Football this fall? No way

[Big Hoss]

European schools are open - with no problems. (There’s your SCIENCE.)

Because they got ahead of it faster than the US, and most countries shut down more than the US did. Now their coming out of it and able to open back up more than we are. Actual proof of the science and yet we continue to argue about our response in the US. God we are stubborn!

[SMU Pom Mom]

Some (who have more scientific and/or medical degrees than most on here) have estimated that the number of those who have died because of coronavirus could be several times the reported numbers.

A few months ago, at the height of the NY outbreak, I saw an interview with an official from the NYC coroner's office. The agency is tasked with retrieving bodies of people who died in their homes. They were getting 175-200 calls per day, up from a normal of 25. That's a good 10K people who died from this virus who are not counted in the total, and that's just one city.

[malonish]

Some (who have more scientific and/or medical degrees than most on here) have estimated that the number of those who have died because of coronavirus could be several times the reported numbers.

A few months ago, at the height of the NY outbreak, I saw an interview with an official from the NYC coroner's office. The agency is tasked with retrieving bodies of people who died in their homes. They were getting 175-200 calls per day, up from a normal of 25. That's a good 10K people who died from this virus who are not counted in the total, and that's just one city.

I personally know a paramedic in NYC and he also told me this. Shout out to Chubbz.

[EastStang]

As I said on the other thread, some experts believe the real number of those infected is closer to 30 Million or approximately 9% of the population. That means that 90% of those infected don't know or they have it or have been briefly symptomatic and have chosen not to get tested. The children's disease that is six months old, is scary, but its a different virus, probably more similar to the flu in its deadliness. We don't close schools for a year for flu.

We are having one of the worst crime summers on record, is it because of rioters? Is it because young people in inner cities have nothing to do with no playgrounds, no schools, no rec centers, no gyms, no pools? With no school in the fall, do you think that will improve? So, let's get real dystopian. If the choice is between children getting sick and perhaps dying with open schools, or children being gunned down, beaten, and/or stabbed, without open schools, which would you choose? It may be a false premise, it may not be a false premise, we don't know. I suspect with no schools, and two earner households there will be a lot of free range kids out there.

[mustangxc]

Some (who have more scientific and/or medical degrees than most on here) have estimated that the number of those who have died because of coronavirus could be several times the reported numbers.

A few months ago, at the height of the NY outbreak, I saw an interview with an official from the NYC coroner's office. The agency is tasked with retrieving bodies of people who died in their homes. They were getting 175-200 calls per day, up from a normal of 25. That's a good 10K people who died from this virus who are not counted in the total, and that's just one city.

...and yet the deniers keep insisting that someone who died of a car accident was added to the COVID-19 totals!

[RunningStang]

There is some good news. Moderna’s vaccine passed phase 1 and is on the way to phase 3 for approval. Personally, I think that for this season only, football should be moved from the fall to the spring. More likely, we could have a full season with fans. Especially if they get the vaccine available by the end of the year.


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[mavsrage311]

I'm with Malonish. If more people took this seriously instead of making excuses or blaming political parties and actually wore masks and social distanced, we wouldn't be wondering if we will have a football season.

[ponyboy]

I. There are two primary schools of thought: 1. The science is clear, what the authorities tell us is reasonable, and the restrictions are not too hard. Just do what they say and we'll have our best chance out of this. 2. There's a lot of misreading of data, the authorities have overstepped their bounds, you're not going to stop -- only delay -- the progress of this virus, so why waste so much time spending a lot of money and running around telling everyone else what to do. I tend to the latter way of thinking, but I'm open to being wrong. I do wear my mask (out of respect for others, primarily).

II. There's no doubt this virus is serious. It's clearly worse than the seasonal flu, even though mortalities -- at least in Texas -- are going to be about as bad as a bad flu year (see 2018). (In Texas, if a universal vaccine doesn't sweep on the scene before mid- to late-October, we'll close this thing out at about 10.5K deaths when we reach herd immunity. We're a little over 3K as of last week). The reason it's particularly bad, though, has to do with the non-mortal side effects, permanent damage, etc.

III. The way we're calculating mortality rate (IFR) is wrong. For some reason beyond my comprehension, we are not considering the fact that the overwhelming majority of people who catch COVID-19 are never tested.

So here's an example taken from the last time I collected Texas data on 7/12 (source covidtracking.com):

Out of 2.5M tests, 250K were positive and 2.2M were negative. 3,192 people have died. That's a mortality rate of 1.23%. in Texas, right? Wrong: Conservative estimates are that 15 to 16 times more people have caught the damn thing, recovered, and never bothered to get an official test to confirm COVID-19 than those who got it and got a positive test. So the *actual* mortality rate is something closer to .18% -- not 1.23%.

The flu's mortality rate is .1%. This thing is .18. Add in the non-mortal COVID-19 effects and, voila!, you have about twice as bad as the seasonal flu in a normal year.

IV. One other vital thing to remember: flattening the curve was never about fewer cases or fatalities. It was always about spreading those out over time so that we didn't overwhelm ICU's -- and maybe, just maybe, so we could come up with an effective universal vaccine before the thing naturally played itself out. Want to spend an entire year's GDP? Restrict freedoms as in no time since WWII? Guarantee a deep recession, if not a full on depression? Just so we can *delay* mortalities for something about twice as bad as the flu?

I still think Malmo, Sweden had the right idea. Take limited precautionary steps, but otherwise go on about your business, keep everything open, take strong steps to protect the elderly and frail. End of story.

[mustangxc]

If you are going to adjust for True positives not counted for COVID-19 you also need to take that into account for influenza. In my life I've never once been tested for influenza and am sure I've had it more than a handful of times as I've had viral illness last 3+ weeks several times so for that matter the mortality rate for influenza is grossly overstated too.

Also, you make a good point about flattening the curve being about not overwhelming the system. Well, in Texas we need to flatten the curve now. New York is in good shape in that regard now. Once we get a handle on the pandemic in Texas then we can get back to more normal living.

I am of the belief that we either should have had a much stronger and swifter response to the pandemic initially or simply gone about business as usual taking proper precautions with masks, social distancing, no large gatherings and limiting capacity at bars, etc. The US government both nationally and locally, truly bungles the response into an international laughingstock. The personal finances of most people, aside from the uber wealthy, are in the tank. At this point the best thing to do is what we probably should have done from the start. Take proper precautions and go one with everything. The problem is too many in this country cannot be bothered to respect their fellow citizens as you are doing ponyboy by wearing a mask that as you say may not help but shows your respect for others. We really are a spoiled nation and our sense of entitlement is disgusting.

[malonish]

CDC director said that if people would just wear a mask like they should this thing would be licked in 6 weeks. Let's round up and call it 2 whole months and we can get our S back to normal.

But no. There are a subset of **both** sides of the aisle who are all bout "Muh Freedom" and refuse to do the basic stuff because they are feeling overly entitled.

[gostangs]

CDC director said that if people would just wear a mask like they should this thing would be licked in 6 weeks. Let's round up and call it 2 whole months and we can get our S back to normal.

But no. There are a subset of **both** sides of the aisle who are all bout "Muh Freedom" and refuse to do the basic stuff because they are feeling overly entitled.

I dont know where you are where you dont see masks. Ive been out quite a bit and literally everyone has them on. Now if you are distanced and outside than i think you can skip it - but there is not really push back on masks other than a statistical handful.

This will run its course because it runs out of susceptible people to catch it. Like every other virus. If our curve behaves like the other areas of the world you will see a pretty major reduction in Texas within the next week or so. Our death counts and hospitalizations are already way better than most - primarily due to the lower age of those catching it currently.

Mask up. Distance. Live your life and wait it out.

[malonish]

CDC director said that if people would just wear a mask like they should this thing would be licked in 6 weeks. Let's round up and call it 2 whole months and we can get our S back to normal.

But no. There are a subset of **both** sides of the aisle who are all bout "Muh Freedom" and refuse to do the basic stuff because they are feeling overly entitled.

I dont know where you are where you dont see masks. Ive been out quite a bit and literally everyone has them on. Now if you are distanced and outside than i think you can skip it - but there is not really push back on masks other than a statistical handful.

This will run its course because it runs out of susceptible people to catch it. Like every other virus. If our curve behaves like the other areas of the world you will see a pretty major reduction in Texas within the next week or so. Our death counts and hospitalizations are already way better than most - primarily due to the lower age of those catching it currently.

Mask up. Distance. Live your life and wait it out.

I dont know where you are where you dont see masks.

Texas.

There are tons of places where before laws were put into place few people wore them. Places where it's not the Law have a high rate of mask forgetfulness (read: disdain for fellow man).

Georgia Gov. issued an order banning cities from making mask mandates. There is a high number of people that will not do it unless it's the law and a smaller group that will just go ahead and break it anyway. I know a nurse in GA and he's right in there treating all those people. He says from his POV there's an 80% rate of people not wearing masks. The "strong suggestion" is not being heeded.

Even in TX the gyms aren't enforcing masks even though their signs say that they are required.

Bonus points: Michigan.

[JasonB]

I. There are two primary schools of thought: 1. The science is clear, what the authorities tell us is reasonable, and the restrictions are not too hard. Just do what they say and we'll have our best chance out of this. 2. There's a lot of misreading of data, the authorities have overstepped their bounds, you're not going to stop -- only delay -- the progress of this virus, so why waste so much time spending a lot of money and running around telling everyone else what to do. I tend to the latter way of thinking, but I'm open to being wrong. I do wear my mask (out of respect for others, primarily).

II. There's no doubt this virus is serious. It's clearly worse than the seasonal flu, even though mortalities -- at least in Texas -- are going to be about as bad as a bad flu year (see 2018). (In Texas, if a universal vaccine doesn't sweep on the scene before mid- to late-October, we'll close this thing out at about 10.5K deaths when we reach herd immunity. We're a little over 3K as of last week). The reason it's particularly bad, though, has to do with the non-mortal side effects, permanent damage, etc.

III. The way we're calculating mortality rate (IFR) is wrong. For some reason beyond my comprehension, we are not considering the fact that the overwhelming majority of people who catch COVID-19 are never tested.

So here's an example taken from the last time I collected Texas data on 7/12 (source covidtracking.com):

Out of 2.5M tests, 250K were positive and 2.2M were negative. 3,192 people have died. That's a mortality rate of 1.23%. in Texas, right? Wrong: Conservative estimates are that 15 to 16 times more people have caught the damn thing, recovered, and never bothered to get an official test to confirm COVID-19 than those who got it and got a positive test. So the *actual* mortality rate is something closer to .18% -- not 1.23%.

The flu's mortality rate is .1%. This thing is .18. Add in the non-mortal COVID-19 effects and, voila!, you have about twice as bad as the seasonal flu in a normal year.

IV. One other vital thing to remember: flattening the curve was never about fewer cases or fatalities. It was always about spreading those out over time so that we didn't overwhelm ICU's -- and maybe, just maybe, so we could come up with an effective universal vaccine before the thing naturally played itself out. Want to spend an entire year's GDP? Restrict freedoms as in no time since WWII? Guarantee a deep recession, if not a full on depression? Just so we can *delay* mortalities for something about twice as bad as the flu?

I still think Malmo, Sweden had the right idea. Take limited precautionary steps, but otherwise go on about your business, keep everything open, take strong steps to protect the elderly and frail. End of story.

1) Dude, you still didn't pay attention to the math lesson in the other post. You can't determine any death rate by using active cases in the calculation.

2) if you are going to bust out the CDC IFR for Flu (0.10), then please share their calculation for Covid rather than yours and tell me it is the same. You can't, because it isn't. It is 0.65, 6.5x higher than the flu. In the CDC best case scenario, they have it at 0.5. Worst case is 0.8. Most likely is 0.65.

Again, if your argument is that a lot of people are going to die, but oh well, then that is fine, share your opinion. But stop sticking your head in the sand and pretending that the facts aren't available.

[ponyboy]

You're right, Jason. I'm sorry about that. I agreed to go back to active cases from three weeks ago as a fair method of determining mortality rate. It was an unintentional gaffe. I should have just looked at my spreadsheet instead of trying to do the calcs manually.

Look, let's just reset and start over. I'll walk this through step by step.

Here's the data source I'll be using, Texas only. https://covidtracking.com/data/state/texas)

1. As of yesterday, 7/19, we had 3,948 deaths from COVID-19.
2. Assuming the disease runs its course in three weeks, we need the positive tests number for 6/28. That number is 148,728 positive tests.
3. How do we determine how many actually caught COVID-19, but never bothered to go get an official test? There's a lot of arguing back and forth out there as to what that number might be. But let's stay super conservative and go with Dr. Robert Redfield, Director of the CDC. He says 10x.
(Source: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/hea ... 258374001/)
4. So the actual number of infections on 6/28 was 1.64M (148,728 * 11)
5. 3,948 deaths on 7/19 divided by 1.64M people infected on 6/28 is an effective mortality rate (IFR) of .242% for COVID-19 in Texas

I don't know where in the world anyone is getting the .5 and .65 IFR numbers you're quoting. But conservatively, in Texas, the mortality rate is at most 2.4x that of the seasonal flu right now. Our IFR is going down day on day, as it has been since we've been keeping data. (For instance, on June 24th, the number was .3. It was .4 on May 29th and .5 on May 16th). I think it's very reasonable to expect it to continue this decline as we continue forward.

Again, let me know if you want to see the spreadsheet.

[mustangxc]

Again, most people that catch the season flu also don't get tested for it so you're not comparing apples to apples.