May well be. A more optimistic view would have less severe recurrences as herd immunity increases each time.
And more vents and PPE.
Leave me a little bit of hope 
5 Likes
I don’t think so. We have a whole mess of people that are developing antigens, and soon we’ll have some herd immunity. People will be getting sick for a few years, but we won’t have more than a couple months of lockdown.
1 Like
3 months from now we may have a better handle on the epidemic here in terms of reducing the rate of infection. My office and court systems are penciling in late June as the “control date” to check to see if things can resume. Its not the most unreasonable expectation.
But then again, I am in the NY metro area and the local government was taking this all very seriously. Same isn’t true of the states where these miscreants hang out in.
Somehow I think they will probably move the date if they expect people to show up.
7 Likes
Well, I don’t know about you but I don’t invite them over my house or anything.
Yeah, I get it. But I can still be pretty satisfied with “IF the racists assholes do get sick and die” thing.
What, the ones getting arrested for continuing to hold services?
Yep, that’s the thing - I’ve seen June mentioned as a likely peak for coronavirus infections in large parts of the US. So it’s probably the worst possible time, not that holding a mass gathering will be a good idea for (very optimistically) the next year (or however long it is until they have a vaccine in distribution).
I don’t think we’re going to have the current level of lockdown for the next 12-18 months (it’s not sustainable, politically if nothing else), but even when the current lockdown gets lifted, mass gatherings are certainly going to be dumb, if not banned outright, until the vaccine gets released. I’m baffled by various events that were supposed to be held this spring that got “delayed” until summer, as if that will be any better. People should have known better, even in February.
Actually, we won’t:
12 Likes
The darwin awards come to mind… I think everybody should take their responsibility. If they want to be stupid enough to gather in big groups they should take responsibility for their own illness that follows and the infections they cause. The problem is that these fascists always look for some external party to blame. In this case they are fighting the ‘chinese’ virus.
4 Likes
2 Likes
Ooooh. I have a mini rolling trash bin and I have now learned how to upgrade it to a fine centerpiece. Thanks!
6 Likes
Sounds like the last few years.
4 Likes
I have five doctors in my family, including two sisters. They don’t get to choose the caliber of people they come into close contact. Neither do grocers and cashiers and delivery people and the rest of the folks who are exposing themselves to others in the interest of keeping our society running.
So yeah, if those bigots get themselves infected it’s going to eventually have a ripple effect through the rest of society.
18 Likes
If you read my post In The thread “are you ok” you’d know I do. medical professionals are in the line of fire regardless of who gets sick.
2 Likes
I read that one too. The author’s right that developing herd immunity shouldn’t be policy, or the primary way we dodge this bullet (because that would mean we’ve already had lots dead and sufering from the disease, no fix). But at some point, the infection will spread through the comunity, even with social distancing, and that will provide us the vulnerable with some measure of protection. It won’t be for a long while, but the idea that we’ll spend years in lockdown is far-fetched. I guess by “soon” I meant the fall, not next week.
2 Likes
Well, isn’t that the epitome of stupid!
I attend a sizable “kinky camping” event in the Midwest USA. We have two events per year, one in June and one in September. The board held out hope as long as they possibly could, but finally announced the cancellation of June’s event today. Yeah, we all knew this was where things were going, but it was the right decision and although it was inevitable, that hope remained until it just wasn’t possible that we’d have some semblance of normal by then.
For now, the September one remains, but of course the board is watching the situation. They are consulting with the medical staff and keeping up to date with the CDC and WHO data. It’s also almost certain that they’ll have to cancel that one, but they’re not going to do it now, because our community is pretty devastated already. The board is holding out hope to attend because they know what it means to some of us to have that beacon up ahead; we can’t get there right now, but we’ll see our tribe again in September. They’re not canceling the second one to give us some hope, but also because they need that hope too right now.
Oh yeah, hi all. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?
5 Likes
If the American Society for Microbiology has cancelled their June conference, I think it’s safe to say that the neonazi conference is not reasonable.
7 Likes
Why? Surely all of them with have their deluxe R-Ticket and there’ll be no one left to close the door.
Perhaps, but:
- We don’t know how long the antigens last.
- Viruses mutate a lot. (RNA copying is probably a lot more error-prone than DNA copying.)
Hopefully we aren’t worrying about COVID-20 by next winter.
Increase in covid infections in Western Australia is now down to about 2% per day and there is speculation they will look for ways to increase the rate of infection, lest they finish up as an isolated covid free state with permanently closed borders.
People who wear MAGA hats are members of a hate group. You won’t see any Nobel physicists running with that crowd.
3 Likes
My understanding was that even in a relatively worst-case scenario, we’d still not have enough people get infected to provide any kind of real herd immunity, much less with the kind of infection rate we’re aiming for with the social distancing currently going on. (And that’s assuming getting infected and surviving provides long-term immunity - or at least for a couple years, until the next wave of mutations.)
