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Texas coronavirus discussion - wear your face masks, y'all
- Thread starter Deleted member 12790
- Start date
- COVID OT
Super not happy about Texas opening up like this. Trying to reduce the amount of time I spend at stores and at work. Ironically, the job I didn't really want to be stuck at at the start of the year has actually allowed me to be super flexible with my hours (and its not public facing). The only problem is that in spite of the large amount of covid related precautions in place, there is one MASSIVE choke point of potential exposure that makes coming in still feel extremely risky. It could be mitigated, but it'd be on my own dime, and would be a pain in the ass to physically keep track of said equipment during work+maintain sterility.
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Talked to my physician father today from the midwest. The biggest worry is still to come. Summer will likely keep many places at a plateau. Doctors can do an ok job distinguishing between allergies and covid. But it is still difficult. Once the flu season hits, however, things might get way worse.
Tonight in Austin while going to get curbside groceries and dinner I saw:
A line at the street to get into the parking lot of Matt's El Rancho and a line of 50+ humans not social distancing without masks to eat shitty texmex.
The sports bar in broadie oaks packed like it's the super bowl. No masks. No 6' distance. Fucking nothing.
Lin Asian where I had pickup: completely full parking lot and packed. I thought they were still curbside only. Won't be eating there again.
Outside dining is 100% open with zero distancing. Bars open Monday and half of bars in Austin have massive patios
We are so royalty fucked.
A line at the street to get into the parking lot of Matt's El Rancho and a line of 50+ humans not social distancing without masks to eat shitty texmex.
The sports bar in broadie oaks packed like it's the super bowl. No masks. No 6' distance. Fucking nothing.
Lin Asian where I had pickup: completely full parking lot and packed. I thought they were still curbside only. Won't be eating there again.
Outside dining is 100% open with zero distancing. Bars open Monday and half of bars in Austin have massive patios
We are so royalty fucked.
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It's because Texas has one of the lowest testing rates in the country. When trump said "can't report cases if you don't test," Texas is the very model of it.
Sure. But that's because we have yet to peak. NYC was side eying Seattle 6 weeks ago
Considering how our country is handling things...it's going to be catastrophic. Dumb fucking morons.
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I stocked up on groceries 2 weeks ago so I could avoid having to go out. I still have stuff to eat, but it's actually getting low. I don't know what I'm going to do when it runs out.
Yeah unfortunately the media doesn't always do a good job contextualizing this type of information. I think it's really important to do so, otherwise you sow distrust in a way that at least partially contributes to the bullshit "fake news" narrative.
i mean, reopening only works if people aren't selfish fucks, but yeh this wont change anything, when we finally get out of this and the next major pandemic happens again, people still wont learn
really wished they would have said fuck it and forced everyone stay home when this all started for 2-3 weeks unless its life threatening
really wished they would have said fuck it and forced everyone stay home when this all started for 2-3 weeks unless its life threatening
Were people eating inside? I work right behind Lin's and saw the parking lot full last night. I wanted to believe it was for pickup :(
One of us here is at a higher risk factor, so we've been doing all our shopping with Instacart. We have the shopper leave everything on the doorstep, then we bring it in after they leave. Anything that needs to be kept cold gets wiped down with disinfectant right away, and everything else just sits in the bag out of the way for a few days.
I'm from Georgia, and you can't compare New York (one of the most densely populated places in the world) to states where there are vast stretches of rural communities.
58 people getting seriously ill could completely overwhelm some places. Also, as others have pointed out, it's 58 one day, then 43 tomorrow, then 61 another day, then 34, then 55, then 70, and so forth for months. It doesn't stop until the Fall, and then it may start back up again.
I consider myself very fortunate that my north Austin office has told me to go ahead and wfh for the rest of the year. Only a handful of people will be going back on site to keep things running for the rest of us at home and to start prepping the office for social distancing whenever the company decides to have more folks work from the office.
Just staying home as much as possible and masking up and keeping my distance when I do have to go out.
Just staying home as much as possible and masking up and keeping my distance when I do have to go out.
If what I've heard from my sister who works in education is right. It is gonna get even worse in June. Lots of rumbling that the state government is gonna try to blast open everything it can in June.
Also it is getting so fucking old having to explain to people telling me "well harris county only has ___ cases right now." that it does not fucking matter what Harris counties confirmed cases are. We don't have enough damn test kits to test everyone! Oh and another fun one is our numbers will actually drop for the next 2 says as the testing locations are gonna be closed due to some flooding concerns. So I'm gonna have to explain to more idiots that it only went down because we reduced testing for a few days.
Also it is getting so fucking old having to explain to people telling me "well harris county only has ___ cases right now." that it does not fucking matter what Harris counties confirmed cases are. We don't have enough damn test kits to test everyone! Oh and another fun one is our numbers will actually drop for the next 2 says as the testing locations are gonna be closed due to some flooding concerns. So I'm gonna have to explain to more idiots that it only went down because we reduced testing for a few days.
Yep. Their patio has tons of people eating and inside was whatever they can get away with.
2 weeks ago we got Lin and it was 100% pickup. I was the only pickup order to ight at 8:30.
Who could've seen this coming? What's frustrating is the lack of empathy from people who "know I'll be fine so whatever" anytime you bring it up. I've had a family member say "if it isn't going away soon, might as well go back to normal" without any understanding how this is changing things. Fuck's sake.
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Not only that, but the number of deaths per day is increasing disproportionally compared to the increase in testing:
:watermark(cdn.texastribune.org/media/watermarks/2020.png,-0,30,0)/static.texastribune.org/media/files/89ee34ff0f85740dcefc285dbce528f4/Fort%20Worth%20Testing%20Site%20ST%20TT%2001.jpg)
As Texas reopens, coronavirus cases are increasing while testing misses benchmarks
Texas has seen a modest but steady increase in the growth of new coronavirus cases in the two weeks since some businesses reopened at 25% capacity. Gov. Greg Abbott sees hope in other metrics.
www.texastribune.org
As testing has increased 30% in Texas, the death rate has increased 12%, much, much higher than the death rate of the virus in most areas.
Also, Texas has failed to hit it's lower-boundry benchmarks in testing all but 3 days since reopening. Texas is testing 20,000 people a day in a state with 29 million. 0.06% of the state per day. As noted yesterday during Dr Bright's conference, it's not just a single test people need. They need to be tested over, and over again, because just because you don't have the virus one day, doesn't mean you don't have the virus the next.
The "increase" in testing isn't large enough to cover the spike in both cases and deaths.
Welcome to Florida. We have beaches and gyms.
Bars and Theaters are still closed.
But go get the virus in our gyms and beaches.
Not only that, but the number of deaths per day is increasing disproportionally compared to the increase in testing:
As Texas reopens, coronavirus cases are increasing while testing misses benchmarks
Texas has seen a modest but steady increase in the growth of new coronavirus cases in the two weeks since some businesses reopened at 25% capacity. Gov. Greg Abbott sees hope in other metrics.
As testing has increased 30% in Texas, the death rate has increased 12%, much, much higher than the death rate of the virus in most areas.
Also, Texas has failed to hit it's lower-boundry benchmarks in testing all but 3 days since reopening. Texas is testing 20,000 people a day in a state with 29 million. 0.06% of the state per day. As noted yesterday during Dr Bright's conference, it's not just a single test people need. They need to be tested over, and over again, because just because you don't have the virus one day, doesn't mean you don't have the virus the next.
The "increase" in testing isn't large enough to cover the spike in both cases and deaths.
Oh, I live near South Lamar and Oltorf. Black sheep is gonna open Monday. Buckle up. Duty 6th will open up. East 6th will open up. It's going to be a fucking nightmare in 3 weeks.
Birds reopens Monday. My climbing gym (Crux) reopens this week. They are taking precautions that sound reasonable on paper but there is zero control.
Deaths haven't really been spiking. They've stayed pretty consistent over the past couple weeks, and hospitalizations actually decreased between May 4-11.
Percentage of COVID-19 hospitalizations in Texas drops slightly, deaths hold steady
As hospitalization rates from the virus creep upward, the percentage of new cases requiring hospital care has begun dropping slightly.
www.kvue.com
Texas Coronavirus Map and Case Count
A detailed county map shows the extent of the coronavirus outbreak, with tables of the number of cases by county.
www.nytimes.com
The 7 day rolling average of deaths is right around where it was at the end of April, definitely not spiking.
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I shaved my head down to the scalp with a razor about 3 weeks ago. Even right now, it's still super short, much shorter than my hair normally would be. I don't think I'll need another hair cut for maybe 3 or so weeks. At which point, I'll just shave it again. I can count the number of times I've gone out on one hand since then, and even then, people have told me my shorter hair looks better.
I was tested a few days ago with the rapid test because I started showing viral infection symptoms and I'm severely immunocompromised. My white count have tanked, and the thing that really lit a fire under my doctors was my potassium level being super low ( I guess that happens in covid?)
It came back negative but they told me to pretend I have it since it's a good chance it's a false negative.
Fuck all those people opening early I was super careful and still...
It came back negative but they told me to pretend I have it since it's a good chance it's a false negative.
Fuck all those people opening early I was super careful and still...
I'm just letting mine grow, it's not like I'm interviewing any time soon.
And in the 3-5 days leading up to you feeling sick, you'll be spreading it to anyone you come in contact with, depending on what the AC is like where you work even people you don't come into contact with. And that's assuming you show symptoms if you do catch it. If not congrats you could be asymptomatically spreading it to people for weeks. As deimosmasque said you should go get tested immediately. Then go get tested again.
Amen brother. I have let mine grow out since it began. Need a bit more product to keep it in control than usual, but rare that I have to do. Only important meetings or photoshoots. Most of the time I am on a meeting I just wear a hat or a toque. This has been the biggest my beard has gotten and everyone just gives compliments on it. My wife will be getting her chance to finally cut my hair and shave/trim my beard which is something she has been asking for since for the better part of decade. I'm excited to see the outcome.
According to The NY Times data, Texas has been seeing an increase in reported cases since April 25th (before they reopened)
Texas Coronavirus Map and Case Count
A detailed county map shows the extent of the coronavirus outbreak, with tables of the number of cases by county.
www.nytimes.com
That's why it's a bet. Our estimates and predictions keep going up and down everyday. The biggest consistent factor here is the less that is done, the more who are in danger of dying.
I'm basically betting the Government's response will continue to be so bafflingly bad, and there will be so many people purposely putting themselves in harm's way, that the death rates will far succeed current estimates.
The fact that the mere existence and threat of the virus is political basically means 1/3 to half the population will do next to nothing to protect themselves or others. You already have people killing each other over mask wearing. Combine that with the R0 factor, and how the infection spreads, and I could see this becoming endemic on a state level in some places.
And from personal experience from my time in Hokkaido, it's extremely hard to lock down a region for a second time, and this is from a largely obedient population. Lockdown ain't happening again guaranteed in many parts of the US. And without lockdown, you won't be slowing the rate of infection nor letting the virus die out, and allowing an already overtaxed healthcare system to burn out.
Unless something really drastic happens within the next 3 months, I don't see how America couldn't reach 1 million casualties. I've basically learned over the last 3 years that whatever the worse case could be, it can get much worse. So I'm basically reaching for the worst possible outcome I can think of and hoping I'm dead wrong, but I bet I won't be.
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If stuff opened 2 weeks ago , that number is only going 1 way sadly. I take it no officials are tracking the R number indicating rate of infection. Given some of the stories in this thread it must be through the roof. Such a sad avoidable situation.
One of my tenants decided that since Texas is opening up and their cases are low and "they've handled things better than here in CA", he's gonna go visit his daughter for a few weeks.
He's not the smartest guy but I was still surprised at his stupidity. He came by and gave me his rent check for June since he may not be back in time. He also took his two grandkids (ages 1 & 4).
And before anyone asks, the 3 adults in that household are currently earning more being unemployed than they were when employed full-time so I don't feel bad about him paying us rent in advance.
I do feel bad for those two kids.
He's not the smartest guy but I was still surprised at his stupidity. He came by and gave me his rent check for June since he may not be back in time. He also took his two grandkids (ages 1 & 4).
And before anyone asks, the 3 adults in that household are currently earning more being unemployed than they were when employed full-time so I don't feel bad about him paying us rent in advance.
I do feel bad for those two kids.
According to The NY Times data, Texas has been seeing an increase in reported cases since April 25th (before they reopened)
Texas Coronavirus Map and Case Count
A detailed county map shows the extent of the coronavirus outbreak, with tables of the number of cases by county.www.nytimes.com
Also, the governor is making announcements for phase 2 Monday. I've heard their intention is to only restrict things back when hospitals are over run. This is why it is only going to get worse from here on for the next year.
If you are a an essential worker. Get tested whenever you can.
If you are an essential worker in the United States of America, you're probably infected.
If you can talk about the fact that you had a haircut, GET FUCKING TESTED AND STAY HOME!!!!
Buy a cloth mask so you can at least pretend you aren't killing everyone you come out in contact with.
And fucking realize that even if you aren't feeling sick, that doesn't mean you are not infected.
And stop returning Amazon packages, or Fashion Nova packages, or Adidas packages, or Spectrum modems, or Frontier modems.
Just stop returning stuff. The $15 or $20 going to get back for that return don't matter compared to my life.
And stop handing us your cellphones.
No way will we get to 1 million deaths imo. Don't see much to suggest than an American vaccine will be rushed compared to any other candidates internationally, nor anything to suggest it's going to be inherently more unsafe or ineffective.
I was thinking something similar just now. Have been for a while. It's so disappointing, and maybe I'm a coward, but I don't think I want to be a part of this country in the future. I want to live in a country where people are taken care of.
I edited my a second post to list my reasonings. And if you think I'm wrong...
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Bernie Sanders asked FDC commissioner Stephen Hahn during his senate hearing if any future vaccine would be available for free to the public.
He said "it will be available to everyone who wants it."
Asked again, to clarify, "For free?"
"It will be available."
Asked a third time, "For free, at no cost to the patient?"
"No comment."
Refusing to make a vaccine like this free where it would be in virtually the entire rest of the world will without a doubt make it less effective.