Off Topic Thread 4.0

Dubinusa

No. Obamacare ruined it. Premiums up. Restrictive testing etc. Co pays are pretty much the same. I had to fork out 400$ for a blood test. Prior to Obamacare it was free..

Neil3030

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/coronavirus-germany-and-us-at-odds-over-vaccine-1.4203651?mode=amp

Welt am Sonntag quoted an unidentified German government source as saying Mr Trump was trying to secure the scientists’ work exclusively, and would do anything to get a vaccine for the US, “but only for the United States”.

If anyone has a white lab coat and a decent Skype connection, they could make a few bob pretending to a fairly desperate man that they are close to developing a vaccine....

Dubinusa

Well, it's pandemonium in my area. Nothing on the shelves in the store.
Wish I could still drink...... sigh

Former Former

Dubinusa wrote: »

No. Obamacare ruined it. Premiums up. Restrictive testing etc. Co pays are pretty much the same. I had to fork out 400$ for a blood test. Prior to Obamacare it was free..

Well, you and your ilk have unleashed Trump on us, so we'll call it even.

Dubinusa

Dubinusa wrote: »

No. Obamacare ruined it. Premiums up. Restrictive testing etc. Co pays are pretty much the same. I had to fork out 400$ for a blood test. Prior to Obamacare it was free..

Why did Obamacare cause the cost for the test to go up?

ClanofLams

Dubinusa wrote: »

No. Obamacare ruined it. Premiums up. Restrictive testing etc. Co pays are pretty much the same. I had to fork out 400$ for a blood test. Prior to Obamacare it was free..

Twenty million people more got insurance under Obamacare. It’s certainly not perfect but that’s an advancement to be proud of. Insurance companies not being able to refuse people unfortunate enough to have pre existing conditions another advancement.

The absurd position of republicans and their ranting about “socialised medicine” - their position that if you get sick without insurance and can’t pay the exorbitant fees, you should either lose your home or your life is responsible for the shortcomings of American healthcare.

Dubinusa

Former Former wrote: »

Well, you and your ilk have unleashed Trump on us, so we'll call it even.

Feck off. You and ur ilk should worry about Ireland.

Podge_irl

A lot of premiums went up after Obamacare because they mandated basic standards of care. There were a huge number of policies that were costing hundreds a month that were essentially worthless. It made people feel better to think they "had insurance" but in reality it would have covered bugger all.

stephen_n

Former Former wrote: »

Well, you and your ilk have unleashed Trump on us, so we'll call it even.

Dubinusa wrote: »

Feck off. You and ur ilk should worry about Ireland.

And that there is why we don’t get to discuss politics on here.

connemara man

stephen_n wrote: »

And that there is why we don’t get to discuss politics on here.

That is correct and that will be the end of the politics chat now

The manager of the US fruit stall is some wanker

b.gud

It was nice while it lasted

sydthebeat

The people revelling in panic porn out there is disgusting.

What puts it onto people's head to put out misleading and utterly false stuff out on social media and dress it up as if its official.

Embarrassed to say I think for about an hour I might have fell for some of the fake news bull**** circulating last night. Won't be doing that again.

Have also decided to take social isolation pretty seriously from here on for a few weeks.

Buer

sydthebeat wrote: »

The people revelling in panic porn out there is disgusting.

What puts it onto people's head to put out misleading and utterly false stuff out on social media and dress it up as if its official.

The father in law has my head f*cking melted with the forwards. He has been warned and told to stop sending rubbish on even if it's with the best of intentions. Last night, he sent on the one about anti-inflammatories which was twisted out of context but said it's genuine as there was an article in the link. Unfortunately, the article was twisted to be deliberately misleading.

I'm grand but he will send this on to 10 others who are in his own demographic i.e. 60 years of age and above. Many of them will take it as truth.

If WhatsApp messages can be traced to source, there should be criminal proceedings for those creating these.

stephen_n

Buer wrote: »

The father in law has my head f*cking melted with the forwards. He has been warned and told to stop sending rubbish on even if it's with the best of intentions. Last night, he sent on the one about anti-inflammatories which was twisted out of context but said it's genuine as there was an article in the link. Unfortunately, the article was twisted to be deliberately misleading.

I'm grand but he will send this on to 10 others who are in his own demographic i.e. 60 years of age and above. Many of them will take it as truth.

If WhatsApp messages can be traced to source, there should be criminal proceedings for those creating these.

The Irish Times published an article it later deleted, saying that French Doctors had suggested stopping taking anti inflammatory medicine. If newspapers are getting caught out spreading this stuff, you can understand how ordinary people do.

Podge_irl

stephen_n wrote: »

The Irish Times published an article it later deleted, saying that French Doctors had suggested stopping taking anti inflammatory medicine. If newspapers are getting caught out spreading this stuff, you can understand how ordinary people do.

Did the French health minister not saying something about it? Thought I saw that on twitter. Which at least gave the whole thing a veneer of truth.

mfceiling

I've a friend who is a top cancer specialist here and he sent a group message last night about the ibuprofen/nurofen story.
Apparently there is a small risk with taking these if you have the virus and he recommended paracetamol should be taken instead.

If i get one more message about the army bringing in marshall law or the supermarkets only letting in 10 people at a time I'm going to delete WhatsApp.

sydthebeat

mfceiling wrote: »

If i get one more message about the army bringing in marshall law or the supermarkets only letting in 10 people at a time I'm going to delete WhatsApp.

Talking to supermarket staff this morning who are sure that that is going to happen.... And judging by the busyness of my local supervalu this morning its probably worth doing

errlloyd

mfceiling wrote: »

I've a friend who is a top cancer specialist here and he sent a group message last night about the ibuprofen/nurofen story.
Apparently there is a small risk with taking these if you have the virus and he recommended paracetamol should be taken instead.

Yeah my mate works in James' and he also got this, but he then got a follow up email from James' admitting they'd been hoaxed. It seems that anti-inflammatories are fine. But maybe check back with him.

Buer

Podge_irl wrote: »

Did the French health minister not saying something about it? Thought I saw that on twitter. Which at least gave the whole thing a veneer of truth.

He did. The issue was the WhatsApp message was implying people should stop taking all anti-inflammatories as of now which is misrepresenting what was said. Not as blatant as previous lies but more dangerous in many ways as it's using genuine information out there and putting an alternative slant on it.

Anyone with small children who have had croup, asthma etc. will be aware that you don't give them Neurofen when it's acting up as it can potentially exacerbate the issue. It's grand to give it to them normally though.

errlloyd

sydthebeat wrote: »

Talking to supermarket staff this morning who are sure that that is going to happen.... And judging by the busyness of my local supervalu this morning its probably worth doing

I am not confident in our strategy. I really struggle to understand it.

As far as I can make out, it is this.

• We only have around 300 ICU beds / ventillators (I think we may have more of the latter, but they are being used interchangebly)
• 5% of people will need a ventillator - and will need it for between 1 week and 3 weeks.
• So if there are 300 ventillators being used 2 weeks at a time, on average there will be 20ish "made available" per day.
• That twenty is 5% of the maximum daily infection rate we can have (20 *0.05 = 400) so our daily rate has to be 400
• For us to naturally get "herd immunity" we have to wait till half the population - around 2.2 million of us get it.
• 2.2m / 400 = 5,500 days or 15 years of isolation.

So at the moment, our strategy seems to be - keep everyone at home until someone invents a vaccine? I am beginning to wonder (quietly) should a few of us be "chicken poxxing it". Getting it intentionally. You don't get lifetime immunity, but in almost all cases you seem to get strong short term immunity.

mfceiling

errlloyd wrote: »

Yeah my mate works in James' and he also got this, but he then got a follow up email from James' admitting they'd been hoaxed. It seems that anti-inflammatories are fine. But maybe check back with him.

Yeah he explained that the risk was very minor and to treat WhatsApp/Fakebook messages with less than a pinch of salt.
Interesting that he said paracetamol is probably the best form of medicine to take for practically anything.
Little to no side effects for the majority of the public - a wonder drug!!

Buer

If we take the "chickenpox" approach, will it not lead to far, far greater numbers becoming infected in a shorter space of time and the paucity of equipment/facilities becoming overwhelmed instantly i.e. greater numbers are likely to die? Is this not what Britain are attempting and are discussing asking anyone over 70 to put themselves into self isolation long term to protect themselves?

Essentially we are trying to control numbers and allow more people to develop immunity until a vaccine becomes available from what I can see. But this is far more sensible than accepting the health system is going to be overrun and potentially thousands die as the system collapses. If we protect ourselves as a society, we'll hopefully be able to manage the numbers a lot more efficiently and limit the mortality rate.

sydthebeat

Obvious big difference between chicken pox and covid is the fatality rate.

1 in 60000 versus 1 in 100

aloooof

Never thought I'd say this, but I'm looking forward to when we can all go back to arguing about POM...

Buer

aloooof wrote: »

Never thought I'd say this, but I'm looking forward to when we can all go back to arguing about POM...

The key to beating coronavirus is not being visible, not getting involved and as little interaction with others around as possible.

POM, this is your time to shine.

Buer

Very easy to digest and clear visual representation of how the various approaches to fighting coronavirus work:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/world/corona-simulator/

awec

On the number of ventilators thing, over 50% of ventilators used worldwide are made in Ireland. We’re also the second largest exporter of medical technology in Europe.

errlloyd

errlloyd wrote: »

So at the moment, our strategy seems to be - keep everyone at home until someone invents a vaccine? I am beginning to wonder (quietly) should a few of us be "chicken poxxing it". Getting it intentionally. You don't get lifetime immunity, but in almost all cases you seem to get strong short term immunity.

People are getting it. The rate at which people get it is almost certainly going to increase quite a lot. The approach you suggest will almost certainly kill people, I don't see how any Govt can propose it wilfully.

sydthebeat

Buer wrote: »

Very easy to digest and clear visual representation of how the various approaches to fighting coronavirus work:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/world/corona-simulator/

thats excellent

aloooof

awec wrote: »

On the number of ventilators thing, over 50% of ventilators used worldwide are made in Ireland. We’re also the second largest exporter of medical technology in Europe.

Wow, wasn't aware of this. You'd imagine production will have ramped up weeks ago.

errlloyd

Sloane Nutritious Ham wrote: »

People are getting it. The rate at which people get it is almost certainly going to increase quite a lot. The approach you suggest will almost certainly kill people, I don't see how any Govt can propose it wilfully.

If we take the "chickenpox" approach, will it not lead to far, far greater numbers becoming infected in a shorter space of time and the paucity of equipment/facilities becoming overwhelmed instantly i.e. greater numbers are likely to die? Is this not what Britain are attempting and are discussing asking anyone over 70 to put themselves into self isolation long term to protect themselves?

Thanks for the responses guys. I do appreciate you both being reasonable and considerate, because I think what I am posting is a little bit radical (although it is just the UKs approach).

Option A (Ire approach)

If we didn't know who was at risk I think our approach would be the only option. (This is important). In that case we would treat all of the population equally, impose an isolation that would only result in 400 cases per day, of which 20 would need ICU, and we would do that till there was a vaccine. This could take months or years, and the main risk is actually econoic collapse, societal collapse, or just widespread lapse in the publics self isolation once the crazy bit is passed.

Option B (UK approach).

But we DO KNOW who is at risk. There are very specific and well understood criteria for what makes a person "at risk". So the second option is to strongly quarantine the at risk people, but literally just allow the not at risk people to get it. I know this sounds crazy, but it is what we do with vaccines (we do not vaccinate at risk people), and in a way it is what we do with Chicken Pox - for Children to get it young so they don't accidentally pass it on to the at risk adults. The advantage of this approach is that we might actually be able to get it done in a known amount of time.

We are not going to destroy this virus. That option is gone.

sydthebeat

errlloyd wrote: »

Option B (UK approach).

But we DO KNOW who is at risk. There are very specific and well understood criteria for what makes a person "at risk". So the second option is to strongly quarantine the at risk people, but literally just allow the not at risk people to get it. I know this sounds crazy, but it is what we do with vaccines (we do not vaccinate at risk people), and in a way it is what we do with Chicken Pox - for Children to get it young so they don't accidentally pass it on to the at risk adults. The advantage of this approach is that we might actually be able to get it done in a known amount of time.

We are not going to destroy this virus. That option is gone.

option B is too simplistic

there are immunocompromised people out there who dont know they are.
there are thousands of people in ireland with heart disease who also dont know they have it.
there are "at risk" parents of children who simply cannot be quarantined away from them.
Logically it may make sense, practically it doesnt.

errlloyd

That is a good point I largely agree about the quarantine. Family groups that one one at risk individual should all avoid contracting it initially.

I want you (and everyone) to know. That I am not underestimating this thing. I had to uninvite my grandmother from dinner yesterday because I had been out on Friday for my sisters birthday. She's already scared about this virus, it's even scarier for her when he grandkids are worried about her. She gets visited by about 6 different home care nurses each week, 3 times per day, 7 days a week.

There is no way for us to know if those nurses are carrying Covid 19 - unless they have already had it. Maybe my initial strategy of "just let young people get it" is over simplistic, but maybe we should start off with a cohort of very health people to get purposely infected, serve very strong quarantines and recover. With that baseline test we could develop a model or how many of the "healthy" cohort required further assistance and work from there.

You do not have to be "pro business" to be worried about the economy right now. Thousands of people are going to lose jobs. Mortgage repayments will be missed. Thousands of other people are going to take a huge mental and physical health hit serving a several week lockdown. I think it is quite reasonable to ask "do we actually have a plan for when or how this lockdown ends"? Because, as far as I can tell, we don't.

Is there a reason beyond Trump being completely unhinged that he would want to try and buy that in-development coronavirus vaccine exclusively for use in the US?

Bazzo

Sloane Nutritious Ham wrote: »

Is there a reason beyond Trump being completely unhinged that he would want to try and buy that in-development coronavirus vaccine exclusively for use in the US?

Because he's the biggest ****bag on the planet and saw an opportunity to make money?

On the UK approach being viable: while there are some experts saying it's a logical approach the vast majority of them seem to think it's a crazy idea. My godmother is an infectious diseases consultant and said it seemed like revisionist nonsense to her.

Bazzo

Bazzo wrote: »

Because he's the biggest ****bag on the planet and saw an opportunity to make money?

On the UK approach being viable: while there are some experts saying it's a logical approach the vast majority of them seem to think it's a crazy idea. My godmother is an infectious diseases consultant and said it seemed like revisionist nonsense to her.

I'm embarrassed to say that didn't even occur to me, such are the times we're in. But yeah that is probably part of it.

CatFromHue

https://twitter.com/JurassicArse/status/1239249090841661441

stephen_n

sydthebeat wrote: »

Obvious big difference between chicken pox and covid is the fatality rate.

1 in 60000 versus 1 in 100

It’s 3.7 in 100 globally based on the figures published at the weekend. Though that’s based on confirmed cases and deaths.

pickarooney

awec wrote: »

On the number of ventilators thing, over 50% of ventilators used worldwide are made in Ireland. We’re also the second largest exporter of medical technology in Europe.

Where have we seen this before?

If they're made by a private company and have been bought and paid for by other countries/hospitals/whatever then so what? Do we rob them?

errlloyd

Sloane Nutritious Ham wrote: »

If they're made by a private company and have been bought and paid for by other countries/hospitals/whatever then so what? Do we rob them?

Other more selfish countries would probably simply ban the export of them. We've seen that with chemicals and masks this time around.

I think Ireland could divert government resources towards guaranteeing their supply chain. Incentivize them to increase their production to as high a point as possible, even beyond enforcement of some usual health and safety rules. (For example there is a limit on how long a worker can work in a plant if the latent noise is over a certain number of decibels. Those sorts of limits could be reduced).

The government could ask experts from those facilities to move to other facilities to help re-tool machines to product ventillators. The government could also pass intellectual property legislation that would prevent those companies from continuing to use the IP after the state of emergency has ended. That sounds crazy (I know) but the UK government has already told Rolls Royce and JCB to retool their machines for making ventilators. And one of the main problems was the existing companies being worried about competition post crisis.

b.gud

Sloane Nutritious Ham wrote: »

Is there a reason beyond Trump being completely unhinged that he would want to try and buy that in-development coronavirus vaccine exclusively for use in the US?

I would assume he's thinking about the election. Imagine being able to say America is the only Medical system in the world that has the virus, and he could go on about how we never would have been able to do that if the dems had there way with medicare

swiwi_

One thing that requires planning is more maternity beds. I'd say the hospitals have about 9 months to undertake the renovations.

Dubinusa

Mass. Just closed restaurants. To go orders only. Pubs too?

swiwi_

Surreal times, I must say. Switzerland has closed any shop that isn't basically essential. My dream of long hippy-style hair might become a realty as hairdressers are in the non-essential list. The confederation has also used extraordinary powers to take over the running of the country from the 26 cantons, who are usually highly autonomous (basically the Swiss state only controls foreign affairs, defence, customs/central money, everything else is pretty much the cantons).

What will be interesting is if medical ethics has to take a role: X number of intensive care beds with X+Y patients. Who gets the beds: youngest? fittest? richest? private insurance? celebrity? healthcare workers? drawing of lots?

If there's a bright side, this might do for Trump. You can't out-tweet, out-insult or fire the coronavirus.

swiwi_

swiwi_ wrote: »

Surreal times, I must say. Switzerland has closed any shop that isn't basically essential. My dream of long hippy-style hair might become a realty as hairdressers are in the non-essential list. The confederation has also used extraordinary powers to take over the running of the country from the 26 cantons, who are usually highly autonomous (basically the Swiss state only controls foreign affairs, defence, customs/central money, everything else is pretty much the cantons).

What will be interesting is if medical ethics has to take a role: X number of intensive care beds with X+Y patients. Who gets the beds: youngest? fittest? richest? private insurance? celebrity? healthcare workers? drawing of lots?

If there's a bright side, this might do for Trump. You can't out-tweet, out-insult or fire the coronavirus.

This is already happening in Italy I'm fairly sure.

Had to uninstall Instagram. The hysteria and pontificing was getting to me

Zzippy

Got the rumours about the army implementing martial law and laughed out loud at the lad on the phone.

"What, both of them?"