D&D and the rising pandemic

[Umbran]

... which makes it bizarre that so many employers still haven't figured figure out #2, so they keep on pressuring workers per #1.

It just goes to show how ingrained ideas can continue in the face of data.

 

[Umbran]

If your employer as policy keeps minimal possible staff, taking a day off (sick, vacation, doctor appointment, whatever) equals coming back to two days' worth of work awaiting you. Because nobody else has the time to spare from their workload to carry some of yours.
If you have a 72-hour bug, you get to dig yourself out of that hole for a week.

The father of modern Quality Assurance was Dr. William Edwards Deming. He was an engineer and statistician, and the understanding of the impact of many of our mistaken polices are grounded in his work.

One rule he found to hold runs as follows: Any system to do work has some maximum normal capacity. But, if you regularly run a system at above about 80% of its maximum capacity, the system will degrade to the point where its new maximum is below that 80%. And it turns out this holds no matter what the systems is built from - machines or people.

The inability to take sick days is an example of this. Since everyone else is working at 100% capacity, nobody has slack time to pick up your work, and you become a bottleneck if you aren't present.

The problem is that managers and executives don't usually read Deming.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I got exposed to this concept in undergrad economics and reintroduced to it in an MBA program. And even my profs noted how few people they worked with (in other capacities) grasped that concept.

I will also note that my econ profs- literally the men and women who wrote the textbooks being used to teach the field around the world, testifying before Congress, etc.- were also quick to debunk the work of Arthur Laffer, but were clearly not listened to on that, either.

IOW, there’s a long standing tradition of people ignoring good, solid economic research. Sometimes up to the point of disaster.

 

[Umbran]

IOW, there’s a long standing tradition of people ignoring good, solid economic research. Sometimes up to the point of disaster.

Among other things, there's a fairly strong pressure on leaders of all sorts to NEVER admit that they were wrong. To change the policy would be admitting the old policy was bad, and they were a bad leader to have that policy.

 

[MoonSong]

Well, in my country taking a sick day is easier, because of worker protections, but it is still a nightmare. You can't be fired for taking a sick day, but you need a doctor's note from one of the two national healthcare providers (depending on whether you work for the government or in the private sector). It is free, and you don't need an appointment, but if you don't have an appointment you need to take a number to see a doctor. And getting a number means having to wait in line with lots of other sick people, outdoors with cold weather, at 5 or 6 in the morning, all while you are feeling too sick for work. Needles to say I haven't taken a sick day ever, but thankfully I haven't been sick enough that I couldn't work.

(Reminds me that I need to settle my healthcare paperwork. I haven't had to, because I prefer to go to private practitioners. They are kind of affordable without insurance, and are less overworked. How affordable? Medical tourism is a big deal here. Many Americans book a vacation to here, stay a few days, have their surgery done, recover and go home for far less than it would cost in the US. Or at least pre-pandemic)

 

[Zardnaar]

Here you don't need a medical certificate until day 3.

I think the boss can ask for one but they have to pay for it. They never do as the doctor will usually sign something.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

A good, if longish, read about how coronaviruses operate in humans and why certain researchers are predicting not only that COVID will be endemic, but also that it may become more like the common cold (a minor nuisance) than the disease we’ve been fighting since 2019.

It should be noted that they recommend vaccination as the quickest path to that possibility.

 

[Maxperson]

First case in Tonga. A traveler from New Zealand tested positive.

Tonga's main island locks down after 1st virus case found

Tonga's main island will go into lockdown for a week after the South Pacific nation reported its first case of the coronavirus, the government said Monday. The far-flung archipelago identified its first virus case last week, after a traveler arriving from New Zealand tested positive and...

www.yahoo.com

 

[Umbran]

A good, if longish, read about how coronaviruses operate in humans and why certain researchers are predicting not only that COVID will be endemic, but also that it may become more like the common cold (a minor nuisance) than the disease we’ve been fighting since 2019.

It should be noted that they recommend vaccination as the quickest path to that possibility.

Yes. They also note that this process can take years - it is essentially generational.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Went to church in person for the first time since March of 2020 this Sunday. Among other things, I got this mixed bag of a story:

Our church’s music director and his whole family got Covid. The parents were both vaccinated, as I recall, but one of the kids came home with it, and infected everyone else. Despite being vaccinated, the music director still got very sick, so they gave him a monoclonal antibody treatment- probably residemivir.

According to him, he felt GREAT after the treatment was completed. In fact, he felt better 15 minutes after treatment than he did at church a week later when I saw him. He’s still having ups & downs, but many more ups than downs.