11:32 Am
Hi boys and girls. The heat is on. This basic reality in northern climes will drive people inside, where this bug likes to be. This will cause blooms everywhere because we failed to prevent C-19 from becoming endemic. C-19 is now another organism which lives here too. We can expect scenes like last Spring in NYC to be almost commonplace, state to state and town to town all over the northern hemisphere.
We also need to watch the southern hemisphere to see if, as it did here, C-19 blooms under the air-conditioning as people seek to escape the heat.
The main spread vector will now become the unthinkable; the people you love and trust. People will take precautions against the stranger, but will let their viral guard down with those closest to them, their family and loved ones. People will do this because it is natural human behavior, but at this juncture it is the very worst thing we can do.
Half of those infected by C-19 have no symptoms at all, or have no symptoms early on when they are most infectious. You won’t know you ran into the bug, that it got into you and will then give it to those around you, whom you live with, sup with, sleep with and often care for. These close proximity indoor extended everyday normality’s will be the largest and most common method of transmission from now till Easter.
That is why masks are so damn important, and why it is so dangerous to ignore them or downplay their effectivness. You do not protest your armor is inadequate by failing to wear it into battle. It is all you have. All we have is distance, isolation, and masks, and viral D Day is coming to us.
I do not expect humans to not be human, for parents not to hug scared children, for spouses not to comfort one another, but in doing so they each risk the others and all those around them. This will drive infections and deaths up, if it overwhelms the system, which we did not shore up for this bloom, then the fatality of the virus and all other health concerns may rise, or even rise dramatically.
I intend to isolate in one room all winter, to only venture forth from my room as need demands, for the facilities and food. I have already begun this self-isolation. Now I have my window open for fresh air and circulation, soon I will run a portable HEPA for this room.
Both my son and his wife work, but there exposure risks are relatively low where they work. I do not think that will matter. I see it as an inevitability that we will get C-19 somehow, however the longer we can put that off the better we all shall be as we will learn more between now and then.
Speaking of learning, we seem to have good results from Remdesivir, or perhaps the anti-body cocktail, or perhaps the steroids, or perhaps the combinations. That is the problem with the POTUS’s treatment, they threw every treatment idea at him, and something stuck, but we do not know which one or why or most importantly, how. Knowing how allows us to know which treatment we are using is working and allows us to repeat that and thus gains efficacy.
It is not a ‘cure’ because one person got well. This reaction from Trump is exactly what I was afraid of. Trump gets the bug, gets medevacked to Walter Reed, gets world-class, ground breaking and experimental treatments for no out of pocket cost, then claims “He” beat it and you can too.
Got an extra $100,000 laying around, then maybe you too can get that treatment, but for the 320,000,000 other Americans that is not a possibility.
Now there is every likelihood that Trump supporters will see his recovery as a sign that C-19 is a ‘nothing burger’, when it is lethal. It is lethal 3-5% of the time, but we do not know why. Having 30% of your population or more ignore protections, ignore masks and social distancing, creates an environment where they will expose the rest of us whether we like it or not, whether it is good for the nation or not.
It is Idiocracy in action, and it is going to kill a lot of us.
Trump and the GOP are continuing to act irresponsibly, refusing to say when the POTUS was last negative, refusing to contact trace their own events which spread C-19, therefore putting others down the line at risk. Trump encourages White Nationalists to “Stand By” and we discover they have plots against State Governments, plots to kidnap the Democratic Governor of Michigan. Michigan, home of the Michigan Militia and its offshoots, the training ground of Tim McVeigh, one previous member.
13 are arrested, Trump says nothing about it and they are all Trump supporters. Apparently Trumps “Law and Order” campaign does not care about R. Wing groups targeting Cops, or about making sure the Police he says are all on his side, get paid. Without a much bigger funding bill than the GOP wants, local cities and towns as well as many states, won’t have the money to keep the lights on, to pay the police, the fire department, or those EMTs we all expect to be there as a C-19 response.
This week in Covid . . .
Global Infected 34,937,150 37,288,362
Increase 2,351,212
7 day average 335,887 infections diagnosed daily
Global Dead 1,033,678 1,074,276
Increase 40,598
7 day average 5,799 deaths daily
USA Infected 7,383,244 7,729,108
Increase 345,864
7 day average 49,409 infections diagnosed daily
USA C-19 deaths 209,399 214,573
Increase 5,174
7 day average 739 deaths daily
Maine Infected 5,486 5,723
Increase 237
7 day average 33 infections diagnosed daily
Maine deaths 142 143
Increase 1
7 day average .14285 deaths daily
Almost 6000 deaths per day globally, 739 of them just in the USA and things are going to get worse. Soon it will be a multi-demic, Influenza, RS virus, Viral Pneumonia & all our winter nasties have a new comrade in arms called Coronavirus. Will our Doctors be able to tell which is which fast enough to effectively treat any of them? Hold onto your hats boys and girls it’s going to be a bumpy ride.
Splinters from a fractured mind 