Covid-19 Thread

[SoulMonster]

Just now, DieselDaisy said:

Soulean über-literal Teutonic pedantry impending,

Cherry-pick a few countries that proves your point, show that USA did better than most of these countries, conclude from this that USA did better than "most other countries", and when people point out how silly that is, blame them for being too literal. Oh, Diesel, what a troll you have become 

[DieselDaisy]

2 minutes ago, SoulMonster said:

Cherry-pick a few countries that proves your point, show that USA did better than most of these countries, conclude from this that USA did better than "most other countries", and when people point out how silly that is, blame them for being too literal. Oh, Diesel, what a troll you have become 

I thought it was evident from the countries I included that I only meant the big boys - not any of your ten bob note countries like your San Marinos. 

[SoulMonster]

Just now, DieselDaisy said:

I thought it was evident from the countries I included that I only meant the big boys - not any of your ten bob note countries like your San Marinos. 

So China, Russia, Argentina, Japan, Denmark, Canada, Mexico, India, etc, etc aren't "big boys" but "ten bob note countries"? Oh, Diesel  Troll better.

 

 

[DieselDaisy]

2 minutes ago, SoulMonster said:

So China, Russia, Argentina, Japan, Denmark, Canada, Mexico, India, etc, etc aren't "big boys" but "ten bob note countries"? Oh, Diesel  Troll better.

 

 

I included Canada and left China out for the simple reason that the stats are about as trustworthy as Saville at a kid's party. You are good with mathematics. You fill in the designated countries. I think you will still find that America's performance is middling, and not the Armageddon you and others depict.

[SoulMonster]

8 minutes ago, DieselDaisy said:

I included Canada and left China out for the simple reason that the stats are about as trustworthy as Saville at a kid's party. You are good with mathematics. You fill in the designated countries. I think you will still find that America's performance is middling, and not the Armageddon you and others depict.

Again, it is the 11 worst country in the world.

Only doing better than San Marino, Peru, Belgium, Andorra, Spain, UK, Chile, Italy, Sweden and Brazil.

And doing worse than such countries as Mexico, France, Panama, Bolivia, Colombia, Equador, Netherlands, Ireland, Iran, Canada, South Africa, Switzerland, Argentina, Romania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iraq, Portugal, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Germany, Denmark, Israel, Bulgaria, Serbia, Austria, Kazahkstan, Turkey, Hungary, Finland, Ukraine, Poland, Egypt, Norway, Estonia, India, Croatia, Czechia, UAE, Algerie, Lithuania, Iceland, Pakistan, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Australia, Greece, Lebanon, Sudan, Yemen, Latvia, Senegal and many, many, many more.

So again, USA hasn't done better than "most other countries". It has in fact done worse than "most other countries". And this is even more interesting considering how much more resourceful USA is than many of these other countries, with its excellent hospitals, equipment and doctors. Yet it has done worse and they have done better. What a shame! The reasons for this are complex but no one in the their right mind won't acknowledge that one of these reasons is having a moron as president who at first didn't act when he should have and when he did act would make things worse by plugging unapproved treatments (like hydroxychloroquine) or implying that drinking poison would kill off the viruses. 

This pandemic is a brilliant visualization of why competent leadership matters. It isn't always so obvious because countries are rarely put so immediately to the test, and most politicians work on more long-term policies and will be long gone when their effects become apparent. But here we have an immediate crisis that demands immediate, competent leadership. And who would have thought that a NYC business crook with a history from beauty pageants and silly TV shows wouldn't be a great choice? 

[Dazey]

Fucking hell! What a plum!  

 

[DieselDaisy]

1 hour ago, Dazey said:

Fucking hell! What a plum!  

 

Should have just held a BLM placard and the cops wouldn't have slapped him with a ten grand fine.

6 hours ago, SoulMonster said:

Again, it is the 11 worst country in the world.

Only doing better than San Marino, Peru, Belgium, Andorra, Spain, UK, Chile, Italy, Sweden and Brazil.

And doing worse than such countries as Mexico, France, Panama, Bolivia, Colombia, Equador, Netherlands, Ireland, Iran, Canada, South Africa, Switzerland, Argentina, Romania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iraq, Portugal, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Germany, Denmark, Israel, Bulgaria, Serbia, Austria, Kazahkstan, Turkey, Hungary, Finland, Ukraine, Poland, Egypt, Norway, Estonia, India, Croatia, Czechia, UAE, Algerie, Lithuania, Iceland, Pakistan, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Australia, Greece, Lebanon, Sudan, Yemen, Latvia, Senegal and many, many, many more.

So again, USA hasn't done better than "most other countries". It has in fact done worse than "most other countries". And this is even more interesting considering how much more resourceful USA is than many of these other countries, with its excellent hospitals, equipment and doctors. Yet it has done worse and they have done better. What a shame! The reasons for this are complex but no one in the their right mind won't acknowledge that one of these reasons is having a moron as president who at first didn't act when he should have and when he did act would make things worse by plugging unapproved treatments (like hydroxychloroquine) or implying that drinking poison would kill off the viruses. 

This pandemic is a brilliant visualization of why competent leadership matters. It isn't always so obvious because countries are rarely put so immediately to the test, and most politicians work on more long-term policies and will be long gone when their effects become apparent. But here we have an immediate crisis that demands immediate, competent leadership. And who would have thought that a NYC business crook with a history from beauty pageants and silly TV shows wouldn't be a great choice? 

Then why are the leaders of Belgium, Spain, Italy, Sweden etc not been attacked, not seen as culpable for this ''mass slaughter''? Trump is basically blamed for creating corona! All those countries have excellent health care facilities incidentally. Only Boris and Bolsonaro have been attacked.

Utterly ridiculous for the democrats to mention Obama's handling of Ebola also.

[Dazey]

29 minutes ago, DieselDaisy said:

Then why are the leaders of Belgium, Spain, Italy, Sweden etc not been attacked, not seen as culpable for this ''mass slaughter''?

Probably because of this. Notice a pattern?

 

Edited September 1, 2020 by Dazey

[SoulMonster]

12 minutes ago, DieselDaisy said:

Then why are the leaders of Belgium, Spain, Italy, Sweden etc not been attacked, not seen as culpable for this ''mass slaughter''? Trump is basically blamed for creating corona! All those countries have excellent health care facilities incidentally. Only Boris and Bolsonaro have been attacked.

Spain and Italy is not criticised to the same extent because at the time they were hit we didn't know much about the disease. Basically, we learnt from Spain and Italy.

Belgium is not being as criticised partly because it is understood their numbers are exaggerated and because it is a country with very high population density which makes it much, much harder to control an epidemic.

Sweden is getting a lot of criticism here in Norway  And I do believe they are getting criticism from other countries too for their initial mistakes in handling the pandemic.

Trump is getting a lot of criticism because he had the time to prepare after Italy and Spain got hit, yet didn't; because his communication has been horrendous (gone by April, magically disappear, hydroxychloroquine, bleach, etc); because he has continue to make mistakes.

[DieselDaisy]

Just now, SoulMonster said:

Spain and Italy is not criticised to the same extent because at the time they were hit we didn't know much about the disease. Basically, we learnt from Spain and Italy.

Belgium is not being as criticised partly because it is understood their numbers are exaggerated and because it is a country with very high population density which makes it much, much harder to control an epidemic.

Sweden is getting a lot of criticism here in Norway  And I do believe they are getting criticism from other countries too for their initial mistakes in handling the pandemic.

Trump is getting a lot of criticism because he had the time to prepare after Italy and Spain got hit, yet didn't; because his communication has been horrendous (gone by April, magically disappear, hydroxychloroquine, bleach, etc); because he has continue to make mistakes.

Goalpost moving by producing caveats.

NB., I am by no means defending Trump's reaction which has been indeed poor - belated and flippant above all else, especially in the early stages - but merely demonstrating that contextually and proportionately, many countries have done a lot worse than the United States, and much of the rhetoric against his handling of the crisis is motivated by demonstrative political bias: it is a convenient narrative for opponents of Trump to depict his handling of the crisis as such.   

7 minutes ago, Dazey said:

Probably because of this Notice a pattern?

 

But we await the (European) sequel. It is coming...

[Dazey]

11 minutes ago, DieselDaisy said:

But we await the (European) sequel. It is coming...

It doesn't seem to be though. I think that if we were going to see a massive second spike like the US we would have seen something by now. The pubs re-opened nearly two months ago now yet we have continued to see a drop in hospitalisations and deaths. I suspect that what we're seeing now is more cases reported due to increased testing but far fewer actual cases than we had at the peak. That and the fact that the vulnerable are being more cautious and the people who are getting infected are younger, fitter and hence less likely to be seriously affected.

Fact is that even countries like Spain, Italy and the UK who have done pretty poorly by numbers were at least sensible enough to implement control measures thereafter. This meant that though they were hit hard at the start they did bring the virus under control. Trump basically did none of this hence why the US is still in the middle of their first wave.

 

Edited September 1, 2020 by Dazey

[DieselDaisy]

If Europe develops a full-blown second wave, you'd have to assume countries like Germany will be harder hit than those proportionately hammered in the first wave such as Belgium, United Kingdom and Sweden - and yes, the US if we look outside Europe. I remember a German scientist being questioned on Germany's excellent handling of kung flu, and he basically said that ultimately - when this whole thing is over - most countries will be a lot closer pertaining to death ratio.

1 minute ago, Dazey said:

It doesn't seem to be though. I think that if we were going to see a massive second spike like the US we would have seen something by now. The pubs re-opened nearly two months ago now yet we have continued to see a drop in hospitalisations and deaths. I suspect that what we're seeing now is more cases reported due to increased testing but far fewer actual cases than we had at the peak. That and the fact that the vulnerable are being more cautious and the people who are getting infected are younger, fitter and hence less likely to be seriously affected.

You haven't been following events in Europe which has witnessed spikes resulting in quarantines and new lockdowns? I am - well, perhaps - going to Poland so have been following these developments. 

[Dazey]

9 minutes ago, DieselDaisy said:

You haven't been following events in Europe which has witnessed spikes resulting in quarantines and new lockdowns? I am - well, perhaps - going to Poland so have been following these developments. 

I have been following events in Europe and thus far these isolated spikes haven't translated into increased hospital admissions or deaths. 

The US is still at 1000 deaths a day at which rate it should be overtaking the UK, Sweden, Italy, Brazil and Chile in the next couple of weeks in the deaths per capita rankings.  

Maybe not Brazil as they also have a cretin in charge but certainly the other countries listed above.

Edited September 1, 2020 by Dazey

[SoulMonster]

26 minutes ago, DieselDaisy said:

Goalpost moving by producing caveats.

NB., I am by no means defending Trump's reaction which has been indeed poor - belated and flippant above all else, especially in the early stages - but merely demonstrating that contextually and proportionately, many countries have done a lot worse than the United States

But many countries haven't done a lot worse than USA  Actually very few countries have done a lot worse than USA. You soooo want this to be true that despite people telling you again and again it is wrong, you keep writing it.

Look, I have made a visualization for you:

|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||

Do you see all the bars above? Those represent individual countries. The better they have handled the pandemic (as deaths per capita), the further to the right they are. Can you see the red marker? Far to the left? That is USA. It is the 11. worst country.

There is no way people can objectively look at this visualization and conclude that "many countries have done a lot worse than the United States". 

Edited September 1, 2020 by SoulMonster

[SoulMonster]

28 minutes ago, DieselDaisy said:

But we await the (European) sequel. It is coming...

Is it? That's just speculation on your part. You have no way of knowing that USA won't be hit harder in a second round. In fact, by looking at how poorly they have handled the first round one would be wise to think they will handle the second round poorly, too.

Most Europeans countries opened up society a long time ago, and now they have found a way to monitor the disease and quickly lock down regions and implements stricter regulation as needed. USA has not shown any signs of having learnt this rudimentary trick in handling the pandemic. They still struggle with their first wave.

[EvanG]

5 minutes ago, SoulMonster said:

There is no way people can objectively look at this visualization and conclude that "many countries have done a lot worse than the United States". 

DieselDaisy just exaggerates, I think that's all... and when someone calls him out on it, he doesn't like to admit he's wrong. He once said that he had been to almost every country in Europe, which I found impressive! So I asked him about it, turned out he hadn't even been to half of them. Not a diss on you, DieselDaisy, just an observation regarding your posting habits.

[SoulMonster]

4 minutes ago, EvanG said:

DieselDaisy just exaggerates, I think that's all... and when someone calls him out on it, he doesn't like to admit he's wrong. He once said that he had been to almost every country in Europe, which I found impressive! So I asked him about it, turned out he hadn't even been to half of them. Not a diss on you, DieselDaisy, just an observation regarding your posting habits.

The exaggeration is vital for him to land home the argument that we are being too unkind to Trump. If it isn't the case that "many countries have done a lot worse than the United States" and that "The US has [...] not suffered from Corona worse than most other countries" then his whole argument falls apart. So I would say it isn't so much him being a bit sloppy in his writing, and hence some exaggerations, as him deliberately lying to substantiate an argument.

Edited September 1, 2020 by SoulMonster

[DieselDaisy]

22 minutes ago, EvanG said:

DieselDaisy just exaggerates, I think that's all... and when someone calls him out on it, he doesn't like to admit he's wrong. He once said that he had been to almost every country in Europe, which I found impressive! So I asked him about it, turned out he hadn't even been to half of them. Not a diss on you, DieselDaisy, just an observation regarding your posting habits.

Exaggeration is both a rhetorical and facetious device which is used extensively in colloquial English speech and writing, however Soul cannot grasp this and interprets everything absolutely literally, with scientific precision, thus triggering constantly these tedious linguistic debates. 

What countries could've been absent (I don't remember this conversation)? Been to Ireland, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy (inc/ Vatican City), Greece, Germany, Austria, Czech Republic, Romania, Hungary. May, or may not, be going to Poland next month (your guess is as good as mine) so that will be another one checked-off. Never been to Scandinavia (out of my price range and besides, I might bump into Soul!!) and your stomping ground, the low countries. Covered all the big players I believe.

[SoulMonster]

18 minutes ago, DieselDaisy said:

Exaggeration is both a rhetorical and facetious device which is used extensively in colloquial English speech and writing, however Soul cannot grasp this and interprets everything absolutely literally, with scientific precision, thus triggering constantly these tedious linguistic debates. 

"Exaggeration", you say? What an astonishing language you have! I have never heard of such a thing! The wonders of colloquial English! 

But as I said to Evan, this wasn't you exaggerating, but you lying to make your argument (that we are too harsh on Trump) stick. 

[EvanG]

1 minute ago, DieselDaisy said:

Exaggeration is both a rhetorical and facetious device which is used extensively in colloquial English speech and writing, however Soul cannot grasp this and interprets everything absolutely literally, with scientific precision, thus triggering constantly these tedious linguistic debates. 

What countries could've been absent (I don't remember this conversation)? Been to Ireland, France, Spain, Portugal, Italy (inc/ Vatican City), Greece, Germany, Austria, Czech Republic, Romania, Hungary. May, or may not, be going to Poland next month (your guess is as good as mine) so that will be another one checked-off. Never been to Scandinavia (out of my price range and besides, I might bump into Soul!!) and your stomping ground, the low countries. Covered all the big players I believe.

I have to admit, I'm that way too, at least in a discussion, I think it's important. In this example, your statement was wrong regarding ''most other countries have done worse'', which is no big deal, but your argument falls flat this way. So if you exaggerate, or bend the truth in your favour, you can expect someone to call you out on it.

As for where you've been... it doesn't matter either. I remember you saying this some time ago and considering there are 51 countries in Europe, I was genuinely impressed if you had been to almost all of them. I think I've only been to 16 or 17 as of now, hopefully I can say I have been to most of them one day.

[DieselDaisy]

(Person A) you're making a mountain out of a mole hill

(Soul) Where ist this Mole Hill you cite? I do not see any mole hill? Und how ist one supposed to make a mountain out of this (wholly fictitious) mole hill - das ist impossible with ze little time we have.

(Person A) Alright, alright, not worth making a song-and-dance about it mate

(Soul) I am not singing and not dancing. Why do you say these things - what you speak is nonsense?

(Shakespeare) All the world's a stage...

(Soul on Shakespeare) Why ist this Englisher playwright saying ''the world ist eine stage'' wann it quite clearly not is? I am not understanding this! The world does not consist entire of a platform mit curtains, looking at stalls! This play perplexes me entire.

[Ace Nova]

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Ace Nova]

 

 

[dontdamnmeuyi2015]

On 9/1/2020 at 10:14 AM, SoulMonster said:

Is it? That's just speculation on your part. You have no way of knowing that USA won't be hit harder in a second round. In fact, by looking at how poorly they have handled the first round one would be wise to think they will handle the second round poorly, too.

Most Europeans countries opened up society a long time ago, and now they have found a way to monitor the disease and quickly lock down regions and implements stricter regulation as needed. USA has not shown any signs of having learnt this rudimentary trick in handling the pandemic. They still struggle with their first wave.

Honestly, I don't believe there are different waves to this virus. I think it's one continuous wave. It just goes down a little, but never leaves and then at any time it goes back up.

The other day the Houston Mayor said for people to now crowd the beaches or have parties with large crowds over Labor Day weekend, but who knows. he said the same thing, the virus is just waiting to infect you the first chance you let your guard down.

I think this virus is in the air and just waiting to infect anyone at anytime.

I saw on the news that NYC will put portable air vents in all the classrooms and halls to try to clean the air every hour or so. Otherwise there is no air flow in the older NYC buildings.

Luckily here Texas has continuous a/c going on the schools in my district put in an air purifier back a few years ago when the flu infection was high. 

I'm hoping for the best because the schools are trying to keep everyone safe. Masks, washing hands and cleaning surface areas and the air. Hope it's enough.

We just have to do three things: wear masks, wash out hands and distance. it's all we can do and who knows if it'll be enough?

 

[Coma16]

Apparently the CDC (quietly) released a report indicating that only ~6% of Covid deaths didn't have any other health conditions. That brings the US fatalities to about 10K... pandemic indeed....