Coronavirus and Walt Disney World general discussion

[The Mom]

I've been looking at this for a long time because I have anxiety about all infectious disease. Not just covid. Many viruses are not robust enough to spread easily in casual settings. Covid seems to be fitting somewhat in that category. For a disease with no vaccine or herd immunity, we would be seeing overwhelming case numbers everywhere if casual contact was the culprit.

This is one area where anecdotal observation is useful. We would be crippled by cases if grocery stores were driving the spread, for example.

I have researched some of the more contagious diseases (measles, chicken pox) and most consider contacts to be someone you had a face to face encounter with for a certain period of time. Both measles and chicken pox are more contagious than covid. We should use what we know collectively about infectious disease and covid to make common sense decisions. Chicken pox was a disease people almost exclusively caught from extremely close knit situations. Everything I've read about covid seems about the same. Some kind of close and prolonged behavior with an infected human. This is the data being left out of every fear peddling article we read and it's part of why people are not seeking treatment for other problems when they need it. Enough. Time to be adults and talk about this in a way that could possibly help allay at least some fear. This is no way for anyone to live when they likely have a lot of findings by now about low risk versus high risk. It's criminal to allow our at risk population to wallow in desperate panic.

This. FL is allowing WDW to open, yet there are patients in nursing homes that have not seen any family or friends in months. There is no reason if the first is allowed, that the second could also be - with tight restrictions. One visitor per day, for 10 -20 minutes, wearing a mask and gloves. Families/friends could set up a schedule. Perhaps only one visiting day/week/patient. Stagger them so there aren't more than one or two family members in the facility at a time.

In the beginning, the virus may have been brought in by families - but was just as likely to be spread by caregivers. Let the patients/family/facility weigh the risks versus benefits on a case by case basis. If they are concerned that they can't isolate patients, then that might be reason to disallow visitors.

 

[mickeymiss]

This. FL is allowing WDW to open, yet there are patients in nursing homes that have not seen any family or friends in months. There is no reason if the first is allowed, that the second could also be - with tight restrictions. One visitor per day, for 10 -20 minutes, wearing a mask and gloves. Families/friends could set up a schedule. Perhaps only one visiting day/week/patient. Stagger them so there aren't more than one or two family members in the facility at a time.

In the beginning, the virus may have been brought in by families - but was just as likely to be spread by caregivers. Let the patients/family/facility weigh the risks versus benefits on a case by case basis. If they are concerned that they can't isolate patients, then that might be reason to disallow visitors.

My husband's grandmother is at a nursing home that allows outdoor visiting in the garden. It's really nice and much better than those sad pictures of people separated by the glass window. We went to an outdoor shopping area in my town and many people over 60 were there. They want to be out as much as anyone. I might say more so judging by the ratio.

 

[Jrb1979]

This. FL is allowing WDW to open, yet there are patients in nursing homes that have not seen any family or friends in months. There is no reason if the first is allowed, that the second could also be - with tight restrictions. One visitor per day, for 10 -20 minutes, wearing a mask and gloves. Families/friends could set up a schedule. Perhaps only one visiting day/week/patient. Stagger them so there aren't more than one or two family members in the facility at a time.

In the beginning, the virus may have been brought in by families - but was just as likely to be spread by caregivers. Let the patients/family/facility weigh the risks versus benefits on a case by case basis. If they are concerned that they can't isolate patients, then that might be reason to disallow visitors.

Here they are allowing people to visit loved ones at the LTC homes but you have to a negative test first. Then again what's opened and what's not is all backwards to me. I look at what has been done where I live, other then our deaths high from LTC homes, we have done really good with keeping cases low. I don't share the view point of opening everything and let what happens happen. We haven't even opened theme parks here and it's looking like they won't open at all this year.

 

[Casper Gutman]

I've been looking at this for a long time because I have anxiety about all infectious disease. Not just covid. Many viruses are not robust enough to spread easily in casual settings. Covid seems to be fitting somewhat in that category. For a disease with no vaccine or herd immunity, we would be seeing overwhelming case numbers everywhere if casual contact was the culprit.

This is one area where anecdotal observation is useful. We would be crippled by cases if grocery stores were driving the spread, for example.

I have researched some of the more contagious diseases (measles, chicken pox) and most consider contacts to be someone you had a face to face encounter with for a certain period of time. Both measles and chicken pox are more contagious than covid. We should use what we know collectively about infectious disease and covid to make common sense decisions. Chicken pox was a disease people almost exclusively caught from extremely close knit situations. Everything I've read about covid seems about the same. Some kind of close and prolonged behavior with an infected human. This is the data being left out of every fear peddling article we read and it's part of why people are not seeking treatment for other problems when they need it. Enough. Time to be adults and talk about this in a way that could possibly help allay at least some fear. This is no way for anyone to live when they likely have a lot of findings by now about low risk versus high risk. It's criminal to allow our at risk population to wallow in desperate panic.

What do you consider “overwhelming case numbers?”

Face-to-face contact, indoors, over longer periods of time does seem to be the most dangerous behavior by a significant margin. I don’t think press coverage has hidden this. Other kinds of contact CAN spread the virus, however, though they are less likely to do so. We have seen numerous grocery store outbreaks among staff.

Ultimately, the way to help everyone, vulnerable and otherwise, is to control the virus. A lot of other nations have done this.

 

[mickeymiss]

Oh my gosh, can they make up their minds? Now it does spread from surfaces and doesn't spread from aerosols?

They need to take 5 seconds from their fear inducing mission to explain how THEY define close contact. It made people feel better to know that surfaces dont play a large role and now they casually say that they do? This is why people don't trust the information. It changes on a dime. It was only last week that the media was warning about aerosols and saying not to worry as much about surfaces.

WHO: Airborne Transmission Plays Limited Role In Coronavirus Spread

After 239 scientists raised concerns about transmission by aerosolized particles, the World Health Organization has issued a brief on the topic — and called for more research.

www.npr.org

 

[Andrew C]

Oh my gosh, can they make up their minds? Now it does spread from surfaces and doesn't spread from aerosols?

They need to take 5 seconds from their fear inducing mission to explain how THEY define close contact. It made people feel better to know that surfaces dont play a large role and now they casually say that they do? This is why people don't trust the information. It changes on a dime. It was only last week that the media was warning about aerosols and saying not to worry as much about surfaces.

WHO: Airborne Transmission Plays Limited Role In Coronavirus Spread

After 239 scientists raised concerns about transmission by aerosolized particles, the World Health Organization has issued a brief on the topic — and called for more research.

www.npr.org

it is a novel virus and science is hard?

 

[chrisvee]

Everything I've read about covid seems about the same. Some kind of close and prolonged behavior with an infected human. This is the data being left out of every fear peddling article we read and it's part of why people are not seeking treatment for other problems when they need it. Enough. Time to be adults and talk about this in a way that could possibly help allay at least some fear. This is no way for anyone to live when they likely have a lot of findings by now about low risk versus high risk. It's criminal to allow our at risk population to wallow in desperate panic.

This is so surprising to me. All of the news sources I follow nationally and locally in the NE have the latest facts and guidance readily available. My state followed a phased reopen that was risk-based. We can see in real time as they tighten policies by locality based on data and we hear the results of the contact tracing tied to where cases have gone up. We just had a whole bunch of cases in one county tied to Myrtle Beach.

My concerns are more about how scalable our test capability and contact tracing is; if it’s not, new case spread could become uncontrolled.

 

[mickeymiss]

it is a novel virus and science is hard?

Science is so hard that they backtrack on their own advice every other day? I'd rather them say nothing at all lol. Silly me assumed they gather a lot of good evidence before distributing it to the public

 

[kong1802]

Oh my gosh, can they make up their minds? Now it does spread from surfaces and doesn't spread from aerosols?

They need to take 5 seconds from their fear inducing mission to explain how THEY define close contact. It made people feel better to know that surfaces dont play a large role and now they casually say that they do? This is why people don't trust the information. It changes on a dime. It was only last week that the media was warning about aerosols and saying not to worry as much about surfaces.

WHO: Airborne Transmission Plays Limited Role In Coronavirus Spread

After 239 scientists raised concerns about transmission by aerosolized particles, the World Health Organization has issued a brief on the topic — and called for more research.

www.npr.org

Is that what that is saying?

Key points of the brief Main findings • Understanding how, when and in what types of settings SARS-CoV-2 spreads between people is critical to develop effective public health and infection prevention measures to break chains of transmission. • Current evidence suggests that transmission of SARS-CoV-2 occurs primarily between people through direct, indirect, or close contact with infected people through infected secretions such as saliva and respiratory secretions, or through their respiratory droplets, which are expelled when an infected person coughs, sneezes, talks or sings. • Airborne transmission of the virus can occur in health care settings where specific medical procedures, called aerosol generating procedures, generate very small droplets called aerosols. Some outbreak reports related to indoor crowded spaces have suggested the possibility of aerosol transmission, combined with droplet transmission, for example, during choir practice, in restaurants or in fitness classes. • Respiratory droplets from infected individuals can also land on objects, creating fomites (contaminated surfaces). As environmental contamination has been documented by many reports, it is likely that people can also be infected by touching these surfaces and touching their eyes, nose or mouth before cleaning their hands. • Based on what we currently know, transmission of COVID-19 is primarily occurring from people when they have symptoms, and can also occur just before they develop symptoms, when they are in close proximity to others for prolonged periods of time. While someone who never develops symptoms can also pass the virus to others, it is still not clear to what extent this occurs and more research is needed in this area. • Urgent high-quality research is needed to elucidate the relative importance of different transmission routes; the role of airborne transmission in the absence of aerosol generating procedures; the dose of virus required for transmission to occur; the settings and risk factors for superspreading events; and the extent of asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic transmission.

Seems like that's what we already knew........

Wear a mask, social distance, wash your hands after touching surfaces and constantly.

Doesn't seem like that big of a shift.

 

[kong1802]

Science is so hard that they backtrack on their own advice every other day? I'd rather them say nothing at all lol. Silly me assumed they gather a lot of good evidence before distributing it to the public

Can you show where they backtracked?

Geniunly curious.

I read the attached Who brief and although not a scientist, I don't see a backtrack.

Looks like they are incorporating more research but still advising the same procedures.

 

[Kevin_W]

Oh my gosh, can they make up their minds? Now it does spread from surfaces and doesn't spread from aerosols?

They need to take 5 seconds from their fear inducing mission to explain how THEY define close contact. It made people feel better to know that surfaces dont play a large role and now they casually say that they do? This is why people don't trust the information. It changes on a dime. It was only last week that the media was warning about aerosols and saying not to worry as much about surfaces.

WHO: Airborne Transmission Plays Limited Role In Coronavirus Spread

After 239 scientists raised concerns about transmission by aerosolized particles, the World Health Organization has issued a brief on the topic — and called for more research.

www.npr.org

that's not the WHO taking a particularly different stance. This was a response to the widely publicized "aerosols are a problem!" letter from a (very small) group of scientists. The message on surfaces hasn't really changed: touching contaminated surfaces can spread disease. they don't think it's a big factor, but it certainly contributes.

 

[mickeymiss]

This is so surprising to me. All of the news sources I follow nationally and locally in the NE have the latest facts and guidance readily available. My state followed a phased reopen that was risk-based. We can see in real time as they tighten policies by locality based on data and we hear the results of the contact tracing tied to where cases have gone up. We just had a whole bunch of cases in one county tied to Myrtle Beach.

My concerns are more about how scalable our test capability and contact tracing is; if it’s not, new case spread could become uncontrolled.

Your area discusses transmission patterns? Lucky. Our state has a nursing home problem but they don't explain where (generally) cases seem to be coming from outside of that. I have suspected for a long time that the "community spread" that they used to stir fear in the beginning was largely household. Important!! Other states like Florida and California aren't being transparent about what their patterns are. A basic outline of what kind of exposure is observed based on their tracing would be grand. They must know dog gone it

 

[Kevin_W]

...and I was typing at the same time as Kong, who probably said the same thing better than I.

 

[chrisvee]

Science is so hard that they backtrack on their own advice every other day? I'd rather them say nothing at all lol. Silly me assumed they gather a lot of good evidence before distributing it to the public

This article isn’t advice.

It’s reporting on the findings of a study. The new here is that some scientists are presenting a body of evidence that there is aerosolized transmission.

 

[kong1802]

This article isn’t advice.

It’s reporting on the findings of a study. The new here is that some scientists are presenting a body of evidence that there is aerosolized transmission.

"To prevent transmission, WHO recommends a comprehensive set of measures including: • Identify suspect cases as quickly as possible, test, and isolate all cases (infected people) in appropriate facilities; • Identify and quarantine all close contacts of infected people and test those who develop symptoms so that they can be isolated if they are infected and require care; • Use fabric masks in specific situations, for example, in public places where there is community transmission and where other prevention measures, such as physical distancing, are not possible; • Use of contact and droplet precautions by health workers caring for suspected and confirmed COVID-19 patients, and use of airborne precautions when aerosol generating procedures are performed; • Continuous use of a medical mask by health workers and caregivers working in all clinical areas, during all routine activities throughout the entire shift; • At all times, practice frequent hand hygiene, physical distancing from others when possible, and respiratory etiquette; avoid crowded places, close-contact settings and confined and enclosed spaces with poor ventilation; wear fabric masks when in closed, overcrowded spaces to protect others; and ensure good environmental ventilation in all closed settings and appropriate environmental cleaning and disinfection "

Exactly. None of the advice in the brief is different.

 

[mickeymiss]

that's not the WHO taking a particularly different stance. This was a response to the widely publicized "aerosols are a problem!" letter from a (very small) group of scientists. The message on surfaces hasn't really changed: touching contaminated surfaces can spread disease. they don't think it's a big factor, but it certainly contributes.

Messaging should be clear. People were spraying disinfectants on their groceries until health officials had to tell them to stop. They said groceries and surfaces were not of concern. Most people interpreted that to mean it's safe to shop as you normally did. Everyone jumped on that as meaning that surfaces were not how this spreads. WHO's website said so and this article contradicts it without explanation.

I think we should all agree that the WHO and CDC need to define close contact so people can do essential business with a good idea of what that means.

 

[Andrew C]

Messaging should be clear. People were spraying disinfectants on their groceries until health officials had to tell them to stop. They said groceries and surfaces were not of concern. Most people interpreted that to mean it's safe to shop as you normally did. Everyone jumped on that as meaning that surfaces were not how this spreads. WHO's website said so and this article contradicts it without explanation.

I think we should all agree that the WHO and CDC need to define close contact so people can do essential business with a good idea of what that means.

get ready.

 

[Touchdown]

In regards to the nursing home issue, that population is far to vulnerable and there is no way to isolate residents who get sick (staff will have to treat sick and non sick residents.) Limiting contact is absolutely needed, as we learned in New York, allowing window visits or visits from doorways really helps reduce spread. I don’t think visiting rules will lift until the virus is either gone, mutated to a less harmful version or we have a vaccine.

 

[mickeymiss]

"To prevent transmission, WHO recommends a comprehensive set of measures including: • Identify suspect cases as quickly as possible, test, and isolate all cases (infected people) in appropriate facilities; • Identify and quarantine all close contacts of infected people and test those who develop symptoms so that they can be isolated if they are infected and require care; • Use fabric masks in specific situations, for example, in public places where there is community transmission and where other prevention measures, such as physical distancing, are not possible; • Use of contact and droplet precautions by health workers caring for suspected and confirmed COVID-19 patients, and use of airborne precautions when aerosol generating procedures are performed; • Continuous use of a medical mask by health workers and caregivers working in all clinical areas, during all routine activities throughout the entire shift; • At all times, practice frequent hand hygiene, physical distancing from others when possible, and respiratory etiquette; avoid crowded places, close-contact settings and confined and enclosed spaces with poor ventilation; wear fabric masks when in closed, overcrowded spaces to protect others; and ensure good environmental ventilation in all closed settings and appropriate environmental cleaning and disinfection "

Exactly. None of the advice in the brief is different.

I literally looked on the WHO website last week and it said surfaces were not thought to be a major risk for transmission. I went today and they are saying it all differently now. It is one of the main ways to transmit it now but the media never made waves about this change. They had been releasing report after report that grocery disinfecting was unncessary, etc. This is all very misleading and most people don't know the guidance is changing that rapidly.

 

[kong1802]

I literally looked on the WHO website last week and it said surfaces were not thought to be a major risk for transmission. I went today and they are saying it all differently now. It is one of the main ways to transmit it now but the media never made waves about this change. They had been releasing report after report that grocery disinfecting was unncessary, etc. This is all very misleading and most people don't know the guidance is changing that rapidly.

Reading their guidelines, I do not see a change. Seems like their advice has been the same.

Wear a mask, social distance, and wash your hands constantly. Don't touch your face, etc.

They do mention more research is needed all the time. I think its prudent that they release the research results. IMO that's better than keeping it to themselves. It can cause frustrations, especially with the headlines, but if you read the briefs I think it shows what is actually happening.