D&D and the rising pandemic

[Acolyte of Zothique]

So, to put this in perspective for folks who are not data scientists or statisticians...

The R0 is the number of people that a sick person will then infect. It is highly dependent on how the population responds to the epidemic.

Typically, the flu has an R0 of about 1.3. Covid-19 has an R0 somewhere between 2 and 3 outside of China - likely around 2.5. This may not sound like much of a difference, but after 20 "generations" of passing along an illness, an R0 of 1.3 would result in 146 infections, but an R0 of 2.5 would result in 36 million infections.

The number of people found with covid-19 infections doubles every 3 to 6 days. Ten days ago, Italy thought it was fine. Today? Their hospital system is overrun, and they are putting up tents outside hospitals to deal wiht the overflow, and there's nationwide policies to restrict spread of the disease.

Compared to the reading I've done, the mortality rate Celebrim has here is high, and I home he doens't mind a correction. His number has been floating around, and seems to be based on a statement of the WHO that 3.4 percent of people with reported covid-19 infections worldwide had died. This is NOT THE SAME as the mortality risk for infection, as many infections happen but never see a health care professional. There is an esimation step that happens between Celebrim's number, and the actual mortality risk.

The flu has a death rate of around 0.1% of infections. Marc Lipsitch, the director of the Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics at Harvard, estimates that for covid-19 it is 1-2%. The latest epedemiological modeling found a 1.6% rate in China in February, sixteen times higher than the flu.

In Italy at present the Case Fatality Rate is over 6%. This is huge and increasing numbers of younger people are experiencing severe illness. There are likely specific reasons why the CFR rate is so high in Italy but still...

The CFR is the percentage of people who get COVID 19 who then go on to die.

Do not underestimate the coronavirus. Anyone who still insists this is the Flu is actually denying the reality of the situation.

I am a health professional myself in the UK National Health Service (NHS). The NHS will be overwhelmed and I am daily looking at the research into the spread of the virus. I am the DM for my group and we play at a D&D Meetup here in London. I am on the verge of cancelling my game; I'm going to run it this Sunday but that may be the last session. COVID 19 cases here are on the cusp of increasing exponentially just as they did in Italy. We are about to increase our testing from 1500 per day to 10000 per day.

 

[Sacrosanct]

In Italy at present the Case Fatality Rate is over 6%. This is huge and increasing numbers of younger people are experiencing severe illness. There are likely specific reasons why the CFS rate is so high in Italy but still...

Do not underestimate the coronavirus. Anyone who still insists this is the Flu is actually denying the reality of the situation.

I am a health professional myself in the UK National Health Service (NHS). The NHS will be overwhelmed and I am daily looking at the research into the spread of the virus. I am the DM for my group and we play at a D&D Meetup here in London. I am on the verge of cancelling my game; I'm going to run it this Sunday but that may be the last session. COVID 19 cases here are on the cusp of increasing exponentially just as they did in Italy.

There are still a lot of unknowns, but what we do know, it's in my opinion that anyone who still compares this with the flu is either grossly mistaken, or being irresponsible (depending on how much information they've been presented so far determining which of the two categories they fall into).

I recall one health professional saying an average of 30 people a day are being admitted into the hospitals in Italy now. Every one of them with severe symptoms. That doesn't happen with the flu. It's not just comparing fatality rates, or how contagious it is. It's also how overwhelmed our healthcare system will be. Best healthcare in the world doesn't matter if you can't get access to it.

 

[NotAYakk]

In Italy at present the Case Fatality Rate is over 6%. This is huge and increasing numbers of younger people are experiencing severe illness. There are likely specific reasons why the CFS rate is so high in Italy but still...

Do not underestimate the coronavirus. Anyone who still insists this is the Flu is actually denying the reality of the situation.

I am a health professional myself in the UK National Health Service (NHS). The NHS will be overwhelmed and I am daily looking at the research into the spread of the virus. I am the DM for my group and we play at a D&D Meetup here in London. I am on the verge of cancelling my game; I'm going to run it this Sunday but that may be the last session. COVID 19 cases here are on the cusp of increasing exponentially just as they did in Italy.

It is increasing exponentially everywhere, except Italy, SK, China, Taiwan and maybe Japan at this point.

If we assume 6% fatality rate if untreated by ICU, infected doubles every week if uncontrolled by travel/contact restrictions, and 1% death rate if treated by ICU.

UK's death count is 6, diagnosed is 453. So 6*800 is about 4800 actual cases. You have 10% coverage of the sick; of everyone with Covid 19, roughly 1 in 10 has been tested and found to have it.

UK has 4000 intensive care and a step down from it beds. On the order of 10%-20% of patients need it. Your utilization is probably north of 80% on those beds right now.

So if you introduced a lock down today, your intensive care bed supply would be stretched to its limit but not break. Probably 10,000 total cases, 100 dead (1% death rate) over 3-5 weeks.

Wait a week. 20,000 total cases. Half of those who need intensive care just die because you don't have the equipment. 100 + 600 = 700 dead.

Wait a week. 40,000 total cases. 3/4 of those who need intensive care just die because you don't have the equipment. 100 + 1800 = 1900 dead.

Wait a week. 80,000 total cases. 4300 dead.

Never do lock down, just let the virus burn itself out. 66 million people in UK. 1/4 get infected within 5 months. 6% death rate among infected because hospitals can do nothing, they don't have the equipment to handle it. 1 million dead.

On the plus side, France and Spain are a few weeks ahead of you along this track. I suspect even Boris will do something eventually.

 

[Sadras]

This is the best link I've seen so far.

Worldometer has more bang for your click and it is more up to date.

 

[akr71]

Worldometer has more bang for your click and it is more up to date.

Yes, I've seen that one too, but I'm a geographer, so I like their map and graduated symbology. While my area still has 0 confirmed cases, up to date isn't as important to me. My spouse is front-line health care worker, who has been in almost daily conference calls as they prepare for the inevitable.

I find the data and maps interesting, but I trust in my wife and her coworkers regarding my community's well-being more than anything I read here or elsewhere on the internet.

Edit: just read that the Canadian gov't is pumping $1B into healthcare to deal with COVID-19 and "Ottawa is also providing support to workers who have been put under quarantine or told to self-isolate by waiving the one-week waiting period for employment insurance." For non-Canadians that means you won't miss a paycheck if you call in sick (and don't have sick-leave). I've always been irritable when people show up to work sick - you aren't proving how tough you are, you are spreading your illness around, go home.

 

[Sadras]

...but I trust in my wife and her coworkers regarding my community's well-being more than anything I read here or elsewhere on the internet.

I agree with your above statement, but speaking about trust issues - I have a colleague who denies the reality of it all for a number of reasons*. She is also against vaccinating so that is her angle. I have asked her how does she imagine the collusion between so many governments and health personnel to exist - but I do not get much of an answer there just the usual elites + power + puppet governments. I hope she doesnt experience it because her youngest has down syndrome with a weak immune system.

*social media platforms such a youbtute direct you to mainstream news sites
*not seen current vlogs of people with with the virus (or that have recovered) that has not been pushed through via mainstream media
*except for a few public officials there are no names (again via mainstream media).

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[NotAYakk]

People will happily vote for 10$ to fix something and won't vote for 1$ to prevent it from breaking in the first place.

Stopping this will be hard. It will require political will. And I guess letting it get bad enough in a region that a few 100 people will die before enacting measures (so, you enact measures when there are 10 community deaths, deal with grumbles, watch as 100-400 die, then say "look what we prevented"?)

Or maybe we really need to start showing some disaster videos of what is actually going on with this virus to the general public.

But how do you show a doctor or nurse forced to let someone suffocate to death in a hallway because the equipment that could save them is already in use to save someone else? How do you show it happening 100 times a day?

 

[briggart]

People will happily vote for 10$ to fix something and won't vote for 1$ to prevent it from breaking in the first place.

Stopping this will be hard. It will require political will. And I guess letting it get bad enough in a region that a few 100 people will die before enacting measures (so, you enact measures when there are 10 community deaths, deal with grumbles, watch as 100-400 die, then say "look what we prevented"?)

Or maybe we really need to start showing some disaster videos of what is actually going on with this virus to the general public.

But how do you show a doctor or nurse forced to let someone suffocate to death in a hallway because the equipment that could save them is already in use to save someone else? How do you show it happening 100 times a day?

This picture was taken yesterday at a nearby hospital, here in Lombardy. These are all ambulances waiting to deliver patients to the hospital, the queue went up to 14 yesterday. It's not people dying, but it's something you rarely see outside natural disasters and the like.

 

[Umbran]

And the thing about public health is that when it works, you don't even notice it! Which is to say- if you assume that the powers that be (TM) scramble and manage to minimize the impact and spread of this, people will be all like, "Well, guess it was a false alarm. No big deal. All that panic over nothing." Whereas if they can't, those same people will say that they weren't protected.

Yeah.

So, Monday in Boston, the city cancelled the upcoming St. Patrick's Day Parade, which is kind of a big thing, and drives a lot of business downtown that day. The mayor, having no other public appearances scheduled yesterday, made an opportunity to speak with the press. And he was asked by one reporter what he had to say to merchants in the area that were complaining about the loss of traffic.

And, he said pretty much what I hoped he would. In only a slighly annoyed tone, he said (in effect), "Folks, this is not a thing you complain about. This is a reasonable step to make sure your customers stay safe and healthy to come back later."