wsuffa
Touchdown! Greaser!
Yabut at a couple of games I've been to the concession stand had nachos grande....
COVID, immunity and vaccines (no politics, science question)
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SoonerAviator
Lol, and it only costs $15 per plate with a $7 domestic beer!
wsuffa
Touchdown! Greaser!
Remember the old saying: you don't buy beer, you rent it.
David Megginson
Pattern Altitude
Staying strictly away from political debates, there was an interview with a local epidemiologist the other day. We don't have numbers yet, but he said that based on past experiences, the new strain will probably be less contagious places it appears later. It was discovered first in the UK not because that's where it (necessarily) originated, but because that's where conditions were best for its spread. Other places, like North America (with less crowding, etc etc) it might not be as big a difference, though it will still be more contagious.
Second, the way to kill a pandemic is just to get R(t) (or R0, or whatever) below 1.0. R(t) is estimated around 1.06 here in Ottawa right now, so every 100 infected people infect about 106 others, and the caseload climbs every couple of weeks (100 -> 106 -> 112 -> 119, etc). We don't have to block it completely; we just need enough immunity to get R(t) below 1.0 and keep it there. For example, if every 100 infected people infect only 90 others, then the number of cases gets smaller every couple of weeks until it fizzles out (100 -> 90 -> 81 -> 73, etc). That happened with the Spanish flu even without a vaccine, but they're hoping the vaccines will shave months (or more) off that time.
denverpilot
Tied Down
Anyone seen any math about why California both went so late and also went so hard in limited areas?
Been wondering if they’re experiencing more of the UK strain than other places.
Most of the actual mathematicians have either been tossed off social media platforms or have gone silent so they aren’t. Which is sad.
And I’m not saying that to start any drama llama stuff here, just explaining that a whole bunch of honest third party sources of error-corrected math data have dried up...
... and my time availability to do all the raw data checking math also disappeared in a cloud of one of our businesses experiencing 18% growth... in a month.
And not the one that kept me beyond busy all summer. Haha. First world problems...
So just curious. What’s up with the California weirdness? Mathematically.
If anyone has been digging... that is. Something was waaaay wrong with LA County numbers months ago... much bigger slope than anything near it, or elsewhere.
I’ve been wondering about that anomaly ever since.
Been wondering if they’re experiencing more of the UK strain than other places.
Most of the actual mathematicians have either been tossed off social media platforms or have gone silent so they aren’t. Which is sad.
And I’m not saying that to start any drama llama stuff here, just explaining that a whole bunch of honest third party sources of error-corrected math data have dried up...
... and my time availability to do all the raw data checking math also disappeared in a cloud of one of our businesses experiencing 18% growth... in a month.
And not the one that kept me beyond busy all summer. Haha. First world problems...
So just curious. What’s up with the California weirdness? Mathematically.
If anyone has been digging... that is. Something was waaaay wrong with LA County numbers months ago... much bigger slope than anything near it, or elsewhere.
I’ve been wondering about that anomaly ever since.
California may be suffering now from people getting out more. There are still restrictions, but it seems from reports that some are being ignored, some are being worked around (going where things are open). Some may be from people getting lax, or feeling that it will be over "soon" with the vaccines.
I definitely could be a different strain. Some of it could be more testing. The data in Georgia shows a very high number of cases, higher than every, but deaths plateaued for quite some time and now seem to be back on a slow decline, even though cases have gone way up.
I definitely could be a different strain. Some of it could be more testing. The data in Georgia shows a very high number of cases, higher than every, but deaths plateaued for quite some time and now seem to be back on a slow decline, even though cases have gone way up.
"Once you and your friends are vaccinated, can you quit social distancing?"
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/22219362/end-of-covid-19-pandemic-social-distancing-masking
Excerpt:
A lot will depend on the answer to a crucial open question: Are the vaccines only good at preventing symptomatic disease, or are they also good at preventing infection and transmission?
“One can imagine a scenario where you are vaccinated and you develop a protective immune response. You will not get sick, you will not die, but the virus will still be able to grow in your nose and transmit to other people,” said Barry Bloom, a professor of immunology and infectious diseases at Harvard.
Bloom and other experts are optimistic that the vaccines help reduce infection and transmission, but nobody knows by how much. “We just need more data on transmission,” he said. “Hopefully it will come out of the trials in a couple of months.”
“One can imagine a scenario where you are vaccinated and you develop a protective immune response. You will not get sick, you will not die, but the virus will still be able to grow in your nose and transmit to other people,” said Barry Bloom, a professor of immunology and infectious diseases at Harvard.
Bloom and other experts are optimistic that the vaccines help reduce infection and transmission, but nobody knows by how much. “We just need more data on transmission,” he said. “Hopefully it will come out of the trials in a couple of months.”
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More testing shouldn't contribute to California having almost no hospital beds available. I don't think that has been the case here until the past month or so.
wsuffa
Touchdown! Greaser!
And apparently Ontario has locked-down again.
(remember when the term "lock down" was only used with prisons?)
(remember when the term "lock down" was only used with prisons?)
denverpilot
Tied Down
That’s the number I didn’t mention. Yeah. Forgot about that.
“Cases” has been horribly broken as a *statistically* useless number the entire time.
But they had a big smash of hospital beds.
And of course that then brings up the past discussion about using percentages when reporting that.
But other hints and wording was sneaking in like “nowhere to transport to” and such that piqued my interest.
Truly full (hundreds or even thousands of beds per facility, doing proper triage) or underprepared (“we’re full because we only prepped 100 beds) ... I couldn’t determine from “news” reports... but generally the wording sneaking past the incredibly reluctant “journalists” who still can’t seem to be specific with numbers ... didn’t sound great.
Aspen/Pitkin County was seriously discussing a full no holds barred lockdown (“Purple in our lovely color chart for the State — oooh, pretty colors like the terrorism thing years ago... taste the rainbow! LOLZ...) again ...
... due to the wealthy ski fashion touristas importing the virus to the ski areas ... again... and tiny mountain town hospitals ...
... well at least as of Friday. It changes daily depending on which way the wind blows.
(Shrug.)
No, it doesn't impact that.
How many of those are used by COVID patients? It's a real question as most people don't realize that hospitals like to keep ICU beds 80-85% utilized normally. So, when they hear "ICU is at 90% capacity!" on the news they freak out.
South Dakota does a good job in covering that; their COVID Dashboard.
denverpilot
Tied Down
Yeah we discussed that already and I’m kinda ... kinda... trying to avoid it... m
Wife’s boss at her hospital company said it best in March...
“We always shoot for 80%.”
Anyway... that’s why I mentioned the other words sneaking into the CA reports.
They *seem* to be having a harder time than that, but I haven’t had time to dig into their numbers and they’re one of a number of States one has to be very careful to check whether they’re obfuscating them with Stats 101 tricks.
Sadly.
So I’m *curious* if folks have a decent source from raw data for them or a hint as to why they hit so late and hard.
Many places you can correlate back to the usual... locking people indoors where the virus is... but CA... that doesn’t make sense.
A higher incidence of a much more infectious strain would, however. As one mathematically sound example, of a bunch of possibilities.
denverpilot
Tied Down
Ahh hell. Ask and ye shall receive.
The The Atlantic literally just published an article explaining quite a bit of CA’s numbers problem. 1.8 beds per 1000 people.
Disregard all after “Good Morning”, over!
(Seriously... I’m no longer even curious. That number ain’t gonna be a happy dance no matter how one slices it locally. Denser areas it’s likely worse, without confirming... considering that’s a Statewide number. Suuuuper ugly...)
The The Atlantic literally just published an article explaining quite a bit of CA’s numbers problem. 1.8 beds per 1000 people.
Disregard all after “Good Morning”, over!
(Seriously... I’m no longer even curious. That number ain’t gonna be a happy dance no matter how one slices it locally. Denser areas it’s likely worse, without confirming... considering that’s a Statewide number. Suuuuper ugly...)
Wow! I just looked, that's basically at the bottom of the list. There are only two states with fewer beds per 1,000 people. No wonder they are having an issue.
denverpilot
Tied Down
Lindberg
Final Approach
For very large cohorts of the unvaccinated population, the level of protection from handwashing is also nearly 100% from serious risk of mortality or long-term morbidity.
wsuffa
Touchdown! Greaser!
Oh, I would have. California is a mess despite the high taxes. Don't worry, though, you can expect them to ask for/get a bailout.
I don't have a breakdown between Covid and non-Covid hospitalizations, but right now, California is showing 0.0% ICU availability statewide. That's why there are reports of ambulances being turned away.
https://covid19.ca.gov/stay-home-except-for-essential-needs/
Juliet Hotel
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Juliet Hotel
How would you even know that? Really how? Do you know most of the mathematicians that exist? Are you in communication with them in some way? Please explain how this statement is in any way factual and not just you trying to spin a limited and unverified data set to fit and/or prove your own narrative.
Lindberg
Final Approach
CA also has onerous regulatory staffing requirements.
bflynn
Final Approach
FTFY.
tspear
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Timothy
Anecdotal, a family friend (Alan) live in CA.
Per Alan, CA has done a better job than many other states of using triage over the years to move more and more medical care to out patient and non-critical care locations. One side effect is that CA has lower hospital capacity by population than almost any other state. Based on requirements, especially the positive/negative air pressure isolation requirements, most of these secondary facilities cannot handle COVID. That leaves CA with a much lower capacity to handle COVID than other states.
Based on these preexisting market factors, and high costs (due to regulatory, salary and other factors), CA has historically had even lower spare capacity ratio than many other states. This has left CA with much less wiggle room to handle any surges.
In terms of spread, Alan also mentioned that multiple cases he is aware of were family spread. One person gets it at work, brings it home to spread to the other ten who live in close confines. Many families are multi-generational with the high costs of rent in LA.
Reminder, this is anecdotal! And just one guys opinion!
Tim
Per Alan, CA has done a better job than many other states of using triage over the years to move more and more medical care to out patient and non-critical care locations. One side effect is that CA has lower hospital capacity by population than almost any other state. Based on requirements, especially the positive/negative air pressure isolation requirements, most of these secondary facilities cannot handle COVID. That leaves CA with a much lower capacity to handle COVID than other states.
Based on these preexisting market factors, and high costs (due to regulatory, salary and other factors), CA has historically had even lower spare capacity ratio than many other states. This has left CA with much less wiggle room to handle any surges.
In terms of spread, Alan also mentioned that multiple cases he is aware of were family spread. One person gets it at work, brings it home to spread to the other ten who live in close confines. Many families are multi-generational with the high costs of rent in LA.
Reminder, this is anecdotal! And just one guys opinion!
Tim
denverpilot
Tied Down
Calm down there Internet expert. LOL!
I actively searched for mathematicians working on the thing publicly and followed a significant number of them. At least two were tossed by FB for alleged “community standards” violations. (Which unlike here, aren’t ever detailed. Nor did any “community” ever agree to any of them, but... I digress. Ha.)
And how I know that is, I’m an admin of a 15,000 user group there. The number of times some idiot paid $2/hr in some second world call center hell hole has tagged our comedy group as having “violated standards” when none was violated, now numbers into significant double digits.
You see, comedy is difficult for people who speak English as a second language.
We even had a group founder tossed completely from FB for posting a photo of a flyer that was so bad grammatically and had such bad spelling, he thought it was funny. FB tossed him for the content of the flyer itself.
Two months and a letter from his lawyer later, someone who actually understands English as well as he does — and English is also his second language — finally read the thing ... and realized their call center staff were idiots.
All group admins I speak to there relate the same story across multiple platforms.
And don’t believe everything you read about their use of “AI”. LOL. “AI” is the name of some poor schmuck with a quota system of things to delete before lunch because there were “complaints”. If he doesn’t click a certain number of deletes before lunch they’ll have him replaced by the afternoon shift.
(You’d never believe how many people out of 15,000 can’t figure out they joined a comedy group. Like honestly don’t know... it’s truly amazing. Then complain to FB or whichever platform it is on.)
A few of the mathematicians are also personal friends, which is what started the interest — been following them for mmm, couple of decades at least? — and they just started doing the math in the early days, since their initial reaction was literally to start doing the math. Like they do with everything. Pretty easy to click on their friends lists and find more of them. Very few change those settings for friend of friend “privacy”. So... off to the races to find a pile of math heads.
(Why not find ‘em? They’re great at it.)
Posting weekly or more, often with links to copies of their spreadsheets. Was nice. Always full accreditation of their sources and descriptions of their methodology, too.
They’ve all gone silent to save themselves from the masses of idiots.
See: People who can’t figure out they’re in a comedy group — above. Then dump a few hundred of them on a personal but public FB page.
Yeah, nobody’s got time for that.
So... How about you? Which mathematicians were you following, and for how many months? Also how many large groups do you admin on other platforms and how many interactions have you had with their third-world monitoring staff? Just curious.
But since you asked... I would “know that” because I literally watched it happen.
Unlike those who make money from selling online ads, and gathering data on page clicks and people, I have no agenda nor any reason to lie about it. Get real.
What do I gain other than the usual accusations of malfeasance by someone like you? LOL. Ooh yeah that’s why I did it! Haha.
However you slice it, spin ain’t how I make money, nor even interesting to me — other than discussing it as a major tactic in the overall web biz. Which clearly, it is and has been for a very long time...
I applaud your newfound skepticism of anything you think is spin on the internet, though. Now just add in juuuuust a touch of analysis about whether someone stands to gain anything from whatever you’re skeptical about.
You’re just about there... but barking up the wrong tree. I sure don’t.
Frankly if people figure out how much of a scam most of the internet and software in general is, I’m likely harmed far more than helped.
Connecting a worldwide untrusted network full of anonymous, often faked, “people” straight into your house?
Incredibly bad idea.
Carrying it around in your pocket linked to a GPS receiver? Even dumber.
Oh well. You asked. And answered. I’m just impressed you think I have any reason to lie about it. Hahahaha. Wow.
I mean ... I guess after over a decade here I just decided to start making up crap that even multiple in-person real-world friends here would have to read... for unknown reasons.
Is this like the South Park Underpants Gnomes episode where my plan is...
1. Make up things for no reason...
2. ...
3. Profit!
Because if so, I’d appreciate someone letting me in on how I’ll be collecting at step 3. Hahahahaha.
PeterNSteinmetz
Ejection Handle Pulled
Yes. See post #53 above for the formula. These are quantitative questions.
Unfortunately difficult for many of the general public to understand as they like to think in qualitative terms like “If I am vaccinated, I am immune and cannot spread COVID-19”. That kind of thinking works fairly well when the numbers are like 99.5%. Not so well for numbers more in the middling range. Leads to a lot of the current acrimony.
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Drake the Outlaw
The intent of my post was to point out that if some people don't take the vaccine, they will always be susceptible, and there will be peer pressure for everyone to "do the right thing" by masking and social distancing forever so the unvaccinated have less risk.
I'm wondering if there are categories of people for whom the vaccine is "not recommended" other than youngsters (we haven't run sufficient trials to OK them for the vaccine.) Anybody... Bueller?
Right, but you want your ICU at that capacity with a good mix including post-op patients. You can be at 99% and perfectly fine as you know that your typical trajectory of a patient after a valve replacement or bypass includes them leaving the ICU in a predictable manner. If for some reason, you dont have a bed opening up, you just tell the surgeon to postpone elective cases. It doesn't work like that with Covid. Those patients stay a long time and suck up a lot of resources, at some point they start displacing elective patients. And assuming that people dont have brain or heart surgery for frivolous reasons, that displacement eventually will lead to worsened outcomes for non-covid patients.
As one example the statewide ICU situation in Arizona. The length of the yellow bars are the patients who are in the ICU for reasons other than covid. Again, I'll just assume that the 1100 or so patients in the ICUs during the 'lull' in october were not there to get full body lifts or boob jobs but rather because they had a legitimate disease or surgery that required ICU admission. So now that there are only 450 non-covid patients in the ICUs, what is the rest doing ?
denverpilot
Tied Down
Yes. We’ve discussed. Millions with auto-immune disorders.
As a few brave ones take it anyway, we’ll see how that goes. Some people gotta do what they gotta do.
The recommendation that MS patients should be okay, for example, was released yesterday for only one of the vaccines. (Pfizer I believe. Skimmed it.)
The finding of Transverse Myelitis in the test groups has made the vaccine a serious no-go for existing TM patients.
No specific determination has yet been made on my own disorder. Due to rarity, it’s unlikely an official one ever will.
Immune system disorders make up a massive number of folks who’ve been told “we don’t know” whether these vaccines are “safe”.
But most of us gave up on “safe” in relation to drugs about five minutes after the Docs said, “There’s no known cause or cure. Want to try X?”
Roll the dice and takes your chances.
That’s just called... Tuesday... around here. LOL!
It's interesting that your point is that these are quantitative questions, because that is exactly the point that I was asking about. The statement I was asking about was: "infections required for herd immunity remains the same with/without the vaccine." Would not the number of infections required for herd immunity be decreased if the vaccine reduces the amount of replication-competent virus, thereby reducing the period of infectiousness, and the severity of new infections? My question assumes the premise that vaccination does not completely prevent the spread of Covid.
It would but it hasn't been proven the vaccine has any impact on "susceptibility and contagiousness".
The key is one can't automatically equate "% of population vaccinated" as a simple "Add that % to the herd immunity pool"
1. It is still to be proven the vaccine stops people from contracting/spreading it. Certainly would be great if it did but the key is "proven to".
2. There is likely a fair % of those vaccinated that already had/recovered from the disease. At this point, one main focus is on vaccinating those with a high risk of contracting the disease(medical workers for example) so it would stand to reason that as a group, medical workers would already have an existing higher % of "infected/recovered". Therefore, even if the vaccination is found to reduce the spread, there is likely a fair number of the vaccinated number that were already in the "immune" pool.
The key is one can't automatically equate "% of population vaccinated" as a simple "Add that % to the herd immunity pool"
1. It is still to be proven the vaccine stops people from contracting/spreading it. Certainly would be great if it did but the key is "proven to".
2. There is likely a fair % of those vaccinated that already had/recovered from the disease. At this point, one main focus is on vaccinating those with a high risk of contracting the disease(medical workers for example) so it would stand to reason that as a group, medical workers would already have an existing higher % of "infected/recovered". Therefore, even if the vaccination is found to reduce the spread, there is likely a fair number of the vaccinated number that were already in the "immune" pool.
PeterNSteinmetz
Ejection Handle Pulled
Yes, I think you are correct and the statement you have here in quotes is incorrect.
If the amount of replication competent virus is reduced, that could well reduce the effective reproduction number, thereby changing the fraction required for herd immunity, roughly by the formula in post #53.
OTOH, I don’t think there is hard evidence this has happened.
That is a great question!
I would expect that if the "non-elective" ICU patients were truly being "turned away", the headlines would be everywhere.
In the early days, AZ state edict was to halt all elective surgeries. AFAIK, that has not been widely implemented again.
Perhaps the distinction is those that are in the ICU because of Covid and those that are in the ICU for "the normal reasons" but also happen to have tested positive for Covid.
I don't know but does seem a bit odd to be taken "At face value"....
denverpilot
Tied Down
More mutations.
Not mathematically surprising at all and just sharing...
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-covid-strain-found-ohio/
Mutants! Mutants everywhere! LOL.
One of us. One of us. One of us. Haha!
Not mathematically surprising at all and just sharing...
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-covid-strain-found-ohio/
Mutants! Mutants everywhere! LOL.
One of us. One of us. One of us. Haha!
Matthew Rogers
Ejection Handle Pulled
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Matt R
Looks like there aren’t actually any vaccine doses held back in the Federal stockpile of “second” doses that were supposed to be there.
So what is already distributed is all there is until more are manufactured. At this rate (12.2 million doses given out of 672 million total doses needed) we are only 55 months away from full vaccination.
Guess the great 2021 Airventure won’t be quite so great after all when a large amount of people won’t be vaccinated and will probably skip the event.
So what is already distributed is all there is until more are manufactured. At this rate (12.2 million doses given out of 672 million total doses needed) we are only 55 months away from full vaccination.
Guess the great 2021 Airventure won’t be quite so great after all when a large amount of people won’t be vaccinated and will probably skip the event.
wsuffa
Touchdown! Greaser!
Hope that the powers that be don't decide to try this in the US....
https://krdo.com/entertainment/2021...sure-of-all-travel-corridors-starting-monday/
https://krdo.com/entertainment/2021...sure-of-all-travel-corridors-starting-monday/
David Megginson
Pattern Altitude
Why would a mathematician know anything more about public health, epidemiology, or virology than your average Joe? Mathematical formulas can also describe how water moves through my pipes, but if I my pipes are leaking, I'm going to call a plumber, not a mathematician.
wsuffa
Touchdown! Greaser!
There are people from all walks of life that think they know about public health and epidemiology - you might find some who think they do on this board. Others think that being elected immediately makes them experts - and I'll go no further about politics.
David Megginson
Pattern Altitude
Exactly right. Our outbreaks in Canada aren't nearly as bad as in the U.S. (Ontario, which is one of the worst-hit provinces, had about 1/2 the per-capita deaths of California, 1/3 of of Florida, or 1/8 of NY), and our ICUs aren't overflowing yet, but the province already preparing triage protocols for guidance in case things go south fast. It's a horrible time to be working in healthcare.
David Megginson
Pattern Altitude
I have a Ph.D. in Medieval Studies and a torque wrench, and I've read a few of Mike Busch's articles, so I guess I'm qualified to overhaul my own engine now.
denverpilot
Tied Down
Never said they did.
Was interested in their mathematical work on death rates, infection rates, catching various public sources releasing statistically improbable numbers, and most of them were digging well past the typical “state graphs” to raw data for other interesting analyses whenever reasonable numbers were provided.
Also as other actual professionals in the field have mentioned here multiple times and even provided the equations, the equations are public. Watching a math geek run them isn’t all that difficult. Or run slope trending or any number of other analyses taught in every Stats 101 course. (Not taking Stats 101 and maybe 102 depending on the speed of the curriculum, prior to reading ANY graph, even the mathematician’s tables and graphs, is a truly terrible idea.)
And of course public discourse about fallacies like public talking heads using percentages of changing resource levels. Or their discussion about graphs from States caught changing the X or Y axis during the same graph where people are either assuming it’s not a manipulative graph or just were flat freaking out or happy about a graph that actually needed to be normalized so they’d see the magnitude shift.
Or... really... the kind of math one would usually see caught/asked about in press conferences of old. Easily. Like no brainer for any reporter back then. Asked on the spot because they used to be well paid, sharp, and they knew an editor would fry them if they came back without asking.
That was a major reason. I miss that level of reporting. I call it the “three days to details” problem today where the rush to get a story out eclipses any digging for a few days and also then tends to be already forgotten as a question by that third day when a handful of reporters finish writing the old fashioned day one articles.
It’s just how it goes in the instant worldwide communications world... pick a catch phrase and stick it in the news wire and it automatically gets copied and formatted for instant consumption. Not really deeply complaining about it, just acknowledging it is the norm now.
I don’t expect much from reporters these days. They mean well but they’re paid awfully as that business model continues to fail and their business goals and personal goals tend toward placating one political group or another.
No big deal.
There’s always a mathematician or engineer or other STEM trained person or group willing to run down the raw data and ask questions about data gathering methods, assumptions, etc.
Nothing against reporters at all. Have numerous friends in that biz. They’re not exactly deep math thinkers and they don’t have any editors pushing for that sort of deeper analysis or data normalization in the sound bite world they all operate in today.
The online news software that pushes headline after headline out doesn’t highlight material like that which used to be back around page 6-10 of a typical old school newspaper. The algorithms just shove the next three “catchy headlines” and “breaking news” at everyone after they click on one.
Oh well. That era ended quite a while ago and the video era is slowly failing. Too easy and cheap to get shallow video content from phones. No friction to slow down the story and have people actually think about it before delivery to the end consumer.
It’s not just political stuff either. Used to have to wait all year for business news on any particular company. Certainly weren’t able to read a stream of consciousness direct from any extroverted CEOs, or their opinions on politics or society, or jock itch daily... for better or worse. Ha.
Maybe I would counter your weird (to me anyway) question with, are you old enough to remember when newspapers actually did the math?
If not, the above might explain why someone older might choose to seek out what mathematicians think about the numbers politicians and businesses with vested interests communicate about things... ?
PeterNSteinmetz
Ejection Handle Pulled
The average Joe does not think nor reason quantitatively. They have a hard time with things that have to be thought about it quantitative terms, like reducing your odds of infection by a given percentage. They like to think qualitatively, like “If I get vaccinated I can’t catch Covid-19”.
Mathematicians and others with quantitative training are usually more comfortable with thinking in terms of odds.