We're all doomed! Doomed I say- the Corona virus thread for panicking in!

[Pettytyrant101]

{{ Ok the thread title is slighty made in jest, as we do seem to have something worth at least some panic and concern, no denying that. But instead of that I thought this is not a bad place to put the small good things coming out of this mess.
Govenrments across Europe are suddenly taking a universal income seriously. Its become stark and clear who in this country, despite being often classed as slow skilled, unskilled and on the lowest wages, are the real key workers in our economy and keep it all going in an emergency- and it aint the cosy middle classes or the feckless upper classes.

On a local note lots of good being done, volunteers checking on elderly, Ive been doing same with neighbours. The local schools whilst they are closing today are keeping their kitchens open so kids from low income families who are entitled to free meals dont lose out and still get fed properly. Lots of folk mucking in where they can to help.

And though I have not been a care worker for a couple fo years now I have to give a huge shoutout to all my carer friends still out there on the front line protecting and caring for the most vulnerable. I know they are especially scared, but the fact they still do it anyway speaks volumes for the character of care workers.
Maybe after this their place will finally be recognised and rewared in society instead of being looked down on as a minimum wage job only the uneducated do.

So come on folks- among the worry whats the good you've seen?}}

[Amarië]

Shopworkers getting cheer for doing their job and keeping the shelves stocked and so keeping people fed.
Facebook groups and such popping up where people can ask for help with shopping.
A colleague was watching her list of messenger friends and planning to contact every one she saw had not been online for a few days, to check on them.
19 kids and their teachers having a google meet conference.
School workhanded out and sent in all digitally.
A lot of clapping happening. People clapping for health workers, and health workers clapping for the people staying at home.

[halfwise]

I've been teaching a couple statistics classes, and started doing some mathematical modelling of the spread of the virus in New York State (I can find numbers for the state, not the city).   Since we now have a dedicated thread, I thought I'd share some of the results.  What we start with is the infection rate: how many people per day an infected person transmits the virus to.  Since the number of infected people continues to grow the result is exponential growth (at least in the early stages), and if you plot the time on the x axis and the logarithm of the infected cases on the vertical axis, the slope is the infection rate.



In New York the infection started on March 1 (convenient!) and by March 7 there was realization of a problem and so restrictions were enacted.  There are several things to note about this.  First, the data fit straight lines extremely well, matching theory.  In fact the fit was so good that with all the possible things that could go wrong with testing and reporting and new infections from outside that I was pinching myself to see if I was dreaming.   Second, after the ordinances were enacted the infection rate dropped by a factor of 2.5.  Very nice!

Okay, so one thing that's going on is infection rate.  If there were unlimited people to infect this would remain a constant exponential growth.  But the population either ends up sick, or recovers but retains immunity, so the the growth rate has to tail off.  Once everyone's infected, the growth stops.

The other thing that's going on is people recover after 14 days, so if you want to know how many people are currently infected, each day you have subtract out the  number who got infected two weeks ago.

This fits together into a rather simple model that can be programmed in a few lines of code or put into a spreadsheet.  The results for percentage of population infected as a function of time looks like this:



And what we see is that for New York state the first month of the disease shows an infected fraction of the population so small to be unnoticeable.  But it's a hidden explosion.  In a couple weeks it will become noticeable in neighbors and co-workers.  At which point people will become even more scared and I think we'll see the infection rate drop even more.  At the moment we are set to max out at 70% of the population infected at the peak.  With people becoming even more cautious that will likely top out at more like 30-50%.  Still a huge strain on the healthcare system if only 5% of those go to hospital.

What amazes me is this simple model matches the official predictions, which use far more sophisticated models. The peak is about 2 months long, and the max infection fraction large enough to still be a huge concern.

[azriel]

This made me smile

https://www.facebook.com/sarcasticmommy4/videos/651785338967871/

[Pettytyrant101]

{{ Some may consider this a good, health imporving outcome of events, personaly Im still reeling from the shock of it- but as of last night Scotland has not one single open pub! It really might be the end of the world! And I'll have to face it sober!!!! That was not the plan!!!
Obviously supermarkets alcohol shelves have long since been cleared as a nation of alcohics hoard for the long term! }}

[halfwise]

Yep, I just dropped a mess last evening on a beneficient wine shop that insisted on continuing their wine tastings up until the last minute they are shut down (which seems to be tomorrow night). Bars have been closed for the last week.

[David H]

{{as of last night Scotland has not one single open pub! It really might be the end of the world! And I'll have to face it sober!!!! That was not the plan!!! Obviously supermarkets alcohol shelves have long since been cleared as a nation of alcohics hoard for the long term! }}

That does indeed sound grim, but I have faith in the Scots and their resourcefulness. I'm sure at this moment there are thousands of old stills being unearthed from cellars and attics, woodsheds and chickenhouses across Scotland. I can almost smell the sweet/rotten stench now!

[azriel]

[halfwise]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/chinese-virus-expert-says-italy-021912288.html

A thumbnail sketch of what chinese experts think of Italy's lock-down: "You people are stupid! I don't know what you're thinking, but they way you're doing it is never going to work."

I suppose the reason the Mafia is so tough is because Italians are not easy to boss around.

[David H]

So everything has been going along pretty well in our little rural community as we try to follow all the rules and still get on with life. There's been a collective effort to reduce gatherings while still finding a way for the social service groups like Neighborhood Watch, the food bank, Alcoholics Anonymous etc to keep functioning, and people looking in on the elderly and sick so they don't have to go out as much. The local stores have been managing their inventory so there's always enough of what you're looking for as long as people only buy what they need.

....until this weekend, when hundreds upon hundreds of tourists flooded out to our community because they'd looked online and had found that our beach was considered low risk for COVID19

And of course they brought all their hoarding habits with them, so now the shelves at our stores are looking pretty much like everybody else's.

It feels like Zombie Apocalypse Lite....

[Pettytyrant101]

{{ We have a similar issue Dave - the reckless Daily Mail in their english edition told their readers the Scottish Highlands were the best place in the country to self-isolate- and as lots of wealthy english have second properties here theyre turning up on mass, clearing out all the local shops that serve the community, leaving particualrly elderly and vulnerable disadvantaged, and risk bringnig the bloody virus with them and overwhelming our areas NHS if they do fall ill.  }}

[Mrs Figg]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/chinese-virus-expert-says-italy-021912288.html

 A thumbnail sketch of what chinese experts think of Italy's lock-down: "You people are stupid!  I don't know what you're thinking, but they way you're doing it is never going to work."

I suppose the reason the Mafia is so tough is because Italians are not easy to boss around.

They have now shut down all non-essential businesses and production. as of yesterday.

[halfwise]

Yep, New York is heading there tonight, a week after bars and restaurants were shut down.

[David H]

{{ We have a similar issue Dave - the reckless Daily Mail in their english edition told their readers the Scottish Highlands were the best place in the country to self-isolate  }}

Well it doesn't help with the hoarding, but at least in the Highlands you have the midges to enforce the self-isolation rules.

[azriel]

For a nation that jokes wildly about chocolate I see all the Easter Eggs & boxes of chocolates are still lounging idly on the shelves ?

[Amarië]

Here people rushed to their cabins the minute the schools closed (9 days ago) and now there's a law forbidding people to go there, unless they have permission or if it's only for the day to remove snow or other really necessary chores. Or if it's within your municipality. Thus not potentially burden the health services in the cabin area.

[Pettytyrant101]

[Pettytyrant101]

{{{ }}

[halfwise]

New York City has ordered all non-essential businesses to close, but since they have bottled water, cleaning supplied and some semblance of food, the Dollar Stores will remain open. So we can relax: civilization will not, in fact, collapse.

[Pettytyrant101]

[azriel]

[Amarië]

Dear citizens!
The Admins office feel the need to inform that though the symptoms may appear similar to the Pirate-R-m80 flu, the vaccine Pirate-BGone does not protect against the 'Scotch' virus.
Mass disinfection of parrots is NOT needed at this time and should be stopped immediately.

[Mrs Figg]

rumour is it started by Scotshobbits doing nasty things to wild Haggis.

[halfwise]

I've heard you can use Scotch tape to remove Scotch virus the same way you use it remove cat fur.

[azriel]

Ive been bathing in Scotch eggs ! They do cure sneezes by inserting one up each nostril