Very well said.    They have recently closed restaurants in Ohio and Illinois except for drive thru.   I expect more.   

I have to agree with you.

If I could add, I'm also pretty tired of folks using this as a means to advance their political agenda. Folks on both sides of the aisle. Cut it out! 

It’s infuriating how uninformed / willfully ignorant people can be. Information is not that hard to get these days.

Hundreds of thousands to potentially millions of American lives are at risk, this goes way beyond politics.

I just hope enough people catch on and start doing the right thing. I like to believe that we’re moving in the right direction but I’m not sure. 

Don’t “Flatten the Curve,” stop it! - Joscha Bach - Medium

---

You have all seen a version of this curve of COVID-19 case loads by now:

It's much graver than you think. The sudden high number of people who will need to be in intensive care is much greater than the number of people who die. Think of it this way, 3% of people just don't fall over dead. That would be a lot cleaner. 6% of people need to be put on a ventilator. If this infects 40% of the population, 143,000,000 people, then 8.1 million of them will need to be on a ventilator. 

"if hospitals put all existing ventilators to use, we have 160,000 of them. In addition, the CDC has a strategic stockpile of 8900 ventilators that can be deployed in hospitals that need them."

Social distancing accomplishes two things. 

1. It spreads out the number of people who need a ventilator so it doesn't overload the system as bad as it would otherwise. 

2. It gives more time to find a cure. 

The lucky people are those who get hit with this thing either really early or really late or not at all. 

Before you burn the soap box...  let me borrow it for a minute.

 I am amazed at how some organizations or people are treating this with a lack of significance.  I was at the Club with my girlfriend for a very "Socially distant" 9 holes yesterday afternoon.  We wiped down the cart steering wheel, cart seat handles, divot fill jars, and bag strap buckles with alcohol (70%) swabs.  We also brought anti-bacterial hand sanitizer for after raking the bunkers.  I know to some of you this may sound like over kill, but My Girl (a former D-1 golfer) has bad Asthma, and I am dedicated to keeping her (and I) safe, while not totally separating us from our live of the game. 

Here is the soap box part of my story...  The club sent an email with an elaborate list of new healthy practices that are in place to protect Staff and Membership alike. (we have a large group of golf members who at at risk due to age and pre-existing health issues).  Among the list was that Cart steering wheels would be sprayed with anti-microbial sprays after each play before the carts are lined up for a round.  I spoke to the Bag room attendant about this process (just making small talk) and he said... we are not doing anything different.  He even asked me if there was a message that actually told the members that it was a new practice?   

Fellow TST members... Please make sure that organizations are actually doing the safety measures that they are promising.  this is serious and lives do depend on it.  Stay safe and Healthy!!!

Couldn't agree more.  Frankly (barring any changes), we are lucky that the virus isn't more deadly than it's shown to be because it has exposed how woefully unprepared the world is to handle a major pandemic.  If anyone is interested, check out the Netflix docu-series called "Pandemic"...extremely eye-opening.  

It's not this particular virus that worries me...it's the one in the future that could be even more deadly. COVID-19 is a novel virus, meaning this is the first time it's infected humans so there is no immunity that anyone on the planet has. My late father, who was born in 1914, told me about his vague memories as a small child of something similar, the Spanish Flu, that had three distinct mutations starting in 1918. It was the H1N1 virus that no one had any immunity to either and It was actually the 2nd wave that killed millions.  It was estimated that 1/3 of the world's population of 1.5 billion at the time became infected with 50 million deaths. Hopefully, the epidemiologists and other pharmaceutical researchers here in the 21st century can come up with something to combat this but this is just not going to go away as the weather gets warmer and anyone who thinks so is, as Prof. Harold Hill said, "is closing your eyes to a situation you do not wish to acknowledge and are not aware of the caliber of disaster indicated by the presence of a pool table (substitute the word "virus") in your community. And so we have trouble my friends, trouble right here." (Meredith Wilson - The Music Man)

I have been scared for over 2 months.  I am a bit tired of the political finger pointing especially WRT ventilators or even like one poster commented that the president finally gets it (seriously?).  Data from China shows that if you get that bad that you need a ventilator, your chance of dying is 81%.  I am not surprised how many people are not isolating.  We need a very, very high level of compliance for this to work.  It is not likely to work based on what I see but hope I am wrong.  Now, I can now sort of understand why the Chinese welded people's apartment doors to keep them inside.

A potentially larger issue than Covid-SaRs-2 is the complete destruction of the economy.  Health doesn't thrive in the conditions Fed Bullocks just described, 30% unemployment and 50% drop in GDP in Q2.  

1 hour ago, Rippy_72 said:

 

A potentially larger issue than Covid-SaRs-2 is the complete destruction of the economy.  Health doesn't thrive in the conditions Fed Bullocks just described, 30% unemployment and 50% drop in GDP in Q2.  

Yep.

The last numbers I heard, about 70% in the U.S. have less than $1,000 saved.  40% have virtually nothing.

Ironically, the effect on the economy will be more severe with people ignoring social distancing advice. Governments will be forced to take harsher and harsher measures to force people to understand. It may be possible to keep things relatively steady if people limit their activities. This is not true if people go about their daily business relatively unchanged.

Other countries are taking this situation more seriously.   For your entertainment, this is a video of Italian mayors chasing people back indoors.  

Italian mayors

It is a flu.

of course - the Concord is an airplane.  A Porsche is a car.......

What we're tired of is people purposely misrepresenting this thing for various reasons:

• to continually and remorselessly and exhaustingly push their pro/anti/etc political agendas (I'm been done with the idiotic rationalization by the fringers to push their shit - this is just a continuation of that - can't expect them to put on hold their sole reason for living the life of total assholiness)
• to satisfy their desire to under or overstate the situation
• to blissfully soak in a combination of optimism and ignorance to do what they want instead of what they should (did you guys actual LISTEN to the spring breaker interviews?  what a product of today's attempts to brainwash the kids - total backfire - and totally predictable)

so the grumble is about human nature

be smart - keep your separation - wash your hands - stay nice to others - don't hoard shit other people might need too - don't be assholes.  Stop proclaiming what OTHERS should do - just be an example and walk the walk.

For me - it's just too much talking.  (like my post here).  Not enough doing.  again, be an example, not a preacher

it's not rocket surgery

oh - and any time ANYONE quotes numbers - make sure to review your statistics textbooks about sampling, causation, correlation, test patterns, etc.  Journalists are NOT known for their mathematical rigor.

An Israeli doctor in Italy:  We no longer help those over 60.

No more help for those over 60!

1 hour ago, iacas said:

A lot of people, stuck at home, have nothing better to do than to come and post here. Which is fine; we can be social while "socially distancing" ourselves.

yup - I'm one of them.  venting is good thing. glad we have places to do it.

(Oh, I have 'better' things to do, but I like you people.  And the 'better' things don't feed my lazy crapulence tendencies as well as posting with online buds.)

I've accepted the discipline. A buddy called me the other day whose wife is a nurse at a local hospital. She said this stuff is freaky. Saw the chest x-rays of a patient who has been diagnosed with COVID-19, and been stricken with pneumonia. She said his lungs looked like they were filled with shards of broken glass! 

The only place I've been in the last 3 days is to the corner gas station to buy a paper. I wash my hands before I go, and use hand sanitizer as soon as I get home. And since I like to sip a little bourbon of an evening, and alcohol kills viruses, I'm looking on it as a prophylactic measure.

In Canada, we were told to stay inside and most have done that. Companies and schools are closed as are restaurants and any non-essential businesses. The virus is still spreading, but slowly. I look at the numbers twice daily and am shocked how fast this is spreading around the world, but, especially in the States. 

Pat first, I was going to continue going out, possible get the virus and get it over with. Flu symptoms for a week, with headache and fever? Once you get over it, nothing to worry about. Over time, it’s obvious you don’t want to get this. We were told in the beginning that older people were at risk, but many, many people younger are having difficulty with this virus. The way it attacks the lungs is something we haven’t experienced and the speed of transmission is unprecedented.

All we can do is try to avoid it and be good neighbours and hopefully, we come out of this stronger and better prepared for the next challenge. The mortality rate here is still low, but almost 40% require hospital care for pneumonia and breathing problems.

He thought about his wife and young kids and prayed for a miracle. His church prayed for him as well. The next morning, he was taken off the ventilator and later, was back home and is now recovered. Doctors called it a miracle. I think so too.

On 3/23/2020 at 7:17 AM, Rippy_72 said:

I have been scared for over 2 months.  I am a bit tired of the political finger pointing especially WRT ventilators or even like one poster commented that the president finally gets it (seriously?).  Data from China shows that if you get that bad that you need a ventilator, your chance of dying is 81%.  I am not surprised how many people are not isolating.  We need a very, very high level of compliance for this to work.  It is not likely to work based on what I see but hope I am wrong.  Now, I can now sort of understand why the Chinese welded people's apartment doors to keep them inside.

A potentially larger issue than Covid-SaRs-2 is the complete destruction of the economy.  Health doesn't thrive in the conditions Fed Bullocks just described, 30% unemployment and 50% drop in GDP in Q2.  

How the Pandemic ends depends on medical advances yet to come.  It will also depend on how individual Americans behave in the interim.  If we scrupulously protect ourselves and our loved ones, more of us will live.  If we underestimate the Virus, it will find us...even on golf courses.  "The buck stops at the top" folks--no matter your political affiliation.

Arch

When covid started attacking the US I was one of the people saying how much more risk the flu was.  After researching I quickly realized how much worse than the flu this actually is.  I’ve fully bought into the recommendations of social distancing and limiting the chance of exposure to myself as well as my family.  Most people in the county I live it has as well.  I’m still amazed at the people I know that aren’t abiding to the recommendations and are continuing to live life as they were before the virus.