Wednesday, July 22, 2020

Here Come the Masks

and we have only ourselves to blame.

We wanted our economy open, but many resisted doing 3 simple things:
  1. Wash your hands often and well
  2. Socially distance as much as possible
  3. Wear a mask when not social distancing
Now I am no saint and violated the rules this weekend for our annual lake party. A gathering of about 25 friends and family at my parent's lake home. However we disinfected often and stayed outside most of the time.  I understand that sometimes exceptions occur...

I do NOT understand people who are resistant to wearing masks when they are inside public spaces and can not social distance? :-(

The unfortunate reality is that the MN COVID case number is climbing again and something needs to be done to slow it back down or stop it.  Any other ideas?

Remember the timing / process (see below):
  1. More people get infected.
  2. They pass it on to more people.
  3. More people go the hospital ~2 weeks later
  4. More people die about 2+ weeks later 
Walz COVID Videos

21 comments:

Laurie said...

As we consider sending kids and teachers back to school we should be doing everything we can to reduce the spread of covid.

John said...

I agree within reason.

It is the annoying irrational minority like Jerry who keep fighting the obvious simple prevention method. :-(

He even said he would not shop at a store that requires masks. I wounder if he is going to drive to another state for groceries now. :-)

John said...

Stanford Mask Answers

Johns Hopkins Mask Answers

jerrye92002 said...

Annoying? Irrational? I will consider the source. You and the media keep harping about the number of CASES, which any rational person recognizes will increase as testing increases. Meanwhile, you ignore the substantial drop in /deaths/ from the disease.

And I have all my groceries delivered.

John said...

Jerry,
Deaths rise to over 1,000 per day again

Current Deaths: ~145,000

If deaths stay at ~1,000 / day through year end...

Total 2020 deaths: ~320,000

John said...

Is that number okay with you?

If not, how do you want to adjust to reduce it?

Anonymous said...

"You and the media keep harping about the number of CASES, which any rational person recognizes will increase as testing increases."

It has been shown that those two numbers currently don't correlate.

Moose

Anonymous said...

The Rise in Testing Is Not Driving the Rise in U.S. Virus Cases

Moose

John said...

Did Protests Increase COVID cases?

"Nearly a month later, Covid-19 diagnoses are climbing, hitting an all-time high on Thursday, with the US arguably in the midst of a second wave of coronavirus cases.

But multiple analyses suggest the protests are not to blame, according to what we know so far. Initial data, reported in the Wall Street Journal and BuzzFeed, found no uptick in Covid-19 cases in cities with major protests. And a recent working paper published by the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) found that there was “no significant divergence in the [Covid-19] trends after the protests” in counties with protests and those without.

“There really hasn’t been an overwhelming amount of data to say we saw spikes as a result” of protests, Saskia Popescu, an infectious disease epidemiologist, told me. “That’s a good thing.”

John said...

How Masks Reduce the Spread

jerrye92002 said...

Moose, your cite is from the NYT, and cannot be read by mere mortals. And it doesn't even make sense. The more people I test, the more cases I will find, that is the inescapable correlation. Now what that statistic is NOT is predictive. In some places, the "case positive rate" (the number infected compared to the number tested) is rising, and in other cases it is declining. It depends on who, where, when you test. And John's cite explains why. If mass outdoor gatherings without the precautions don't increase transmission of the disease, then testing isn't telling us what we think we know. It's telling us we do NOT know.

Besides, you all are still measuring the wrong thing and leading yourself to wrong conclusions. We should be tracking AVOIDABLE deaths per capita. Some 99% of Minnesota deaths are among the elderly in congregate housing, and/or with 3 or more co-morbidities." The chance of a young healthy person succumbing are near zero. Here's the logical paradox: for months, now, we have not had a mask mandate, and deaths per day have dropped 90%. NOW, we will have a mask mandate, and it will accomplish, what, exactly, that NOT having a mask mandate did not?

John said...

Jerry,
The good news is that you are pretty much powerless in this situation... Thank heavens...

As for death rates. Here are the actual numbers.

jerrye92002 said...

"For one thing, Dean is leery of the studies comparing outcomes in mask-wearing and non-mask-wearing settings. "I find those types of before-and-after studies a bit hard to interpret, just because usually there is a lot else going on at the same time," she says.

Indeed, it's worth noting that while many countries in Asia with high mask use have managed to keep the virus controlled, two countries in South America where mask use was also high in some parts — Chile and Brazil — have seen raging outbreaks. Mokdad says one reason may be that those countries are in the Southern Hemisphere, so their outbreaks coincided with cold weather, which seems to correlate with higher transmission of the virus. But if true, that could diminish the benefit that mask wearing could have in the U.S. come autumn."

Sometimes we just have to read a little further.

jerrye92002 said...

Thanks for the numbers. US deaths/day have plateaued at down about 85%. Northern states way down, southern states (mostly open, and with air conditioning) going up.

Not sure why you take such delight in me being right but unable to affect outcomes.

John said...

You must be looking at a different table than I am.

I see it going from ~2,000 dead per day

Down to ~800 dead per day

And now starting to climb back up to 1,000 dead per day.

With no reduction in cases in sight...


Why do you think Trump is panicking?

John said...

Oh well... It is just the old and infirm right?

How did Scrooge say it again?

"Many can't go there; and many would rather die." "If they would rather die," said Scrooge, "they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population."

John said...

Jerry,
So 30 states have mandatory mask orders in place and many more like Georgia are begging people to wear them.

So why do you think they are forcing the issue?

Or why is Trump now saying that you are wrong?

"“It will probably unfortunately get worse before it gets better,” President Trump said from the White House, but he also touted a reduction in deaths and progress on vaccines and treatments for COVID-19, which Trump referred to repeatedly as a the “China virus.” He also continued his belated encouragement of Americans to wear masks when social distancing is not possible, saying, “Whether you like the mask or not, they have an impact.

Is he in on the mask conspiracy?

jerrye92002 said...

40 down to 4 is 90%

Trump listened to Fauci when Fauci told him masks weren't necessary. Now Fauci has changed his tune and the Donald is finally doing something political. There remains scant evidence that such universal mandates are anything more than marginally effective, and may in fact be harmful.

Anonymous said...

"Now Fauci has changed his tune..."

It's called Science. I know Republicans like you don't care, but do try to keep up.

Moose

Anonymous said...

From what I can gather, MN has only had 6 days with 30 or more deaths, with no day higher than 35.

Tracking the Minnesota COVID-19 numbers

One has to wonder why you're goosing the numbers.

Moose

John said...

Or why he would want to focus on MN data???

Which just shows that Walz made some pretty good choices.

Here is data with a rolling average...

It shows our peak was ~23 per pay and now we are at 5 per day.

Of course it also shows that cases and hospitalizations are starting to go up again. :-(

Which means deaths will likely start to climb again in a few weeks. :-(

Thus the mask mandate.