wuhan - coronavirus

[Condessa]

7 minutes ago, CuriousMomof3 said:

 

Where does it say anything about closing them forever?  The emergency is far from over.

But yes, if a religious institution is KILLING people, then in my opinion it can be closed forever.  Do you support closing mosques that are actively supporting terrorists?  Or religious cults that kill people?

 

Setting aside for a moment that violating a quarantine order is not the same thing as active murder (you can draw parallels, but they are neither in fact nor legally the same thing).  We do not take basic constitutional human rights away without due process.  I support taking actual legal action against the noncompliant individuals for their actual actions.

Edited March 29, 2020 by Michelle Conde

[Katy]

Just now, Michelle Conde said:

 

Setting aside for a moment that violating a quarantine order is not the same thing as active murder (you can draw parallels, but they are neither in fact nor legally the same thing).  We do not take basic constitutional human rights away without due process.  I support taking actual legal action against thenoncompliant individuals for their actual actions.

 

There is significantly less due process involved in states of emergency when people are willfully endangering public health.  And to be fair, he's threatening this, he hasn't actually filed for eminent domain over any houses of worship yet.

[Katy]

2 minutes ago, square_25 said:

 

I'm going to be surprised if this actually comes to pass, frankly. 

 

So will I.  But this virus has already widely spread through houses of worship.  Perhaps the threat will make leaders think about whether they will ever be able to get a job again if they lose their church or temple because they cared more about defying orders than they did about people's lives.

[Pen]

7 minutes ago, Katy said:

 

There is significantly less due process involved in states of emergency when people are willfully endangering public health.  And to be fair, he's threatening this, he hasn't actually filed for eminent domain over any houses of worship yet.

 

What I would have written 😀

[Condessa]

8 minutes ago, Katy said:

 

Yes it is, for at least three reasons off the top of my head. 

1. It falls under eminent domain, which the supreme court ruled in favor of.  If something in a location doesn't serve the best interests of the city, local government can force it to be closed and sold. 
2. Ignoring Quarantines and continuing to spread disease definitely isn't constitutional. 
3. Several Attorneys General, both state and federal, have stated that willfully spreading CV-19 can probably be prosecuted under federal terrorism laws.

What he doesn't have the ability to do is change anyone's religion or prevent the same people from opening a religious institution in another location when this is over.  But he can certainly have them criminally prosecuted for all the lives who died because of their refusal to follow legal orders.

 

1.  Bill of rights takes precedence over eminent domain.

2.  Not arguing

3.  So prosecute them under laws that apply (though generally those terrorism ones have to show the ‘willfully’ part.  So, you can apply them to the person who intentionally coughs all over the produce to try to spread it, but not to the families who meet up at the park despite shelter-in-place).

2 minutes ago, Katy said:

 

There is significantly less due process involved in states of emergency when people are willfully endangering public health.  And to be fair, he's threatening this, he hasn't actually filed for eminent domain over any houses of worship yet.

 

I don’t have a problem with a government-enforced shutdown during a state of emergency.  It’s the threat to punitively shut down religious institutions permanently that I think is completely out-of-line.

[Katy]

1 minute ago, Michelle Conde said:

 

1.  Bill of rights takes precedence over eminent domain.

2.  Not arguing

3.  So prosecute them under laws that apply (though generally those terrorism ones have to show the ‘willfully’ part.  So, you can apply them to the person who intentionally coughs all over the produce to try to spread it, but not to the families who meet up at the park despite shelter-in-place).

 

I don’t have a problem with a government-enforced shutdown during a state of emergency.  It’s the threat to punitively shut down religious institutions permanently that I think is completely out-of-line.

 

I'll agree to disagree about eminent domain, because the way the rulings have been interpreted don't tend to support that argument.  Especially with regard to buildings where infection is actively spreading in defiance of Quarantine laws meaning that location is actively creating immediate public health emergencies. 

I think the threat might skirt the line, but allowing 500 person weddings to continue among populations that have been shown to be the most vulnerable is a bigger threat than seizing a temple.  Would he actually follow through with this?  I think it's unlikely.  Will the people in charge decide to not risk it rather than continue to hold weddings with 500 people?  I hope so.

[Condessa]

Just now, CuriousMomof3 said:

 

Permanently means indefinitely in this context.  How could they possibly know, when we don't now when this will end, the definite end date for the shut down.  

 

 

That is not the meaning of the word permanently.  While we might hope that he actually meant indefinitely, it makes no sense to assume he meant something other than the meaning of the words he actually said, unless he had actually offered some additional comments indicating this.

[SoCal_Bear]

I saw this article today questioning China's reported numbers because of the number cancelled cell phones. 

https://www.ibtimes.sg/china-hiding-covid-19-death-toll-21-million-cell-phones-disappeared-why-41580 

[Condessa]

16 minutes ago, CuriousMomof3 said:

If we imprison someone for this, then we're taking someone who is very likely to be infected, and exposing LEO officers, and corrections officers who go home and risk their families. We're exposing other prisoners.   We're risking using up hospital beds.  

Either the church or synagogue or religious institution belongs to the congregation, in which case they are all responsible.  Or it just belongs to the leader, in which case taking his church or synagogue is reasonable.

 

So if, hypothetically, some members of your congregation chose to continue meeting in defiance of quarantine, you would support giving government the right to close your church permanently as a punishment?

[Katy]

3 minutes ago, Michelle Conde said:

 

So if, hypothetically, some members of your congregation chose to continue meeting in defiance of quarantine, you would support giving government the right to close your church permanently as a punishment?

 

I would.  Services can be held online or in other ways. We don't need to all be close together spreading infection that will kill people.  If 2% of the people at that wedding die from a virus they caught at the wedding, the people who made the decision to have that wedding are directly responsible for the deaths of ten people, not to mention the deaths of anyone they spread it to.

[Condessa]

2 minutes ago, CuriousMomof3 said:

Absolutely.  Without hesitation.  

If my congregation took steps that endangered my child's life (because that's what we're talking about.  We're talking about a situation where someone from that congregation walks into the hospital where my child gets infusion treatments, and my child dies), then I would want them closed.  And if that "permanently" turned out to be forever, that would be fine with me.  I certainly wouldn't step foot there again.  

 

I sympathize with your feelings.  However, I am very wary of giving that power to government.  Giving government the ability to close religious institutions, not just as needed to protect public safety in a time of emergency, but permanently as a punishment for the constituents’ behavior—that sets a legal precedent that could have far-reaching effects.

[Pen]

12 minutes ago, Michelle Conde said:

 

So if, hypothetically, some members of your congregation chose to continue meeting in defiance of quarantine, you would support giving government the right to close your church permanently as a punishment?

 

not who you were writing to, but yes.

 My church has only committed to being closed till end of March and I am deeply concerned that they might try to open for Easter and pre-Easter services. 

[Pen]

4 minutes ago, Michelle Conde said:

 

I sympathize with your feelings.  However, I am very wary of giving that power to government.  Giving government the ability to close religious institutions, not just as needed to protect public safety in a time of emergency, but permanently as a punishment for the constituents’ behavior—that sets a legal precedent that could have far-reaching effects.

 

I don’t think post emergency if court case were then started that it would continue . But I don’t think it is a new giving of a power. Rather an exercise of a power already there

[Pen]

9 minutes ago, Michelle Conde said:

 

I sympathize with your feelings.  However, I am very wary of giving that power to government.  Giving government the ability to close religious institutions, not just as needed to protect public safety in a time of emergency, but permanently as a punishment for the constituents’ behavior—that sets a legal precedent that could have far-reaching effects.

 

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/close-churches/608236/

[Pen]

7 hours ago, TracyP said:

That is a complete mischaracterization of some very well thought out replies on that thread. I may not agree, but geez.

 

In re the “well thought out replies” to me those are even sadder than the ‘because someone wants her hair colorized’ or ‘because others want to party hearty on the beach’ arguments.

To me the “well thought out replies” are part of a “let people die- it’s good for the economy” movement— which is totally chilling.

 And the more I think about it, you are right, it doesn’t deserve the light hearted reply I gave at all.

 It deserves ... I don’t know what. I had previously thought more highly of that person and am now utterly utterly  appalled.  

About 3 minutes in to:

https://youtu.be/BoDwXwZXsDI

there’s a good short rebuttal to that

 

or more at: 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 29, 2020 by Pen

[vonfirmath]

23 hours ago, Jean in Newcastle said:

Our Safeway grocery store has screens at checkout counters to protect the cashiers.  Some have masks and gloves and some don't.  I don't know if that is by choice or not.  (ie. I don't know if the masks and gloves are provided by the grocery store if they bring them from home.)

 

I'm so glad to hear this. My best friend is a cashier at Safeway in downtown Bellevue and she's over 60. I've been concerned about her but all I hear from her is she's fine and so glad she's essential. 

[Pen]

If already posted to this thread, I missed this.  Credit to @JennyD on mental health thread — I think this is wonderful:

https://youtu.be/wdyHlYpRvko

https://youtu.be/wdyHlYpRvko

[Ausmumof3]

8 hours ago, square_25 said:

There are cases in every state now. There’s NO POINT in locking down NY. The cat is out of the bag. Pandora’s box has long been open.

There needs to be a national strategy and need to be federal laws, like, yesterday. This is going to be an epic, unnecessary disaster. The longer we go on with toothless “guidance” from the national level (not to mention the misinformed reassurances that slow action), the worse it will be. 

I wondered about this because we are closing state borders here. (Soft closure) But I think the idea is to minimise travel.  It makes contact tracing easier and we are still doing that.  

[Pen]

11 minutes ago, Ausmumof3 said:

I wondered about this because we are closing state borders here. (Soft closure) But I think the idea is to minimise travel.  It makes contact tracing easier and we are still doing that.  

 

I believe closing state borders will help.

 More clearly so in Australia with fewer cases, but also in USA. 

I think that @square_25 is seeing this from an *inside* New York City perspective where it feels like it is too late.

But from *outside* of New York, closing borders makes lots of sense.  The first cases in my mother’s area were tourists from New York. 

New York will almost certainly get fairly high priority help in terms of supplies. Rural areas, and other states where infectious New Yorkers may take the virus won’t.  

Open travel from New York could easily spark off a few lines of exponentially growing transmission lines in my less favored, less well endowed state that at just a few thousand cases would be totally overwhelming.

I am extremely thankful that things are being shut. Otherwise, a nearby city would have been hosting the Olympic Track and Field trials shortly and I think that would have been devastating.  The economic boon to local businesses from the  convergence of tourists / spectators would have been completely overbalanced by the health costs. 

[73349]

Eminent domain is indeed (SCOTUS found in the case re: New London, CT) a constitutional due process for seizing property, even if for financial purposes--the argument for using it to keep people alive would hold up very well IMO.

Re: New York, let's recall that some essential workers don't live inside the city. People who run the traffic lights, for example, or the water system might live in in NYC itself, but quite possible some commute in from CT.

Edited October 2, 2020 by Carolina Wren

[DoraBora]

President Trump just announced extending "Slow the Spread" to April 30th.

[Wheres Toto]

2 hours ago, square_25 said:

Are they? NJ is up to 30,000 tests, so it's actually not as limited as other places, I would think. 

Really?  I'm surprised that there's that many.  The two locations that have been open a while are stopping at 500 a day.  All I'm hearing locally is people saying it's really hard to get a test.  I know there's a couple more locations opening this week, so I figured that would help.  

[Pen]

1 minute ago, square_25 said:

I think it would make sense if there weren't SO MANY hot spots. If New York was the main place which could spread it then by all means, close the borders. But if you take a look at a county map, you'll see that there are cases absolutely everywhere. And we can't really close all of them. And a lot of the hot spots we don't even know about well, because of the testing issues. 

But I could absolutely be wrong about this one. 

 

The analysis for my state posted above somewhere iirc was that if state is closed to nonessential travel AND  if 9 out of 10 people stay home we can weather the CV19 situation for awhile, long enough to maybe have better treatments etc in place .

  Long enough to do a Hammer and Dance type approach maybe. 

If people are coming on in in an open way from outside OR if fewer than 9 of 10 Stay Home, we won’t.  And though we aren’t as big and important a good growing area as the Central Valley of California, we are important.  

Tossing the food growing regions to the viral wolves may yield more hunger in big cities down the road a little ways

[Pen]

9 minutes ago, square_25 said:

I think it would make sense if there weren't SO MANY hot spots. If New York was the main place which could spread it then by all means, close the borders. But if you take a look at a county map, you'll see that there are cases absolutely everywhere. And we can't really close all of them. And a lot of the hot spots we don't even know about well, because of the testing issues. 

But I could absolutely be wrong about this one. 

 

In our area particularly if they had far more tests, they could still effectively contact trace and quarantine.  Not perfect, but better than not trying.  

[Pen]

6 minutes ago, square_25 said:

Maybe. Or maybe you have quite a lot and you don't know yet. 

I think this would be a more interesting discussion if we had more tests. 

 

Omg! I know we have a lot! I knew we had community spread when our government was pretending that we didn’t!

 

But a lot more than acknowledged, even 10-40 times more, which is what i suspect, or at least around 100-300 times the number of confirmed dead from it, is still far less than what would happen without the Stay Home rules in place!

 

 

Edited March 29, 2020 by Pen

[matrips]

2 hours ago, calbear said:

I saw this article today questioning China's reported numbers because of the number cancelled cell phones. 

https://www.ibtimes.sg/china-hiding-covid-19-death-toll-21-million-cell-phones-disappeared-why-41580 

Wow!  That’s a lot of cancelled accounts 😳. 

[Pen]

Just now, square_25 said:

 

Well, I do agree that we should all stay home! 🙂I'm a fan of NY's orders. I'm a fan of every state that's doing shelter-in-place. My question is whether quarantining places would make much of a difference, given the rate of community spread and given that we don't really know where things are. 

But again, I'm not 100% on this, unlike some things. 

 

Even dispersal through permeable membranes (where flow may tend to go from greater concentration to lesser) 

versus containment in non permeable containers

?

 

If I were the virus (entity)  I’d prefer free access to as many hosts as possible as quickly as possible.  In a contained area I might Peter out. 

 

————

Regardless of probable extreme underreporting of cases and fatalities in China, Do you think it would have been a better strategy to keep Wuhan open? 

Do you think it would be a better strategy to keep Italy open? 

Shall we reopen up to tourism flights from Milan to the New York City area?  Should New York City receive the passengers from Rotterdam and her sister ship? Does all that make no difference now because NYC already has so many cases there’s no point trying to keep out additional ones?   Like 60,000 each growing exponentially or 100,000 each growing exponentially makes no difference?  

I dunno. Maybe for New York it doesn’t-    I am sure that for my county 1000 cases versus 5000 is still a huge difference.  We have just barely got or not quite got the beds needed at the percentage of 1000 prob needing hospital . 5000 is into our catastrophe zone.  

And we really don’t even have places like Javitz center to convert. 

[Melissa in Australia]

6 hours ago, RootAnn said:

The call is going out for people with 3D printers to help by printing the frames for face shields. I've seen a few on YouTube. This one is for the area my DD attends college. I am hopeful when people work together to solve problems.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=t-01gQS6AKU&feature=youtu.be

My oldest has been doing this here in Australia for a group of hospitals. They don't need the yet, but are getting ready

Edited March 29, 2020 by Melissa in Australia

[Pen]

Just now, square_25 said:

 

The thing I wonder if it's a case of diminishing returns to quarantine places at this late date :-/. Like, they spent a LOT of energy containing the Westchester outbreak around here. It was, in fact, relatively contained. It did, however, turn out that the cat was out of the bag, anyway. It's possible the energy would have been better spent shutting things down earlier, for example.

 

We are where we are now. Too late to change the past. 

Just now, square_25 said:

It's also a lot harder to close state borders as opposed to country borders. How would you even enforce it?

That’s true.  That’s a reason why I think Stay Home except for essentials orders would work better. 

But this arose out of whoever it was @TracyP? question  of MN being able to safely go back to business as usual in 2 weeks — if other places don’t have Stay Home orders in place and if there aren’t shut borders. The question was can MN safely be an open business as usual place.  I think that was the question.  ???

Just now, square_25 said:

And what do you do with the fact that most states now have a hot zone? How big an area do you quarantine? Do you send in the military to patrol state borders? Is this even constitutional? Can you ensure that supplies can cross the lines? There are a lot of questions. 

I think the travel advisory is a good idea, anyway. I just wonder if there are better ways to spend energy than closing state borders or quarantining. Especially since most places are already locked down and very few people are flying as is. 

But again, I'm not vehemently against, except insofar that it seems like it'll take more energy than it's worth. 

 

[ktgrok]

Any church doing that would not be a church I'd step foot in again. and I'd report them to their higher ups, as far as I had to. 

I'm still annoyed that mine was one of the last to actually close. And that the last week they held services, AFTER everyone knew we should be 6 ft apart, they had people kneeling shoulder to shoulder at the altar rail. 

And today, on the streamed service yes, it was just the 2 priests, the music head playing the organ, and I think two choir members. But the priests were standing right next to each other!!!! WHY!?!? If one of them gets it, we need the other one to do the priestly stuff!

I swear, it's driving me insane. 

[matrips]

22 minutes ago, CuriousMomof3 said:

 

Have people in China experienced individual economic fall out because of this, though?  I can imagine that if my family was struggling financially, and no one was going out, cancelling the kids cell phones, for example, would be one of the first things I'd do. 

I'd also want to know how often cell phones get cancelled in a typical 3 month period.  When I worked with families in poverty, people would get a new cell phone number every month or two.  Not a new phone, but they'd run out of minutes on their pay as you go plan, go for a week or two without a phone, and then when the new month started, maybe choose a different company or a different number.  Now that I think of that they probably did that so that I, their kid's teacher, would stop calling them.   

Anyway, my guess is that there are more cancelled accounts every month in the U.S., than most people would expect.

 

I think the supposition is that many of those 21 million accounts may be dead.  They said Chinese aren’t allowed to cancel their own accounts and most months the numbers grow.

[Pen]

19 minutes ago, square_25 said:

Well, personally, I don't think they can ;-). But maybe we'll have way more tests in a month and then it'll be a more interesting question. 

But the other question is: is it really state borders you want to close? The hot spots are often urban areas, so restricting travel to within a state mightn't even help that much, if there are any urban areas in the state. 

 

I don’t think that’s the way to go after it.  I think the Hammer and the Dance idea sounds like a wiser approach.

This discussion on my part started because of the MN discussion.  

[Pen]

1 minute ago, Dotwithaperiod said:

 I can’t say it’s filthy talk for a country’s leaser to insinuate that medical personnel are selling their equipment? I must live on a different planet than you. No way in hell will I apologize for calling out despicable lies.

 

You are violating the WTM Board Rules. IMO.

Please stop it. You don’t need to apologize, just stop.

.  There is a non public forum for political discussions where you can discuss politics all you want.

[Pen]

@Dotwithaperiod

I think the type of discussion you want to engage in is allowed by the rules set up by Susan Wise Bauer over at 

https://forums.welltrainedmind.com/clubs/267-wtm-politics/

and I think the club owner there for joining is @Amira iirc. 

And that under Susan Wise Bauer’s Rules it is Not allowed here on the public Chat area. 

[Pen]

Just now, Dotwithaperiod said:

Ok. So no reporting on anything the president says. That’s not allowed here. Because it’s politics. None of his statements are allowed? Because printing one of his effing lies is going to make this place erupt? 

To hell with this garbage. Quoting the president and calling out a lie as filth is political. You guys are beyond pathetic. 

 

 

Dot, you agree to abide by site rules when you use a site. Please knock it off. 

  A word about political threads1 2

By Susan Wise Bauer, June 14, 2011   

 

 

[DoraBora]

1 hour ago, Dotwithaperiod said:

Deleted by moderator

 

I reported something the president said.  He is extending the "Stop the Spread" campaign through the end of April.  I posted it because people were worried about his hopes that we could open things up by Easter.  

Somehow I doubt my post broke any rules.

[SoCal_Bear]

Regarding cell phones in China. If you don't have a cellphone, you are pretty much unable to engage in normal activities. You have to have it to do every day things because it's a virtually cashless society everything is mobile payment. And it's even more critical now as you have to show your health status on your phone as to whether or not you are permitted to freely move about.

I was over there in 2018 before they started allowing WeChat and Alipay to be linked to a foreign bank account in late 2019. It was just a lot harder because they don't want cash. In many places, it's impossible to get a taxi without a phone because no one will stop for you.

Edited March 29, 2020 by calbear

[Corraleno]

3 hours ago, calbear said:

I saw this article today questioning China's reported numbers because of the number cancelled cell phones. 

https://www.ibtimes.sg/china-hiding-covid-19-death-toll-21-million-cell-phones-disappeared-why-41580 

There are so many ridiculous assumptions in that article. After saying that "probably" all 21 million closed accounts belonged to people who died of CV19, they go on to list all the other reasons that people would cancel cell phone accounts, including that many people have two cell phones and would naturally cancel one if they were out of work, and then at the end they say that if only 10% of the cell phone accounts were canceled because of death that would be 2 million deaths.

Around 10 million people died in China last year, so even if you assume those are distributed evenly throughout the year, you would expect 25% of the usual number of deaths in the first 25% of the year  — that's 2.5 million deaths attributable to causes excluding CV19. Factor in what is probably a higher death toll in winter during flu season, plus an increase in deaths from other causes due to lack of hospital capacity, and you could get up to 3 million deaths in the first quarter of the year without even factoring in CV deaths.

I think it's pretty widely accepted that China is fudging their numbers for both cases and deaths. I could easily believe that their numbers were more like 10,000 or even 20,000 deaths. But the implication that China could be hiding 21 million deaths in a 3 month period is beyond absurd. Wuhan has a population of about 11 million, and the population of Hubei Province is 58 million — the idea that they could hide millions of deaths that occurred in a city of 11 million, let alone a number that represents one-third of the entire population of Hubei, is tin-foil-hat territory.

[matrips]

13 minutes ago, Arctic Mama said:

Yeah.  Best guesses are that the numbers being reported are missing a zero, at least.  It’s awful 😞 The on the ground reports that are getting out through semi-covert means to foreign family and friends, plus things like the urns and deactivated cell phones, tell a much worse story about the spread than what is being reported.

Exactly.  And I think their misinformation played into how this was handled here originally. I mean all of China and only 3000 deaths?.  That didn’t seem to warrant shutting our entire country down.  I think once folks saw the numbers in Italy though...

[Ausmumof3]

10 minutes ago, Happymomof1 said:

Hey one thing I'm wondering is how come Bejiing didn't have a surge of cases?  It is all over our big cities.  They are so crammed in there.  And if it is just the forced lockdown, then I'm guessing it will happen to them later in the year?

They had much more significant lock downs than we do with 14 day quarantine for anyone exiting or leaving the city.  And in case we’re in doubt about quarantine in Shanghai right now foreign journalist that’s in quarantine had a magnetic alarm on his door that goes off if he leaves.  They deported an Australian Chinese Citizen for trying to go for a run.  They are taking it beyond seriously.  The reduced measures in place now resemble our measures 

[Ausmumof3]

I didn’t see it posted but the German Finance minister from the state of Hesse apparently committed suicide last night.  Apologies if it was already posted I haven’t had time to catch up yet.  Woke up and checked my phone at 2am and that kinda sabotaged sleep

[DoraBora]

1 hour ago, DoraBora said:

I reported something the president said.  He is extending the "Stop the Spread" campaign through the end of April.  I posted it because people were worried about his hopes that we could open things up by Easter.  

Somehow I doubt my post broke any rules.

Quoting myself to add:  I didn't intend the above to sound smug.  (Sigh)  I'm sorry.  This is such a tense time!

[Ausmumof3]

6 minutes ago, square_25 said:

Or maybe they aren't reporting... 

I one hundred percent believe there’s some of that but the bbc reported guy reckons there’s not widespread flooding of hospitals etc.  Which doesn’t mean there aren’t isolated unreported cases but it does mean there’s not a chaotic out of control situation reflecting it running rampant.  I think that they would probably sacrifice other areas to protect Beijing?

[Ausmumof3]

1 hour ago, matrips said:

Exactly.  And I think their misinformation played into how this was handled here originally. I mean all of China and only 3000 deaths?.  That didn’t seem to warrant shutting our entire country down.  I think once folks saw the numbers in Italy though...

I agree but I still don’t know why world leaders weren’t looking at what they were doing and not what they were saying.  I mean the widespread massive lockdowns and hospital building programs should have told us something.  China might have been fudging stuff,  Who might have backed them up but when we could see what was actually happening on the ground that seems like it should have been a wake up call that was ignored.

[Ausmumof3]

Bno - New York state coronavirus death toll reaches 1,000 as NYC reports 98 new deaths

Edited March 30, 2020 by Ausmumof3

[Garga]

3 hours ago, CuriousMomof3 said:

I wonder if some of the difference on feelings about crossing state lines has to do with where in the country someone lives.  I live in an area where state lines are very close together.  When I was working, I crossed a state line every day. On a typical week in the winter, last winter, members of our household would be in four different states, because we lived in one, had a standing medical/therapy appointment in another, and kids had after school activities in two others.  One of the family members who is picking up groceries and dropping them off at our house, while we are self isolating, lives in another state.  The nearest Walmart to my house is in another state.   If I had to take one of my kids to the ER with suspected COVID, I'd cross a state line, because the two nearest Children's hospitals are in two different states.  So, in my mind, closing state lines seems like an enormous step.  

On the other hand, if you live smack dab in the middle of state the size of Iowa or Texas, you might go for months without crossing a state line.  

 

2 hours ago, square_25 said:

 

It's also a lot harder to close state borders as opposed to country borders. How would you even enforce it? And what do you do with the fact that most states now have a hot zone? How big an area do you quarantine? Do you send in the military to patrol state borders? Is this even constitutional? Can you ensure that supplies can cross the lines? There are a lot of questions. 

I think the travel advisory is a good idea, anyway. I just wonder if there are better ways to spend energy than closing state borders or quarantining. Especially since most places are already locked down and very few people are flying as is. 

But again, I'm not vehemently against, except insofar that it seems like it'll take more energy than it's worth. 

 

I live right by a state border, too.  Less than 4 miles from my door to the border.  My in-law’s house used to be on the street that WAS the border.  If they stepped into the grass across the street from their house, they were in another state.  We pop back and forth across the border constantly.  My dh works in the bordering state, my kids’ orthodontist is in the bordering state, etc.  It’s all just “local” stuff to us. 

I don’t think state borders really mean anything to the virus.  It’ll be perfectly happy straddling a state line, or it’ll be happy to be smack in the middle of a state.  

A better idea would be to find a way to surround an area of outbreaks—some sort of X-mile radius around the center of it.  

But maybe legally, that’s too much of a hassle.  

Edited March 30, 2020 by Garga

[Ausmumof3]

Aus - ABC

“As we mentioned earlier, the ABC's medical expert Norman Swan was tested for coronavirus this morning after developing symptoms.

Dr Swan said he was now in self-isolation and to his knowledge, had not come into contact with anyone with the virus.”

[Ausmumof3]

Abc - aus

Strict regulations around the manufacture of hand sanitiser have been relaxed so more businesses can make the product and meet rising demand.

  
The Federal Government says the Therapeutic Goods Administration no longer needs to approve the product if it's made with the recipes developed by the World Health Organisation.
  
Cheaper food grade alcohol can now also be used instead of the medical grade ingredient.
  
Some wineries with bushfire-damaged grapes are now using their facilities to manufacture sanitiser instead.

Edited March 30, 2020 by Ausmumof3

[fairfarmhand]

Just read that country music singer joe Diffie died of corona virus. Living right outside Nashville, that hurts. Country music stars are neighbors here.

[Arcadia]

2 hours ago, Happymomof1 said:

Hey one thing I'm wondering is how come Bejiing didn't have a surge of cases?  It is all over our big cities.  They are so crammed in there.  And if it is just the forced lockdown, then I'm guessing it will happen to them later in the year?

 

1 hour ago, Ausmumof3 said:

They had much more significant lock downs than we do with 14 day quarantine for anyone exiting or leaving the city.  

 

China has a hukou system for decades. People aren’t allowed to move to major cities to work and live easily.