence drive-through testing or setting up tents outside the hospital where people can walk up to get tested. Another lesson? It took too long to get approval to make test kits. Hence the test kit development and approval process was greatly streamlined, with the result that Korea has a higher percentage of testing than anywhere. The U.S. has seriously dropped the ball (read: CDC and FDA) on that.

Very interesting points and helps understand why they were so on the ball with this compared to many other countries.

I'm hopeful that we will be able to catch-up now that the US is fully awake to the threat and private industry and government are marching to the same beat, but I expect there will be some very tough months ahead before we turn the corner.

Regards,

- Erik

I posted this exact information earlier. It's right at the top of page 20 along with a quote and a link to a pretty detailed story.

Kind of disappointing that apparently some aren't reading these things. Rather than just sticking a link out there, I usually include interesting graphics and "to-the-point" quotes. A fair amount of effort goes into the research, including a HUGE amount of time looking for sources that don't have an agenda. (Ironically, that one link was a violation of my own policy, but the story is really important and it was the only source I could find)

[BBfanboy]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

ORIGINAL: CaptBeefheart

I think the lesson that supply chains need to diversify has hit home this time. Let's hope people don't forget in five years.

Cheers,
CB

Partly it's diversifying where things are obtained, and partly stockpiling of critical items. The "just in time" supply chain model is very efficient and therefore very alluring from the perspective of maximizing profit. For important and certainly for critical items there needs to be a supply cache, a buffer if you will, which is there for genuinely urgent situations like this one. That "emergency supply" must never be dipped into for profit or convenience reasons.

The problem is trying to maintain that politically, and by politically I include within companies. There is always someone willing to show the board how much money they can save - and increase profits - by reducing or eliminating such a cache with so-called little or no risk. And even when not formally approved it sometimes gets done surreptitiously to show increased profits and increase certain executives' compensation.

Hopefully it is BS, but now we have international politicking about deliberately denying critical supplies. That is also a consideration in diversifying supply chains.
https://www.foxnews.com/world/chinese-deny-americans-coronavirus-drugs

Warehousing stockpiles does cost money and we should not expect private corporations to keep a stockpile for us without compensation. The usual route is for the Public organization (WHO or government Public Health in the case of epidemics) to purchase and maintain the stockpile and charge the people who will benefit from it through their taxes.

We should also note that many items are subject to deterioration in storage. For example, a rubber respirator might have the rubber dry out over the years and become brittle. During my time flying on C-130s we checked the expiry dates on first aid kit items. The bandages in sealed packets had no expiry date so we opened one pack which had probably been there for 15 years - the gauze bandage was dust, dried out by the air conditions at altitude and crumbled by the heavy vibrations from the C-130's turboprops. The whole fleet had to replace those bandages and mark the package with the date and five year expiry date.
Point is, managing a stockpile is not a "buy-and-forget-until-needed" proposition.

[Erik Rutins]

ORIGINAL: Kull
I posted this exact information earlier. It's right at the top of page 20 along with a quote and a link to a pretty detailed story.

Kind of disappointing that apparently some aren't reading these things. Rather than just sticking a link out there, I usually include interesting graphics and "to-the-point" quotes. A fair amount of effort goes into the research, including a HUGE amount of time looking for sources that don't have an agenda. (Ironically, that one link was a violation of my own policy, but the story is really important and it was the only source I could find)

Sorry Kull, I try to read them all and have been reading your posts, but must have missed that one.

[Spikeosx]

ORIGINAL: Kull
It appears the test kit bottleneck in the US has been solved.

It has not. Last night the governor of my state said that we have only 800 test kits, and have been waiting for requested 20,000. Governor said he is very frustrated with testing kit situation.

[traskott]

Here in Spain, state of alert is about to be declared. It's expanding very fast. It's not about your docs are the best in the world. Is a matter of quantity. Like you have Pearl Harbour and the only hospital you have is a cabin. Too many sick people at once. Thats the main problem here.

[USSAmerica]

ORIGINAL: obvert

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

If this manages/happens to run its course in a month or so, imagine the surge in confidence/relief/exuberance as world's economies begin to ramp up and then gain steam going into the summer and the autumn. (The longer it takes for the virus to run it's course, the less resilient the economies, in all likelihood).

But there will be all kinds of collateral damage requiring government interventions, as airlines, cruise lines, and many other industries and business suffer tremendous shocks to their cash flow.

This is from GreyJoy. I reached out to see how he is doing through all of this.

Hi erik,

nice to hear from you my friend. It's been a while
Here it's a mess, much worse than what we all expected few weeks ago. Much worse than what the authorities are telling us. I have many friends who are doctors at the hospitals and they say the situation is incredibly grief. Young people (20, 30, 40 years old) are dying even if in healthy conditions. And the worst part is that it seems there's no way to isolate or contain the virus.
Yesterday evening the Gov locked down everything. Cities seem like just before the apocalypse. No one's around. Very few cars. People have emptied the supermarkets.
The economy is crumbling down fast. Very fast.
You should see Venice...seems like when you read about the 1348 plague... the city is simply dead.
Not only the stock exchange markets. My clients are on the edge of bankruptcy and nobody is paying anybody at all.
And things will not get better. Experts say it will take at least another month in order to see the curve of the contagious decrease. One more month of lockdown. Don't know how we'll get over this.

Stay safe Erik and don't underestimate this emergency. I've heard in UK Johnson is doing like Trump in the US...denying the evidence. Yesterday at Anfield there were 50k people massed together... madness! Smart-work if you can and avoid dinners and non necessary contacts with everybody but Rachel and your son for few weeks. It's a small price to pay in order to stay safe.

Ciao my friend

Keep in touch

Thanks for sharing this, Erik. Good to hear from Greyjoy, even if what he has to say isn't very good news.

[Kull]

ORIGINAL: Spikeosx

ORIGINAL: Kull
It appears the test kit bottleneck in the US has been solved.

It has not. Last night the governor of my state said that we have only 800 test kits, and have been waiting for requested 20,000. Governor said he is very frustrated with testing kit situation.

The bottleneck was the CDC building it's own kits. Now they are coming in from a variety of new sources and in large numbers. Including a new test just approved today:

The FDA approved the test that will be run by Swiss pharmaceutical giant Roche's automated testing machines. The machines are already in 100 American laboratories.

Roche's diagnostic machine will be able to run up to 4,000 tests per day and will give doctors the result in less than four hours.

I bolded the important point. We aren't waiting for some potential thing to happen - this testing methodology can start immediately.

[witpqs]

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

ORIGINAL: witpqs

ORIGINAL: CaptBeefheart

I think the lesson that supply chains need to diversify has hit home this time. Let's hope people don't forget in five years.

Cheers,
CB

Partly it's diversifying where things are obtained, and partly stockpiling of critical items. The "just in time" supply chain model is very efficient and therefore very alluring from the perspective of maximizing profit. For important and certainly for critical items there needs to be a supply cache, a buffer if you will, which is there for genuinely urgent situations like this one. That "emergency supply" must never be dipped into for profit or convenience reasons.

The problem is trying to maintain that politically, and by politically I include within companies. There is always someone willing to show the board how much money they can save - and increase profits - by reducing or eliminating such a cache with so-called little or no risk. And even when not formally approved it sometimes gets done surreptitiously to show increased profits and increase certain executives' compensation.

Hopefully it is BS, but now we have international politicking about deliberately denying critical supplies. That is also a consideration in diversifying supply chains.
https://www.foxnews.com/world/chinese-deny-americans-coronavirus-drugs

Warehousing stockpiles does cost money and we should not expect private corporations to keep a stockpile for us without compensation. The usual route is for the Public organization (WHO or government Public Health in the case of epidemics) to purchase and maintain the stockpile and charge the people who will benefit from it through their taxes.

We should also note that many items are subject to deterioration in storage. For example, a rubber respirator might have the rubber dry out over the years and become brittle. During my time flying on C-130s we checked the expiry dates on first aid kit items. The bandages in sealed packets had no expiry date so we opened one pack which had probably been there for 15 years - the gauze bandage was dust, dried out by the air conditions at altitude and crumbled by the heavy vibrations from the C-130's turboprops. The whole fleet had to replace those bandages and mark the package with the date and five year expiry date.
Point is, managing a stockpile is not a "buy-and-forget-until-needed" proposition.

Quite so!

One possibility without direct subsidy is to mandate a stockpile for any company which deals in them so the stockpile cost gets built into the prices. Not meaning to include detail here, some oversight and penalties for non-compliance would be required of course.

[USSAmerica]

ORIGINAL: Canoerebel

Here's some totals as of the 12th, along with some of my musings.

Dan, this is starting to look like one of your well annotated AAR maps. I love the visual way you tend to present information.

[Kull]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

One possibility without direct subsidy is to mandate a stockpile for any company which deals in them so the stockpile cost gets built into the prices. Not meaning to include detail here, some oversight and penalties for non-compliance would be required of course.

On problem with that idea is the speed at which equipment goes obsolete. So if you are stockpiling gaskets for the "Purifier-1000", that thing is probably going to be obsolete in 2-3 years (or sooner), and the gaskets for the "Purifier-2000" will - of course - be a different configuration. So now you are stockpiling gaskets for both models (because not all medical facilities will have upgraded), and then the next model and the next, and the cost of building parts that aren't being used becomes yet one more factor in driving medical costs higher and higher.

To say nothing of the ever-increasing warehouse space, which will eventually become reminiscent of that final scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark.

[RangerJoe]

ORIGINAL: witpqs

ORIGINAL: BBfanboy

ORIGINAL: witpqs



Partly it's diversifying where things are obtained, and partly stockpiling of critical items. The "just in time" supply chain model is very efficient and therefore very alluring from the perspective of maximizing profit. For important and certainly for critical items there needs to be a supply cache, a buffer if you will, which is there for genuinely urgent situations like this one. That "emergency supply" must never be dipped into for profit or convenience reasons.

The problem is trying to maintain that politically, and by politically I include within companies. There is always someone willing to show the board how much money they can save - and increase profits - by reducing or eliminating such a cache with so-called little or no risk. And even when not formally approved it sometimes gets done surreptitiously to show increased profits and increase certain executives' compensation.

Hopefully it is BS, but now we have international politicking about deliberately denying critical supplies. That is also a consideration in diversifying supply chains.
https://www.foxnews.com/world/chinese-deny-americans-coronavirus-drugs

Warehousing stockpiles does cost money and we should not expect private corporations to keep a stockpile for us without compensation. The usual route is for the Public organization (WHO or government Public Health in the case of epidemics) to purchase and maintain the stockpile and charge the people who will benefit from it through their taxes.

We should also note that many items are subject to deterioration in storage. For example, a rubber respirator might have the rubber dry out over the years and become brittle. During my time flying on C-130s we checked the expiry dates on first aid kit items. The bandages in sealed packets had no expiry date so we opened one pack which had probably been there for 15 years - the gauze bandage was dust, dried out by the air conditions at altitude and crumbled by the heavy vibrations from the C-130's turboprops. The whole fleet had to replace those bandages and mark the package with the date and five year expiry date.
Point is, managing a stockpile is not a "buy-and-forget-until-needed" proposition.

Quite so!

One possibility without direct subsidy is to mandate a stockpile for any company which deals in them so the stockpile cost gets built into the prices. Not meaning to include detail here, some oversight and penalties for non-compliance would be required of course.

I believe that private organizations like the Red Cross could maintain stockpiles and would get them out quicker than governments.

That said, in the US there is the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) that could have federal level stockiles, the states and local governments could also have more stockpiles. The supplies would have to be rotated so they don't expire but that is something to bring up to people who can do something about it. I am sure that other countries also have similar organizations for the same purpose.

[USSAmerica]

Despite occasional political opinions flaring up here and there, this thread has been a great source of detailed and reasonable discussion and information. I hope it continues in that tone and usefulness. [8D]