Government Response to Coronavirus 5: We're On Our Own

[DarkAnts]

8 minutes ago, Audrey2 said:

I still don't understand why so many "pro life" people refuse to wear a mask.

Oh right, they aren't pro-life (or anti-abortion), they are pro-controlling women.

It really gets me when they wave "My body, my choice" signs.

Because it's not actually being about prolife. It's about having a political stand to show that they are morally superior. They use to be outwards racist. They switched to abortion when they lost the right to legally be racist. Now they are overtly racist.

[Dandruff]

2 hours ago, DarkAnts said:

People who don't wear masks should be charged with reckless endangerment at a minimum. If they cause someone else to get the virus, attempted manslaughter. If the person dies, reckless manslaughter at a minimum.

And I'd deny insurance coverage to anyone seeking treatment for COVID, who can be shown to have intentionally disregarded safety guidelines.

[GreyhoundFan]

If you watch closely, you can see Joni's nose growing with every word:

 

[smittykins]

Governor Cuomo just announced that the NYS Fair(usually held the last two weeks of August and ending on Labor Day)has been cancelled.

[clueliss]

Um - sure - yeah.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

LOL, TLP always has a good comeback:

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"States mandate masks, begin to shut down again as coronavirus cases soar and hospitalizations rise"

Spoiler

The pandemic map of the United States burned bright red Monday, with the number of new coronavirus infections during the first six days of July nearing 300,000 as more states and cities moved to reimpose shutdown orders.

After an Independence Day weekend that attracted large crowds to fireworks displays and produced scenes of Americans drinking and partying without masks, health officials warned of hospitals running out of space and infection spreading rampantly. The United States is “still knee deep in the first wave” of the pandemic, Anthony S. Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said Monday.

Fauci noted that while Europe managed to drive infections down — and now is dealing with little blips as it reopens — U.S. communities “never came down to baseline and now are surging back up,” he said in an interview conducted on Twitter and Facebook with his boss, National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins.

Despite President Trump’s claim that 99 percent of coronavirus cases are “harmless,” Arizona and Nevada have reported their highest numbers of coronavirus-related hospitalizations in recent days. The seven-day averages in 12 states hit new highs, with the biggest increases in West Virginia, Tennessee and Montana. The country’s rolling seven-day average of daily new cases hit a record high Monday — the 28th record-setting day in a row.

In Arizona, 89 percent of the state’s intensive care unit beds were full Monday morning, the state’s Department of Health announced, as the recently hard-hit state surpassed 100,000 cases.

In Miami-Dade County, authorities reversed course on a reopening plan, issuing an emergency order that shut down gyms, party venues and restaurants, with exceptions for takeout and delivery. That order will go into effect Wednesday. Florida has seen its caseload soar past 10,000 per day and 200,000 overall.

“We want to ensure that our hospitals continue to have the staffing necessary to save lives,” Miami-Dade Mayor Carlos Gimenez said in his announcement.

Gimenez said the spike has been driven by infections among 18- to 34-year-olds who have been gathering in congested places — indoors and out — without wearing masks and maintaining proper distancing.

“Contributing to the positives in that age group, the doctors have told me, were graduation parties, gatherings at restaurants that turned into packed parties in violation of the rules, and street protests where people could not maintain social distancing and where not everyone was wearing facial coverings,” Gimenez said.

Despite the steep new rise in infections, the House and Senate have adjourned for a two-week recess, setting up a potential battle when they return over another pandemic relief package.

And more politicians continue to contract the virus. In Mississippi, where cases are rising, several lawmakers have tested positive, including the speaker of the State House of Representatives. Gov. Tate Reeves (R) wrote on Twitter he was “briefly in contact” with one of them, so he plans to isolate himself until he gets his own test results back. Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms (D) tweeted Monday evening that “COVID-19 has literally hit home. I have had NO symptoms and have tested positive.”

The United States has reported 2.9 million coronavirus cases to date, and at least 127,000 people have died of the virus nationwide. The United States has had more than twice as many reported deaths as any other country and accounts for nearly a quarter of all deaths attributed to the virus worldwide.

Some states imposed fresh restrictions on Monday in an attempt to tamp down rising case numbers and preserve hospital capacity.

West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice (R) announced that face coverings will be mandatory inside buildings, and he asked residents to comply voluntarily. West Virginia hit an all-time peak of 130 new cases in one day on Sunday, putting its total at 3,442 cases on Monday.

“If you go to work in a building, I expect you to wear a mask as you enter work, and if you’re working in an area that is completely socially distanced, take your mask off,” Justice said during a briefing. “If you go to a drinking fountain, put your mask on. If you go into a retail business, then I expect you to wear a mask.”

Local ABC affiliate WCHS reported that Justice added that he had put off mandating masks but eventually decided “it is the very thing I want to do the most because I know in my heart if we don’t, we are going to have funeral after funeral.”

Universities, quickly approaching their fall semesters, also were grappling with how to provide an education without risking student health.

Harvard University announced Monday it will reopen with fewer than half of its undergraduates on campus, a sign of the extraordinary constraints colleges face across the country as they map out plans for the fall term. No more than 40 percent of Harvard’s undergrads will live at the Ivy League campus in Cambridge, Mass., when the school year begins, the university said. Most of them will be first-year students, who will get priority access to help them adjust to college life. All undergraduate courses will be taught remotely, the university said, no matter where the students are living. Tuition will remain the same.

Public health officials have been pleading with younger people to take the virus more seriously, as new cases among that demographic have driven spikes in several places. Fauci on Monday called on young people to realize that they are not “invulnerable to serious consequences” of the virus. Even though they may not get sick enough to end up in the hospital, they still could get “very sick” for weeks, he said. And by getting infected, he added, “they are propagating the outbreak” and might inadvertently infect someone vulnerable, with potentially fatal outcomes.

Though largely considered less vulnerable, young children have shown susceptibility as people try to return to their normal routines. The Texas Department of Health and Human Services reported Monday that at least 1,335 people have tested positive at child-care facilities, and about a third of the cases were children.

Trump and his campaign have increasingly argued that Americans need to continue to live their lives despite the pandemic. On Monday afternoon, Trump tweeted, in all caps, “SCHOOLS MUST OPEN IN THE FALL!!!”

Trump has played down the rise in cases, attributing it to expanded testing, and has recently emphasized that U.S. deaths have not spiked with new cases. He tweeted on Monday: “The Mortality Rate for the China Virus in the U.S. is just about the LOWEST IN THE WORLD!”

Other Republicans have struck a more serious tone. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Monday said: “This is not over.”

“We had hoped we’d be on the way to saying goodbye to this health-care pandemic. Clearly it is not over,” McConnell said at a news conference at a Louisville food bank. Public health officials in both parties have criticized the Trump administration for dismissing science and expertise in its handling of the pandemic. Dozens of former government scientists on Monday called for a science-based approach.

“Sidelining science has already cost lives, imperiled the safety of our loved ones, compromised our ability to safely reopen our businesses, schools, and places of worship, and endangered the health of our democracy itself,” wrote officials from the Trump, Obama and George W. Bush administrations.

Another group of more than 200 scientists from dozens of countries urged the World Health Organization to take more seriously the possibility of airborne-transmission of the virus, saying there is growing evidence that it can linger in the air indoors in small aerosol particles. More than 11.5 million cases have been reported worldwide.

Also on Monday, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration granted an emergency use authorization for a rapid, point-of-care covid-19 diagnostic test that can yield results within 15 minutes, medical technology company Becton Dickinson announced.

The new antigen test, which detects the presence of the virus, will be used in conjunction with another diagnostic tool from the company that is in use in more than 25,000 hospitals, medical centers and retail pharmacies across the country.

Dave Hickey, president of Integrated Diagnostic Solutions for Becton Dickinson, said in a statement that the test will be a “game changer” for health-care workers and patients.

In May, the FDA issued an emergency approval for the first coronavirus antigen test that was made by Quidel Corp.

Fauci and Collins ended their 30 minute session on Monday with something of a pep talk.

“We will get through this,” Fauci said. “We have already suffered through a lot of pain, a lot of economic and personal pain and inconvenience.” He said “science will get us through this” by delivering drugs for early- and late-stage covid-19.

“Hang in there, it will end,” he said. “We promise you.”

 

[JillyO]

ICE announced yesterday that international students must leave the country if their universities do online-only instruction in the Fall semester. Many universities (including Harvard and Princeton) had already announced that they were going to do precisely that in order to curb the spread of COVID. Because universities are highly dependent on the revenue brought in by foreign students, this move is expected to essentially force universities to go back to in-person instruction in the Fall. In the middle of the pandemic, with cases continuing to rise, the Trump administration is in effect forcing students, staff, and faculty to risk their lives and further spread the virus by going back to in-person classes. I'm so fucking furious and so so should everyone else in this country. Here is some information: https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2020/07/06/new-covid-19-exchange-students-rules-to-require-in-person-instruction/, but this news really hasn't hit most of the major news outlets as much as it should. This is a big fucking deal for EVERYONE in this country, whether you're directly affected or not.

[Cartmann99]

 

[47of74]

Ugh, Kimmy (R-Koch Brothers) strikes again here in Iowa.

Quote

Gov. Reynolds decries local mandatory mask wearing

Gov. Kim Reynolds says city and county officials in Iowa do not have the authority to implement mandatory mask-wearing unless the governor says they can.

Reynolds on Tuesday reiterated her stance when asked about a proclamation signed by Muscatine Mayor Diana Broderson on Sunday requiring residents to wear a face-covering in public. Reynolds says local government officials cannot under Iowa law implement orders that conflict with public health declarations of the governor.

I was talking to my career advisor up at school after the news about my job so we could talk about my next steps.  One of her questions was where I wanted to practice and I said probably Minnesota.  She asked why and I said there was some certain companies up there I was interested in working for.  I did not say I wanted to move because we have a fucking idiot for a governor here in Iowa who has her head so far up Fuckmuppet von #BunkerBitch's ASS that when he yawns she sees daylight.   I was sorely tempted to do so though.

[WiseGirl]

ÖHighlights: "Most children probably won't die" (what about the teachers?)

"Trump wants schools to open just not with CDC guidelines. something to that effect.

Gov. Cuomo: (summarizing) Fuck Trump. I agree. Children are not expendable moron.

I know being home is not good for kids, I get it. I hate that they are willing to play Russian Roulette with children.

 

Spoiler

 

 

Spoiler

 

Edited July 9, 2020 by WiseGirl
Spoiler

[Ali]

29 minutes ago, WiseGirl said:

ÖHighlights: "Most children probably won't die" (what about the teachers?)

"Trump wants schools to open just not with CDC guidelines. something to that effect.

Gov. Cuomo: (summarizing) Fuck Trump. I agree. Children are not expendable moron.

I know being home is not good for kids, I get it. I hate that they are willing to play Russian Roulette with children.

 

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I have read comments where people say to teachers should just quit if they don't want to risk their lives for their job. Sure, just walk away from a career you dedicated your life to and invested thousands of dollars in for an advanced degree. 

Some are only one or two years away from getting the years they need for their pension or the age they need to reach for retirement. I like the idea of providing a way for teachers like this to retire early instead of attacking them. It would help teachers that are newer like me.

I got laid off last month and feel extremely lucky to already have a position in another district because there have been significantly fewer job postings. Unsurprisingly, my top concern in finding a new job was health insurance for me and my family. 

I also can't stand  those who want money taken away if school is not happening in the building. Transitioning to online was quite time consuming. I also have three kids and my oldest needed help with her schooling. It was an emotionally and mentally draining experience.

I am thankful that I live in Michigan and "that woman from Michigan" is not a Trump worshipper and is not afraid to do what she thinks is right.

[SassyPants]

Why would anyone think that opening schools is the answer? Our country did not do what we needed to do and now we must pay the price of extending the pain. It’s like sorta treating lice, and then going right back to sharing hats and combs. Guess what, you’re going to be scratching your head again. 
 

If the schools open, many will have to close again, which seems like a half assed plan. The only kids who should be in physical school are those of essential workers. All others who can be schooled outside of the building, should be, until the spread is more under control.

Yes, it sucks. Too bad there was no Proactive, federal plan or leadership earlier in the year.

[Becky]

Sorry, dude, Donnie had that idea first.

Ohio State Representative: Stop Getting Tested!

[GreyhoundFan]

Larger version of the graph in case you don't want to click:

[Cartmann99]

 

[47of74]

In case you all need a reminder that Chuck is an asshole 

 

[WiseGirl]

 

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Truly, you could not make this up: "Touting criticized study, White House presses FDA to authorize hydroxychloroquine — again"

Spoiler

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro is leading a Trump administration effort to demand the Food and Drug Administration reverse course and grant a second emergency authorization for the antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine to treat covid-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.

Navarro, armed with a controversial new study that he says shows the drug’s effectiveness, is being cheered on by President Trump, who has long touted the drug as a “game changer” and even used himself as a possible preventive measure. Trump praised the study on Twitter earlier this week, urging the FDA to “Act Now.” The campaign also has been promoted by Rudolph W. Giuliani, the president’s lawyer, and Laura Ingraham’s show on Fox News.

But Navarro, an economist known more for his aggressive approach to trade issues and China policy than for his medical credentials, faces serious challenges as he denounces what he calls “media-induced hydroxy hysteria." Scientists have widely criticized the new study, by Detroit’s Henry Ford Health System, as flawed. In addition, just weeks ago the FDA revoked its emergency authorization for hydroxychloroquine after major studies found the medication wasn’t effective for covid-19. And the unexpected revival of a politically fraught issue comes as FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn tries to shake off criticism he sometimes seems overly deferential to Trump.

“A reversal [on hydroxychloroquine] would be widely seen as bending to the political will of the White House and the hit to Dr. Hahn’s credibility would be profound,” said Steven Joffe, a medical ethicist at the University of Pennsylvania.

The FDA’s response to this pressure will be closely watched, not only because the White House has already been criticized for pushing to influence the CDC’s guidelines for the pandemic, but also because the agency will take the lead in approving a vaccine for the coronavirus, a decision that could potentially affect millions. Health experts say it is important for the agency, which was criticized for its initial decision to okay hydroxychloroquine in March, to guard its credibility as it prepares to make these landmark decisions for a public sometimes skeptical of vaccines.

The tug-of-war on hydroxychloroquine also is seen by many as a test for the FDA’s Hahn. While sympathetic about his difficult position, some health experts say he appears too willing at times to placate Trump. Just last Sunday, Hahn declined repeated opportunities on two different television shows to dispute Trump’s statement that 99 percent of covid-19 cases are harmless. On CNN, he said he didn’t want to “get into who is right and who is wrong.”

Hahn did not want to get into a distracting debate about the president’s statement, according to an administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.

Navarro says his goal is simple: At a time when the virus is surging in many parts of the country, there are 60 million millions of doses of hydroxychloroquine in the Strategic National Stockpile that can’t be distributed unless the FDA issues an emergency authorization. He asserted the Henry Ford study shows the drug works when used as an early treatment and said the FDA should take action “within days, not weeks or months” so he could send the shipments.

Trump has told aides that he sees the Detroit study as “vindication” of his position and wants the drug sent to hospitals across the country, in the words of another senior administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. A number of Trump political aides, along with the Republican National Committee and campaign officials, have also promoted the Detroit study.

Navarrao said if the Detroit data is backed up by subsequent studies, “there is blood on the media’s hands” for sowing doubts about the drug.

Navarro has loudly clashed with medical experts, including Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, over hydroxychloroquine and has become obsessed with promoting the drug, advisers say. While he is viewed by many colleagues as bombastic, sometimes uninformed and temperamental, he has maintained a close adviser spot in Trump’s game-of-thrones White House by embracing and promoting issues like hydroxychloroquine and tariffs.

The FDA initially gave emergency use authorization to hydroxychloroquine in March based on scant evidence. The agency in April issued a safety warning about potential cardiac problems before withdrawing its approval last month.

The Henry Ford study, which involved more than 2,400 patients hospitalized between March and May, found death rates were 50 percent lower among the patients treated with hydroxychloroquine, the authors said. They also noted the drug posed no safety problems.

Henry Ford officials said the results were different from other studies that didn’t show effects from the drug because they treated patients soon after they were hospitalized and used different dosages. They said they asked the FDA for emergency authorization for hydroxychloroquine “for a clearly defined list of clinical uses,” including trials. The health system declined to make the authors available and the FDA said it would not comment on any pending submission.

“The FDA needs to very carefully and quickly consider the Detroit request — China virus cases are rising, Americans are dying, and hydroxychloroquine appears to be a very effective weapon when used in early treatment with virtually no downside risk,” Navarro said. He said he had talked to someone at the FDA about the issue but declined to identify the person.

But the Henry Ford study has been sharply criticized by scientists who said it shouldn’t be used to change policy. It was an observational study, considered much less rigorous than a randomized trial, in which patients are randomly assigned to receive a treatment or not. And its results fly in the face of three major randomized trials that have found hydroxycloroquine is not effective in treating or preventing covid-19.

Critics also noted that twice as many of the Henry Ford patients who received hydroxychloroquine also got a steroid — which has been shown to benefit covid-19 patients — compared to those who didn’t get hydroxychloroquine. That made it hard to know which drug benefited the patients, they said. The authors made statistical adjustments to account for that, but other scientists said the methodology wasn’t clear and that it is very hard to correct studies in that way.

“You want to look at the totality of the data,” said Eric Topol, director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute. “The totality is overwhelmingly in the opposite direction. You have to conclude with the Henry Ford study is an outlier and there’s some kind of confounder that is skewing the data and not representing the truth.”

Doctors can still prescribe the drug for covid-19 because it is approved for other illnesses. But Navarro said that the FDA’s safety warning and withdrawal of the emergency authorization had effectively killed demand. “In my discussions with the FDA, they seemed unaware of the massive depressive effect their decisions have had on use of the medicine,” he said.

Peter McCullough, an internist at Baylor University Medical Center, said he agreed with Navarro that the FDA should change its position. “This is the public health crisis of the century and doctors should not have barriers,” he said, noting that some state medical boards are making it hard for doctors to prescribe the drug.

In recent interviews, Giuliani, the president’s lawyer, said the studies discounting hydroxychloroquine are bogus. “They’ve thrown cold water on it because they are academics,” he said, adding he has taken the drug three times without side effects.

Test results so far have been “silly,” he said, adding that a police officer friend and others in New York have succeeded after taking it. “They don’t know what they’re talking about,” he said of doctors warning against it.,

Hahn, who declined to be interviewed for this story, has said repeatedly that the FDA makes its decisions based on science and data and that he has never felt political pressure to take any specific action. He has said the agency will continue to make decisions based on those factors, not political ones.

Any decision about reauthorizing hydroxychloroquine will be made by FDA career scientists, said an administration official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal processes.

Many scientists said they doubted the FDA would move to reauthorize hydroxychloroquine based on the Detroit study, considering the price the agency might pay in credibility.

“When future coronavirus vaccines come up for FDA approval, the public should have full confidence that the FDA will make the correct decision to protect the public health by ensuring that vaccines are safe and effective,” said David Boulware, an infectious-disease specialist at the University of Minnesota Medical School who conducted one of the major clinical trials on hydroxychloroquine.

Peter Lurie, a former top FDA official during the Obama administration, agreed it was unlikely hydroxychloroquine would be reauthorized. “That would be an about face of an about face,” he said. Referring to the Washington suburb where the agency is located, he added, “White Oak will be suffering from dizziness if that keeps happening.”

So Navarro, Guiliani, and Ingraham are setting health policy?

[WiseGirl]

Sums up how I feel. The author also includes some good ideas.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/10/opinions/schools-reopening-covid-19-pandemic-rabinowitz/index.html

Title of the artcle: I teach public school. I love my students. I don't want to die

[WiseGirl]

Oh this is great... */sarcasm

https://www.yahoo.com/news/white-house-seeks-discredit-fauci-184700526.html

"The White House is seeking to discredit Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, as President Donald Trump works to marginalize him and his dire warnings about the shortcomings in the U.S. coronavirus response."

 

[Ozlsn]

44 minutes ago, WiseGirl said:

Oh this is great... */sarcasm

https://www.yahoo.com/news/white-house-seeks-discredit-fauci-184700526.html

"The White House is seeking to discredit Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, as President Donald Trump works to marginalize him and his dire warnings about the shortcomings in the U.S. coronavirus response."

 

Well that was predictable. More trusted, believed, respected, and importantly liked than Trump? Gotta bring him down. 

Also leading far, far better than Trump - not least because he appears to be anchored in reality. If he and the people whose job it is to manage these types of disasters had been able to just get on and do it without WH interference and with WH support and cooperation from early on things might be different.

But that would have required Trump to have both maturity and leadership skills.

[WiseGirl]

Good

 

 

[47of74]

On 7/9/2020 at 7:56 AM, Ali said:

I am thankful that I live in Michigan and "that woman from Michigan" is not a Trump worshipper and is not afraid to do what she thinks is right.

Unfortunately down here in Iowa we have a total fuck nugget worshiper in Gov Reynolds.  She who totally let 2 or 3 million Iowans die before she broke away from said fuck nugget and went against his orders.  Between her and Joni why else would I want to leave the state of my birth.

And if Kimmy wasn't Governor and we had Democrats in charge she would totally be the woman holding the flag in this photo...

[GreyhoundFan]

Betsy is so too-faced: