Coronavirus and Walt Disney World general discussion

[hopemax]

We had that pre-hurricane exercise into why The COVID Tracking Project's testing numbers were different from the FL DOH numbers and determining that CTs numbers are "new" people tested, vs FL DOH total people tested (although they do publish a new people positivity percentage).

Since the hurricane, I've been watching CT's numbers, waiting for them to return to pre-hurricane levels and so far they haven't. Pre-hurricane, the range was 45K-50K+ (with some days even in the 60K or 70K range in July and the record being 98K on 7/12), during the hurricane it dropped to 31K, it has come back up to about 40K. Saturday was 49K, Sunday dropped back to 40K.

So I would caution that there could be testing issues in FL's numbers, for the past week. If less people feel the need to get tested, that would be one thing (generally, good). If less people are able to be tested, that would mean something else. If I look at the County info for Broward, Palm Beach and Dade Counties (Orange too), the number of cases dropped approximately a third to half starting on 8/1, coinciding with the hurricane testing closures, but have been slow to rise back up. Maybe, the pending storm and rainy weather delayed celebrations and gatherings resulting in less opportunity for community spread (+1 for social distancing)? So I would also caution that people might interpret the drop in numbers as a sign of organic improvement (vs hurricane/behavioral) and start doing more of the things where spread occurs (especially as schools/colleges try to reopen), and in 2-3 weeks FL rebounds to where they were before the hurricane.

FWIW, hurricanes might be good for COVID control, lol.

 

[JoeCamel]

I feel bad for buying a car last year then but after 10 years with my other one, it was time. That and I didn't want to bother with my check engine light that was coming on.

They program them to do that so you buy another car.

 

[SamusAranX]

We had that pre-hurricane exercise into why The COVID Tracking Project's testing numbers were different from the FL DOH numbers and determining that CTs numbers are "new" people tested, vs FL DOH total people tested (although they do publish a new people positivity percentage).

Since the hurricane, I've been watching CT's numbers, waiting for them to return to pre-hurricane levels and so far they haven't. Pre-hurricane, the range was 45K-50K+ (with some days even in the 60K or 70K range in July and the record being 98K on 7/12), during the hurricane it dropped to 31K, it has come back up to about 40K. Saturday was 49K, Sunday dropped back to 40K.

So I would caution that there could be testing issues in FL's numbers, for the past week. If less people feel the need to get tested, that would be one thing (generally, good). If less people are able to be tested, that would mean something else. If I look at the County info for Broward, Palm Beach and Dade Counties (Orange too), the number of cases dropped approximately a third to half starting on 8/1, coinciding with the hurricane testing closures, but have been slow to rise back up. Maybe, the pending storm and rainy weather delayed celebrations and gatherings resulting in less opportunity for community spread (+1 for social distancing)? So I would also caution that people might interpret the drop in numbers as a sign of organic improvement (vs hurricane/behavioral) and start doing more of the things where spread occurs (especially as schools/colleges try to reopen), and in 2-3 weeks FL rebounds to where they were before the hurricane.

FWIW, hurricanes might be good for COVID control, lol.

I think, frankly, it's better to only count new infections/cases rather then retests.

 

[hopemax]

I think, frankly, it's better to only count new infections/cases rather then retests.

Just be aware FL's reported data is a bit of a mess in that regard. They post:

New cases
Positivity among new cases

Total Tests (including retests)
Positivity among all tests (DCBaker doesn't post this chart here)

What is missing is "new people being tested."

****

In other news, College Football is toast. The Big-10 is the first Power 5 to pull the plug, with the Pac-12 likely joining them tomorrow. MAC, and Mountain West have already cancelled. New news is that multiple athletes who have recovered from COVID-19 are showing signs of Myocarditis (heart inflammation). Given the intensity of college football, that's going to be a deal breaker. Hopefully, these cardiac symptoms will resolve themselves in 3-6 months, as with other viruses, but COVID is a novel virus. There's a lot we don't know, and do we want student-athletes to be the guinea pigs for finding out? Rather than putting fall sports on pause, and hope we know more and the situation is better by spring.

Heart issue linked to virus drives Power 5 concern

A rare heart condition that could be linked to COVID-19 has been found in several athletes in the Big Ten and other Power 5 conferences.

www.espn.com

Dr. Matthew Martinez, director of sports cardiology for Atlantic Health System in New Jersey, said he has received calls from physicians from at least a dozen Power 5 schools who have identified more than a dozen athletes with some post-COVID-19 myocardial injury. He said about half of them had symptoms.

"Initially we thought if you didn't have significant symptoms that you are probably at less risk. We are now finding that that may not be true," he said.

 

[Lilofan]

Media is reporting that Russia has an approved covid vaccine ! The U S stock market is reacting positively to the news. Fingers crossed!

 

[G00fyDad]

Media is reporting that Russia has an approved covid vaccine ! The U S stock market is reacting positively to the news. Fingers crossed!

No thanks. Every country is rushing to be the first to develop a vaccine. Vaccines take years to develop. Not months. I will be ecstatic if this vaccine proves to be effective and not lethal but it is approved by and coming from a country with a leader that does not care about the people he governs. But what could you expect from someone that effectively rigs elections, murders his opponents, and sets himself up as a lifetime ruler (dictator). I do not trust his judgement and I sure don't trust a vaccine from that country. I truly hope they have it right and it does not cause more harm than good but I am not betting on those odds.

 

[Heppenheimer]

No thanks. Every country is rushing to be the first to develop a vaccine. Vaccines take years to develop. Not months. I will be ecstatic if this vaccine proves to be effective and not lethal but it is approved by and coming from a country with a leader that does not care about the people he governs. But what could you expect from someone that effectively rigs elections, murders his opponents, and sets himself up as a lifetime ruler (dictator). I do not trust his judgement and I sure don't trust a vaccine from that country. I truly hope they have it right and it does not cause more harm than good but I am not betting on those odds.

There's an interesting YouTube channel called Megaprojects, in which the host discusses the history of various large-scale engineering projects throughout history. There's a recurring theme in these...the Soviet Union/Russian Federation rushing through a copycat version of something the West was attempting. The results were usually either an outright failure (the Soviet attempts at a moon rocket to match NASA's Saturn V), an impractical, poorly designed white elephant (the Soviet's version of the Concord), or rarely, a technologically simpler copy that somehow manages to be versatile enough to remain useful (MiG fighter jet).

So, I'm viewing Russia's vaccine with that same lens. We'll see how forthcoming they are in sharing their data and if the results are reproducible. My gut feeling is that they neither tested it on enough people nor followed them long enough to rule out some of the rare but potentially severe side-effects you can get from a vaccine, like Guillan-Barre syndrome.

 

[John park hopper]

I too am skeptical of a Russian vaccine. We had a Russian chemist came to our lab and worked for several months, he was amazed at how well equipped our lab was supplies, equipment etc, and said they had nothing like this in their Russian lab --underfunded, no supplies and outdated equipment. When he returned to Russia we were sending him supplies. So yes unless something has drastically changed I would be leery of any Russian produced vaccine.

 

[Lilofan]

No thanks. Every country is rushing to be the first to develop a vaccine. Vaccines take years to develop. Not months. I will be ecstatic if this vaccine proves to be effective and not lethal but it is approved by and coming from a country with a leader that does not care about the people he governs. But what could you expect from someone that effectively rigs elections, murders his opponents, and sets himself up as a lifetime ruler (dictator). I do not trust his judgement and I sure don't trust a vaccine from that country. I truly hope they have it right and it does not cause more harm than good but I am not betting on those odds.

There is always hope. If it takes "years" to develop vaccines then we are all in trouble. Politics aside, I don't care who discovers a vaccine.

 

[drizgirl]

No thanks. Every country is rushing to be the first to develop a vaccine. Vaccines take years to develop. Not months. I will be ecstatic if this vaccine proves to be effective and not lethal but it is approved by and coming from a country with a leader that does not care about the people he governs. But what could you expect from someone that effectively rigs elections, murders his opponents, and sets himself up as a lifetime ruler (dictator). I do not trust his judgement and I sure don't trust a vaccine from that country. I truly hope they have it right and it does not cause more harm than good but I am not betting on those odds.

Cheer up. They probably stole it from someone who knows what they're doing.

 

[G00fyDad]

There is always hope. If it takes "years" to develop vaccines then we are all in trouble. Politics aside, I don't care who discovers a vaccine.

Nor do I but Russia pushing this vaccine out with less than 100 test subjects should be sending red flags racing up the poles. And yes, we are in trouble because it will take longer than this to get a real vaccine.

 

[John park hopper]

In the past it took years to develop a vaccine but science and technology has advanced greatly in the last 10 years (genome mapping, gene splicing, etc etc). There are already several potential vaccines in clinical trials. IMO a vaccine will be available by next year

 

[Heppenheimer]

Nor do I but Russia pushing this vaccine out with less than 100 test subjects should be sending red flags racing up the poles. And yes, we are in trouble because it will take longer than this to get a real vaccine.

If that is true, then... wow. That isn't nearly enough people to even to begin to assess efficacy. And when you consider that most vaccines are considered safe if severe side effects are limited to a range of less than 1 in 100K to 1 million (depending on the disease and the specific side effect), there's is no way the safety of this vaccine has been adequately assessed. If it turns out this vaccine is both safe and effective in most people, it will be because of dumb luck, not because careful, diligent and ethical research protocols were followed.

 

[G00fyDad]

In the past it took years to develop a vaccine but science and technology has advanced greatly in the last 10 years (genome mapping, gene splicing, etc etc). There are already several potential vaccines in clinical trials. IMO a vaccine will be available by next year

I understand your thoughts on why you think this vaccine could be sped up but literally every single scientist (even on Fox News) has said that this is rushing the process by a year. Not even they have confidence in the veracity of a rushed vaccine. Yes. We have come a long way with science but not that far.

 

[Andrew C]

Russia says they have a vaccine? Pass.

 

[The Mom]

Please be careful as some of you are starting down the political road, which is not allowed.

 

[Heppenheimer]

In the past it took years to develop a vaccine but science and technology has advanced greatly in the last 10 years (genome mapping, gene splicing, etc etc). There are already several potential vaccines in clinical trials. IMO a vaccine will be available by next year

All those tools can give us a head-start in developing potential vaccines in the lab stage, but they don't help you get through the human trials any quicker. You still need to follow the trial subjects for a long enough time to watch for delayed adverse reactions, which can arise weeks or even months later. This is the reason most experts think the earliest vaccines won't be ready until this winter, at the absolute earliest, and that's only assuming everything goes well.

 

[easyrowrdw]

All those tools can give us a head-start in developing potential vaccines in the lab stage, but they don't help you get through the human trials any quicker. You still need to follow the trial subjects for a long enough time to watch for delayed adverse reactions, which can arise weeks or even months later. This is the reason most experts think the earliest vaccines won't be ready until this winter, at the absolute earliest, and that's only assuming everything goes well.

Yeah. I think a few of them have entered the "final" trial stages. One of them is being tested in my city (in part) and I think they said it should be about 3 months to complete the testing. Different methods have shown promising results through initial trials so that's encouraging at least.

 

[GoofGoof]

Media is reporting that Russia has an approved covid vaccine ! The U S stock market is reacting positively to the news. Fingers crossed!

Good. If it works then we will know that at least one of ours will work since they hacked someone and stole it

In all seriousness, if it works who cares who came up with it. Since they didn’t actually run a real clinical trial to test it I guess the first people they give it to will be the test group.

 

[GoofGoof]

I understand your thoughts on why you think this vaccine could be sped up but literally every single scientist (even on Fox News) has said that this is rushing the process by a year. Not even they have confidence in the veracity of a rushed vaccine. Yes. We have come a long way with science but not that far.

You can’t really speed up the trial process. You can speed up some of the other time spent on a traditional vaccine. We are literally putting the horse before the cart. Normally you run your trials and between each stage of the trials it takes months to write up the paper on the trial results then it has to be published and peer reviewed and only after it passes the peer review sniff test do we move to the next phase of trials. The main reason for waiting is money. No pharma company wants to waste money starting a phase 2 trial if it turns out phase 1 has serious questions. Because the government stepped in and offered to fund the development of the vaccines they took away that financial roadblock. So for each of the vaccines in phase 3 trials they started the next phase of trials before the first phase official results were published and reviewed.

The second part of the process which will be extremely sped up is the production and distribution of the vaccines. Normally after phase 3 trials are complete it takes months to write up the results and then publish and have them peer reviewed. After the peer review is complete the FDA then reviews the final results and that review could take months too based on limited availability of FDA reviewers. After the FDA issues approval then the production of the vaccine starts. It could take 6 months to a year to produce enough of the vaccine and distribute it. Again, that’s being done right now before phase 3 is even done. So if the phase 3 trial is successful and the FDA grants emergency approval then the vaccine will be ready to be distributed cutting up to a year off of the traditional process. The FDA approval is still only going to be emergency approval. Full FDA approval won’t happen until a while later and they study longer term impacts.

Because of the money the government is pumping into this there’s a lot of traditional financial roadblocks being eliminated that have nothing to do with taking shortcuts on the actual trials. In other words the only thing being rushed is the payments for stuff that would normally take longer. The worst case scenario is none of the vaccines work and the government wasted billions on a bunch of busts. Well worth the gamble.