Coronavirus and Walt Disney World general discussion

[Disney Experience]

Yes, which is why they are updating the guidance. Fauci even said in an interview he would have no issue getting together with family members who were also vaccinated indoors without masks or distancing. The official guidelines just haven’t been updated yet, which is coming soon. Now that a larger percent of people have been vaccinated it’s more of a reality then when 5% or less were done.

I think the initial hesitancy to say vaccinated are ok to congregate together without mask is that they did not have data on how the vaccines impacted transmission of the virus. So, in theory, a large maskless vaccinated group could be a super-spreader event.

There is data now that suggests that the vaccinated have a significantly less chance to silently spread the virus so they are more receptive to lessen the restrictions.

 

[seascape]

Another day over 2M vaccinated. We are over 90M vaccinations with a daily average over 2.1M. We should hit 100M doses administered by Wed or Thursday....50 days early

That just shows how stupid it was saying the goal was 100 million shots in 100 days. We are actually getting close to 3 million shots a day and rising. The number of cases are again dropping at an accelerating rate and Florida should be below 20 cases per 100,000 by Tuesday March 16. The NY Times had them at 25 through yesterday. Todays number of 4,094 cases works out to 18.44 if it averaged that for a week, based on their 22.2 million population. It is just a shame NY, NJ and RI are doing such a poor job of controlling Covid19 as they are the only states with over 30 cases per 100,000 and way more than number 4 SC with 26 per 100,000. Think of that, NY and NJ have 42.3% more cases than the number 4 state.

 

[matt9112]

As far as vaccines go...
Both my folks and MIL (all in their early to late 80’s) were all fully vaccinated weeks ago. DWifey and myself (57 and 58) got our first dose this past Tuesday evening. Our youngest DD (26) is a teacher and fully vaccinated. Our DS (28) and our SonIL (30) both got their first doses the week before us. Our oldest DD (29) is expecting our second granddaughter in July, so she has not yet been vaccinated.
My next youngest bro and his DWifey (mid 50’s), and their DD (late teens) have all been fully vaccinated. Their son (early 20’s) got COVID months ago at college (Texas A&M) and apparently still has antibodies, so has not yet been vaccinated.
My youngest bro and his DWifey (early 50’s), and their 3 kiddos (teens) have not yet been vaccinated.
I’m not sure about my lil’ sis’ and DH (late 40’s), and their 5 kiddos (pre-teens, teens) in Louisiana though.
The rest of us mentioned above all live in Texas.
Even so, all of us are still following COVID protocols like we did before for now...wearing masks, distancing, and not gathering in large groups. Hopefully, that will change relatively soon...!!!

Interesting to see an entire family full of essentials.....

 

[Incomudro]

Maybe she has seen the light! Good that she got one.
Sometimes people need something to happen to them or a loved one before they change their mind on things.

My father in law uses the expression "saw angel feathers" when someone gets a life changing scare.
Her bout with covid was fairly rough. No hospitalization, but she was home and quite sick.
She largely takes care of her self, though a lot of what she believes in is hokey, and she & her husband used to smoke constantly.
She was a Jenny McKarthy follower, so she comes from that angle.
Still don't know how she secured herself a vaccine given her age and lack of medical issues, but yes - I am glad that she saw the light at least for this one.

 

[GoofGoof]

I think the initial hesitancy to say vaccinated are ok to congregate together without mask is that they did not have data on how the vaccines impacted transmission of the virus. So, in theory, a large maskless vaccinated group could be a super-spreader event.

There is data now that suggests that the vaccinated have a significantly less chance to silently spread the virus so they are more receptive to lessen the restrictions.

Agreed. It seems very likely that being vaccinated gives you not just a high level of protection from getting symptomatic Covid but also a high level of protection from being able to spread Covid as well. The hope that everyone had seems to be likely to pan out based on initial studies. Really good news.

 

[GoofGoof]

That just shows how stupid it was saying the goal was 100 million shots in 100 days. We are actually getting close to 3 million shots a day and rising. The number of cases are again dropping at an accelerating rate and Florida should be below 20 cases per 100,000 by Tuesday March 16. The NY Times had them at 25 through yesterday. Todays number of 4,094 cases works out to 18.44 if it averaged that for a week, based on their 22.2 million population. It is just a shame NY, NJ and RI are doing such a poor job of controlling Covid19 as they are the only states with over 30 cases per 100,000 and way more than number 4 SC with 26 per 100,000. Think of that, NY and NJ have 42.3% more cases than the number 4 state.

It was a very low bar to set. I’m glad since that time they have decided to raise the bar significantly and say we would have enough doses for all adults who want one by middle of May. Much more of a target to shoot for.

I don’t think it’s time yet for a victory lap on cases, the pandemic isn’t over. Keep on keeping on. Keep following masks and distancing and keep getting the vaccinations done. The worst thing any state can do is relax all restrictions now. That will only hurt the likelihood that people get vaccinated and drive the case numbers higher which will take the vaccines longer to flatline the virus. There will come a time much later when history can look back at the public health record of each state and the economic impact as well. There will be winners and losers for sure but I’m not sure picking a small sample of days and gloating is very productive right now.

 

[Heppenheimer]

I'm not joking, I would be asking why they are not there then

Because FEMA has few assets of their own. They function as a coordinating body to mobilize people and material to where they're needed. Every state is busy vaccinating their own, so moving people around right now would equate to stealing from Peter to pay Paul.

 

[DisneyFan32]

@GoofGoof is not going to be a variant resurgence by fall if all people got vaccines? I'm scared.

 

[GimpYancIent]

@GoofGoof is not going to be a variant resurgence by fall if all people got vaccines? I'm scared.

@GoofGoof is a variant???

 

[GoofGoof]

@GoofGoof is not going to be a variant resurgence by fall if all people got vaccines? I'm scared.

Nothing to worry about. So far the vaccines we currently have still have a high level of effectiveness vs the variants that exist today. Maybe not 95% but still pretty high. In the US the only variant that is widespread is the UK variant and all 3 vaccines are highly effective vs that one. Lots of hype around variants in the media but nothing to lose sleep over yet.

There is always a chance a new variant emerges and that it’s resistant to the vaccines. If that’s the case Pfizer, Moderna and JnJ are all capable of making a new vaccine very quickly and since it will use the exact same technology won’t need to go through extensive trials. They are capable of cranking out more than 100M doses a month of vaccine so if needed they could manufacture a new booster shot for every American in about 3 months time. So if a variant emerged now we could be ready to start injecting people by June or July and done by September. Not the end of the world scenario some of the media and others like to portray, and keep in mind that’s actually the worst case scenario. There’s a very good chance no variant ever truly challenges the vaccines here and we reach herd immunity before they become dominant here.

 

[Disney Experience]

Potential Future therapeutics ( Yea!).

They just need a bigger study (Safety and efficacy, ie phase 3)

Ridgeback Biotherapeutics and Merck Announce Preliminary Findings from a Phase 2a Trial of Investigational COVID-19 Therapeutic Molnupiravir - Merck.com

The findings reported on a secondary objective to reduce time to negativity of infectious SARS-CoV-2 virus isolation from nasopharyngeal swabs from participants with symptomatic COVID-19 Primary and other secondary findings to be presented at an upcoming medical meeting Merck (NYSE: MRK), known...

www.merck.com

ClinicalTrials.gov

clinicaltrials.gov

and if you are a ferret:

Therapeutically administered ribonucleoside analogue MK-4482/EIDD-2801 blocks SARS-CoV-2 transmission in ferrets - PubMed

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is having a catastrophic impact on human health¹. Widespread community transmission has triggered stringent distancing measures with severe socio-economic consequences. Gaining control of the pandemic will depend on the interruption of...

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

FDA wanted more info back in Sept:

Merck's OncoImmune COVID-19 Therapeutic Stuck at Starting Gate Pending Further Data

On Thursday, the company said the U.S. Food and Drug Administration wants to see additional data beyond the Phase III study announced last year.

www.biospace.com

 

[seascape]

It was a very low bar to set. I’m glad since that time they have decided to raise the bar significantly and say we would have enough doses for all adults who want one by middle of May. Much more of a target to shoot for.

I don’t think it’s time yet for a victory lap on cases, the pandemic isn’t over. Keep on keeping on. Keep following masks and distancing and keep getting the vaccinations done. The worst thing any state can do is relax all restrictions now. That will only hurt the likelihood that people get vaccinated and drive the case numbers higher which will take the vaccines longer to flatline the virus. There will come a time much later when history can look back at the public health record of each state and the economic impact as well. There will be winners and losers for sure but I’m not sure picking a small sample of days and gloating is very productive right now.

Personally, I would not want the responsibility of deciding what should have been done and what shouldn't. Going back to January 2020, I know I took this seriously as I purchased 50 N95 masks. Yes, I took it seriously but I also opposed locking down everything. I am 62 and overweight. I am in the high risk group and so is my diabetic wife. I thought closing everything down to protect people like me was wrong. Anyone can go back and see my posts.

Now, as for Cuomo, I am also on record supporting him at first for his press conferences but then when the Nursing Home issue was raised by the NY Post started posting against him. Many posters here said the Post was crazy and lied. Well today we know Cuomo was wrong, lied and let people die and his Administration covered it all up. NY and NJ, 2 if the 3 states I own property in did a horrible job based on thenumber of cases and deaths. Florida, the other state I own property in did not close down, protected people at risk but still actually has had more cases than NJ but less than NY based on 100,000 citizens. On deaths NJ is worst and NY second while Florida is 27. However, those are only 2 factors in the evaluation process. The number of jobs lost, the budget loss, how unemployment was handled and other issues must also be adressed, and as far as the unemployment insurance goes, I can't think of one state that did as bad as Florida did. I am not a cheerleader for Florida but I hate the job NJ and NY did. I know too many people who died and lost too much because of delays in unemployment in all 3 states.

At the end of this, we need a complete investigation into every aspects of Covid19 from its initial discovery in China, to the cases in Washington State and Italy and how it came to the east coast. I believe it is from the garment industry from clothes manufacturers in China, designers in Italy and sales in NYC. Additionally, we need to look at everything the government did, at all levels and why we were not better prepared. Why wasn't there a stockpile of ventilators and PPP? Who used up out prior supplies and never replaced them? Why were states like NY warned to stockpile supplies but didn't? These all need to be adressed and rather than just place blame, state what needs to be done in the future and explain all the legitimate reasons we weren't prepared. Blame alone gets us nowhere and we need to have all sides accept some blame but more importantly come up with solutions to prevent a repeat. If that means cut other spending to ensure we don't have to borrow from future generations to take care of problems we created and refused to prepare for, so be it. We need to prepare and learn how to even speed up vaccinations even faster. Operation Warp Speed was a success but still needs to be improved further. 1 year is amazingly fast but we still lost over 500,000 Americans.

 

[danlb_2000]

That just shows how stupid it was saying the goal was 100 million shots in 100 days. We are actually getting close to 3 million shots a day and rising. The number of cases are again dropping at an accelerating rate and Florida should be below 20 cases per 100,000 by Tuesday March 16. The NY Times had them at 25 through yesterday. Todays number of 4,094 cases works out to 18.44 if it averaged that for a week, based on their 22.2 million population. It is just a shame NY, NJ and RI are doing such a poor job of controlling Covid19 as they are the only states with over 30 cases per 100,000 and way more than number 4 SC with 26 per 100,000. Think of that, NY and NJ have 42.3% more cases than the number 4 state.

I am from NJ, as I believe you are, and I am not sure what more the state could be doing at this point. The facts that these three states are close together brings up the concern that maybe the NY variant, or other variant, is impacting the spread.

 

[GoofGoof]

Personally, I would not want the responsibility of deciding what should have been done and what shouldn't. Going back to January 2020, I know I took this seriously as I purchased 50 N95 masks. Yes, I took it seriously but I also opposed locking down everything. I am 62 and overweight. I am in the high risk group and so is my diabetic wife. I thought closing everything down to protect people like me was wrong. Anyone can go back and see my posts.

Now, as for Cuomo, I am also on record supporting him at first for his press conferences but then when the Nursing Home issue was raised by the NY Post started posting against him. Many posters here said the Post was crazy and lied. Well today we know Cuomo was wrong, lied and let people die and his Administration covered it all up. NY and NJ, 2 if the 3 states I own property in did a horrible job based on thenumber of cases and deaths. Florida, the other state I own property in did not close down, protected people at risk but still actually has had more cases than NJ but less than NY based on 100,000 citizens. On deaths NJ is worst and NY second while Florida is 27. However, those are only 2 factors in the evaluation process. The number of jobs lost, the budget loss, how unemployment was handled and other issues must also be adressed, and as far as the unemployment insurance goes, I can't think of one state that did as bad as Florida did. I am not a cheerleader for Florida but I hate the job NJ and NY did. I know too many people who died and lost too much because of delays in unemployment in all 3 states.

At the end of this, we need a complete investigation into every aspects of Covid19 from its initial discovery in China, to the cases in Washington State and Italy and how it came to the east coast. I believe it is from the garment industry from clothes manufacturers in China, designers in Italy and sales in NYC. Additionally, we need to look at everything the government did, at all levels and why we were not better prepared. Why wasn't there a stockpile of ventilators and PPP? Who used up out prior supplies and never replaced them? Why were states like NY warned to stockpile supplies but didn't? These all need to be adressed and rather than just place blame, state what needs to be done in the future and explain all the legitimate reasons we weren't prepared. Blame alone gets us nowhere and we need to have all sides accept some blame but more importantly come up with solutions to prevent a repeat. If that means cut other spending to ensure we don't have to borrow from future generations to take care of problems we created and refused to prepare for, so be it. We need to prepare and learn how to even speed up vaccinations even faster. Operation Warp Speed was a success but still needs to be improved further. 1 year is amazingly fast but we still lost over 500,000 Americans.

I think we‘ve been through this before, but the same policy of returning Covid positive patients from hospitals back to nursing homes was happening in FL as well into April. Luckily the number of cases just wasn’t as high. There’s a great deal of media scrutiny on Cuomo for how nursing homes were treated and rightly so, but it was happening most places. The lying and cover ups weren’t. The difference is NY/NJ was in the middle of their first wave and so deaths were exponentially higher. It wasn’t until the middle of May that FL changed their policies to allow hospitals to keep Covid positive nursing home patients on Medicare and Medicaid even if they didn’t require hospital level treatment. That was the main reason that was happening. It all comes back to inflexible billing practices. Luckily for FL the number of cases and community spread was much lower. Here’s a few articles from the time.

Seniors are sick with coronavirus and need special care. But hospitals and nursing homes are in conflict about who takes on the less-critical patients

South Florida’s vulnerable elderly sickened by the new coronavirus are finding themselves in an anxiety-producing conundrum — stuck between the competing priorities of nursing homes and…

www.sun-sentinel.com

Florida transferring nursing home residents with coronavirus into hospitals

Florida has been mass-transferring residents with coronavirus out of nursing homes with outbreaks and into local hospitals since Sunday, regardless of whether they show signs of the virus. So far, …

www.sun-sentinel.com

 

[seascape]

I am from NJ, as I believe you are, and I am not sure what more the state could be doing at this point. The facts that these three states are close together brings up the concern that maybe the NY variant, or other variant, is impacting the spread.

If you were at the Jersey Shore this Summer you would know how bad things were. No social distancing or mask wearing on the beach or boardwalks. I stayed away even though my home is less than 1 block from the beach. The Nursing Home issue was the same as NY since our Governor just followed all the advice of NY. NJ should have taken it's own course but didn't and unfortunately let Cuomo take the lead. Since Murphy is from Monmouth County I am even more upset. I wore masks and took this seriously and but too many didn't and it wasn't enforced.

 

[Incomudro]

I think we‘ve been through this before, but the same policy of returning Covid positive patients from hospitals back to nursing homes was happening in FL as well into April. Luckily the number of cases just wasn’t as high. There’s a great deal of media scrutiny on Cuomo for how nursing homes were treated and rightly so, but it was happening most places. The lying and cover ups weren’t. The difference is NY/NJ was in the middle of their first wave and so deaths were exponentially higher. It wasn’t until the middle of May that FL changed their policies to allow hospitals to keep Covid positive nursing home patients on Medicare and Medicaid even if they didn’t require hospital level treatment. That was the main reason that was happening. It all comes back to inflexible billing practices. Luckily for FL the number of cases and community spread was much lower. Here’s a few articles from the time.

Seniors are sick with coronavirus and need special care. But hospitals and nursing homes are in conflict about who takes on the less-critical patients

South Florida’s vulnerable elderly sickened by the new coronavirus are finding themselves in an anxiety-producing conundrum — stuck between the competing priorities of nursing homes and…

www.sun-sentinel.com

https://www.sun-sentinel.com/corona...0513-vdpc2txp7jeztepngt3dsk3eve-story.html[/U

My wife as a director of nursing ... what some of these places were trying to do.

 

[danlb_2000]

If you were at the Jersey Shore this Summer you would know how bad things were. No social distancing or mask wearing on the beach or boardwalks. I stayed away even though my home is less than 1 block from the beach. The Nursing Home issue was the same as NY since our Governor just followed all the advice of NY. NJ should have taken it's own course but didn't and unfortunately let Cuomo take the lead. Since Murphy is from Monmouth County I am even more upset. I wore masks and took this seriously and but too many didn't and it wasn't enforced.

I was at the Jersey shore this summer and didn't feel this was a big problem. The risk of spread under those conditions was pretty small, and this is supported by NJ's fairly low case number through the summer. My post was about what is happening now that is keeping the numbers up.

 

[GoofGoof]

I was at the Jersey shore this summer and didn't feel this was a big problem. The risk of spread under those conditions was pretty small, and this is supported by NJ's fairly low case number through the summer. My post was about what is happen now that is keeping the numbers up.

The percent positive was below 2% at times this summer in NJ and cases were very low. Right now cases are higher than most places, but it’s a fluid situation. A month or 2 ago everyone was talking about cases in CA and look where they are now. Things go up and down. It’s better to look at the longer term trends and impacts specific mitigation has had on cases. I don’t think just comparing place A with place B is particularly useful out of context. If FL was doing something different to prevent spread and NJ wasn’t then maybe it would be more meaningful as an analysis of the effectiveness of the government actions.

 

[danlb_2000]

The percent positive was below 2% at times this summer in NJ and cases were very low. Right now cases are higher than most places, but it’s a fluid situation. A month or 2 ago everyone was talking about cases in CA and look where they are now. Things go up and down. It’s better to look at the longer term trends and impacts specific mitigation has had on cases. I don’t think just comparing place A with place B is particularly useful out of context. If FL was doing something different to prevent spread and NJ wasn’t then maybe it would be more meaningful as an analysis of the effectiveness of the government actions.

Good point about California. Here are the cases per capita for the last few months. NJ is the yellow line which is overlapping NY at the end of the chart.

 

[GoofGoof]

Good point about California. Here are the cases per capita for the last few months. NJ is the yellow line which is overlapping NY at the end of the chart.


View attachment 537863

Yep, and if you had the same discussion around NYE it would have been why is CA not doing better. It turns out they were dealing with a variant but the mitigations put in place which people were saying didn’t work actually did drive cases way down. It takes time.