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Can touching a barbell in the gym get you sick with the coronavirus?

We’re live with Bill Gates, Microsoft co-founder, philanthropist and TED speaker, to talk about the healthcare systems in dire need of fixing.
TED Connects



Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates on Tuesday said that the United States missed its opportunity to control the outbreak of the novel coronavirus without a shutdown, arguing that the government did not "act fast enough" to avoid this.

"We need to shut down so that the worst case that was happening in [Wuhan, China] or Northern Italy, that we avoid that," Gates said in an interview on the TED Connects program, referring to regions hit particularly hard by the virus.

Asked about suggestions being floated in the U.S. about relaxing social distancing measures to avoid severe economic damage, Gates said there is "no middle ground" between the virus and the cost to businesses.

"It’s very tough to say to people, ‘Hey, keep going to restaurants, go buy new houses, ignore that pile of bodies over in the corner. We want you to keep spending because there’s maybe a politician who thinks [gross domestic product] GDP growth is what really counts,’” Gates said, adding that a shutdown may need to remain in place for six to 10 weeks. Bill Gates says we need a shutdown: Can't reopen business and 'ignore that pile of bodies in the corner'


Bill Gates says the US missed its chance to avoid coronavirus shutdown and businesses should stay closed
Bill Gates says the US missed its chance to avoid coronavirus shutdown and businesses should stay closed

· Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates answered questions about COVID-19 during a “TED Connects” program.

· Gates said the United States missed its chance to avoid stay-at-home orders because it didn’t act fast enough on the pandemic.

· He added that the U.S. needs to ramp up its testing abilities.

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates said Tuesday that the United States missed its chance to avoid mandated shutdowns because it didn’t act fast enough on the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic.

“The U.S. is past this opportunity to control (COVID-19) without shutdown,” Gates said during a TED Connects program broadcast online. “We did not act fast enough to have an ability to avoid the shutdown.”

“It’s January when everybody should’ve been on notice,” Gates added. The virus was first discovered in December in China.

Gates acknowledged Tuesday that self isolation will be “disastrous” for the economy, but “there really is no middle ground.” He suggested a shutdown of six to 10 weeks.

“It’s very tough to say to people, ‘Hey keep going to restaurants, go buy new houses, ignore that pile of bodies over in the corner, we want you to keep spending because there’s some politician that thinks GDP growth is what counts,’” Gates said. “It’s hard to tell people during an epidemic … that they should go about things knowing their activity is spreading this disease.”

Gates added Tuesday that the United States needs to ramp up its COVID-19 testing abilities and better navigate who actually needs to be tested.

“In terms of testing, we’re still not creating that capacity and applying it to people in need,” Gates said. “The testing thing has got to be organized, has got to be prioritized. That is super, super urgent.”
 


[OA] The Effect of Human Mobility and Control Measures on the COVID-19 Epidemic in China

The ongoing COVID-19 outbreak expanded rapidly throughout China. Major behavioral, clinical, and state interventions have been undertaken to mitigate the epidemic and prevent the persistence of the virus in human populations in China and worldwide.

It remains unclear how these unprecedented interventions, including travel restrictions, affected COVID-19 spread in China.

We use real-time mobility data from Wuhan and detailed case data including travel history to elucidate the role of case importation on transmission in cities across China and ascertain the impact of control measures.

Early on, the spatial distribution of COVID-19 cases in China was explained well by human mobility data. Following the implementation of control measures, this correlation dropped and growth rates became negative in most locations, although shifts in the demographics of reported cases were still indicative of local chains of transmission outside Wuhan.

This study shows that the drastic control measures implemented in China substantially mitigated the spread of COVID-19.

Kraemer MUG, Yang C-H, Gutierrez B, et al. The effect of human mobility and control measures on the COVID-19 epidemic in China. Science 2020:eabb4218. The effect of human mobility and control measures on the COVID-19 epidemic in China
 
[OA] Effect of SARS-CoV-2 Infection Upon Male Gonadal Function

Since SARS-CoV-2 infection was first identified in December 2019, it spread rapidly and a global pandemic of COVID-19 has occurred. ACE2, the receptor for entry into the target cells by SARS-CoV-2, was found to abundantly express in testes, including spermatogonia, Leydig and Sertoli cells. However, there is no clinical evidence about whether SARS-CoV-2 infection can affect male gonadal function so far.

In this study, we compared the sex-related hormones between 81 reproductive-aged men with SARS-CoV-2 infection and 100 age-matched healthy men, and found that serum luteinizing hormone (LH) was significantly increased, but the ratio of testosterone (T) to LH and the ratio of follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) to LH were dramatically decreased in males with COVID-19. Besides, multivariable regression analysis indicated that c-reactive protein (CRP) level was significantly associated with serum T:LH ratio in COVID-19 patients.

This study provides the first direct evidence about the influence of medical condition of COVID-19 on male sex hormones, alerting more attention to gonadal function evaluation among patients recovered from SARS-CoV-2 infection, especially the reproductive-aged men.

Ma L, Xie W, Li D, et al. Effect of SARS-CoV-2 infection upon male gonadal function: A single center-based study. medRxiv 2020:2020.03.21.20037267. Effect of SARS-CoV-2 infection upon male gonadal function: A single center-based study
 
Italy is still falling apart. They had nearly 1000 deaths in a day, closing in on 10000 dead.

Stay inside if you're from NYC. It's going to get bad there. I don't want to fear monger but the numbers don't support a success story.

Hunker down and good luck fuckers.
 
ickyrica said:
Italy is still falling apart. They had nearly 1000 deaths in a day, closing in on 10000 dead.

Stay inside if you're from NYC. It's going to get bad there. I don't want to fear monger but the numbers don't support a success story.

Hunker down and good luck fuckers.
Click to expand...


Agreed! I’m out in a desert based state and hope things don’t get bad here.
 



Dr. David Price is a critical care pulmonologist. He does a conference call describing his experience. It’s a long video, but quite valuable.

The first 20 minutes of the video are recommendations for general behavior (i.e., wear a mask in public, but only to keep you from touching your face. Price doesn’t mention gloves). From 20-30 minutes in, Price discusses what you should do if you think your’e infected, or if you have a family member who is infected. From 30 minutes to the end, Price deals with general questions.

Bottom line: COVID-19 is becoming well understood. If you practice good hand cleanliness procedures and distancing, you have nothing to worry about.

1. Hand to face is the critical path. Spray, rarely.

2. Get into the habit of knowing where your hands are and be sure they are clean. (sanitizer)

3. Wear a mask, not to protect you, but simply to avoid hand to face contact.

4. You don’t need an N-95 mask. Anything will do. Give N-97 to your local hospital.

5. Carry sanitizer with you when you go out.

6. Be friendly and social, just stay 6′ away.

7. Shrink your social circle. You don’t want to be in large groups.

8. Go to the hospital only if you are short of breath. Headache, fever, muscle ache, cough – stay home.

9. Course of the disease is 7 -14 days. Immunity then follows.

If you follow the simple rules, you will not get COVID-19. This should be liberating.


Not wearing masks to protect against coronavirus is a ‘big mistake,’ top Chinese scientist says
Not wearing masks to protect against coronavirus is a ‘big mistake,’ top Chinese scientist says | Science | AAAS

Chinese scientists at the front of that country’s outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) have not been particularly accessible to foreign media. Many have been overwhelmed trying to understand their epidemic and combat it, and responding to media requests, especially from journalists outside of China, has not been a top priority.

Science has tried to interview George Gao, director-general of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), for 2 months. Last week he responded.

Gao oversees 2000 employees—one-fifth the staff size of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention—and he remains an active researcher himself. In January, he was part of a team that did the first isolation and sequencing of severe acute respiratory syndrome 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus that causes COVID-19. He co-authored two widely read papers published in The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) that provided some of the first detailed epidemiology and clinical features of the disease, and has published three more papers on COVID-19 in The Lancet.

His team also provided important data to a joint commission between Chinese researchers and a team of international scientists, organized by the World Health Organization (WHO), that wrote a landmark report after touring the country to understand the response to the epidemic.

First trained as a veterinarian, Gao later earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry at the University of Oxford and did postdocs there and at Harvard University, specializing in immunology and virology. His research specializes in viruses that have fragile lipid membranes called envelopes—a group that includes SARS-CoV-2—and how they enter cells and also move between species.

Gao answered Science’s questions over several days via text, voicemails, and phone conversations. This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

...

Q: What mistakes are other countries making?

A: The big mistake in the U.S. and Europe, in my opinion, is that people aren’t wearing masks. This virus is transmitted by droplets and close contact. Droplets play a very important role—you’ve got to wear a mask, because when you speak, there are always droplets coming out of your mouth. Many people have asymptomatic or presymptomatic infections. If they are wearing face masks, it can prevent droplets that carry the virus from escaping and infecting others.
 
Would everyone wearing face masks help us slow the pandemic?
Would everyone wearing face masks help us slow the pandemic?

As cases of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) ballooned last month, people in Europe and North America scrambled to get their hands on surgical masks to protect themselves. Health officials jumped in to discourage them, worried about the limited supply of masks for health care personnel. “Seriously people-STOP BUYING MASKS!” began a 29 February tweet from U.S. Surgeon General Jerome Adams. The World Health Organization and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have both said that only people with COVID-19 symptoms and those caring for them should wear masks.

But some health experts, including the director of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, think that’s a mistake. Health authorities in parts of Asia have encouraged all citizens to wear masks in public to prevent the spread of the virus, regardless of whether they have symptoms. And the Czech Republic took the uncommon step last week of making nose and mouth coverings mandatory in public spaces, prompting a grassroots drive to hand make masks.

Even experts who favor masking the masses say their impact on the spread of disease is likely to be modest. Many are also afraid to promote mask buying amid dire shortages at hospitals. But as the pandemic wears on, some public health experts think government messages discouraging mask wearing should shift.

…
 
Simple DIY masks could help flatten the curve. We should all wear them in public.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/03/28/masks-all-coronavirus/

When historians tally up the many missteps policymakers have made in response to the coronavirus pandemic, the senseless and unscientific push for the general public to avoid wearing masks should be near the top.

The evidence not only fails to support the push, it also contradicts it. It can take a while for official recommendations to catch up with scientific thinking. In this case, such delays might be deadly and economically disastrous. It’s time to make masks a key part of our fight to contain, then defeat, this pandemic. Masks effective at “flattening the curve” can be made at home with nothing more than a T-shirt and a pair of scissors. We should all wear masks — store-bought or homemade — whenever we’re out in public.

…

My data-focused research institute, fast.ai, has found 34 scientific papers indicating basic masks can be effective in reducing virus transmission in public — and not a single paper that shows clear evidence that they cannot. masks-research

Studies have documented definitively that in controlled environments like airplanes, people with masks rarely infect others and rarely become infected themselves, while those without masks more easily infect others or become infected themselves.

Masks don’t have to be complex to be effective. A 2013 paper tested a variety of household materials and found that something as simple as two layers of a cotton T-shirt is highly effective at blocking virus particles of a wide range of sizes. Oxford University found evidence this month for the effectiveness of simple fabric mouth and nose covers to be so compelling they now are officially acceptable for use in a hospital in many situations. Hospitals running short of N95-rated masks are turning to homemade cloth masks themselves; if it’s good enough to use in a hospital, it’s good enough for a walk to the store.

…
 
[OA] Facemasks and Hand Hygiene to Prevent Influenza Transmission in Households

Background: Few data are available about the effectiveness of nonpharmaceutical interventions for preventing influenza virus transmission.

Objective: To investigate whether hand hygiene and use of facemasks prevents household transmission of influenza.

Design: Cluster randomized, controlled trial. Randomization was computer generated; allocation was concealed from treating physicians and clinics and implemented by study nurses at the time of the initial household visit. Participants and personnel administering the interventions were not blinded to group assignment. (ClinicalTrials.gov registration number: NCT00425893)

Setting: Households in Hong Kong.

Patients: 407 people presenting to outpatient clinics with influenza-like illness who were positive for influenza A or B virus by rapid testing (index patients) and 794 household members (contacts) in 259 households.

Intervention: Lifestyle education (control) (134 households), hand hygiene (136 households), or surgical facemasks plus hand hygiene (137 households) for all household members.

Measurements: Influenza virus infection in contacts, as confirmed by reverse-transcription polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) or diagnosed clinically after 7 days.

Results: Sixty (8%) contacts in the 259 households had RT-PCR-confirmed influenza virus infection in the 7 days after intervention. Hand hygiene with or without facemasks seemed to reduce influenza transmission, but the differences compared with the control group were not significant. In 154 households in which interventions were implemented within 36 hours of symptom onset in the index patient, transmission of RT-PCR-confirmed infection seemed reduced, an effect attributable to fewer infections among participants using facemasks plus hand hygiene (adjusted odds ratio, 0.33 [95% CI, 0.13 to 0.87]). Adherence to interventions varied.

Limitation: The delay from index patient symptom onset to intervention and variable adherence may have mitigated intervention effectiveness.

Conclusion: Hand hygiene and facemasks seemed to prevent household transmission of influenza virus when implemented within 36 hours of index patient symptom onset. These findings suggest that nonpharmaceutical interventions are important for mitigation of pandemic and interpandemic influenza.

[OA] Cowling BJ, Chan KH, Fang VJ, et al. Facemasks and hand hygiene to prevent influenza transmission in households: a cluster randomized trial. Ann Intern Med. 2009;151(7):437–446. doi:10.7326/0003-4819-151-7-200910060-00142 https://annals.org/aim/fullarticle/744899/facemasks-hand-hygiene-prevent-influenza-transmission-households-cluster-randomized-trial
 
WEAR THE BEST MASKS YOU CAN FIND OR AFFORD
They help a lot.

1 Masks help prevent you from inhaling virus containing droplets, or at least reduce the amount of viruses you potentially inhale = much less severe disease.

2 If you were to unknowingly have the chinese coronavirus (many people do) it reduces the droplets you expel by sneezing, coughing or just talking, therefore preventing you from infecting other people.

FUCK THAT "LEAVE MASKS FOR DOCTORS WHO NEED THEM" BS
THAT'S BS SPREAD BY THE WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION = CHINA BITCHES
NOW CHINA WANTS US TO BE AS SICK AS POSSIBLE.
 


The official recommendation in the United States (and other Western countries) that the public should not wear face masks was motivated by the need to save respirator masks for health care workers. There is no scientific support for the statement that masks worn by non-professionals are “not effective”.

In contrary, in view of the stated goal to “flatten the curve”, any additional, however partial reduction of transmission would be welcome — even that afforded by the simple surgical masks or home-made (DIY) masks (which would not exacerbate the supply problem). The latest biological findings on SARS-Cov-2 viral entry into human tissue and sneeze/cough-droplet ballistics suggest that the major transmission mechanism is not via the fine aerosols but large droplets, and thus, warrant the wearing of surgical masks by everyone.


1_cJ7fMaWrzk0Nm4YKY2ClNg.png

Figure 1. “Flattening the curve”. Effect of mitigating interventions that would decrease the initial reproduction rate R0 by 50% when implemented at day 25. Red curve is the course of numbers of infected individuals (”case”) without intervention. Green curve reflects the changed (”flattened”) curve after intervention. Day 0 (March 3, 2020) is the time at which 100 cases of infections were confirmed (d100 = 0). The model is only for illustration and was performed in the SEIR-model simulator (Epidemic Calculator). The non-intervention model was fitted to these data points: a time period of twenty days in which the number of cases in the United States has risen from 100 (d100=0) to 35,000 (d100=20). Standard parameters were used (population size 330 M, Tinc=5.2 days, Tinf = 3.0 days but with the rather high value R0=5.6 in order to achieve the observed rate of increase of case numbers in the U.S. The curves are redrawn not to scale.


1_m_a-cX7BpzAOg5YpyDa_ZA.png

Figure 2. Droplet larger than aerosols, when exhaled (at velocity of <1m/s), evaporate or fall to the ground less than 1.5 m away. When expelled at high velocity through coughing or sneezing, especially larger droplets (> 0.1 micrometers), can be carried by the jet more than 2m or 6m, respectively, away.
 


Dr. Didier Raoult of Marseilles and his co-workers have published another preprint on clinical results with the chloroquine/azithromycin combination that their earlier work has made famous. And I still don’t know what to think of it. https://www.mediterranee-infection.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/COVID-IHU-2-1.pdf

This is going to be a long post on the whole issue, so if you don’t feel like reading the whole thing, here’s the summary: these new results are still not from randomized patients and still do not have any sort of control group for comparison. The sample is larger, but it’s still not possible to judge what’s going on. And on further reading, I have doubts about Dr. Raoult’s general approach to science and doubts about Dr. Raoult himself. Despite this second publication, I am actually less hopeful than I was before. Now the details.

…

All in all, I am pretty sure that I don’t care for Didier Raoult very much. And I don’t care for his style of research nor for his ways of expressing himself. Now, it would be a more simple world if assholes were always wrong about things, and I am not yet prepared to say that Dr. Raoult is wrong about hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin. But neither does he seem to be the sort of person who is always a reliable source, either. I do not take pleasure in this. But I am less hopeful about this work than I was when I first read about it, and I can only wonder what direction those hopes will take in the weeks to come.
 


An Australian astrophysicist has been admitted to hospital after getting four magnets stuck up his nose in an attempt to invent a device that stops people touching their faces during the coronavirus outbreak.

Dr Daniel Reardon, a research fellow at a Melbourne university, was building a necklace that sounds an alarm on facial contact, when the mishap occurred on Thursday night.

The 27 year-old astrophysicist, who studies pulsars and gravitational waves, said he was trying to liven up the boredom of self-isolation with the four powerful neodymium magnets.

….

“I accidentally invented a necklace that buzzes continuously unless you move your hand close to your face,” he said.

“After scrapping that idea, I was still a bit bored, playing with the magnets. It’s the same logic as clipping pegs to your ears – I clipped them to my earlobes and then clipped them to my nostril and things went downhill pretty quickly when I clipped the magnets to my other nostril.”

…

3780.jpg
 
[OA] A Rush to Judgment? Rapid Reporting and Dissemination of Results and Its Consequences Regarding the Use of Hydroxychloroquine for COVID-19

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has placed the scientific and research communities under extraordinary pressure, to which they have responded with exceptional vigor and speed. This desire to quickly find safe and effective treatments may also lead to relaxed standards of data generation and interpretation, which may have undesirable downstream effects. The recent publication of a study evaluating hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) in COVID-19 is a useful test case, highlighting the challenges of conducting research during a pandemic.

…

Despite the study's substantial limitations, a simplification and probable overinterpretation of these findings was rapidly disseminated by the lay press and amplified on social media, ultimately endorsed by many government and institutional leaders. Public interest in HCQ rapidly grew (Figure). The study's findings were extrapolated to include the use of HCQ to prevent COVID-19 infection or as postexposure prophylaxis, indications for which there are currently no direct supporting data. Despite promising in vitro data for influenza (7, 8), HCQ failed to prevent infection in a randomized, placebo-controlled, double-blind trial (9). Efforts to understand the clinical efficacy of HCQ as postexposure prophylaxis are under way (Post-exposure Prophylaxis / Preemptive Therapy for SARS-Coronavirus-2 - Full Text View - ClinicalTrials.gov), which should yield important insight into this issue.

…

There is enough rationale to justify the continued investigation of the efficacy and safety of HCQ in hospitalized patients with COVID-19. It is critical to reiterate that although viral clearance is important, clinical outcomes are much more relevant to patients. There currently are no data to recommend the use of HCQ as prophylaxis for COVID-19, although we eagerly await data from trials under way. Thus, we discourage its off-label use until justified and supply is bolstered. The HCQ shortage not only will limit availability to patients with COVID-19 if efficacy is truly established but also represents a real risk to patients with rheumatic diseases who depend on HCQ for their survival.

Kim AH, Sparks JA, Liew JW, et al, for the COVID-19 Global Rheumatology Alliance†. A Rush to Judgment? Rapid Reporting and Dissemination of Results and Its Consequences Regarding the Use of Hydroxychloroquine for COVID-19. Ann Intern Med. 2020; [Epub ahead of print 30 March 2020]. doi: Potential Public Health Harms of Rushing to Judgment | Annals of Internal Medicine | American College of Physicians
 
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