wuhan - coronavirus

[Ausmumof3]

2 minutes ago, cintinative said:

Thoughts on this? Note: preprint study,  not reviewed
https://www.scmp.com/news/world/article/3093690/coronavirus-are-two-strains-together-deadlier-one?fbclid=IwAR0PurzOhu9KivwpSljHiAa0QaU_JCYnHG7-0ZgzHMzam54XBTya9LuDLPw

These are not my thoughts but thoughts of a couple of infection disease people on it, worth reading the comments.  I nearly posted here yesterday but the comments were reassuring enough that I didn’t think it worth getting too worried about at this point.

Basically the most likely explanation is that the times when you have peak Covid is also the time when you have peak mortality and when you have peak Covid there’s more chance that you’ve got multiple strains.  So it’s most likely a correlation not a cause effect relationship.  But still worth considering.

[Ausmumof3]

Here in Aus federal parliament won’t be taking place in two weeks as its deemed too high risk bringing everyone to Canberra.  And there are some calls for a hard border round Melbourne to try prevent spread to wider Victoria.  I’m not sure how feasible that would be to manage though.

[ElizabethB]

1 hour ago, Pen said:

 

I’m wondering what they use for the  antigen to determine the agglutination , and how they determine that it’s SARS2 / Covid19 caused agglutination rather than blood type.  

I thought it was just basic blood agglutination overall, which any hematology lab either has tests for already or can figure out something quick.

(And, also why it wouldn't work on a Hemophiliac or, problem in the opposite direction, Factor 5 Leiden.)

It which case, it would be a good quick screening that would need to be checked with a more accurate test, some people may have clotting issues and not realize it, many people with Factor 4 Leiden don't figure it out until later in life or never know at all.  Hemophiliacs usually figure it out early, especially if they get circumcised.

If it's agglutination-PCR, more difficult, hopefully they can quickly sell the technology or process. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agglutination-PCR

Edited July 18, 2020 by ElizabethB

[Ausmumof3]

53 minutes ago, ElizabethB said:

I thought it was just basic blood agglutination overall, which any hematology lab either has tests for already or can figure out something quick.

(And, also why it wouldn't work on a Hemophiliac or, problem in the opposite direction, Factor 5 Leiden.)

It which case, it would be a good quick screening that would need to be checked with a more accurate test, some people may have clotting issues and not realize it, many people with Factor 4 Leiden don't figure it out until later in life or never know at all.  Hemophiliacs usually figure it out early, especially if they get circumcised.

If it's agglutination-PCR, more difficult, hopefully they can quickly sell the technology or process. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agglutination-PCR

This has a bit more detail

https://thenewdaily.com.au/news/2020/07/18/australians-researches-coronavirus-test/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

unfortunately six months to get it up and running dilly is probably too long.

Edited July 18, 2020 by Ausmumof3

[Ausmumof3]

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acssensors.0c01050
 

and here’s the actual paper on the test

[ElizabethB]

8 minutes ago, Ausmumof3 said:

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acssensors.0c01050
 

and here’s the actual paper on the test

Looks like agglutination PCR, thanks.

 

[Ausmumof3]

Over 74,000 for US on Worldometer so yet another highest day.  Deaths there seem to have been stable at around high 900s.

[Ausmumof3]

217 cases in Vic.  Hard to think two weeks ago that that would be feeling like good news.  15 for NSW and 2 deaths in Vic.

[Ausmumof3]

Overview of data on duration of infectiousness and reinfection etc

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/duration-isolation.html

it looks like the recommendation is 10day isolation for mild moderate but 20 days for more severe cases.

[Ausmumof3]

Dexamethazone study peer reviewed and officially published.  effective in patients on respiratory support.  Not a miracle cure but the most effective thing we seem to have so far. 
 

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2021436?query=featured_coronavirus

[Ausmumof3]

(Reuters) - Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani said on Saturday that 25 million Iranians have been infected with the coronavirus and that another 35 million are at risk of acquiring it.

https://mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKBN24J07V?taid=5f12a750977e0100010f0a61&utm_campaign=trueAnthem%3A Trending Content&utm_medium=trueAnthem&utm_source=twitter&__twitter_impression=true
 

 

[TracyP]

Sweden says its open school policy (school was open to <16 yo) did not lead to covid spread. The report also apparently showed that teachers were not at any more risk than any other profession.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKCN24G2IS

The report, which has not been peer-reviewed, found that during the period of February 24 to June 14, there were 1,124 confirmed cases of COVID-19 among children in Sweden, around 0.05% of the total number of children aged 1-19.

Finland recorded 584 cases in the same period, also equivalent to around 0.05%.

"In conclusion, (the) closure or not of schools had no measurable direct impact on the number of laboratory confirmed cases in school-aged children in Finland or Sweden," the agencies said in the report, published last week.

The report showed that severe cases of COVID-19 were very rare among both Swedish and Finnish children aged 1 to 19, with no deaths reported. A comparison of the incidence of COVID-19 in different professions suggested no increased risk for teachers.

[TracyP]

3 minutes ago, square_25 said:

That article also claims

"State epidemiologist Anders Tegnell of the health agency, who has devised Sweden’s response to the epidemic, has said there is little evidence linking the death toll to the absence of a lockdown, pointing instead to conditions at nursing homes, a decentralised health care system and travel patterns."

which I have to say is kind of priceless... when your neighbors all locked down and all had fewer deaths (and probably similar conditions at nursing homes!), you ought to assume that your strategy resulted in more deaths. 

Yeah, that was eyeroll worthy. Another example of someone who does not want to admit mistakes may have been made.

3 minutes ago, square_25 said:

I did think that Europe's open schools were evidence that kids don't spread COVID much, but I don't know what to do with this sort of evidence, because I have no clue how many people they've tested. Do they have random samples of different occupations? Have they randomly sampled the schoolchildren? Because if they didn't, it's hard to know what to do with any of their data. 

It is hard to know, but while schools struggle with this decision I think it means there isn't one clear right answer here. I wouldn't want to open schools in a hotspot. However, it might not be that risky in areas that are not experiencing an outbreak. 

[ktgrok]

34 minutes ago, TracyP said:

Sweden says its open school policy (school was open to <16 yo) did not lead to covid spread. The report also apparently showed that teachers were not at any more risk than any other profession.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKCN24G2IS

.

Um, but other professions had tons of exposure too. Saying they are not worse than other professions, when those are not doing well either, isn't really reassuring. What we wanted to hear is that teachers are LESS at risk than others, which would mean kids are not spreading it to them. If they have the same risk, that means that kids are spreading it, right? 

Also, I'm betting Sweden isn't talking about 3-5 thousand teens all on a campus together, like we have here. How big are their schools? Class sizes? Here even the smallest elementary school has I think 700 students. Class sizes are 25-35 for all ages. (actually some highschools are bigger classes)

Edited July 18, 2020 by Ktgrok

[TracyP]

5 minutes ago, square_25 said:

Yeah, he's doubled down pretty hard. It's been painful to watch. 

It certainly looks like it's one of the more reasonable things to reopen, and it has a lot of benefits. On the other hand, given travel between the states, I wonder how well we'll be able to predict whether something is a hot spot or not... 

It is a gamble. 🙁 I feel like it is a risk worth taking to get kids back in school, but I don't love either option. 

[Matryoshka]

13 minutes ago, TracyP said:

Yeah, that was eyeroll worthy. Another example of someone who does not want to admit mistakes may have been made.

It is hard to know, but while schools struggle with this decision I think it means there isn't one clear right answer here. I wouldn't want to open schools in a hotspot. However, it might not be that risky in areas that are not experiencing an outbreak. 

Yeah, well, Israel's completely different experience has to be explained to me before I agree even with that.  10 cases per day for the whole country when they opened the schools, now they've got an outbreak and 49% of the spread has been traced back to the schools.

Considering that we haven't even managed to get this under control as it is - even most  Northeast states don't have transmission rates as low as Israel did - I would not place any bets that we'd fare more like Sweden than Israel.  Even in current 'lower' outbreak areas I think there has to be a phased approach.  Israel actually did well with Phase 1, the problem seems to have been skipping any further phases and going back full throttle.

We're down to only a couple hundred cases a day here, but even without schools, our Rt has been creeping up and is back over 1.  That is a huge red flag.

[TracyP]

7 minutes ago, Ktgrok said:

Um, but other professions had tons of exposure too. Saying they are not worse than other professions, when those are not doing well either, isn't really reassuring. What we wanted to hear is that teachers are LESS at risk than others, which would mean kids are not spreading it to them. If they have the same risk, that means that kids are spreading it, right? 

Also, I'm betting Sweden isn't talking about 3-5 thousand teens all on a campus together, like we have here. How big are their schools? Class sizes? Here even the smallest elementary school has I think 700 students. Class sizes are 25-35 for all ages. (actually some highschools are bigger classes)

This is where the right answer may vary. We have a very small school. In my two closest districts the graduating classes run around 20 kids. Most grades have one class, but I know the current 6th grade is "big" with 25 kids so they have split that grade into 2 classes. I forget sometimes how different this decision is for others.

[Matryoshka]

3 minutes ago, TracyP said:

This is where the right answer may vary. We have a very small school. In my two closest districts the graduating classes run around 20 kids. Most grades have one class, but I know the current 6th grade is "big" with 25 kids so they have split that grade into 2 classes. I forget sometimes how different this decision is for others.

LOL, that's true.  With those numbers, even I wouldn't be all that worried.  I'm worried about our tossing our 1700 high school students back into a building that was built for far less than that number, so has been over capacity for years already, and then mixing and matching them all day long.  Hallways are shoulder to shoulder during class changes.  We do not have any options for opening things up to the outside like many people in more temperate climates are talking about.

[ktgrok]

46 minutes ago, TracyP said:

This is where the right answer may vary. We have a very small school. In my two closest districts the graduating classes run around 20 kids. Most grades have one class, but I know the current 6th grade is "big" with 25 kids so they have split that grade into 2 classes. I forget sometimes how different this decision is for others.

Yeah, it is an entirely different conversation to talk abut sending 12 kids per room, a few hundred kids all together, in an area with low spread, to school and to send 30 kids into a room, in a school with several thousand students, in an area with uncontrolled spread, rising hospitalizations, record deaths. And yet...the powers that be are treating it all the same. 

14 minutes ago, square_25 said:

My answer is air conditioning :-P. 

No, really, right now even Sweden with its lax policies looks very under control, while the places with AC do not. Israel has lots of AC. So do the Southern US states. And I can tell you that Europe have very minimal air conditioning on average... 

I think you are right, and it would also point at why southern states are doing worse than northern ones now, and why northern ones did worse when it was cold enough to have windows closed, etc. I don't think it is the whole answer, but it is part of it. 

13 minutes ago, square_25 said:

I think there is NO WAY to reopen high schools without major outbreaks. And I thought even Sweden did some distance learning for older kids? 

Yup. 16 and over didn't go back. 

[Matryoshka]

8 minutes ago, Ktgrok said:

Yeah, it is an entirely different conversation to talk abut sending 12 kids per room, a few hundred kids all together, in an area with low spread, to school and to send 30 kids into a room, in a school with several thousand students, in an area with uncontrolled spread, rising hospitalizations, record deaths. And yet...the powers that be are treating it all the same. 

I think you are right, and it would also point at why southern states are doing worse than northern ones now, and why northern ones did worse when it was cold enough to have windows closed, etc. I don't think it is the whole answer, but it is part of it. 

Well, you're making me feel just a teensy bit better in that there's almost no air conditioning in the schools up here.  But still 30 kids to a room, thousands to a building, swapping rooms every hour still seems like a recipe for disaster...

Quote

Yup. 16 and over didn't go back. 

And this is a HUGE caveat!  High school should just be distance only this year.

[Kanin]

1 hour ago, Ktgrok said:

Um, but other professions had tons of exposure too. Saying they are not worse than other professions, when those are not doing well either, isn't really reassuring. What we wanted to hear is that teachers are LESS at risk than others, which would mean kids are not spreading it to them. If they have the same risk, that means that kids are spreading it, right? 

 

Plus, it's not just the kids. There are other adults in the building, which could germ up the bathrooms, photocopier area, etc. 

I'm at more risk inside a school than sticking close to my house, only going out for walks and the occasional grocery store run.

[Kanin]

1 hour ago, Matryoshka said:

Considering that we haven't even managed to get this under control as it is - even most  Northeast states don't have transmission rates as low as Israel did - I would not place any bets that we'd fare more like Sweden than Israel.  Even in current 'lower' outbreak areas I think there has to be a phased approach.  Israel actually did well with Phase 1, the problem seems to have been skipping any further phases and going back full throttle.

 

Is there a website that shows the transmission rates in other countries as compared to US states? I would like to see that.

[Laura Corin]

17 hours ago, Acadie said:

Antibody testing in the UK is quite accurate, so I'm going to trust the results of this study linking three types of rashes to Covid as key diagnostic signs.

Summary on King's College website: https://www.kcl.ac.uk/news/skin-rash-should-be-considered-fourth-key-symptom-of-covid

(Cross-posted on Covid toes thread)

I report to this study app each day. The research seems well organised.

[Pen]

31 minutes ago, Kanin said:

Is there a website that shows the transmission rates in other countries as compared to US states? I would like to see that.

 

I think I have found It on this website in the past. But right now I can’t. If you find the exact right place could you please post back that link.

 

https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-data

[Matryoshka]

36 minutes ago, Kanin said:

Is there a website that shows the transmission rates in other countries as compared to US states? I would like to see that.

rt.live shows the numbers by state - I tried googling rt world and worldwide, and I got a bunch of hits for Russia Today!  😱

If anyone has better googling skills than I, please share!

[Pen]

1 hour ago, Kanin said:

Is there a website that shows the transmission rates in other countries as compared to US states? I would like to see that.

 

It looks like right now you have to individually search by country of interest - here’s Brazil:

https://perone.github.io/covid19analysis/brazil_r0.html

[Wheres Toto]

2 hours ago, square_25 said:

My answer is air conditioning :-P. 

No, really, right now even Sweden with its lax policies looks very under control, while the places with AC do not. Israel has lots of AC. So do the Southern US states. And I can tell you that Europe have very minimal air conditioning on average... 

I've been thinking about this.  It's been super hot here lately.  Lots and lots of air conditioning, nobody wanting to be outside.  It's going to be even worse in the next week or so (110 heat index Monday).   

[Acadie]

19 hours ago, square_25 said:

I'll cross-reply, I guess... I don't see them actually testing people with COVID toes here?? 

 

You're absolutely right, Square--my bad, I didn't read the actual study. I don't want to my mistake to detract from the value of these findings, though.

They're gathering lots of data both from people who have tested positive for Covid and people who are untested but do have symptoms, and concluded that 3 types of rashes should be considered symptoms of Covid. Getting the word out will help people when testing can be hard to access and still inaccurate in some places.

Interesting to hear that @Laura Corin reports data to this project! With such a wide range of Covid symptoms what we can learn from broad surveys like this is valuable.

[Kanin]

3 hours ago, Matryoshka said:

rt.live shows the numbers by state - I tried googling rt world and worldwide, and I got a bunch of hits for Russia Today!  😱

If anyone has better googling skills than I, please share!

Thanks!

[Kanin]

3 hours ago, Pen said:

 

I think I have found It on this website in the past. But right now I can’t. If you find the exact right place could you please post back that link.

 

https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-data

Neat, thanks!

[MEmama]

22 hours ago, square_25 said:

I'll cross-reply, I guess... I don't see them actually testing people with COVID toes here?? 

In the article or here irl?

My DS did get tested even without any other symptoms. I think we really lucked out with a knowledgable doctor; I can imagine in too many practices it would have been a fight.

I made a point of mentioning his Covid toes to every nurse and doctor when we were just in the ER for something (probably) unrelated, and will continue to bring it up at every one of DS's upcoming doctor visits because I want it documented everywhere. Should this country ever actually study it, or should weird health issues come up in the future, I want clear documentation and records in case there are dots to be connected.

[Ausmumof3]

CNN - pooled sampling in the US The US Food and Drug Administration on Saturday announced it has issued an emergency use authorization that allows Quest Diagnostics to pool samples from up to four individuals to test for Covid-19. 

This is the first Covid-19 diagnostic test in the United States to be authorized for use with pooled samples, the agency said in a statement. 

"This EUA for sample pooling is an important step forward in getting more Covid-19 tests to more Americans more quickly while preserving testing supplies," FDA Commissioner Dr. Stephen Hahn said in the statement. "Sample pooling becomes especially important as infection rates decline and we begin testing larger portions of the population."

Sample pooling allows multiple people to be tested at once. The samples are collected and then tested in a pool or "batch" using just one test. If the pool tests positive, this means one of or more of the people tested in that pool may be infected with the virus. Each of the samples would then have to be tested again individually.

The FDA last month published guidance for developers that want to make and use tests for pooled samples.

In late June, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said the White House coronavirus task force was "seriously considering" pool testing as a new strategy to improve testing as the nation experienced a surge in Covid-19 cases.

In its statement, the FDA said that while there is a "concern that combining samples may make it more difficult to detect positives, since pooling in the laboratory dilutes any viral material present in the samples," Quest’s validation data correctly identified all of the pooled samples that contained a positive sample. 

[RootAnn]

Pooling, if done correctly & with a low enough % positive rate, saves tests. At the 10% or higher rate, I think the math doesn't work out as well.

[Ausmumof3]

363 cases, 3 deaths for Vic today.  Mandatory masks in some areas in Melbourne.

[Melissa in Australia]

Mandatory masks for the whole locked down area in Vic., so all of Melbourne plus the shire directly north of Melbourne. There will be a $200 on the spot fine after Wednesday for anyone older the age of 12 not wearing a mask. 

Also 80% of new cases over the last few days people have caught the virus at work. 

[Laura Corin]

14 hours ago, Acadie said:

 

You're absolutely right, Square--my bad, I didn't read the actual study. I don't want to my mistake to detract from the value of these findings, though.

They're gathering lots of data both from people who have tested positive for Covid and people who are untested but do have symptoms, and concluded that 3 types of rashes should be considered symptoms of Covid. Getting the word out will help people when testing can be hard to access and still inaccurate in some places.

Interesting to hear that @Laura Corin reports data to this project! With such a wide range of Covid symptoms what we can learn from broad surveys like this is valuable.

Yes, there are 4 million subscribers. The study also spotted anosmia as an early symptom before it was well known. They ask you to report any and all symptoms daily, as well as test results if any, supplements taken, contact with others over the previous week, mask wearing, etc.

[Ausmumof3]

4 hours ago, Melissa in Australia said:

Mandatory masks for the whole locked down area in Vic., so all of Melbourne plus the shire directly north of Melbourne. There will be a $200 on the spot fine after Wednesday for anyone older the age of 12 not wearing a mask. 

Also 80% of new cases over the last few days people have caught the virus at work. 

How easy are masks to come by?  I’m considering ordering here just to be prepared.  I could probably sew some but would rather order some in I think.  My sewing is “ok” but not professional.  I’ve held off due to cost.

[Ausmumof3]

South Carolina dog tests positive for COVID.  Dog had to be euthanised due to a separate chronic condition.

https://7news.com.au/travel/coronavirus/family-dog-euthanised-after-testing-positive-for-coronavirus-in-south-carolina-c-1175238

[Melissa in Australia]

I haven't actually looked for a mask. so I don't know on availability. 

 we have 1 mask that was given to us by the army when we evacuated from fires in the summer . I made bandannas for the twins, and will make some cloth masks this week. the government has provided links to patterns of masks. I haven't looked yet.

 

 

[Rosie_0801]

53 minutes ago, Ausmumof3 said:

How easy are masks to come by?  I’m considering ordering here just to be prepared.  I could probably sew some but would rather order some in I think.  My sewing is “ok” but not professional.  I’ve held off due to cost.

Up in our area of Central Vic, there seems to be a woman in every town making them. I bought some locally to send home with dd for her household last weekend. 

[TracyP]

I have been looking for results on the U Of MN hydroxychloroquine study. It had 2 arms - 1 was looking at taking hcq after a covid exposure. This showed little benefit, although there were some limitations because they weren't able to test most patients.

The 2nd arm was looking at taking hcq early on in the covid progression. These results were just published here.  They concluded that hcq had little benefit for these patients too. However, I am confused. 10 patients in the placebo group were hospitalized and 4 patients in the hcq group were hospitalized. That seems significant to me. What am I missing?

[ktgrok]

3 minutes ago, TracyP said:

I have been looking for results on the U Of MN hydroxychloroquine study. It had 2 arms - 1 was looking at taking hcq after a covid exposure. This showed little benefit, although there were some limitations because they weren't able to test most patients.

The 2nd arm was looking at taking hcq early on in the covid progression. These results were just published here.  They concluded that hcq had little benefit for these patients too. However, I am confused. 10 patients in the placebo group were hospitalized and 4 patients in the hcq group were hospitalized. That seems significant to me. What am I missing?

There were almost 500 participants. And 2 of the 10 hopitalized in the placebo arm were hospitalized for something not related to Covid. So it was 8 vs 4, and when you are looking at 500 people that isn't enough to be statistically significant vs just random fluctuation. 

[Ausmumof3]

3 hours ago, Rosie_0801 said:

Up in our area of Central Vic, there seems to be a woman in every town making them. I bought some locally to send home with dd for her household last weekend. 

Awesome.  Glad to hear that.

[TCB]

1 hour ago, Plum said:

To find out whether particular symptoms tend to appear together and how this related to the progression of the disease, the research team used a machine learning algorithm to analyse data from a subset of around 1,600 users in the UK and US with confirmed COVID-19 who had regularly logged their symptoms using the app in March and April.

The analysis revealed six specific groupings of symptoms emerging at characteristic timepoints in the progression of the illness, representing six distinct ‘types’ of COVID-19. The algorithm was then tested by running it on a second independent dataset of 1,000 users in the UK, US and Sweden, who had logged their symptoms during May.

All people reporting symptoms experienced headache and loss of smell, with varying combinations of additional symptoms at various times. Some of these, such as confusion, abdominal pain and shortness of breath, are not widely known as COVID-19 symptoms, yet are hallmarks of the most severe forms of the disease.

The six clusters are as follows:

 

1- (‘flu-like’ with no fever): Headache, loss of smell, muscle pains, cough, sore throat, chest pain, no fever.

2- (‘flu-like’ with fever): Headache, loss of smell, cough, sore throat, hoarseness, fever, loss of appetite.

3- (gastrointestinal): Headache, loss of smell, loss of appetite, diarrhea, sore throat, chest pain, no cough.

4- (severe level one, fatigue): Headache, loss of smell, cough, fever, hoarseness, chest pain, fatigue.

5- (severe level two, confusion): Headache, loss of smell, loss of appetite, cough, fever, hoarseness, sore throat, chest pain, fatigue, confusion, muscle pain.

6- (severe level three, abdominal and respiratory): Headache, loss of smell, loss of appetite, cough, fever, hoarseness, sore throat, chest pain, fatigue, confusion, muscle pain, shortness of breath, diarrhea, abdominal pain.

Next, the team investigated whether people experiencing particular symptom clusters were more likely to require breathing support in the form of ventilation or additional oxygen.

They discovered that only 1.5% of people with cluster 1, 4.4% of people with cluster 2 and 3.3% of people with cluster 3 COVID-19 required breathing support. These figures were 8.6%, 9.9% and 19.8% for clusters 4,5 and 6 respectively. Furthermore, nearly half of the patients in cluster 6 ended up in hospital, compared with just 16% of those in cluster 1.

Broadly, people with cluster 4,5 or 6 COVID-19 symptoms tended to be older and frailer, and were more likely to be overweight and have pre-existing conditions such as diabetes or lung disease than those with type 1,2 or 3.

The researchers then developed a model combining information about age, sex, BMI and pre-existing conditions together with symptoms gathered over just five days from the onset of the illness.

This was able to predict which cluster a patient falls into and their risk of requiring hospitalisation and breathing support with a higher likelihood of being correct than an existing risk model based purely on age, sex, BMI and pre-existing conditions alone.

Given that most people who require breathing support come to hospital around 13 days after their first symptoms, this extra eight days represents a significant ‘early warning’ as to who is most likely to need more intensive care.

“These findings have important implications for care and monitoring of people who are most vulnerable to severe COVID-19,” said Dr Claire Steves from King’s College London. “If you can predict who these people are at day five, you have time to give them support and early interventions such as monitoring blood oxygen and sugar levels, and ensuring they are properly hydrated - simple care that could be given at home, preventing hospitalisations and saving lives.”
https://www.technologynetworks.com/diagnostics/news/researchers-identify-six-distinct-types-of-covid-19-337592
 

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.06.12.20129056v1

That sounds like a really good tool!

I hope your dh is feeling better. I was wondering if you knew how hospitals are faring in your state? I heard someone at work saying the report of bed availability in Houston wasn’t as bad as portrayed- although the person she heard it from was not a HCW but lived in the city and knew 3 nurses, not sure what kind of nurses they were. I wish there was an easier way of getting just the facts but it seems very difficult to do that right now.

[TracyP]

 

4 hours ago, Ktgrok said:

There were almost 500 participants. And 2 of the 10 hopitalized in the placebo arm were hospitalized for something not related to Covid. So it was 8 vs 4, and when you are looking at 500 people that isn't enough to be statistically significant vs just random fluctuation. 

I wondered about including those 2. Whether 10 or 8 vs. 4 it seemed significant to me, but I guess I don't know how that works when it comes to these studies. 

3 hours ago, square_25 said:

Yeah, that’s the problem with following people who aren’t sick yet — you might have few enough people get sick that you have no statistical power.

If I remember correctly, the 500 isn’t relevant here, only the small numbers hospitalized. 

By the way, “statistically significant” generally means “has a chance of less than 5 percent of happening randomly.” If you randomly distributed 12 hospitalized patients between two groups, the chance of having 4 or fewer in one group is around 20 percent, which is far too high.

That makes sense, though I guess this study is still going to leave me with unanswered questions about hcq which is annoying. 😋 Do either of you (or anyone) have thoughts on remdisivir? That drug seems to be quite popular even though the study results seemed fairly insignificant to me. 

[Ausmumof3]

BNO Italy's Lombardy, once the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak, has reported 0 new deaths for the first time in nearly 5 months
 

 

[Ausmumof3]

https://www.thelocal.ch/20200715/only-those-with-plastic-visors-were-infected-swiss-government-warns-against-face-shields/amp
 

just a single anecdote but this feels worth knowing about.  Particularly as some airlines are moving toward complementary face shields instead of masks.

[Melissa in Australia]

275 new cases in Victoria today. 1 death. 

Reusable Face masks are going to be issued to all staff and students in schools. Teachers can chose not to wear the mask in the classroom at their own discretion but need to wear the mask when not actively teaching. Students need to wear a mask or scarf at all times unless eating. Only year 11 and 12 and special school students are back to school in Melbourne greater area. The rest are to be taught at home 

[Innisfree]

This sounds promising. 

Quote

The preliminary results of a clinical trial suggest a new treatment for Covid-19 dramatically reduces the number of patients needing intensive care, according to the UK company that developed it.

The treatment from Southampton-based biotech Synairgen uses a protein called interferon beta which the body produces when it gets a viral infection.

The protein is inhaled directly into the lungs of patients with coronavirus, using a nebuliser, in the hope that it will stimulate an immune response.

The initial findings suggest the treatment cut the odds of a Covid-19 patient in hospital developing severe disease - such as requiring ventilation - by 79%.

...

If it does get approval, the drug and the nebulisers used to deliver it would then need to be manufactured in large quantities.

Mr Marsden says he instructed companies to start producing supplies back in April to ensure they would be available should the results be positive.

He says he expects Synairgen to be able to deliver "a few 100,000" doses a month by the winter.

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-53467022

[Laura Corin]

Head in hands....

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/world-53468151?ns_mchannel=social&ns_source=twitter&ns_campaign=bbc_live&ns_linkname=5f15702fb2cd210661d41bf4%26Outbreak closes contact tracing centre in Scotland%262020-07-20T10%3A57%3A20.399Z&ns_fee=0&pinned_post_locator=urn:asset:46230e24-7549-4d2b-be6e-b51b0ba110aa&pinned_post_asset_id=5f15702fb2cd210661d41bf4&pinned_post_type=share