Ohio Governor drops MOAB on his state economy

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azure said:
Good point about ventilators, very true. Of course, the fact of needing so many is directly related to our inability to nip this thing in the bud. I'm not sure of the reason why we can't produce them - do you have a reference for that?
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I do know that GM is stepping up and using one of their automotive electronics facilities to assist in making ventilators. I would assume this not necessary if present manufacturers could keep up with demand, but don't have a cite.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...to-build-ventilators-in-indiana-idUSKBN21A2Y4
 
azure said:
Certain other countries were able to produce the needed kits and avoid shutting down their economies - S. Korea is the most notable example. That we couldn't do it, with the strongest economy and best medical technology in the world, is to our lasting shame.
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S. Korea, along with Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan had the "benefit" of learning from the 2003 SARS outbreak. For example, Singapore started taking temperatures at airports and shut it's borders to Chinese travelers on Feb 1, which was a week after Wuhan locked down.
 
It seems that people fall into 1 of 2 camps with no in-between. There are the "doomsayers" and the "deniers". The "doomsayers" want everyone to hide at home for months. The "deniers" want to go about things as usual.

The moves taken by various shelter in place governors fall into the "doomsayer" category. They have the potential to lead to an economic depression that will last 10 years with a potential $100 trillion loss of GDP (assume 50% reduction of current 20 trill spread over 10 years).

The "deniers" are out partying on the beach in large crowds.

I'm looking for more leaders to find a path in between and I don't see many.
 
Bill Jennings said:
I do know that GM is stepping up and using one of their automotive electronics facilities to assist in making ventilators. I would assume this not necessary if present manufacturers could keep up with demand, but don't have a cite.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...to-build-ventilators-in-indiana-idUSKBN21A2Y4
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Yep, I've heard about that project, if not in so much detail; thanks for the link.

Yes it is clear that manufacturers can't keep up with the demand, but I'm not sure of the reason why. Note that the need for tons more ventilators depends on how many critical cases develop, which in turn depends on the effectiveness of public health measures. That's why I place most of the blame on whoever is responsible for our inability to make sufficient testing available.
 
asicer said:
S. Korea, along with Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan had the "benefit" of learning from the 2003 SARS outbreak. For example, Singapore started taking temperatures at airports and shut it's borders to Chinese travelers on Feb 1, which was a week after Wuhan locked down.
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Yep, very true. But again, that we didn't learn from their experience is symptomatic of the blinders we've had on about the possibility. That a pandemic might result from a new zoonotic virus like SARS (also a coronavirus) is NOT news... it is something that the medical community (and some reporters) have been warning us about for years.
 
azure said:
I'm not sure of the reason why we can't produce them - do you have a reference for that?
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Because up until a few months ago they were heavily taxed items along with other medical equipment. Why produce if you’re going to be taxed to death on your production? Thankfully that tax has been repealed and more medical equipment is now being manufactured.
 
azure said:
While this is true, absolute numbers of deaths are a misleading indicator. The number of people diagnosed with the flu are way, way above the number diagnosed with coronavirus.
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Most people with coronavirus won't get diagnosed, a much higher percentage with the flu will. Its estimated that actual coronavirus cases world wide are in excess of 10 million, but we've identified less than 400,000 of them.
 
azblackbird said:
Because up until a few months ago they were heavily taxed items along with other medical equipment. Why produce if you’re going to be taxed to death on your production? Thankfully that tax has been repealed and more medical equipment is now being manufactured.
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Lmao. Device tax had little to nothing to do with it. Hospitals are the buyers, they have margins to maintain. They are not going to purchase and maintain something for which they do not have a use on a regular basis.
As a country, we have structured our healthcare system to fundamentally be the least incentivized possible to plan ahead and manage such an outbreak.

Tim
 
Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe said:
Edgamacation is not on the list of critical infrastructure. Ain't like kids gotta be learned to spell.

My classes are 100% on line for the rest of the semester (some of the lab stuff the students can do at home) but management still wants me to show up and sit in my office...
Michigan public schools are closed, but on-line classrooms don't "count" for the required days of public school. I would suggest that this is a stupid policy - particularly under the circumstances, but that would be getting political. Dunno what the policies are in other states.
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Aahhhh.... you did say ichigan!
 
bflynn said:
Most people with coronavirus won't get diagnosed, a much higher percentage with the flu will. Its estimated that actual coronavirus cases world wide are in excess of 10 million, but we've identified less than 400,000 of them.
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Just like with coronavirus, it is hard to say how many influenza cases go undiagnosed. The only reason I was diagnosed with Type A last month is because I sought medical advice to determine if I should self-isolate. My case was fairly mild, probably thanks in part to getting a flu shot last fall. I had several students report having tested positive for Type A, so I thought I should find out. For what I had, I would not have ordinarily gone to the doctor at all.

All we can go by is the case fatality rate when we don't know the actual infection rate. The flip side of that, of course, is that with a disease as contagious as COVID-19, that vast pool of undiagnosed infection is also a vast pool of unknown disease vectors spreading the infection, and a big part of the reason we can't control its spread.
 
azure said:
I know... that's why I said it is to our lasting shame. :(



Good point about ventilators, very true. Of course, the fact of needing so many is directly related to our inability to nip this thing in the bud. I'm not sure of the reason why we can't produce them - do you have a reference for that?
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I'm pretty sure you have to buy parts from China
 
Bill Jennings said:
I'm starting to come around to @Datadriver and @Morgan3820 's way of thinking. The CDC says that thus far deaths from the regular flu season have been 23,000-59,000 [1]. So, the corona deaths so far have been only 1-2% of the number already dead from regular flue yet we're destroying our economy, destroying wealth, putting thousands out of work, and it will likely take the better part of a decade to recover. Does it really make sense to sacrifice so much for so little?
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Deaths come in the neighborhood of 3 weeks after initial infection. If you look at the number of infections we had 3 weeks ago, it's no surprise that we haven't had a lot of deaths yet. The worst is yet to come.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
Deaths come in the neighborhood of 3 weeks after initial infection. If you look at the number of infections we had 3 weeks ago, it's no surprise that we haven't had a lot of deaths yet. The worst is yet to come.
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Don't come in here with your pesky facts Kent!
 
flyingcheesehead said:
LMAO... Nobody's going to produce something that won't be bought. :rolleyes:
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The state of NY/Cuomo had plenty of opportunities to buy ventilators. How come he didn’t knowing that a pandemic was in their disaster plans? I know why. I’ll leave it to you to do your own research on what the truth is.
 
azure said:
... The real crime here is that we could have been better prepared - by having the machinery in place to quickly ramp up production of testing kits - but instead we chose to sit fat, happy, and stupid when we knew that something like this was bound to happen sooner or later.
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Perhaps we could have been BETTER prepared, but to keep things in perspective we were better prepared than any other country. US preparedness ranked #1 out of 195 countries surveyd.

https://www.ghsindex.org/

https://www.ghsindex.org/country/united-states/
 
azure said:
Would be interesting to see the 2020 GHS index, when it comes out. I suspect they will have to reassess our preparedness in light of what has happened over the last month and a half or so...
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I would say something about 2020 hindsight, but it would make a terrible play on words......

:D
 
DavidWhite said:
Yet we're on track to have over 100,000 cases by friday. Bigly prepared.
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Economically not feasible to be bigly prepared. I'll tell you what, when this is all done, make a business case to build, stock, and staff empty hospitals just in case. I'll bet you'll have people tripping over themselves to loan you the money. Not.
 
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DavidWhite said:
Yet we're on track to have over 100,000 cases by friday. Bigly prepared.
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Oh, and while I'm thinking about it, preparedness also starts at home. Have decent food supply on hand, but more importantly, people should have at least six months of after tax income per household wage earner saved up in their rainy day fund. And people should be fit, active, not overweight, and shouldn't smoke/vape as these things increase the chances of lung damage.
 
Bill Jennings said:
Economically not feasible to be bigly prepared.
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Absolutely right. You cannot prepare for everything or you'd have warehouses full of doomsday supplies and equipment covering the countryside. You (we) have to mostly rely on adaptability to overcome new threats.
 
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Bill Jennings said:
Oh, and while I'm thinking about it, preparedness also starts at home. Have decent food supply on hand, but more importantly, people should have at least six months of after tax income per household wage earner saved up in their rainy day fund.
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The savings thing is great, but the reality is in our consumer society, the vast majority of people would rather have a new car or cellphone than put back a couple of weeks of pay. So when we do have an event, the government steps in and fixes it for the folks with the new phones and cars. That just trains them to do the same thing next time because Uncle Sam will be there to make it all better <again>.
 
kyleb said:
The savings thing is great, but the reality is in our consumer society, the vast majority of people would rather have a new car or cellphone than put back a couple of weeks of pay. So when we do have an event, the government steps in and fixes it for the folks with the new phones and cars. That just trains them to do the same thing next time because Uncle Sam will be there to make it all better <again>.
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Oh I agree, I'm just tired of those who do have common sense and plan for a rainy day being forcibly taxed to pay for those who don't.
 
Having never studied economics I don't see how giving trillions to people who haven't produced anything isn't a communist solution to a capitalist problem. Now, if it's a loan everybody has to pay back... :dunno:
 
I wonder what one of those "bubble head" ventilators you see in use in Italy costs to manufacture. From the looks of it not much, nor does it look complex. Even if such equipment need not be manufactured and stockpiled, certainly plans for rapid production could be in place, if an early warning system were in place.

My understanding is the valves for them are being manufactured on an emergency basis on 3D printers. Hell, we could build Liberty ships in 40 days.
 
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Of course, that presumes maintaining some kind of domestic manufacturing base, and not always chasing the lowest cost provider.
 
Chip Sylverne said:
I wonder what one of those "bubble head" ventilators you see in use in Italy costs to manufacture. From the looks of it not much, nor does it look complex. Even if such equipment need not be manufactured and stockpiled, certainly plans for rapid production could be in place, if an early warning system were in place.

My understanding is the valves for them are being manufactured on an emergency basis on 3D printers. Hell, we could build Liberty ships in 40 days.
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There was an article about GM working with a ventilator company to mass produce them. I forget he name of the company, GM stated they have the capability to manufacture or supply 95% of the parts; but they are looking for sources for the remaining 37 (I think those were the numbers). And those 37 parts were effectively the "brains and sensors" of the ventilator.

Ford has announced a similar deal working with GE; in this case Ford is going to use a 3D prototype system to supply the majority of the parts to produce 1000 units a month to start while mass production ramps up. In this case; GE will focus on supplying the critical "brains and sensors" and Ford handles the assembly.

My point is, those systems are much more complicated than you realize. They have to have sensors and enough smarts to change pressure based on the person inhaling/exhaling.... This is not the old simple mechanical lungs based system.

In terms of the Liberty ships; it took years to tune and build the supply chain to get to that rate. And the 40 days was only the portion.

Tim
 
tspear said:
There was an article about GM working with a ventilator company to mass produce them. I forget he name of the company, GM stated they have the capability to manufacture or supply 95% of the parts; but they are looking for sources for the remaining 37 (I think those were the numbers). And those 37 parts were effectively the "brains and sensors" of the ventilator.

Ford has announced a similar deal working with GE; in this case Ford is going to use a 3D prototype system to supply the majority of the parts to produce 1000 units a month to start while mass production ramps up. In this case; GE will focus on supplying the critical "brains and sensors" and Ford handles the assembly.

My point is, those systems are much more complicated than you realize. They have to have sensors and enough smarts to change pressure based on the person inhaling/exhaling.... This is not the old simple mechanical lungs based system.

In terms of the Liberty ships; it took years to tune and build the supply chain to get to that rate. And the 40 days was only the portion.

Tim
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There is also some thought about using Auto - CPAP machines as low cost or part of a low cost solution.
 
Bill Jennings said:
Economically not feasible to be bigly prepared. I'll tell you what, when this is all done, make a business case to build, stock, and staff empty hospitals just in case. I'll bet you'll have people tripping over themselves to loan you the money. Not.
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Actually, it is possible to be prepared. A plan, even an imperfect plan, will have a better outcome than no plan. In 2018, the plans the Federal government had were dismantled.
Combined with the current "death of expertise" and dismissing of experts has actually placed us in the current situation. South Korea is the perfect example; where the plan and reality did not match. But executing the plan, and then adjusting has allowed the country to be surgical instead using a sledge hammer.

Tim
 
tspear said:
Actually, it is possible to be prepared. A plan, even an imperfect plan, will have a better outcome than no plan. In 2018, the plans the Federal government had were dismantled.
Combined with the current "death of expertise" and dismissing of experts has actually placed us in the current situation. South Korea is the perfect example; where the plan and reality did not match. But executing the plan, and then adjusting has allowed the country to be surgical instead using a sledge hammer.

Tim
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Agree... but this is getting into IBTL territory...
 
tspear said:
Ah, but how are facts against TOS? :)
Spin on the facts is the issue.

Tim
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Based on what Mari wrote in a different thread, I suspect the MB feels differently about such statements as "dismissing of experts". Would be nice if they clarified... :(
 
azure said:
Based on what Mari wrote in a different thread, I suspect the MB feels differently about such statements as "dismissing of experts". Would be nice if they clarified... :(
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Speaking for myself, this is a fine line. If you can discuss the subject without getting into veiled (or unveiled) insults to either side of the political aisle, I would say that it OK. However, it seems that some are unable to resist. Some also get pleasure out of pushing the moderation envelope. Try to tone down the emotion.
 
It takes guts, but what should have happened once we learned of this in Wuhan was total incoming shutdown at all US borders. Those that want to leave, OK, go. Those who want in, including US nationals on travel, so sorry, you're going to have to ride this out wherever you may be. If nobody gets in, the virus doesn't get in.
 
Bill Jennings said:
It takes guts, but what should have happened once we learned of this in Wuhan was total incoming shutdown at all US borders. Those that want to leave, OK, go. Those who want in, including US nationals on travel, so sorry, you're going to have to ride this out wherever you may be. If nobody gets in, the virus doesn't get in.
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The trouble is, it would likely have already been too late... because of the incubation period, because most cases are mild, even subclinical, and because of the fact that China suppressed the truth for as long as they could (hope that's not too political). Might have slowed things down some, given us a little extra time - it's been suggested, not unreasonably, that Italy's open policy toward China was partly responsible for their getting overwhelmed so quickly and so early - but we might be not too far behind where we are now, and with exponential growth, the result was pretty much a foregone conclusion once the infection took hold here.

As has been said before, the only alternative to shutdown in a global pandemic is widespread, universal testing availability. We were not, and still are not, prepared to do that. So we are, where we are. :(
 
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