Flu + Covid is Happening Now!

[TravelingChris]

24 minutes ago, Scarlett said:

And has anyone else heard that smokers seem to be having less complications than non smokers?  Not that I think anyone should start smoking....but how weird.

Yes, I haver heard this, or rather, read this many months ago.  BTW,  there is one autoimmune disease that doesn't strike smokers=Ulcerative Colitis.  On the other hand, if you smoke, you are more likely to get rheumatoid athritis and ankolysing Spondylosis.  I have both of those and didn't smoke.

[mathnerd]

53 minutes ago, TravelingChris said:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-science/asthma-patients-less-likely-to-die-from-virus-new-test-better-at-telling-who-is-still-infectious-idUSKBN26S38T

I don't think this is where I read it but hopefully it has the same info

 

21 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

I don't have a link, but I've also seen that asthma patients were lower risk. 

Interesting, thanks. The article linked here says that Corticosteroids in asthma medication actually helps when fighting covid. I have several family members who would benefit from this information, so, thanks again!

[TravelingChris]

22 minutes ago, Not_a_Number said:

I don't have a link, but I've also seen that asthma patients were lower risk. 

They are not sure what the reason is.  One thing seems to be that asthma causes less ACE in the lungs.  Another thing, is that they think asthmatics may be more likely to use masks (I know that the asthmatics in my family certainly do that including me).  Then a third reason may be that most asthmatics use steriod inhalors every day and since steriods have been shown to help with more serious cases of COVID, they may also help prevent it if you are inhaling them.  (I inhale, use for my nose and take a small dose of steriods by mouth too), 

[Not_a_Number]

2 minutes ago, TravelingChris said:

They are not sure what the reason is.  One thing seems to be that asthma causes less ACE in the lungs.  Another thing, is that they think asthmatics may be more likely to use masks (I know that the asthmatics in my family certainly do that including me).  Then a third reason may be that most asthmatics use steriod inhalors every day and since steriods have been shown to help with more serious cases of COVID, they may also help prevent it if you are inhaling them.  (I inhale, use for my nose and take a small dose of steriods by mouth too), 

That's interesting. 

I remember seeing that data coming out back in the spring and being quite surprised by it. I'm glad they are coming up with some theories about it. 

[fairfarmhand]

On 12/1/2020 at 4:28 PM, MEmama said:

Yeah, I think about this in regards to anti vaxxers too. *Every* generation before us knew what it was like to bury 4 or 6 kids to diseases we are fortunate to prevent easily today. I mean, go to any cemetery and look at how many entire families were buried within days or months if each other. Their suffering would be unfathomable to us today. That we don’t know the horrors of polio today is a freaking miracle, yet so many people are willing to thumb their noses at how we got to this incredibly privileged place. 

Literally one of the best things we the common people can do for ourselves, our families and our communities is wear a little piece of fabric over our mouths and that’s too much to ask? SMH. 

There;s a small cemetery on our property that's very old. In that cemetery there are graves that, from the dates and the little local history that I've gleaned, are possibly from the Great Influenza. If I remember correctly, there are like five  or six  graves of children less than 13 years old all with the same last name. They all died in the same year. But even if it wasnt the flu, and perhaps they were cousins, can you imagine losing five or six children in the same family unit in a single year? It boggles my mind. 

[Not_a_Number]

1 minute ago, fairfarmhand said:

There;s a small cemetery on our property that's very old. In that cemetery there are graves that, from the dates and the little local history that I've gleaned, are possibly from the Great Influenza. If I remember correctly, there are like five  or six  graves of children less than 13 years old all with the same last name. They all died in the same year. But even if it wasnt the flu, and perhaps they were cousins, can you imagine losing five or six children in the same family unit in a single year? It boggles my mind. 

That's so sad 😞 . 

And I think people were sadly pretty used to child mortality. If you read British literature from the 1800s and 1700s, people would describe how many kids they had as "I had 5, buried 2." People didn't really expect kids to make it to adulthood. 

[fairfarmhand]

Just now, Not_a_Number said:

That's so sad 😞 . 

And I think people were sadly pretty used to child mortality. If you read British literature from the 1800s and 1700s, people would describe how many kids they had as "I had 5, buried 2." People didn't really expect kids to make it to adulthood. 

Yes, there are a lot of children's graves from the early 1900s in our little cemetery. That was pretty normal for the times. 

I do some genealogy work and my great great grandmother had 11 children. Her last 4 didn't survive infancy. She was bearing children from 1843-1867. Burying four babies. So sad.

[MEmama]

8 minutes ago, fairfarmhand said:

There;s a small cemetery on our property that's very old. In that cemetery there are graves that, from the dates and the little local history that I've gleaned, are possibly from the Great Influenza. If I remember correctly, there are like five  or six  graves of children less than 13 years old all with the same last name. They all died in the same year. But even if it wasnt the flu, and perhaps they were cousins, can you imagine losing five or six children in the same family unit in a single year? It boggles my mind. 

Yup. We have lots of cemeteries here from the early 1700s on. It’s so, so common to see similar situations. It’s utterly heartbreaking— it’s not as though parents loved their kids any less than we do today. And yet today, so many people don’t seem to understand that it can play out the same way if we aren’t vigilant. Privilege at its worst, and with no excuses. 😞 

[kbutton]

2 hours ago, fairfarmhand said:

There;s a small cemetery on our property that's very old. In that cemetery there are graves that, from the dates and the little local history that I've gleaned, are possibly from the Great Influenza. If I remember correctly, there are like five  or six  graves of children less than 13 years old all with the same last name. They all died in the same year. But even if it wasnt the flu, and perhaps they were cousins, can you imagine losing five or six children in the same family unit in a single year? It boggles my mind. 

Hard to imagine. I wonder if they were actually diphtheria? I think there were still frequent outbreaks at that point and would be more likely to have killed children. The 1918 flu was more threatening to young to middle-aged adults than the old and young. My great-grandfather was 12ish when he survived the 1918 flu, but his father died of of it. 

This article indicated that there was an overlap in flu and diphtheria years (diphtheria peaked in the early 1920s). https://www.healthline.com/health/worst-disease-outbreaks-history#diphtheria

During this timeframe another branch of my family was dealing with infant deaths that were at least partly from congenital heart defects (which reappear in less deadly form in subsequent generations with better surgical intervention). My great grandparents lost eight babies that made it far enough along to be born, stillborn, or die in the first two years of life. 

I can’t imagine what our ancestors carried with them. 

[fairfarmhand]

12 hours ago, Halftime Hope said:

That's why it should be studied in an exact same way.  But I have to tell you, there are two very vocal doctors here in DFW who are having great results with HQC.  I have no way of knowing how many others are doing so but not being vocal.  Maybe a lot, maybe not.   Dr Mobeen Syed is treating referrals by telemed, mostly family members of medical personnel he knows, and he reports much better success with ivermectin, often times treating patients who already had a course of HQC and are out of the hospital but not getting well.  He is pleased with ivermectin and with a "pulse" of steroids (his term) and perhaps a second one for very tough cases.  So far, no long-haulers in his patients.  (That's actually pretty amazing because he is seeing really sick, non-responding patients.) I'm guessing mostly causcasian, Asian, and middle-eastern patients, given the overseas connections he mentions and his west coast location, but i've never heard him mention demographics, other than a lot of advanced age patients. 

 

12 hours ago, Halftime Hope said:

To be clear, I think the data is out on HQC, and with ivermectin showing such promise, that would be my first choice.  It's probable a more ethical choice, too, at this point.  

Huh. Ivermectin. That’s what we use to worm our cattle. That stuff is cheap too. I wonder how ethical it would be to give that to anyone who came down with covid in my house. 

[Lucy the Valiant]

3 hours ago, Not_a_Number said:

That's so sad 😞 . 

And I think people were sadly pretty used to child mortality. If you read British literature from the 1800s and 1700s, people would describe how many kids they had as "I had 5, buried 2." People didn't really expect kids to make it to adulthood. 

This is how much of the continent of Africa answers that question even today.

[Not_a_Number]

13 minutes ago, Lucy the Valiant said:

This is how much of the continent of Africa answers that question even today.

Huh. I guess that makes sense, but I haven't thought about it 😞 . I probably should have... 

[Not_a_Number]

2 hours ago, kand said:

I had only heard the opposite, so just went looking for information on that, and I saw the study from back in April that found that. Everything else I found indicated that smokers have worse progression. There looked to be a pretty serious flaw with the study that found smokers had less complications, and that was that in the countries where the two studies were done (China and France), smoking is much more popular among younger people. Therefore, it makes sense that there would be a correlation where the people who smoked (young people) were less likely to be hospitalized than the people who didn't (older people). It's disappointing how often there are these correlational studies that get a lot of press, with major confounding factors, but people don't see the follow up of why the conclusions are unlikely to be valid.

Thanks for checking that. I remember seeing that back in the spring, but I remember that it looked like kind of a joke: like, "ha-ha, look at the spurious correlation they found!" 

But maybe that's the perspective of a probabilist 😉 . 

Edited December 3, 2020 by Not_a_Number

[Not_a_Number]

55 minutes ago, fairfarmhand said:

Huh. Ivermectin. That’s what we use to worm our cattle. That stuff is cheap too. I wonder how ethical it would be to give that to anyone who came down with covid in my house. 

Yeah, not sure. The data looks promising, but I'd really like an RCT that's out of a Western country. 

[Scarlett]

3 hours ago, kand said:

I had only heard the opposite, so just went looking for information on that, and I saw the study from back in April that found that. Everything else I found indicated that smokers have worse progression. There looked to be a pretty serious flaw with the study that found smokers had less complications, and that was that in the countries where the two studies were done (China and France), smoking is much more popular among younger people. Therefore, it makes sense that there would be a correlation where the people who smoked (young people) were less likely to be hospitalized than the people who didn't (older people). It's disappointing how often there are these correlational studies that get a lot of press, with major confounding factors, but people don't see the follow up of why the conclusions are unlikely to be valid.

Yes thank you for checking that. I had been meaning to look further in to it for months because it did not make sense.

1 hour ago, Not_a_Number said:

Thanks for checking that. I remember seeing that back in the spring, but I remember that it looked like kind of a joke: like, "ha-ha, look at the spurious correlation they found!" 

But maybe that's the perspective of a probabilist 😉 . 

Lol

[Not_a_Number]

Just now, Scarlett said:

Yes thank you for checking that. I had been meaning to look further in to it for months because it did not make sense.

Lol

It's possible mathematicians have weird senses of humor, lol. I really do remember laughing about it with DH! (But we're both mathematicians...) 

[Scarlett]

Just now, Not_a_Number said:

It's possible mathematicians have weird senses of humor, lol. I really do remember laughing about it with DH! (But we're both mathematicians...) 

I just remember thinking that maybe their lungs were already so covered in tar that the virus could not readily attack the tissue.

I am sure that is not a scientific possibility.  Lol

[Scarlett]

And while we are talking sound bites can anyone shed some light on the theory of blood types being a factor in how a person contracts or handles the virus?

[Scarlett]

Just now, Thatboyofmine said:

I’m curious about that, too. 
also, how do you find out your blood type?  I think I might be A+ but I have no clue about dh and ds.   No one has ever mentioned it.  

I only found out I was O- when I was pregnant.  

[vonfirmath]

7 minutes ago, Thatboyofmine said:

I’m curious about that, too. 
also, how do you find out your blood type?  I think I might be A+ but I have no clue about dh and ds.   No one has ever mentioned it.  

I was reacquainted with my blood type when I gave blood. I believe my doctor has it too -- in those blood tests they do.

[Scarlett]

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-science/type-o-blood-linked-to-lower-covid-risk-taking-vitamin-d-unlikely-to-help-idUSKBN2872LH
 

is this reputable?

[katilac]

7 hours ago, TravelingChris said:

BTW,  there is one autoimmune disease that doesn't strike smokers=Ulcerative Colitis.  

There's a lower risk but smokers can certainly get ulcerative colitis. 

[BakersDozen]

On 12/1/2020 at 11:05 PM, Frances said:

What part of the country? It sounds more political than science based.

Southwest.

[Pen]

2 hours ago, Scarlett said:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-science/type-o-blood-linked-to-lower-covid-risk-taking-vitamin-d-unlikely-to-help-idUSKBN2872LH
 

is this reputable?

probably

as long as you note that D is unlikely to help if given when CV19 is already severe

indications are that having a high D level avoids getting to that stage in the first place

there have also been indications that a form of vitamin D that can rapidly raise level given right away can helpe

[Scarlett]

5 hours ago, Pen said:

probably

as long as you note that D is unlikely to help if given when CV19 is already severe

indications are that having a high D level avoids getting to that stage in the first place

there have also been indications that a form of vitamin D that can rapidly raise level given right away can helpe

I am wondering about the blood type connection.  

[ktgrok]

On 12/1/2020 at 2:18 PM, easypeasy said:

 

He'll hear zero judgment from me!!! ALL of this sucks - for everyone - in a million different ways! He's no idiot - but just made an educated decision balancing mental welfare against physical and lost the bet.

 

I'm not judging him - if he made a choice to take that risk, thats his call. But I am FRUSTRATED when people then say they were being totally safe, and can't figure out where they got it. 

Own your decision. You decided to go somewhere with more risk, and you caught it, and that's how life goes sometimes. Don't pretend you have no idea how you possibly could have caught it when going to an indoor location without wearing a mask. 

On 12/1/2020 at 2:56 PM, Choirfarm3 said:

No, they haven't posted about the dangers of indoor dining. Not in my small town.

Have they posted about the danger of being indoors with a large number of people without a mask? Or about the importance of wearing a mask when indoors?

It isn't that restaurants are dangerous because they are restaurants, but because indoor spaces can have the virus circulating around the room - and at a restaurant all those people are not wearing masks so they can eat. Same with any other indoor space. 

On 12/1/2020 at 3:06 PM, MEmama said:

Ah, good, I misunderstood. 

I do find it strange that people think it’s safe to eat in a public, indoor environment when it’s well known that covid spreads through the air. Doesn’t seem hard to put together. But at least your local paper isn’t totally ignoring the pandemic! 

Right. I mean - restaurant, bowling alley, church, whatever. 

[Amy in NH]

On 12/1/2020 at 6:13 PM, popmom said:

Well, I'm a bit "tied up in knots". How do you find out which doctors are willing to prescribe Ivermectin? Or which doctors are having success treating outpatient? Are these primary care docs? 

You don't actually need a prescription; you just need to make sure to give the right dose.  Ivermectin is an antihelminthic (wormer) used for all types of livestock, and you can buy it at Tractor Supply, Agway, and all over the internet.  It is safe for human consumption.

 

15 hours ago, fairfarmhand said:

 

Huh. Ivermectin. That’s what we use to worm our cattle. That stuff is cheap too. I wonder how ethical it would be to give that to anyone who came down with covid in my house. 

We are waiting on results from COVID tests here, after a full-contagion exposure one of my household family members had a work in each of the three days before Thanksgiving.  We've all been self-isolating this week while we wait.  If it comes up positive, we'll all be taking an appropriately titrated dose of Ivermectin from what we keep on hand.

[Pen]

6 hours ago, Scarlett said:

I am wondering about the blood type connection.  

yes apparently less bad for  O-   (Maybe O+ too, but statistically seemed most clear for O-       Was on Medcram etc months ago. I don’t recall details. I cannot change my blood type so tend to look at things I have control over)

[popmom]

1 hour ago, Amy in NH said:

You don't actually need a prescription; you just need to make sure to give the right dose.  Ivermectin is an antihelminthic (wormer) used for all types of livestock, and you can buy it at Tractor Supply, Agway, and all over the internet.  It is safe for human consumption.

 

We are waiting on results from COVID tests here, after a full-contagion exposure one of my household family members had a work in each of the three days before Thanksgiving.  We've all been self-isolating this week while we wait.  If it comes up positive, we'll all be taking an appropriately titrated dose of Ivermectin from what we keep on hand.

I have a bottle of Ivermectin too, but I read that humans shouldn't take it. 

[Pen]

On 12/3/2020 at 11:03 AM, popmom said:

I have a bottle of Ivermectin too, but I read that humans shouldn't take it. 

humans take Ivermectin (human grade) for a variety of things such as internally particularly for various types of worms , externally for lice, possibly some types of rashes

dosage needs to be correct!

There’s info re CV19 at: