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Princess Turandot

Princess Turandot's Journal
Princess Turandot's Journal
March 25, 2020

NYC (sadly) has an extensive contingency plan for this...

This is a bit sensationalistic, I expect.

'Morgues' are referring to the official facilities of the NYC Medical Examiner (I assume). However, each hospital also has facilities for the deceased because of normal transportation delays, and because in the normal course of matters, only certain cases need to be sent to the ME. The hospital facilities thus will also be used.

The main ME facility in Manhattan is part of a half-mile 11-block long stretch of private, public and VA health facilities between First Avenue and the East River. If it comes to it, they have quite a bit of room for refrigeration trucks on the side streets; that's what they did post 9/11.

This is just a conjecture on my part, but given the uncertainty around the virus, concerns about infection control will be the challenge here, from the hospital mortuary to the funeral directors/morticians. I read that in China by decree of the government most of the deceased were cremated as quickly as possible, without any ceremony/funeral attended by family members. I don't see that happening here.

March 23, 2020

The Army Corp of Engineers has begun the installation of 4 FEMA emergency hospitals in NYC's Javits

Convention Center. Each hospital has 250 beds, and is 40,000 sq ft in size, so it will provide 1,000 beds in total. They will be built on the Center's main exhibit floor, which per Wikipedia is 840,000 sq ft. (There will also be 320 federal staff coming along, although I'm not quite sure what they'll be doing.) They're also considering the addition of another 1,000 beds which would be used for patients who need a less intensive level of care. They hope to have the initial facilities running within 10 days.

In addition, the ACE will be erecting 3 field hospitals inside of other buildings in the NYC area.

Governor Cuomo provided information on the work here:

https://twitter.com/NYGovCuomo/status/1242181379015794689
If the video below shows only a black box, clicking on that will take you to it on Periscope.
https://twitter.com/NYGovCuomo/status/1242144891032895488

March 21, 2020

Live Science had a decent article on this...

The French health minister was referring to a letter submission to Lancet. Subsequent to his comments, the researchers added a statement on how to interpret their letter, which puts forth what the authors say is a hypothesis that is 'information for researchers, not patients' that 'does not constitute a recommendation to use certain drugs or not.'


Live Science: Should you take ibuprofen if you have COVID-19?

There's a lot of speculation but very little data to say one way or another.

The health minister's warning was based on a recent letter published in the journal The Lancet that suggested such anti-inflammatory drugs boost the body's production of an enzyme that sits on the cell's surface, known as ACE2. The coronavirus hijacks these ACE2 receptors to enter human cells.The authors hypothesized that drugs that spur the body to produce more of this enzyme would allow the virus to infect more cells, which in turn could increase the risk of developing "severe and fatal" COVID-19.

"The only problem is they offer no proof that this actually occurs," Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at Columbia University in New York, wrote on Twitter. "And this hypothesis relies on several major assumptions that may not be true."
March 21, 2020

Or that after swearing to shut down the so-called wet markets where Chinese scientists determined..

that the SARS virus jumped from a bat via a civet to a shopper, crossing the species line in 2003, they kinda didn't really do that. (Although they did subsequently thoroughly sanitize the wet-market where they believe COVID-19 got its all-access pass.)

As to Taiwan, WHO initially refused to allow them to collaborate in the various activities/ conferences etc that they were organizing. (They did eventually reverse that.)

March 12, 2020

Yes. Cuomo and for NYC, de Blasio.

They're both smart and not inclined to panic. Or make decisions based upon idiocy.

Yesterday, Cuomo ordered a 1 mile containment area around part of New Rochelle in Westchester. This is the area associated with the attorney who became ill last week, if you recall the story. New Rochelle is a serious hotspot: the order prohibits large gatherings. This affects several public and private schools, houses of worship among others. He also called up the National Guard to work on disinfecting buildings/streets etc. They will also be delivering meals to kids from the closed schools who depend upon school-provided meals for much of their nutrition.

Also, de Blasio has made a point of telling people during his briefings that folks who are not insured will be tested for covid-19 without any financial repercussions to them. And that no one will be asking about anyone's immigration status when someone comes in for a test. Cuomo has ordered insurance companies licensed to operate in NYS to waive cost sharing requirements (i.e. coinsurance/deductibles) for all stages of the testing process for people who have insurance.

Happily, the governor of NJ, Phil Murphy, is also a Democrat. Were Christie still there, he'd probably be bricking up the Jersey-side exits of the Hudson River tunnels right about now.

March 9, 2020

As of this moment, the reported stats for Italy are worse....

They show a case fatality rate of 5%: 463 deaths/9172 cases = 5.05%

Iran's rate is ~3%. China's Hubei province (includes Wuhan) is 4.4%

Worldwide is 3.5%.

Data per JHU: https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

March 8, 2020

Earlier today, CNN reported on a meeting between Pence and members of the cruise line industry...

that took place today. (It's in their live update roll, which doesn't provide links to most entries: https://www.cnn.com/asia/live-news/coronavirus-outbreak-03-07-20-intl-hnk/index.html)

Hopefully, these means that they are removing them from the ship before any next care/quarantine steps, not just parking them out of the way.

Pence said state and federal officials have “developed a plan which is being implemented this weekend to bring the ship into a non-commercial port. All passengers and crew will be tested for the coronavirus and quarantined as appropriate. Those that require additional medical attention will also receive it."

Also, the trade industry guy discussed the costs:

Adam Goldstein, global chairman of the Cruise Lines International Association, told Pence it was the “commitment” of the cruise line industry to “work closely with government and to go above and beyond anything we are currently doing to screen even more stringently to prevent those who should not be allowed to board, to monitor and test and care for those who are on board and to transition and help pay for any sick guests or crew to move to locations staffed and equipped COVID-19 cases."

“We will work aggressively with government to further develop and strengthen all necessary protocols for prevention, for detection and for care,” Goldstein said.
March 2, 2020

As of right now, the overall case fatality rate for all ages is actually 3.4%..

That's based upon 3,044 confirmed deaths divided by 89,070 cases as of 11:33 PM on 3/1.

The data is from the Coronavirus COVID-19 Global Cases mapping project being run by the Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE).

The data is from various governments' sources, so there may be some consistency questions, but it's the information available.

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