Personal Update / Conspiracies I'm Ignoring / Deaths on the Decline / Risk-Based Assessment Approach
Personal Update
Personal Update
Okay, I'm going to try to shorten the time to produce these newsletters. Last week was just crazy. It took me at least 5-6 hours doing the research, editing, etc. It was lots of fun, but it wore me out, and it's come to my attention that I've been neglecting other aspects of my life.
After high stress at the day job and my almost-COVID-but-not sickness, I've gone into what I like to call "to-do-list debt." I've been putting off many tasks, especially in my music and fiction writing. So, I've got to take some measures.
Tonight you get no research from me. I'm just going to get personal, and tell you how I feel. After that, I'll briefly describe the Risk-Based Assessment thing I mentioned last week, and explain how that works.
After high stress at the day job and my almost-COVID-but-not sickness, I've gone into what I like to call "to-do-list debt." I've been putting off many tasks, especially in my music and fiction writing. So, I've got to take some measures.
Tonight you get no research from me. I'm just going to get personal, and tell you how I feel. After that, I'll briefly describe the Risk-Based Assessment thing I mentioned last week, and explain how that works.
Now back to my story ... I really hate failing tests, even when it's COVID related. I took two "quick" tests a month apart, and both were NEGATIVE. Last week I took an antibody test, and it was NEGATIVE, making it very clear to me that the chances of me ever having the virus are small ... around 10% (okay ... maybe not that small).
And that kind of depressed me. I had thought I caught it and was suffering from "long haulers" syndrome where RNA fragments remain long enough to wreak havoc for months, even though not contagious. If it were true, it would mean that I caught the bug, I survived, and I wasn't going to die -- even though I was getting super tired all the time.
But now I know ... I am still susceptible, and I have absolutely no reason to believe that when I catch it that it will be mild. In my low 50's, I'm already on the border of danger, and my susceptibility to catching sinus infections and bronchitis with every single nasal sickness I get increases my chances of being bad enough to be hospitalized.
And that kind of depressed me. I had thought I caught it and was suffering from "long haulers" syndrome where RNA fragments remain long enough to wreak havoc for months, even though not contagious. If it were true, it would mean that I caught the bug, I survived, and I wasn't going to die -- even though I was getting super tired all the time.
But now I know ... I am still susceptible, and I have absolutely no reason to believe that when I catch it that it will be mild. In my low 50's, I'm already on the border of danger, and my susceptibility to catching sinus infections and bronchitis with every single nasal sickness I get increases my chances of being bad enough to be hospitalized.
On the other hand, I'm really starting to miss seeing all my friends and being able to eat in a restaurant, and all-around watching a thriving economy. I was really hoping for that POSITIVE antibody test result so I could venture out more into society. And then I learn that I have to continue to be careful? It's like a mid-life crisis. It almost feels like I'm back to square one in this whole pandemic thing.
Then again, maybe it won't be so bad. I'm pretty sure I've caught the regular cold coronavirus, so perhaps I have adequate T-Cell immunity to fight off this new coronavirus quickly. Plus I have O+ blood, which is supposed to help (something I haven't researched yet).
The guys at work call me Pestilence. Last year in February, I got really, really sick ... most likely a flu. The real sickness lasted only a few days, and it was only a mild fever, but it still knocked me out for a full month. I only took 3 days off from work max, but I chose to work from home for a couple of weeks. That was fun ... do some coding, fix some processes for a couple of hours, then the chills would hit, and so I'd lay down under my desk shivering next to the space heater for about 20 minutes, and then I'd get back up to do more work.
And when I finally did go back in to work, my coworkers said I looked like death -- I was walking really slow, and that stupid bronchitis had me coughing more than usual. That was funny. I believe I caught the bug from someone sitting near me in a department that didn't really let you take sick days because you were that important. And I came to learn that three other guys sitting around me caught the bug, too. Only, they didn't get as sick as me.
And a few years ago, our whole department got hit by a stomach bug ... on the same day! I called in sick, and my boss accused me of participating in a sickout with my friends. Practically everyone in our room ... about 20 of us, caught the bug and we were all out sick except for maybe 3 people (including my boss).
So ... yeah ... I'll catch any bug that's going around, but I have no idea how my immune system will handle COVID-19.
As for my bronchitis, it still keeps coming and going, but I've learned that running actually helps to clear it up, so I've been increasing that. And one of my relatives has convinced me to start up a regiment of D3 and vitamin C. I gotta boost this immune system.
Coming back to my decisions going forward ... I gotta cut down on my coronavirus time. If it hasn't already become clear, I really, really, really, really enjoy conspiracy theories. I loved The X Files, and the movie Conspiracy Theory with Mel Gibson. It's not that I believe any of them, but I love the stories and love analyzing them, and even engaging people who believe in them -- to see if I can help them see the light. Sometimes I like to see if I can convince other people to believe them, as well. One of my favorites is the whole Moon Landing Hoax. And guess what ... you don't have to be an idiot to believe any of these.
While most of these conspiracy theories are harmless, COVID-19 hoaxes can be outright dangerous, especially when they cause people to behave in ways that help to spread the virus.
So, I've allowed my passion to get the better of me. I've been concentrating on fighting these theories, and it's eaten up too much of my time. I've come to learn that this combative approach doesn't really work, and can actually sow contention among my friends and family.
For a good analogy, I've been watching this show: JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. In Part 3, there's this creature called a flesh bud. It attaches directly to the brain, allowing an evil party to gain complete control. When JoJo (who's just plain awesome) attempts to pull out one of these buds, it fights back ... it holds on to the victim's brain deeper, and all these tentacles come out to attack the one removing it. If you can remove the bud in time and destroy it, then the person lives and comes back to his senses -- the evil person no longer has control of him. However, if you fail, you both die.
I believe this adequately describes how I feel when trying to combat these conspiracy theories. My intent, the whole time, is to destroy the idea, not the person. However, since the person believes the theory, he feels as if he's being attacked personally (like an ad hominem I do not intend). So the person entrenches and lashes out, and nothing gets accomplished.
And recently it's been eating a lot of my time. You wouldn't believe how many videos and articles I receive via PM ... and at first I've been trying to honor the person sending it to me, and give the video or article a chance ... after all, perhaps I've missed something.
But I simply do not have time for this anymore, so I've starting ignoring them. It's time for me to move on to better things.
On the flip side, I've witnessed some friends who got caught up in these conspiracies early on, but then came around to see the light ... ON THEIR OWN. Maybe I helped in some small way, but only through my "positive" efforts. So, going forward, I'll spend much less time on conspiracy theories, and more on providing data, analyses, and projections. I'm going to be friendlier.
And yes ... I know ... this is getting long, but believe me ... without the researching, this post is going very fast for me.
Then again, maybe it won't be so bad. I'm pretty sure I've caught the regular cold coronavirus, so perhaps I have adequate T-Cell immunity to fight off this new coronavirus quickly. Plus I have O+ blood, which is supposed to help (something I haven't researched yet).
The guys at work call me Pestilence. Last year in February, I got really, really sick ... most likely a flu. The real sickness lasted only a few days, and it was only a mild fever, but it still knocked me out for a full month. I only took 3 days off from work max, but I chose to work from home for a couple of weeks. That was fun ... do some coding, fix some processes for a couple of hours, then the chills would hit, and so I'd lay down under my desk shivering next to the space heater for about 20 minutes, and then I'd get back up to do more work.
And when I finally did go back in to work, my coworkers said I looked like death -- I was walking really slow, and that stupid bronchitis had me coughing more than usual. That was funny. I believe I caught the bug from someone sitting near me in a department that didn't really let you take sick days because you were that important. And I came to learn that three other guys sitting around me caught the bug, too. Only, they didn't get as sick as me.
And a few years ago, our whole department got hit by a stomach bug ... on the same day! I called in sick, and my boss accused me of participating in a sickout with my friends. Practically everyone in our room ... about 20 of us, caught the bug and we were all out sick except for maybe 3 people (including my boss).
So ... yeah ... I'll catch any bug that's going around, but I have no idea how my immune system will handle COVID-19.
As for my bronchitis, it still keeps coming and going, but I've learned that running actually helps to clear it up, so I've been increasing that. And one of my relatives has convinced me to start up a regiment of D3 and vitamin C. I gotta boost this immune system.
Coming back to my decisions going forward ... I gotta cut down on my coronavirus time. If it hasn't already become clear, I really, really, really, really enjoy conspiracy theories. I loved The X Files, and the movie Conspiracy Theory with Mel Gibson. It's not that I believe any of them, but I love the stories and love analyzing them, and even engaging people who believe in them -- to see if I can help them see the light. Sometimes I like to see if I can convince other people to believe them, as well. One of my favorites is the whole Moon Landing Hoax. And guess what ... you don't have to be an idiot to believe any of these.
While most of these conspiracy theories are harmless, COVID-19 hoaxes can be outright dangerous, especially when they cause people to behave in ways that help to spread the virus.
So, I've allowed my passion to get the better of me. I've been concentrating on fighting these theories, and it's eaten up too much of my time. I've come to learn that this combative approach doesn't really work, and can actually sow contention among my friends and family.
For a good analogy, I've been watching this show: JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. In Part 3, there's this creature called a flesh bud. It attaches directly to the brain, allowing an evil party to gain complete control. When JoJo (who's just plain awesome) attempts to pull out one of these buds, it fights back ... it holds on to the victim's brain deeper, and all these tentacles come out to attack the one removing it. If you can remove the bud in time and destroy it, then the person lives and comes back to his senses -- the evil person no longer has control of him. However, if you fail, you both die.
I believe this adequately describes how I feel when trying to combat these conspiracy theories. My intent, the whole time, is to destroy the idea, not the person. However, since the person believes the theory, he feels as if he's being attacked personally (like an ad hominem I do not intend). So the person entrenches and lashes out, and nothing gets accomplished.
And recently it's been eating a lot of my time. You wouldn't believe how many videos and articles I receive via PM ... and at first I've been trying to honor the person sending it to me, and give the video or article a chance ... after all, perhaps I've missed something.
But I simply do not have time for this anymore, so I've starting ignoring them. It's time for me to move on to better things.
On the flip side, I've witnessed some friends who got caught up in these conspiracies early on, but then came around to see the light ... ON THEIR OWN. Maybe I helped in some small way, but only through my "positive" efforts. So, going forward, I'll spend much less time on conspiracy theories, and more on providing data, analyses, and projections. I'm going to be friendlier.
And yes ... I know ... this is getting long, but believe me ... without the researching, this post is going very fast for me.
Conspiracies I'm Ignoring
Here is an example list of conspiracies I'll be ignoring going forward.
- COVID-19 is just like the flu. (It isn't ... all indications are that the mortality for COVID-19 is higher as well as susceptibility -- can't ignore excess deaths data.)
- COVID-19 vs. Swine Flu. (No comparison ... the mortality for the Swine Flu turned out to be much smaller than a regular flu season ... only 12,000-18,000 deaths in the US.)
- COVID-19 is a hoax. (It isn't. People are dying.)
- Masks are not effective OR masks are dangerous. (We have years of data on how masks are effective against coronaviruses.)
- Masks are activating COVID-19. (And it was doing this during our first wave when no one was wearing masks?)
- Any practitioner claiming to have a miracle cure while refusing to go through the already established method of communication. (Show us the data or get out!)
- HCQ is a miracle cure, but doctors aren't allowed to use it. (Science is not kind to HCQ right now. Hundreds of studies and actual experience show that it's not effective ... and yes ... some of them did try exactly as prescribed by some very loud practitioners, mixing with Z-Pak, and so on.)
- 5G is activating COVID-19. (I seriously believe left-wingers created this one so they can say how stupid right-wingers are for believing this, as I've yet to have one friend say they believe this.)
- COVID-19 is all about Democrats trying to unseat Trump. (How did they get India and Brazil to join in with their increasing thousands of deaths? Do they really hate Trump that much?)
- Trump is manipulating the data. (This one got me at first, but then as I researched it, it turns out that this is impossible to do. Worldometers does not get its data only from the CDC or the HHS, but mainly from the state departments directly -- before Trump can get his hands on it.)
- Any video featuring an Anonymous voice over.
All in all, pandemics are easy to understand. The solutions are simple, and eradication is always possible. We have experience, we have data, we have math, and we have science. Anything else to complicate this is bad, and most likely to be wrong. Unfortunately, terrible leadership has gotten us to where we are today, and we could have been almost done with it all by now. We could have avoided any and all lockdowns, but we just failed to follow the simple established rulebook on pandemics.
But, it is what it is.
I might as well list what I *am* interested in, which I may be focusing on going forward.
- Strategies for opening up the economy safely.
- Further analyses on Sweden ... how did they manage to finally get deaths and cases down?
- Further analyses on Peru ... what did they do wrong?
- Effects of warm weather on the virus.
- Anything on T-Cells and/or the 20% Herd Immunity Theory.
- Any tips on boosting immunity.
- Any further studies on early mitigation strategies ... even HCQ if it's compelling evidence.
Before moving on, I'll leave this fun little conspiracy for you enjoy ...
Deaths on the Decline?
I'm am truly surprised that deaths in the US are declining from last week -- especially when the math predicted a crazy jump in growth over the next couple of weeks. But this clearly isn't happening, so it's a very welcome development -- the mortality rate is definitely smaller than expected.
This could indicate any of the following:
- Trump was right ... the recent rise in positive results is among our more healthier younger crowd.
- Hospitals are getting better at saving lives -- DEX seems to be helping on this front.
- Hotter weather may be helping symptoms to be milder.
Let's give it another week and take a closer look.
Risk-Based Assessment Approach
A few weeks ago I claimed that masks were the key -- countries that use masks do better than other countries that don't use masks. Here in the US, the sudden stop in the spread could indeed be a result of increased mask usage throughout the nation.
But then two counter examples exist.
Sweden suddenly has a drop in cases and deaths -- but why? They are among the worst in mask usage -- or at least they were a couple of months ago. And they have the deaths to prove it. But why improve now? Did they start wearing masks? I doubt it, but then again I've yet to research this piece.
And Peru has had mandatory masks from near the beginning -- wear them or be arrested. But their deaths per capita are as bad as Sweden's, so what did they do wrong? Why didn't masks help them?
It becomes clearer to me that there are many factors to consider. I know that masks are helpful, but how helpful are they exactly? Could we put a number on that?
So, the idea is: you can think of a whole suite of factors -- some of which increase the risk of infection, and others that decrease it. And then you can imagine a big formula where you plug in all the positive and negative factors and get a final probability of spread out the other end.
Would you like to see how well a country is doing? Or are you planning an event and you want to see what the overall risk is? Just plug the factors into the formula ... and viola!
This approach can also help you know how to change behaviors to reduce risk. Say you want to hold an event. If you want to keep it safe, you can take measures to decrease the risk, and then ... there you go ... you can go ahead and invite people to participate.
If have no idea how to set numbers, but here's a general direction ... I'll try to list some factors and then indicate which helps to make things safer (+) and which makes things more risky (-).
Outside +++++
Wearing masks +++
Testing to identify sick people ++
Effective contact tracing ++
Quarantining the sick and exposed ++
Temperature checks at the door +
Lockdowns +/- (safer at first and then more risky if prolonged)
Inside with ventilation --
People sitting / not moving ---
People less than 6 feet apart ----
No masks ----
Dirty masks -----
Mass singing or shouting ------
Inside with no ventilation ---------- (yeah ... really really really bad)
If you do the same math with an inside Trump rally, then ... whoa nellie!
Then all of a sudden, Peru starts making sense. Sure, they wore masks, but in the poorer districts, these masks were very dirty, which helped to spread the virus.
That's all I have for today. Looks like it took me about 2.5 hours. Not bad ... it was still fun, and I'll try to get it shorter next week.
For a bonus, click on the picture at the very top of the article to see more classics COVID-ified.
1 comment:
I find it hilarious that you believe there is a moon, let alone a landing...;p
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