packgrad said:

---

Agreed. The "scoreboard" number of people that have tested positive has always been a scare tactic to me.

---

Media enjoys the eyeballs they are getting off this

King Leary said:

---

RunsWithWolves26 said:

---

I wonder what the dumbasses in DC think $1200 one time is going to do for people. That is the median rent in the USA per month. I said it earlier in this thread and will say it again. When you have absolute morons like Pelosi, Schumer, McConnell and McCarthy running things, I will never have any confidence in what is being or will be done. If I was a very bored person, I would go through the bill and see just how much each dumbass up there is benefiting from this bill. I may not be a trump fan but the fact they left his business's out is stupid. The people employed by his businesses need help as well. Just like with everything else, the DC dumbasses will use this as much as possible to their political advantage and the rest of us be damned.

---

It's also money to businesses so that's going to keep companies from cutting more jobs.

---

They could have gotten A LOT more had the add-ons for this politician buddies and that politicians buddies not been added. Again, when you have idiots like the ones I listed above running this country and people bowing to them, this is what you get. A bill that accomplishes little and hurts lots in the long term.

packgrad said:

---

I get the DOE money. Have no idea how to quantity if the amount is appropriate, but the way schools have been turned upside down I imagine significant money is needed to implement the distance learning.

---

Shouldn't the school systems be saving money since they aren't paying for bussing the kids to schools anymore, all the food in the cafeteria that gets eaten daily, cleaning supplies, and utilities? My guess is that most kids have laptops to do their work from home. I don't see 10B in more expenses there

cowboypack02 said:

---

packgrad said:

---

I get the DOE money. Have no idea how to quantity if the amount is appropriate, but the way schools have been turned upside down I imagine significant money is needed to implement the distance learning.

---

Shouldn't the school systems be saving money since they aren't paying for bussing the kids to schools anymore, all the food in the cafeteria that gets eaten daily, cleaning supplies, and utilities? My guess is that most kids have laptops to do their work from home. I don't see 10B in more expenses there

---

I think they also are covering all interest on student loans.

That said... we shouldn't have a Dep of Education at all....

cowboypack02 said:

---

packgrad said:

---

I get the DOE money. Have no idea how to quantity if the amount is appropriate, but the way schools have been turned upside down I imagine significant money is needed to implement the distance learning.

---

Shouldn't the school systems be saving money since they aren't paying for bussing the kids to schools anymore, all the food in the cafeteria that gets eaten daily, cleaning supplies, and utilities? My guess is that most kids have laptops to do their work from home. I don't see 10B in more expenses there

---

The schools in my area are providing free meals for the kids who aren't able to get food from the school. That money is going towards that bill

cowboypack02 said:

---

packgrad said:

---

I get the DOE money. Have no idea how to quantity if the amount is appropriate, but the way schools have been turned upside down I imagine significant money is needed to implement the distance learning.

---

Shouldn't the school systems be saving money since they aren't paying for bussing the kids to schools anymore, all the food in the cafeteria that gets eaten daily, cleaning supplies, and utilities? My guess is that most kids have laptops to do their work from home. I don't see 10B in more expenses there

---

That very much depends on the county. I strongly believe a good portion of the kids in the county my wife works in do not have laptops. The schools are making accommodations to give laptops to kids so they can do the work remotely. Also, some of the schools are cooking meals for kids and their families. I guess the cleaning stops so there are some savings there. My wife and her coworkers spent a week scrubbing down every toy, chair, table, toilet, water fountain, etc in her school. Her school has never been cleaner.

Edit to add... her schools are also still open to the teacher. They had required workdays. I'm not sure if they're on optional days now or not. Next week, and I think even this week, they could start working at home. Some of this is dependent on the principal so I don't mean to speak for the entire county on when they could start working from home.

Again, I have no idea how much is necessary, but I know there is a need for some.

Got this e-mail from my State Senator and it's beyond frustrating. We need to be testing as much as possible, not reducing the amount of testing. We're never going to get out of Shelter In Place if they don't ramp up testing.

Quote:

---

NEW TESTING RULES
When it comes to testing, our state - along with the rest of the country - has three critical shortages:
[ol]

the test kits

necessary components, like extraction kits and swabs (believe it or not, the main manufacturer for the swabs is in Lombardy, Italy...), and

the masks/gowns/gloves necessary to perform the tests.

[/ol]
The good news is we've made real strides in the last ten days with private labs coming online. 90% of the testing in our state is now being done by private labs and we're doing more testing per capita than most states.

Here's the bad news. Even with this added capacity, the CDC anticipates that the demand for testing will continue to outpace supply. So the CDC has put out new guidance on criteria for testing, and NC has adopted that new criteria.

And the short version is this, direct from DHHS: "In general, patients with mild illness (defined as fever and cough without shortness of breath or difficulty breathing) do not need testing."

• So the old qualification was: fever + negative flu test + cough OR shortness of breath.
• The new qualification is: fever + negative flu test + cough AND shortness of breath (or other serious symptom).

That means if you're a middle-aged, reasonably healthy person and you develop mild, flu-like symptoms and think you may be infected, the new guidance is to call your doctor, at which point your doctor will likely tell you to assume you're infected and self-quarantine until you've been fever-free for three days (unless your condition worsens, in which case call your doctor again).

That's a major shift in combating this virus, and it dramatically increases the importance of social distancing. As DHHS says, "We are moving to a different phase of our response efforts [and are now focused on] mitigation strategies" in which a big part of the goal is "to conserve supplies and capacity so our health care workers can care for people who need medical attention even during the peak of the outbreak."

Let's be honest about what that means: It means we are not going to have the type of widespread testing we would ideally have because we just don't have the supplies, nor - at this point - the time. It's not good news, but it is a realistic assessment of where things stand.

If we're not going to beat this the way South Korea did (test -> trace -> isolate) then we have no choice but to beat this by not getting sick in the first place - or at least not all at once - which means social distancing is our only real, scalable strategy at this point. It's the only lever big enough that - if we pull it really hard - will actually flatten the curve and keep our hospitals from being overwhelmed, as we're starting to see in NYC. We're on to Plan B, and there is no Plan C. So we have to make this work.

STAY AT HOME ORDERS
That's why you're starting to see stay at home orders on the county and city level (Mecklenburg + Wake + Orange + Durham + Pitt + Madison + Buncombe + Winston-Salem + Clemmons + Beaufort), and why you're going to see more, and why we may see similar statewide action soon. In response to whether there would be a statewide shelter in place, the Governor recently said, "We will be issuing additional restrictions soon."

---

They need to start including those presumed positive cases in the overall numbers then, IMO.

JamesJohnson said:

---

RunsWithWolves26 said:

---

cowboypack02 said:

---

packgrad said:

---

I get the DOE money. Have no idea how to quantity if the amount is appropriate, but the way schools have been turned upside down I imagine significant money is needed to implement the distance learning.

---

Shouldn't the school systems be saving money since they aren't paying for bussing the kids to schools anymore, all the food in the cafeteria that gets eaten daily, cleaning supplies, and utilities? My guess is that most kids have laptops to do their work from home. I don't see 10B in more expenses there

---

The schools in my area are providing free meals for the kids who aren't able to get food from the school. That money is going towards that bill

---

Buses in many county are running to deliver food. Probably saving some money overall but not the amount many would assume.

---

I didn't realize that. I just assumed that the state would be footing the bill, not the DOE for things like that

statefan91 said:

---

Got this e-mail from my State Senator and it's beyond frustrating. We need to be testing as much as possible, not reducing the amount of testing. We're never going to get out of Shelter In Place if they don't ramp up testing.

Quote:

---

NEW TESTING RULES
When it comes to testing, our state - along with the rest of the country - has three critical shortages:
[ol]

the test kits

necessary components, like extraction kits and swabs (believe it or not, the main manufacturer for the swabs is in Lombardy, Italy...), and

the masks/gowns/gloves necessary to perform the tests.

[/ol]
The good news is we've made real strides in the last ten days with private labs coming online. 90% of the testing in our state is now being done by private labs and we're doing more testing per capita than most states.

Here's the bad news. Even with this added capacity, the CDC anticipates that the demand for testing will continue to outpace supply. So the CDC has put out new guidance on criteria for testing, and NC has adopted that new criteria.

And the short version is this, direct from DHHS: "In general, patients with mild illness (defined as fever and cough without shortness of breath or difficulty breathing) do not need testing."

• So the old qualification was: fever + negative flu test + cough OR shortness of breath.
• The new qualification is: fever + negative flu test + cough AND shortness of breath (or other serious symptom).

That means if you're a middle-aged, reasonably healthy person and you develop mild, flu-like symptoms and think you may be infected, the new guidance is to call your doctor, at which point your doctor will likely tell you to assume you're infected and self-quarantine until you've been fever-free for three days (unless your condition worsens, in which case call your doctor again).

That's a major shift in combating this virus, and it dramatically increases the importance of social distancing. As DHHS says, "We are moving to a different phase of our response efforts [and are now focused on] mitigation strategies" in which a big part of the goal is "to conserve supplies and capacity so our health care workers can care for people who need medical attention even during the peak of the outbreak."

Let's be honest about what that means: It means we are not going to have the type of widespread testing we would ideally have because we just don't have the supplies, nor - at this point - the time. It's not good news, but it is a realistic assessment of where things stand.

If we're not going to beat this the way South Korea did (test -> trace -> isolate) then we have no choice but to beat this by not getting sick in the first place - or at least not all at once - which means social distancing is our only real, scalable strategy at this point. It's the only lever big enough that - if we pull it really hard - will actually flatten the curve and keep our hospitals from being overwhelmed, as we're starting to see in NYC. We're on to Plan B, and there is no Plan C. So we have to make this work.

STAY AT HOME ORDERS
That's why you're starting to see stay at home orders on the county and city level (Mecklenburg + Wake + Orange + Durham + Pitt + Madison + Buncombe + Winston-Salem + Clemmons + Beaufort), and why you're going to see more, and why we may see similar statewide action soon. In response to whether there would be a statewide shelter in place, the Governor recently said, "We will be issuing additional restrictions soon."

---

---

This seems to be a far cry to the US having the 'best tests available for anyone who needs one'.

Failure in leadership at all levels.

Cases have gone up quite a lot today. Thankfully the media has let us all know the recovery numbers, numbers of people tested that tested negative and any other somewhat positive information on this. One earlier even broke news to let us know that a milestone had been reached and there were 500,000 confirmed cases worldwide. Damn the ****ing media, politicians, and all the rest who are making sure they profit as much as possible on this. Rant over.

707 cases in NC now. 140 new ones today

RunsWithWolves26 said:

---

707 cases in NC now. 140 new ones today

---

In the Live Coronavirus story on the N&O they say:

"But even these totals don't reflect the virus' full spread in North Carolina. State officials are limiting testing to only patients whose symptoms are severe enough for them to been seen by a medical professional. Patients with mild symptoms are estimated to be 80% of those infected."

To not include the number of people with mild symptoms who are presumed to have it but who are not being tested makes the numbers meaningless. There are multitudes more people that have it than are known, which seems bad, but it really means that it is likely much less deadly than predicted. There's lots of positive signs right now. That doesn't mean it isn't going to get worse, that it isn't very serious and that we should not be doing some of the things we're doing. But scaring people by putting body counters up on the evening news like it's the Vietnam war isn't helping.

IseWolf22 said:

---

RunsWithWolves26 said:

---

707 cases in NC now. 140 new ones today

---

In the Live Coronavirus story on the N&O they say:

"But even these totals don't reflect the virus' full spread in North Carolina. State officials are limiting testing to only patients whose symptoms are severe enough for them to been seen by a medical professional. Patients with mild symptoms are estimated to be 80% of those infected."

---

Exactly. These numbers are all bullcrap. There's no telling how many hundreds of thousands or even millions of people have already gotten this in some form or another and were never counted.

wilmwolf80 said:

---

To not include the number of people with mild symptoms who are presumed to have it but who are not being tested makes the numbers meaningless. There are multitudes more people that have it than are known, which seems bad, but it really means that it is likely much less deadly than predicted. There's lots of positive signs right now. That doesn't mean it isn't going to get worse, that it isn't very serious and that we should not be doing some of the things we're doing. But scaring people by putting body counters up on the evening news like it's the Vietnam war isn't helping.

---

1,000,000,000,000 times agreed with your final sentence!

470,000 negative test results so far. Wonder when the media will break coverage to announce that

First day of operating my landscape company under restrictions here in Charlotte. No issues and it felt like a Sunday night driving home tonight. No traffic.

Popping back in to counter the flu argument. COVID-19, at least this initial year, is worse than the flu. We still need more studies on COVID-19, but here are some early numbers:

- 2.5 infectious rate, 1.3 flu
- 20% cases send people to hospital, 2% flu
- 10-11 day average hospital stay, 5-6 day flu
- 1% death rate, .1% flu
- no vaccine or natural immunity, flu yes (to some extent)

Again, we need more time to accurately asses, but with those numbers we are doing exactly what we should currently. If this pushes into the fall flu season, we are going to be screwed healthcare-wise. Should the media cover it 24/7? Probably not, but when people are still going to spring break and doing other dumb ****, it needs to be beaten into their heads to stay home. Also, when POTUS is bored and calls a press briefing every afternoon, should the media not cover it? The faster we can get everyone in, the faster we can go back to normalcy. So blame the idiots, not the media IMO. Listen to the actual doctors, please. They aren't the media.

Dr Birx dropping bombs on fake media reports. Pretty sure I read an article in the NYT this week about not having enough ventilators.

I haven't seen much of her but appreciate her level headed ness. I'm not going to be able to handle this for an indefinite amount of time.

Some updates from today I find interesting:

1) Dr. Birx was definitely not happy with some in the media and how they are beginning to slant their stories to be more doom-and-gloom. I thought she did a great job of destroying their narrative that we do not have enough hospital beds and people are going to die due to the lack of beds and ventilators.
2) Governor Cuomo mentioned in his press conference today that they have no shortage of PPD's and anyone in healthcare who needs PPD's, they can get them. Said they have at least a week and a half supply and more is on the way. He said hospitals would like to have more on hand and this is why they are raising alarm bells, but he said they had enough to meet what they need right now.
3) The person who published the study a few weeks ago saying up to 2.2 million Americans could die based on his modeling has now come out and said he was wrong. He now believes, based on more recent data, that the deaths attributable to the virus will be significantly lower. People should remember that this is the study that most of the government officials saw and made decisions to start locking things down.
4) After listening to Dr. Birx today, it is clear that they are starting to think about the exit strategy and how to get back to work. Some points on this:
a) Almost 40% of the the US have very low official rates of infection, even though most have been experiencing infections for weeks. It seems they were surprised by this low infection rate in many states.
b) She talked about making more and faster tests available and she seemed to be optimistic that we will soon have a test that people can administer themselves and a potential blood test that would return results in 15 minutes in a doctor's office. Both of these things mean that once approved, the ability to test large numbers of people goes way up.
c) She commented on the ability to trace infections in the US and said they have systems and protocols that can very easily be implemented in the US, giving them tremendous ability to trace where infections are the greatest and to open up those areas where infection is much lower. Mentioned their ability to track HIV in Africa and how much it has lead to large reductions of AIDS in Africa. Said if they can implement this tracking in Africa, it is much easier to implement in the US.
5) Based on what I heard today, I think it is possible you will see a relaxing of the shutdown in at least 40% of the country in the next few weeks. I think by May, you could see large portions of the US opening back up for business. The key is testing and tracing - something I have commented on a few times.
6) Dr. Fauci talked about the vaccine development and during his update, he said they would begin production of the vaccine well before testing is fully complete. He said it is a risk, but not unheard of and if the government underwrites the costs, it should be doable. He said they have done this with other vaccines in the past. The goal is to have the vaccine ready to deploy when final testing is complete, instead of having to wait an additional 6 months.

Overall, I am feeling optimistic about things starting to open up in May and through the Summer. The news media now seems to be taking delight in communicating bad news and trying to scare people. I read one article in the Atlantic today that painted a very dire picture and tried to say at the end that the best hope is for President Trump to be defeated in November. Much of what was in the article I read was debunked by Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx today. It made me think they had read the article too.

PackBacker07 said:

---

Popping back in to counter the flu argument. COVID-19, at least this initial year, is worse than the flu. We still need more studies on COVID-19, but here are some early numbers:

- 2.5 infectious rate, 1.3 flu
- 20% cases send people to hospital, 2% flu
- 10-11 day average hospital stay, 5-6 day flu
- 1% death rate, .1% flu
- no vaccine or natural immunity, flu yes (to some extent)

Again, we need more time to accurately asses, but with those numbers we are doing exactly what we should currently. If this pushes into the fall flu season, we are going to be screwed healthcare-wise. Should the media cover it 24/7? Probably not, but when people are still going to spring break and doing other dumb ****, it needs to be beaten into their heads to stay home. Also, when POTUS is bored and calls a press briefing every afternoon, should the media not cover it? The faster we can get everyone in, the faster we can go back to normalcy. So blame the idiots, not the media IMO. Listen to the actual doctors, please. They aren't the media.

---

Flu is based on years worth of data and estimates of population exposure. Covid numbers are based solely on limited positive tests. Current hospitalization in NC is at less than 5% for Covid for VERY limited testing.. I swear I saw Cuomo say NY was at 13% of their positives. And that is only the cases they know... Rates are likely much lower for the entire exposed.

It can be possible that both the government and the media have totally botched this.

Not sure if you saw my post earlier but my State Senator sent an email that Mecklenburg is not going to try to do test and trace, they are relying more heavily on social distancing. This is infuriating and I don't know what to do besides try to survive being on lockdown.

statefan91 said:

---

Not sure if you saw my post earlier but my State Senator sent an email that Mecklenburg is not going to try to do test and trace, they are relying more heavily on social distancing. This is infuriating and I don't know what to do besides try to survive being on lockdown.

---

Eventually, people will start to violate the social distancing rules, especially when they see other areas of the country opening up. If we have ability to use Test and Trace in a few weeks when testing becomes more available, they have no reason to not use it - unless they are trying to destroy the economy on purpose. America has to get back to work in 60 more days. Social distancing should only be used as a last resort, when you do not have the ability to Test and Trace.

PackBacker07 said:

---

Popping back in to counter the flu argument. COVID-19, at least this initial year, is worse than the flu. We still need more studies on COVID-19, but here are some early numbers:

- 2.5 infectious rate, 1.3 flu
- 20% cases send people to hospital, 2% flu
- 10-11 day average hospital stay, 5-6 day flu
- 1% death rate, .1% flu
- no vaccine or natural immunity, flu yes (to some extent)

---

You don't know this yet. We have decades of data on the flu. We have a few month's worth on this.

Obama tweeted out that article in the Atlantic. Such a grand thing to do during a pandemic. Undercut your successor. What a bum.

packgrad said:

---

Obama tweeted out that article in the Atlantic. Such a grand thing to do during a pandemic. Undercut your successor. What a bum.

---

Yes, Trump hasn't mentioned Obama's name at all during this crisis., right?

Ground_Chuck said:

---

packgrad said:

---

Obama tweeted out that article in the Atlantic. Such a grand thing to do during a pandemic. Undercut your successor. What a bum.

---

Yes, Trump hasn't mentioned Obama's name at all during this crisis., right?

---

Unfortunately, Obama doesn't have the class of GWB. Obama needs to just shut up and let the current president preside. Spreading fake news does nothing to help the situation.

Ground_Chuck said:

---

packgrad said:

---

Obama tweeted out that article in the Atlantic. Such a grand thing to do during a pandemic. Undercut your successor. What a bum.

---

Yes, Trump hasn't mentioned Obama's name at all during this crisis., right?

---

Unless you went after Obama and democrat politicians for blaming Bush for everything negative that happened during Obama's presidency maybe you better sit this one out....

packgrad said:

---

Ground_Chuck said:

---

packgrad said:

---

Obama tweeted out that article in the Atlantic. Such a grand thing to do during a pandemic. Undercut your successor. What a bum.

---

Yes, Trump hasn't mentioned Obama's name at all during this crisis., right?

---

Unfortunately, Obama doesn't have the class of GWB. Obama needs to just shut up and let the current president preside. Spreading fake news does nothing to help the situation.

---

Do you didn't read the article and have no idea what it said?

cowboypack02 said:

---

Ground_Chuck said:

---

packgrad said:

---

Obama tweeted out that article in the Atlantic. Such a grand thing to do during a pandemic. Undercut your successor. What a bum.

---

Yes, Trump hasn't mentioned Obama's name at all during this crisis., right?

---

Unless you went after Obama and democrat politicians for blaming Bush for everything negative that happened during Obama's presidency maybe you better sit this one out....

---

He tweeted an article.