Corona / Wuhan virus

MoonFlier said:
Our local doctors office only just got the COVID-19 test in yesterday (3/16). Daughter was tested and told the results might be back by Friday, otherwise Monday. Until then she needs to self-quarantine. WTF.

She's been sick for 2 weeks, we just need to know if she had it so we have an idea of who may have been exposed to her. It would also be nice to know if two high risk people in this household dodged a bullet.
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Even more relying on the fact that many children don’t present symptoms at all...
 
MoonFlier said:
Our local doctors office only just got the COVID-19 test in yesterday (3/16). Daughter was tested and told the results might be back by Friday, otherwise Monday. Until then she needs to self-quarantine. WTF.

She's been sick for 2 weeks, we just need to know if she had it so we have an idea of who may have been exposed to her. It would also be nice to know if two high risk people in this household dodged a bullet.
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This is nuts. According to my ex, her hospital has many sick patients on ventilators, but they've all tested positive for flu. So hopefully, a bullet was dodged.
 
ReasonEnduring said:
Not a us citizen so I wont benefit but the potential UBI is a very smart move.

$1000-$4500 per person to stay home? Better than another trillion to the stock market.
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My province (Canada) was testing UBI in some areas as a pilot project to determine whether or not it would be beneficial to have it for all Canadians. A few other provinces had very successful pilots. Then our dumb fuck provincial government got elected and had it canceled so now we'll never know. Now would have been a really nice time for UBI though. It would save a lot of people a lot of stress and make it easier to stay home safely while this thing passes.
 
Somnium said:
Even more relying on the fact that many children don’t present symptoms at all...
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She's in her 20s.

Milktoast Bandit said:
This is nuts. According to my ex, her hospital has many sick patients on ventilators, but they've all tested positive for flu. So hopefully, a bullet was dodged.
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Right! My son is younger than her and has asthma, as do I. If the virus hits home here we could be in for bigger problems than just economic.
 
SpecialEdition said:
My province (Canada) was testing UBI in some areas as a pilot project to determine whether or not it would be beneficial to have it for all Canadians. A few other provinces had very successful pilots. Then our dumb fuck provincial government got elected and had it canceled so now we'll never know. Now would have been a really nice time for UBI though. It would save a lot of people a lot of stress and make it easier to stay home safely while this thing passes.
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Indeed. Australians did it a few years ago. So called Helicopter money to give it a negative spin.

Its smarter than injecting it straight into the stock market. Perhaps give everyone gets a voucher worth X which cannot be paid into a bank but is redeemable in any store, so businsses can exchange it for face value. Stops hoarding.

I had a similiar idea for a package to encourage retraining in schools/colleges.
 
Not sure the government here cares particularly. Schools here are not being closed at all but groups of 500 oops now I believe 100 (adults) are banned. Now I have seen i the past nit (cooties I think elsewhere) infestations and how fast they spread through a class of school kids. I cannot see how this wont go balls up! There's about 900 kids running around as free as birds, passing on the virus if they have it.

Some of the stuff we are not doing that seems common sense is ludicrous. We are being told to wash our hands and stand a few metres away from other people and our kids are being told to range free. We were told up until last Friday that groups of 500 would be banned, but by the way .. get out there and do whatever you want for the weekend. The virus needs time off too apparently!

All based on some expert advice. I really think these elected officials need to prop up their claims with footnotes as to what sources they are getting their information from .. I think it could be the notes that come with Xmas bon - bons or crackers! If it weren't so serious it would make you laugh at the absurdity :laughing::tearsofjoy::sleepy:

I agree with not buying all foods from the supermarkets .. but really, when everyone else is depleting the shelves why wouldn't you want to be left out in the cold with three day's food if everything shuts down for two weeks? They're saying it won't but hey .. they're saying a lot of things about events we all have minimal experience in.
 
I think I have worked out their little plan. Them being the government

They know they can't beat this thing, but they can "manage" it. by that I mean that they reduce the spread of the virus to make it manageable for the health care system.

We are also looking at a double whammy. Flu season as well as COVID-19 as we are starting to go into winter.

If they are doing it the way I think, they're being pretty smart about it. They want it to spread .. eventually. Hence the schools being forced (in some cases) to stay open. That really bugged me until I realised you need to have a way of continuing the spread. Children seem to tolerate this virus very well, so let them have it. Let it filter up to their parents. Let their parents control who they see and don't. Let it fall on their shoulders. With a trickle through effect it is much more manageable within the healthcare system. Have a look at all handwashing graphs. They display that handwashing will allow you to keep the virus within manageable healthcare system limits.

If things get out of hand, simply close the school system. If it gets really out of hand, shutdown the country. I think what initiates a shutdown is more about whether the healthcare system is able to cope with the expected number of cases coming in based on their modelling. Then let it all go again. All managed.

Because what happens when the healthcare system gets overrun? They can't manage. People complain. they complain about the government not doing the right thing to prepare. They then remember this the next time they vote. This is the perfect way for the government to look good (we are doing so much to stop the spread of the virus), evade responsibility (experts have advised this is the best way - its not us) and not overspend on the budget. Really everything that gives them the best chance of being elected again. They know what this virus will do. They know the predicted numbers. They don't care about the numbers. They care about what politicians have cared about after first getting elected - getting re-elected. Always look at it from what people in power hope to achieve.

It is an indictment on us as well. They think we are stupid, and the thing is, they're pretty much on the money on that count.

Viruses are nature. They are natural. We all have to stop thinking that we as a society are invulnerable. We have been taught for many years that mankind is in control of our own destiny. We are going to be proven wrong on that count, maybe not even this time, but one day. But if we do manage to knock this one on it's head, then the next one will be that much worse. The scientists would be telling politicians that as a society we need to build resistance to anything that comes our way. We do need to as well. Unfortunately this means that some don't make it. But if we hold off until something worse comes along then a whole lot more of us won't make it. Mainly because we didn't build up resistance the first time. Look at the 1918 Spanish Flu Pandemic .. the first wave was pretty low rate, the second version came through a lot harder. Look at the flu shots we get. They help us build immunity for the actual flu.

I'm not saying I'm right but why keep schools open but limit adult gatherings to 100 people? Those little rugrats are like rats in the bubonic plague era :tearsofjoy: they pass on every little lurgy and nit that they come into contact with! If I was in charge of REALLY trying to stop the advance of this virus, that's the first place I would close down!

My first really controversial post. But I'm not saying this is the case. It's just that many things have been bugging me about how they're going about this, and this scenario does tick a lot of boxes
 
ReasonEnduring said:
Indeed, indeed. I know the system is bad. The UK has similiar issues around bonuses.

And you have no idea how shitty it is working for the NHS these days. My mother was a nurse. She quit as soon as she could and is never going back.

Expected to work extra hours for no pay, mistakes are made because people are overworked and under supported. You can earn more money working in a clothes store than a nurse, so only the passionate go in, and their passion dies quickly. Its why we have so many foreign nurses because no native Brit wnts to go into healthcare. We know how bad it is.

They then have to sign up with private healthcare companies to get a better wage, which costs 5x whats a normal nurse costs and half of that goes to private company. Its a terrible system.

That said I don't think the US will implement socialised healthcare successfully in the next 10 years, and when it fails people will blame it on the system not on the way it was set up.

It should have been done at the end of WW2 but it wasn't, unlike the UK.

Now if its tried it will be poorly designed, badly run, cost many times more than predicted and increase waiting times significantly. Wait times are a major issue the UK still hasn't fixed.

A public option is the first step for the US. Get a basic optoin everyone can buy into and ocvers those who can't afford insurance.

THEN consider a path to a NHS style system. The groundwork needs to be done though.

Jumping to a Sanders style Medicare for All will only fall flat and cause people to reject the idea in the future.
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Firstly, I didn't mean for that post to sound like I was scolding you, lol, I was ranting in general mostly, not particularly at you! ;)
So sorry if it sounded that way!
<3
(consider this post the same)
I do have to disagree though about moving to a socialized program of medicine in the US.
The main reason we cannot get it done is because of the insurance companies and the medical lobby in Congress.
We don't have to copy/paste the NHS from England here....there are many successful models from around the world to choose from, dissect, pick apart, and form into one that is truly better.
The issue with a single payer is again - the insurance/medical industry companies and the Congress.
Our system now is their bread and butter, they will not give that up quickly or easily.
It's going to take a fight, it's going to take some kind of huge wake up call like this virus before people start to demand real change.
Biden is 1000x better than Trump in this regard and many others - but he is still also the status quo, he has stated that even if Congress were to pass such a bill (voted on by the peoples' representatives) that he would veto it as POTUS.
Why?
He's got his fingers in the pie just like the rest of them.
Why hasn't Congress implemented somewhat easy reforms already like allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices with the drug companies?
Fingers in the pie.
What continues to be called wishful thinking by Bernie Sanders would actually be really amazingly helpful right now with this entire Covid crisis.
Those who continue to say it cannot be done are those who own the news corporations with - fingers in the pie.
Including the seemingly more liberal organizations like MSNBC - fingers in the pie.
They don't want significant structural change because it will impact their bottom line.
Single payer would be nice, but it's not going to be significantly less than any other insurance out there now.
I'm sure the other insurers would also do their best to help if fail.
I'm sorry about your Mom's experiences...kudos for her time spent in the nursing trenches!
What you described though of her experience is exactly the same here with one key difference.
She still had/has access to medical care at a reasonable price.
Before I left the field I was first assisting with open heart surgery, working over 100 hours a week sometimes, I made a pretty decent wage to say the least - but even so, I was still struggling to afford the medications I needed to keep my condition from intruding into my working life.
Here's a good example for you.
Doctors wanted me to be on Cimzia - self-injectable once every two weeks.
To start you get 4 booster shots.
We got it all approved with the insurance after much gnashing of teeth.
After the 3rd booster, the medication made me so ill that I couldn't hardly function, had zero appetite, sick all the time...garbage.
Then I received a bill for 16,000.00+ in the mail...must be some mistake right?
This is not what I was told certainly!
I even had it in writing!
But because the nurse in the Rheumatologist office wasn't trained to inject it, they sent over a nurse from the infusion clinic to give the shot.
Mind you, this is not an infusion via IV like other drugs I had been on, it's a simple injection into the fat layer of the stomach.
After the booster shots, I would have done them myself at home.
The bill was no mistake.
Because this other nurse gave the injection, they charged me full price cost.
BS - might as well have bought a new car!
After many long phone conversations/arguments and tearing out of hair, it was plain to see they would not relent and I would be stuck with this insane bill for only 3 injections.
(What can I do...sue them? Wrong...you cannot.)
I had to file financial hardship paperwork with the hospital I WORKED FOR, and luckily, thank the heavens they wrote it off.
Even filing was not an easy process and for someone who is very ill it would be downright painful.
The system is out of control...capitalism gone insane.
Gouging people of their money they've worked hard to earn and save.
If single payer was significantly less it would still destroy the other insurers business, cut into the profits of the drug/device manufacturers, etc.
They won't let that happen.
It will not be cheaper by any stretch of the imagination.
People will still be unable to afford most of the services and drugs...people will still be chased by medical debt collectors, they will continue to file bankruptcy.
These are people who are supposedly "insured", which is total nonsense.
What are we even paying huge premiums and copays for if we aren't really insured??
So bless those healthcare workers in the NHS who do so much for so little - people here do the same for just as little if not less as they aren't even guaranteed affordable healthcare themselves.
Those CNAs working in the nursing homes get minimum wage at best most places - with a heaping spoonful of expensive yet shitty health insurance on top.
They do incredibly difficult and unpleasant work for nothing...so you have those who are passionate about it, or you have those who cannot find legit work elsewhere because of some personal issues aka are crappy workers.
The only groundwork that needs to be done is getting big money out of the healthcare system and Congress.
In Portland, which is about 45 mins from me, there is the Rose Garden Arena - now renamed "The Moda Center".
Moda healthcare (insurer) is paying double figure millions of dollars to have their name advertised on the building instead of using the money that people pay out the nose to them go toward lowing their bills.
They give no fucks whatsoever because they all have a price-fixing monopoly on the system.
Making money and gouging people, causing them to lose their life savings, etc., all so they can NOT provide affordable healthcare is inhuman and inhumane.
It's the same as war profiteering...making money by swindling as much money as they can from the injured, ill, sick, disabled, and dying is wrong no matter how they try to spin it.
When those companies post huge profits and their CEOs own mansions and yachts, private jets, etc. no single payer system is going to dent that.
They won't allow it.
Trump is in their pocket and so is Biden...Sanders at least is calling it out for what it truly is and going for the throat.
I can appreciate and stand behind that.
All the propaganda about socialized medicine being so terrible is just that...propaganda and spin for profit.
And I do know several nurses from Canada and elsewhere.
I have experienced healthcare in several countries myself (France, Russia) even and have to say this country is a damn joke set up to only make money.
Hell man, we have a CURE for Hepatitis C, but it's so expensive you would need to take out a home mortgage to get the series of injections.
So instead of eliminating a deadly and now wholly treatable disease from this country and society - they continue to allow it to spread and kill people so they can continue to make a crap-ton of money.
All those people who have contracted it since they developed the treatment, those who will die because they couldn't afford the cure - those deaths are on their heads - those deaths are for new sports cars and big fucking houses in the Hamptons.
They don't care though...they are sociopaths and greedy psychos.
Disgusting.
Again - this is another rant...not directed at you!
We need drastic change...not more of the same with a facelift.
Much love my friend!
:<3white:

Milktoast Bandit said:
This is nuts. According to my ex, her hospital has many sick patients on ventilators, but they've all tested positive for flu. So hopefully, a bullet was dodged.
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That's the problem though.
When they talk about "flattening the curve", it's because we already have 80% of the ventilators being used by other people with other illnesses and issues.
If there is a huge influx of people needing them - they will begin to ration care and preventable deaths will occur.
Not just from Covid, but other medical issues.
You should do the pudding test with your kids.
Have them take chocolate pudding and cover their hands completely...then show them just how long it takes to truly wash their hands in order to get it all off and out from under their nails, etc.
It might help them realize they need to wash more efficiently.
Maybe, lol.
:<3white:
 
Skarekrow said:
Hell man, we have a CURE for Hepatitis C, but it's so expensive you would need to take out a home mortgage to get the series of injections.
So instead of eliminating a deadly and now wholly treatable disease from this country and society - they continue to allow it to spread and kill people so they can continue to make a crap-ton of money.
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guess who get Hepatitis C curative treatment. . .wait for it..........................
felons in prison, the severely mentally ill. . why you ask?
the government knows it is cheaper to provide the treatment then fight the lawsuits. . I worked at the Oregon State Penitentiary for 12 years,and community mental for 2. . ;
it's all about money folks. .
insurance companies are in the business of making money. . beside paying millions of dollars to their CEO, they spend millions buying members of congress. . for instance, the bills in congress about corona virus vaccine have a provision that allows pharma to have no limits on profits, of other drugs. .
we are being fucked boys and girls
 
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