COVID-19 — Coronavirus

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Chippy_boy said:
Agreed but how does that explain them only having 9 serious/critical cases??? For reference, Italy with circa 5x the number of cases, have 1,000 serious/critical. On a like for like basis it's 9 vs 200.

Yes, we all know about the demographic in Italy being older etc, but 9 vs 1,000? Surely there's something else afoot. I am reminded of the 'two strains" discussion and have been wondering if the Germans have a higher prevalence for the less aggressive strain, perhaps?
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Happy to be proven wrong because I didn't note the source, but I have read that Germany is not classifying deaths as Coronavirus related if they had other serious illnesses already.
 
Gelsons Dad said:
Numbers-of-critical-care-beds-corrected-for-size-of-population-per-100-000-inhabitants.png



Could well be the case.
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Yes interestingly Austria also has a low number, as does Luxembourg and Romania.
 
Chippy_boy said:
What is that? Genuine question - I was unaware of them doing anything particularly proactive or aggressive, but maybe I have missed it? Also whilst I can fully grasp the possibility of them having a much lower mortality rate, what is a complete mystery to me is why they have far fewer critical cases? Better medical treatments surely influences outcomes, but not the percentage of people getting ill in the first place? The German numbers are to me at least, very puzzling.
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Gelsons Dad said:
? What have they done? As far as I can see they haven't done anything more than the UK. And they have a lot more cases. It's just the deaths that are low.
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Their response has generally been more proactive with screening, testing, isolation, and treatment for moderate-to-severe cases (which has been easier for them because of the higher critical care capacity that I mentioned), as well as a populace that has generally taken guidance from the government and health organisations seriously. They are also apparently reporting with more strict criteria.

That specific relative ease is inherent to their system, rather than the response, but it is a factor in the issues with other countries’ responses, as both the WHO and the CDC have advised that there is an even higher need for proactive, aggressive measures from nations with more limited critical care capacities (like the UK and US) and/or screening/testing ability (like many in the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and South America). That has mostly come via the various initiatives originating from health systems (but generally supported by various levels of government) — you both are correct that they hadn’t (until overtures announced yesterday by Merkel and co) implemented travel restrictions or general quarantine procedures. That is apparently going to change now.
 
The Brazilian government has confirmed that president Jair Bolsonaro’s communications secretary Fabio Wajngarten has coronavirus just days after meeting Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago, Dom Phillips, in Rio de Janeiro, reports.

The Don could have it - Somebody think of the virus!
 
Chippy_boy said:
Agreed but how does that explain them only having 9 serious/critical cases??? For reference, Italy with circa 5x the number of cases, have 1,000 serious/critical. On a like for like basis it's 9 vs 200.

Yes, we all know about the demographic in Italy being older etc, but 9 vs 1,000? Surely there's something else afoot. I am reminded of the 'two strains" discussion and have been wondering if the Germans have a higher prevalence for the less aggressive strain, perhaps?
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If you're getting your figures from Worldometer for ICU patients I would be careful as I don't know where some are coming from. The Italians kindly report how many are in ICU daily but I haven't seen a comparable report from some of the countries. The UK is showing as zero on that site which cannot be realistic but it would be fantastic.
 
Chippy_boy said:
Agreed but how does that explain them only having 9 serious/critical cases??? For reference, Italy with circa 5x the number of cases, have 1,000 serious/critical. On a like for like basis it's 9 vs 200.

Yes, we all know about the demographic in Italy being older etc, but 9 vs 1,000? Surely there's something else afoot. I am reminded of the 'two strains" discussion and have been wondering if the Germans have a higher prevalence for the less aggressive strain, perhaps?
Click to expand...

cleavers said:
No idea really, maybe they're just catching it and treating it earlier ?
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The explanation I read over here is the idea, that Covid was brought to Germany by younger, fit tourists back from skiing or hiking from Italy with a good chance to have mild symptoms.

They have been tested very quickly, contact persons too, and the virus did have a lower chance to get transmissed to older people.

In the meantime our curve gets quite steep too (+536 cases to now 2,502).

That's why more drastic measures are being taken now.
 
AlgarveBlu said:
The Brazilian government has confirmed that president Jair Bolsonaro’s communications secretary Fabio Wajngarten has coronavirus just days after meeting Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago, Dom Phillips, in Rio de Janeiro, reports.

The Don could have it - Somebody think of the virus!
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i wouldn't wish the d aft fuckwit on even a virus
 
Looking at the comparison between COVID19 and the two common strains of Influenza w/r/t Viral Pneumonial infection, here is a description of 'regular' Flu (Influenza a/b) progressing to viral pneumonia:

>After inhalation, the virus is deposited onto the respiratory tract epithelium, where it attaches to ciliated columnar epithelial cells via its surface hemagglutinin. Local host defenses, such as mucociliary clearance, or secretion of specific secretory IgA antibodies can remove some of the virus particles. However, if mucociliary clearance is impaired (as in smokers [21] or older patients [22]) or secretory anti-influenza IgA antibodies are absent (as in no antecedent exposure to the virus), infection continues unabated.

So one reason COVID19 is ringing many, many alarm bells - we do not have any exposure, thus no IgA antibodies or equivalent. Thus pneumonial viral infection is much more likely. Of course, there is no reason why you can't get more than one viral (or bacterial) infection, and COVID19 will allow that to happen. And there is no tamiflu to fight this infection - a drug which has been used succesfully to the point where less than 1% of influenza a/b or h1n1 samples are resistant to it.

So the dangers we can say are present:
We lack the immune response that we have to Influenza a/b
This virus is spreading rapidly, at a pandemic level (which is normally associated with an increase in influenza cases progressing to viral pneumonia)
And unlike Influenza a/b Doctors have no antiviral treatment to treat these cases with.

There is temptation to speculate on the risk of harm that COVID19, like other more recent non-influenza a/b viruses, presents due to the nature of the actual infection... that's not something we can really know yet... it is definitely not at a SARS level, (personally would be suprised if despite the above factors, it wasn't inherenty a little more dangerous than the viral pneumonia caused by 'regular' influenza).

But that's beside the point. We fight Influenza a/b with herd immunities and specific immune responses that help prevent viral pneumonia infections. And when it happens, we fight that infection with an extremely efficient antiviral agent. So when you talk about the flu, or flu season, we are talking about THAT situation. And when you talk about COVID19, you are talking about another disease for which we don't have immunity or treatment. It resembles flu in terms of symptomology, and in some ways etiology... but in my opinion, the compulsion to call it 'a flu' is to willfully turn a blind eye the reasons why it will spread further, cause more problems, and why everyone from the WHO to the government cannot and willnot treat it as such. In a way, it's a philosophical argument, people like to group things that seem to belong together - which is understandable to a point... for many cases, the sufferer's experience will likely be very similair to catching Influenza B, with the caveat that they are more likely to experience discomfort or problems breathing because they will lack the particular immune response. But it's also an invitation to cognitive bias, and would certainly hinder the work of assessing, measuring, and treating.
 
This coronavirus that's been in the news recently is getting quite serious now. It's all people can talk about.
 
St.Pauli support said:
The explanation I read over here is the idea, that Covid was brought to Germany by younger, fit tourists back from skiing or hiking from Italy with a good chance to have mild symptoms.

They have been tested very quickly, contact persons too, and the virus did have a lower chance to get transmissed to older people.

In the meantime our curve gets quite steep too (+536 cases to now 2,502).

That's why more drastic measures are being taken now.
Click to expand...
I was about to tag you in to see if my post about the German response was accurate (it’s based on various articles/reports I have read over the last month or so).
 
Summerbuzz said:
Looking at the comparison between COVID19 and the two common strains of Influenza w/r/t Viral Pneumonial infection, here is a description of 'regular' Flu (Influenza a/b) progressing to viral pneumonia:

>After inhalation, the virus is deposited onto the respiratory tract epithelium, where it attaches to ciliated columnar epithelial cells via its surface hemagglutinin. Local host defenses, such as mucociliary clearance, or secretion of specific secretory IgA antibodies can remove some of the virus particles. However, if mucociliary clearance is impaired (as in smokers [21] or older patients [22]) or secretory anti-influenza IgA antibodies are absent (as in no antecedent exposure to the virus), infection continues unabated.

So one reason COVID19 is ringing many, many alarm bells - we do not have any exposure, thus no IgA antibodies or equivalent. Thus pneumonial viral infection is much more likely. Of course, there is no reason why you can't get more than one viral (or bacterial) infection, and COVID19 will allow that to happen. And there is no tamiflu to fight this infection - a drug which has been used succesfully to the point where less than 1% of influenza a/b or h1n1 samples are resistant to it.

So the dangers we can say are present:
We lack the immune response that we have to Influenza a/b
This virus is spreading rapidly, at a pandemic level (which is normally associated with an increase in influenza cases progressing to viral pneumonia)
And unlike Influenza a/b Doctors have no antiviral treatment to treat these cases with.

There is temptation to speculate on the risk of harm that COVID19, like other more recent non-influenza a/b viruses, presents due to the nature of the actual infection... that's not something we can really know yet... it is definitely not at a SARS level, (personally would be suprised if despite the above factors, it wasn't inherenty a little more dangerous than the viral pneumonia caused by 'regular' influenza).

But that's beside the point. We fight Influenza a/b with herd immunities and specific immune responses that help prevent viral pneumonia infections. And when it happens, we fight that infection with an extremely efficient antiviral agent. So when you talk about the flu, or flu season, we are talking about THAT situation. And when you talk about COVID19, you are talking about another disease for which we don't have immunity or treatment. It resembles flu in terms of symptomology, and in some ways etiology... but in my opinion, the compulsion to call it 'a flu' is to willfully turn a blind eye the reasons why it will spread further, cause more problems, and why everyone from the WHO to the government cannot and willnot treat it as such. In a way, it's a philosophical argument, people like to group things that seem to belong together - which is understandable to a point... for many cases, the sufferer's experience will likely be very similair to catching Influenza B, with the caveat that they are more likely to experience discomfort or problems breathing because they will lack the particular immune response. But it's also an invitation to cognitive bias, and would certainly hinder the work of assessing, measuring, and treating.
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One of the best posts in this thread.

Well done, mate.
 
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