5833

For MA, that’s only the state lab numbers, and the private labs and academic labs have far higher throughput. For people that are interested in tracking the numbers, they are a real mess. I hope someone in the state government somewhere has the right numbers.

5834

Michigan just started with other lab sources yesterday, which is why confirmed cases jumped from 80 to 336 in 24 hours. Total tests jumped from 352 to 2,449. Only up to 2,618 today, but that’s still a big increase in daily capacity even if it has a long way to go. Regardless, things are not looking good for the Detroit area.

5835

Because of course they would

5836

Things are starting to heat up in The Netherlands, especially the southern part which had more infections probably due to carnival some time ago. They are expecting a massive influx of new cases.

A friend of mine is a surgeon in the Southern part. The last couple of days he has being retrained for IC work with protective gear, to do medical work he hasn’t done in 2 decades. A lot of doctors are being retrained to create extra capacity. There is not enough gear to go around so they have to go 8 hours with one suit, so no eating, drinking and bathroom breaks for 8 hours straight.

5837

Take that, peace loving hippies!

5838

They’re in a nasty situation, as they only get paid after two years of service (and only $10k at that). Everything else is a stipend, which is obviously coming to a rather abrupt end. Yeesh.

5839

I’m pretty sure just trolling GoFundMe has had daily examples for years now…but I get your point.

5840

Why not take them, and use them to help with the crisis here in the US? Or at least offer that as an option.

5841

While I completely agree with you, my guess is some bean-counter is worried about lawsuits.

5842

I now know a couple folks who have this. One is 20 and she’s in really bad shape, though she has risk factors. The other is fine.

5843

A friend of mine here in Michigan has been sick for over a week and when she went to get tested for Coronavirus yesterday they refused to test her because “she hadn’t been in direct contact with someone who has tested positive” and sent her home.

5844

One nice but slightly ominous side effect: very little traffic noise. Not something I usually even pay attention to, but going outside just now it’s eerily quiet…just the occasional car and the distant sound of sirens (a little disquieting on its own).

5845

I think deaths won’t be affected by lockdown until after 3 weeks. This bug isn’t kill people intermediately.

5846

My employer I think is finally starting to take it seriously - we’ve closed about 25% of our retail stores with leadership discretion for any locations that are still open… however, being a luxury retailer located mostly in malls I don’t know how much longer we’ll have the option of keeping stores open. The initial WFH policy for our main office was set to have everyone back in office on the 30th. I’m pretty confident that’s going to be extended and went to Micro Center today to set up a proper WFH area, away from my gaming PC. As I’m looking for a keyboard I can’t help but notice the couple who is making a point to test out damn near every keyboard that’s on display. sigh

5847

When you hardly test anyone, no one has been in contact with someone who has tested positively. /taps head

5848

We are still living in a world where we are either ignoring the obvious reality that community spread is happening, or lying to our patients by using this as justification for no testing, when the reality is there is not enough testing capability right now. It’s happening all over the western world and is leading directly to an increased infection spread.

5849

My guess is that this administration in general, and Mike Pompeo in particular, is not a fan of peace in general, and the Peace Corps in particular.

5850

Yeah I live in New Mexico and I’m not sure how we’re doing it either, except that the governor has been out in the forefront of this. They rolled out drive through testing at one of the local hospitals last Friday and another one followed suit a day or two later.

The state has been fairly aggressive and early in fighting this, closely following Ohio and New York. We’re not in lockdown yet, but they’d put restrictions on restaurants earlier in the week and outright closed them yesterday plus bars, theaters, all malls, and because it’s New Mexico…flea markets. All non-essential businesses are to limit operations and hotels are to reserve 50% capacity for health care workers. Even the numerous pueblos in the state have closed casinos, which I’m sure took some wrangling because the pueblos pretty much do what they want. All that on discovery of the first case of community transmission.

5851

New Mexico has serious retirement communities much like Florida, does it not? Maybe they take it more seriously because of that?

5852

I think you spelled out the key point there. Glad to hear you’ve got good leadership there!