Corona Virus and Oshkosh?

I would assume that Oshkosh will be cancelled, since it's mostly the 60+ crowd who is at higher risk and that is an usually high percentage of the attendees.
 
Well I guess the social security money will be around for a few more decades after the boomers are purged by the Wuhan Plague...
 
Most sporting events of 10K+ have been canceled in the US this month, don't expect much to improve by May...and I am an optimistic.
 
And Sun & Fun has not yet cancelled. It must suck being an EAA staff lawyer right now.
 
Illinois just banned any gathering >1000. The horse is already out of the barn though. At this point I think we're all just along for the ride. Hopefully we're through it by late July.
 
Should be some cheap flights into Orlando for the show ,as Disney and universal have shut down till at least the end of March.
 
Ironically, the US should be taking efforts to delay the downswing of the virus as much as possible. That is bad for events like Oshkosh, but good for hospitals who need to spread out the cases in order to not get swamped.

I'm needed to work through the pandemic, so I need to avoid large events like these. Hopefully I can go in future years.
 
I was reading on the WHO site and they aren't sure whether or not it's a persistent illness or not at this point. There has been at least one case where a lady had it, recovered and then got it again apparently.

Though they don't know if she was "completely" recovered or if it just diminished and then flamed back up again. So, just because you recover today, doesn't necessarily mean you are home free. We could be in for the long haul on this one, as in, YEARS. People just need to learn to live with it like the cold or a flu. According to the sources I've read we're at least a year or more out from a vaccine.
 
PiperW said:
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

appears China is on the downswing
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Yeah, but consider that once they started taking action, they were extremely aggressive with their measures. I don't see that Americans would accept not being allowed to leave their houses or being forcefully(!!) dragged into hospitals. One of many videos:

I'm surprised that the American media isn't more reporting about scientific topics, but instead entirely focuses on stuff like whether Trump's speech was good or not. Anyway, here are some data points from Germany, I don't see why things would be much different in the US, only that we are few weeks behind:

- The virus is almost twice as contagious as a flu
- Eventually, 60 - 70% of the population are expected to become infected with it
- In 10 - 20% of the cases severe symptoms are expected, requiring hospitalization
- Warmer temperatures will have only a minimal impact on the virus
- The measures (school closings, no big events, people encouraged to work from home, travel restrictions, quarantine, etc.) will only delay the spread of the virus, not stop it
- This delay is supposed to spread out the infections, to make it easier for doctors and hospitals to deal with them
- Model simulation have shown that the peak of infections will only occur in the July / August time frame
- Germany has 38 intensive care hospital beds per 100,00 people (the US has only around 26).

Positively assuming that only 60% of the population will become infected, that only 10% of them will need intensive care, that all of this will spread out over 6 month and that intensive care will be needed for only a single week, this still translates to 100,000 * 0.6 * 0.1 / 26 weeks = 230 ICU beds / 100,000 people.

I am wondering how the US government is planning planning to handle this? Even the total number of hospital beds in the US (~210 / 100,000) would not be sufficient, particularly not since they can't free up the entire capacity for COVID-19 patients. What about the equipment to support these patients, like respirators?

I have some doubts that the Ostrich strategy will be successful in the long term...
71dc5aa7d66548b7ad6131235e775dc6
 
Luckily flying will be the only pastime that I get to do for the next few months as I fly out of a sleepy private airport where I am lucky to see a single person there.

My family is young (36,33,4) so we aren’t worried, but we live 30 feet from my dad (70 and in chemo for pancreatic cancer) and mom (66). Kid runs back and forth all day, so no chance of them staying protected if he is out catching germs all day long. So we are staying put and in voluntary quarantine (mostly as we still need to take my dad to the hospital for chemo treatments) until those treatments are finished and he is at slightly less risk.
 
Snowmass said:
An interesting analysis. Hopefully if it follows the typical summer dip there will be a good vaccine by next fall especially if it does not mutate.
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All the experts, including Fauchi, don't expect to have a vaccine available before early 2021.
 
bobmrg said:
Tom Hanks and his wife are in Australia, which is famously hot, and they both have the virus.
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Also remember that Australia is in the southern hemisphere. They're just coming off the summer there. I just got back from five weeks in Australia and NZ (two of which was on a cruise ship to boot). You won't believe the number of people that are openly hostile to the fact that I'm not quarantining myself.
 
Juliet Hotel said:
This. I can well imagine small vendors with less than 10 employees total saying I ain't afraid of no virus and still showing up. But I have to expect any company with deep pockets is not going to want to open themselves to the inevitable law suit they will face when a staff member is assigned to work the show and tests positive afterward. I could be wrong but I suspect Garmin and the like do not want that kind of liability exposure.
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No lawsuit from the employees acting in the course and scope of their employment. Rather these are worker's comp claims, which could be just as problematic. It would not surprise me if worker's comp insurers were not pressuring their insureds to take steps to limit claims.

I am not sure how Sun n Fun can be cavalier about this. While the open air crowds might not be the worst exposure scenario, the toilet and shower facilities could be another matter. They could really be opening themselves up to liability to keep open what might easily be a money-loser anyway with the vendors pulling out and reduced attendance.
 
We just received an e-mail from the SnF organizers letting us know they are meeting with city officials and will have a statement this afternoon. Make of that what you will.
 
Sun 'n Fun has announced that they'll be making a statement today.
 
455 Bravo Uniform said:
I don’t know what the driver would be for EAA to cancel it so early. I wouldn’t see the downside to letting this play out for another few weeks or month or two, other than lost effort in current planning.
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Might be driven by insurance requirements. Many events like this have insurance coverages that kick in to cover lost income. The insurance companies are taking a beating and may be pushing for earlier cancellation to help curtail increasing sunk costs by the time the event is actually cancelled.
 
weilke said:
It'll either be over by then, or all the boomer pilots have been killed off. No way of telling right now.
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Hah funny! Wait, I'm boomer.......

I predict it will crest in April/May, gone in June, and will be a great case study on why we all reacted this way vs the swine flu 8 years ago which at the end of the day killed 100 times as many people (30,000 or so).

I myself wouldn't hesitate to go to Oshkosh, or even get on a cruise ship next week. But that's me.
 
WDD said:
Hah funny! Wait, I'm boomer.......

I predict it will crest in April/May, gone in June, and will be a great case study on why we all reacted this way vs the swine flu 8 years ago which at the end of the day killed 100 times as many people (30,000 or so).

I myself wouldn't hesitate to go to Oshkosh, or even get on a cruise ship next week. But that's me.
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Swine flu lasted 1.5 years. We are only in month 3 of this.
 
WDD said:
I predict it will crest in April/May, gone in June, and will be a great case study on why we all reacted this way vs the swine flu 8 years ago which at the end of the day killed 100 times as many people (30,000 or so).
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It's another case of "math matters". There were 60 million cases of 2009 flu with 12,000 deaths.
If (and yes, a bit "if" at this point) there were 60 million cases of COVID, assuming a conservative mortality rate of 3%, we'd have 1.8 million deaths.
Big difference. There's a very strong reason to try to limit infection early.

It is WAY too early to make a statement like swine flu killed "100 times as many people".
 
write-stuff said:
If (and yes, a bit "if" at this point) there were 60 million cases of COVID, assuming a conservative mortality rate of 3%, we'd have 1.8 million deaths.
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3% is at the upper end of the numbers we see in the larger outbreaks.
Even at 0.7 or 0.9 it won't be a picnic.
 
Personally, I only trust the one news source which separates opinion from fact, the Wall Street Journal. Today's, 3/13/20, issue has an entire section on covid-19. One thing the WSJ reported is that in addition to 35+ vaccines being worked on drug companies are testing existing drugs such as HIV and Ebola drugs, for effectivity.
 
write-stuff said:
It's another case of "math matters". There were 60 million cases of 2009 flu with 12,000 deaths.
If (and yes, a bit "if" at this point) there were 60 million cases of COVID, assuming a conservative mortality rate of 3%, we'd have 1.8 million deaths.
Big difference. There's a very strong reason to try to limit infection early.

It is WAY too early to make a statement like swine flu killed "100 times as many people".
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Maybe I didn't write it clearly enough. I was predicting / guessing that at the end of all of this that is what it will turn out to be. Not a statement of fact, but a swag / prediction. Am I optimistic? Maybe. Mortality rate of this thing is about the same as the flu from what I've read, so I'm not sure where your numbers are coming from. I know the flu has a higher mortality rate than .02%. But lots of people have lots of different sources, and it is early to have hard facts, rates, etc.

I do know that this isn't as deadly as ebola or the Spanish Influenza.

Time will tell. In the mean time, 1/2 of our office is supposed to alternate working from home each week. My wife is home because her school closed. Costco is selling a boat load of toilet paper - why, I don't know. And bottled water, because the water supply will obviously be shut off for some reason. And my plans for retiring in my early 60's and becoming my wife's trophy husband just vanished.

Life goes on.......
 
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WDD said:
Maybe I didn't write it clearly enough. I was predicting / guessing that at the end of all of this that is what it will turn out to be. Not a statement of fact, but a swag / prediction. Am I optimistic? Maybe. Mortality rate of this thing is about the same as the flu from what I've read, so I'm not sure where your numbers are coming from. I know the flu has a higher mortality rate than .02%. But lots of people have lots of different sources, and it is early to have hard facts, rates, etc.

I do know that this isn't as deadly as ebola or the Spanish Influenza.

Time will tell. In the mean time, 1/2 of our office is supposed to alternate working from home each week. My wife is home because her school closed. Costco is selling a boat load of toilet paper - why, I don't know. And bottled water, because the water supply will obviously be shut off for some reason. And my plans for retiring in my early 60's and becoming my wife's trophy husband just vanished.

Life goes on.......
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WDD,

Mortality rate is based on the general population numbers. What you want is the case fatality rate. That is how many people die who have a confirmed case.
Flu runs about 0.1% CFR.
South Korea runs around 0.5% with COVID-19.
China is around 4% with COVID-19.
Italy is seeing around 7% with COVID-19.
There is a direct correlation to the hospital capacity. We have less hospital capacity than China. That does not bode well for that get sick.

Lastly the media and political people who keep talking about the flu are very misleading. Read/listen to the scientists. When you boil it down, the problem is fundamental about system capacity now, containment failed a long time ago.

Tim

Sent from my HD1907 using Tapatalk
 
Fascinating as to why South Korea has such a low rate. I wonder if counting is being done differently. You know what they say about statistics and lies.
 
Thank you Tim for the thoughts and point of view. I enjoy looking at things from different angles. Appreciate it.

Keeping it completely out of the US was never the goal or even possible. Slowing the entry, reducing the number of new sources does help reduce the crest / eventual total number of cases when all said and done, and buys time.

I remember reading about the Spanish flu. Philadelphia had no response, allowed people to travel as they wanted, had parades , etc. City was devastated. San Francisco was completely opposite, and was mostly spared.

Point is that travel and gathering policies can have a positive effect.
 
Brad W said:
..... every time I start looking at early retirement the economy takes another negative turn. What's up with that?...is somebody monitoring my dreams about retirement?
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Knowing these events occur, what if we were already in retirement, and occur after we retire? Our “retirement plans” should include downward spirals from time to time.

Mine? Not there. Not sure it’ll ever be where it’d be bomb-proof. So the only thing I can control is my spending. That’s the thing that will determine how early or if I can retire. This expensive plane hobby doesn’t help, so I’m a slave to my 45 year old Cessna for now.
 
Brad W said:
..... every time I start looking at early retirement the economy takes another negative turn. What's up with that?...is somebody monitoring my dreams about retirement?
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Please - for all of us -stop looking and it will go back up! LOL
 
455 Bravo Uniform said:
Knowing these events occur, what if we were already in retirement, and occur after we retire? Our “retirement plans” should include downward spirals from time to time.

Mine? Not there. Not sure it’ll ever be where it’d be bomb-proof. So the only thing I can control is my spending. That’s the thing that will determine how early or if I can retire. This expensive plane hobby doesn’t help, so I’m a slave to my 45 year old Cessna for now.
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My understanding is that one's retirement plan should include 3 years of resources in fixed income so that you can ride out a failure in the equity markets.
 
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