OT: Coronavirus (COVID-19): Part V

[Machinehead]

A few days ago the WHO was saying Remdesivir was proving ineffective. Hopefully it is. The US Military bought a shitload of it a couple years back so we should have a pretty decent supply.

I did read something to the effect of that study being deemed insignificant because of too few patients and the WHO was not supposed to publish it, which they did in error.

Hopefully, that one is able to be tossed out.

 

[NYR Viper]

He's comparing it to when he and his team discovered the first viable HIV treatment. Wow!

Im attempting not to watch EVERYTHING as honestly I’m finding it anxiety-i dicing but wasn’t this the drug that The President discusses being a hopeful treatment and then the WHO said it failed and everyone chastised him for it? Now Fauci is saying it will help?

 

[NYR Viper]

I did read something to the effect of that study being deemed insignificant because of too few patients and the WHO was not supposed to publish it, which they did in error.

Hopefully, that one is able to be tossed out.

Wow, if that’s the case, that’s yet another hit on the WHO.

 

[Irishguy42]

Im attempting not to watch EVERYTHING as honestly I’m finding it anxiety-i dicing but wasn’t this the drug that The President discusses being a hopeful treatment and then the WHO said it failed and everyone chastised him for it? Now Fauci is saying it will help?

Yes, he mentioned it at the end of March. However, at that time, there were pretty much no evidence/trials/etc. to support his claim of it being "promising"

So...

 

[Machinehead]

Im attempting not to watch EVERYTHING as honestly I’m finding it anxiety-i dicing but wasn’t this the drug that The President discusses being a hopeful treatment and then the WHO said it failed and everyone chastised him for it? Now Fauci is saying it will help?

The President did mention Remdesivir but as I recall, hydroxychloroquine is the one he was resoundingly panned for and definitely doesn't work.

Two different drugs.

 

[Crease]

NIH's study shows that patients who received remdesivir recovered faster that those who received a placebo:

Preliminary results indicate that patients who received remdesivir had a 31% faster time to recovery than those who received placebo (p<0.001). Specifically, the median time to recovery was 11 days for patients treated with remdesivir compared with 15 days for those who received placebo. Results also suggested a survival benefit, with a mortality rate of 8.0% for the group receiving remdesivir versus 11.6% for the placebo group (p=0.059).
​

Manufacturer Gilead separately compared outcomes where remdesivir administered over 5 vs. 10 days, and found no difference in efficacy. That's positive in the sense that shorter treatments means more people can access the limited supply of medicine:

This study sought to determine whether a shorter, 5-day course of remdesivir would achieve similar efficacy results as the 10-day treatment regimen used in multiple ongoing studies of remdesivir . . . . In this study, the time to clinical improvement for 50 percent of patients was 10 days in the 5-day treatment group and 11 days in the 10-day treatment group.​

 

[Leonardo87]

I live heyah and not fuh nuttin but FL ain’t New Yawk

Ever since I moved here I laugh when they call these ‘towns’... cities. It’s a joke.

There’s no place you can go, even the theme parks, that’s comes anywhere CLOSE to a crowded street or subway. That’s the difference.

If the Florida theme parks take precautions and limit capacity to maybe just resort guests who stay on property and to maybe just pass holders, I don’t see anything wrong with that. Small steps is the key. Need to start businesses back up soon.

Heck, just saw they are opening more beaches now in Florida.

NYC and neighboring areas are going to take awhile sadly.

 

[Oscar Lindberg]

Head of the federal reserve just came out and said they'll continue to dump money into the market until the US is on it's way to recovery (which is an incredibly vague statement)

And while we're on the road to "recovery", we'll be well on our way to hyperinflation.

Yay us

 

[NYSPORTS]

Head of the federal reserve just came out and said they'll continue to dump money into the market until the US is on it's way to recovery (which is an incredibly vague statement)

And while we're on the road to "recovery", we'll be well on our way to hyperinflation.

Yay us

what alternative would you suggest?

 

[NYSPORTS]

Im attempting not to watch EVERYTHING as honestly I’m finding it anxiety-i dicing but wasn’t this the drug that The President discusses being a hopeful treatment and then the WHO said it failed and everyone chastised him for it? Now Fauci is saying it will help?

the findings is the difference regardless of who said it. Info is already a bit confusing from, of course, the media. One reported improved recovery times while another mentioned it “blocked” the virus. We’ll learn soon.

Meanwhile, there is such a significant effort world wide “trying anything” let’s hope a solution is discovered soon.

 

[Oscar Lindberg]

what alternative would you suggest?

I don't know, maybe a world where our money isn't being hyper inflated so that the super rich get even more loaded

But that might be too much to ask

 

[sbjnyc]

This virus has exposed what running with every study as fact can do. It creates a lack of confidence in science in general. 10% kill rate, no 5%, no 1%, hmmmm maybe we better hold off on this for solid data, first you say no mask, then mask, choloroquine is the savior, no it is the devil, remsentavir will end this finally, oh wait it doesn't work, wait wait, it only works when given early....and on and on and on) It is a crazy time and there's lots of weak science out there with poor samples due to time constraints and interest in just garnering any useful data, often no control group etc. yet they're often the front page of multiple media sites touting the results as the New Facts of the Virus. No immunity after getting it? Vaccine impossible to work? Unable to detect people who have had it already? Everyone rushes to get their data out, and media rushes to report it. Instead of waiting for multiple robust healthy studies, we run with what's available and it is a complete shitshow science wise out there. Really need to sift through the articles and reports to find legit information with validity and reliability these days.

The big problem isn't with the media in general but how they communicate the science process for which they essentially have no clue. And part of the problem is with the scientists themselves. Basically a group of scientists will perform a study covering a particular phenomenon with very specific controls (e.g. a group of people who contracted the flu from a white rhinocerous in Africa getting treatment A vs a group of people who contracted the flu from a white rhinocerous in Africa who only eat Pork on Tuesday getting treatment A modified with twinkie extract). The scientists or their PR team write the abstracts and omit some of the specific details (We compared the class of patients undergoing controled treatments for flu contracted from african white rhinos by modifying existing treatments of pork eaters with twinkie extract. We found a statistically significant reduction in hospital stays of 0.03 days on average). The media only read the abstracts and you wind up with the headline "Studies show a diet of bacom and twinkies cure the flu!" even though the effect size is minimal at best and does not suggest eating twinkies is part of the treatment.

But if you are going to point to data, doesn't it also show that the mortality rate overall is overwhelmingly in the elderly and the infirm? So yes, deaths per capita is data, but it should be given out with some context.

What is happening in nursing homes is awful right now.

If the data is showing that there is a portion of the population for whom this is brutal and which account for much of the deaths, would that not imply that for the rest of the population it is not as bad as originally thought? Just food for thought here. Again, we can only theorize about what has flattened the curve. Many here would say that it was definitive solely due to the lockdown. They could be right. At a minimum, it certainly helped. But it could be that this was simply never as deadly as originally thought and the predictions of bodies piling up in the streets were incorrect? It could also be due to this floating around here since December and since we know just how quickly the spread is, that more people have contracted the virus and it simply stopped there?

Again no way to prove, just musing possibilities.

I posted upthread a table showing the massive difference in the fatality rate of the flu (and pneumonia) by age over about 20 years. The fatality rate was about 1 per 100,000 lives for people ages 15-44. This is with treatments and vaccines. The number would be much higher otherwise. I presume that this disease will follow a similar path once treatments and vaccines are develop but currently the case fatality rate in the US is 5.72%. The infection fatality rate is much lower but still substantially higher than the flu.

Head of the federal reserve just came out and said they'll continue to dump money into the market until the US is on it's way to recovery (which is an incredibly vague statement)

And while we're on the road to "recovery", we'll be well on our way to hyperinflation.

Yay us

What is hyperinflation in this country, 5%? Inflation was negative in March and will probably be negative in April as well. We do not want to go into a deflationary economy and become Japan.

 

[True Blue]

I posted upthread a table showing the massive difference in the fatality rate of the flu (and pneumonia) by age over about 20 years. The fatality rate was about 1 per 100,000 lives for people ages 15-44. This is with treatments and vaccines. The number would be much higher otherwise. I presume that this disease will follow a similar path once treatments and vaccines are develop but currently the case fatality rate in the US is 5.72%. The infection fatality rate is much lower but still substantially higher than the flu.

Right, I get that and agree on what happens when treatments and vaccines are created. I actually do not know if they will ever find a vaccine, but still my point was that citing the mortality statistics without context is not necessarily the correct way to do it. Those numbers are stratified by age and the overwhelming amount of fatalities seems to be in the old or infirm. Which, in turn, at least suggests that this may not be as deadly as originally feared.

 

[NYSPORTS]

I don't know, maybe a world where our money isn't being hyper inflated so that the super rich get even more loaded

But that might be too much to ask

so this stimulus, etc had nothing to do with preventing everybody from having their 401K crash, trying to help many small business owners while dropping the rates to 0% didn’t allow companies to maintain payroll, etc?

Yes, we have criminals who bet against the market and made billions which is absurd but i know this stimulus was intended for everybody. The rich would have made a lot more money had their been no stimulus and allowed the market to hit 12K and then buy back in.

 

[Oscar Lindberg]

What is hyperinflation in this country, 5%? Inflation was negative in March and will probably be negative in April as well. We do not want to go into a deflationary economy and become Japan.

Oh please

Anyone who's under 40 should be furious about the bullshit the Fed is doing right now. Saddling the future generation with issues so the market is flat or up slightly right now

 

[Off Sides]

In the aftermath, perhaps we could have commercial banks be required to be completely separate from investment firms?

Or at least not allow large corporations to leverage themselves many times over? Perhaps instead of buying back their own stock with a tax windfall, part of that tax law could require them to lower their debt to a more manageable ratio? So the Fed does not have to buy as much of that debt just to avoid mass bankruptcy immediately as stuff hits the fan?

 

[sbjnyc]

Right, I get that and agree on what happens when treatments and vaccines are created. I actually do not know if they will ever find a vaccine, but still my point was that citing the mortality statistics without context is not necessarily the correct way to do it. Those numbers are stratified by age and the overwhelming amount of fatalities seems to be in the old or infirm. Which, in turn, at least suggests that this may not be as deadly as originally feared.

The table I posted was for the flu/pneumonia. I don't have any data for covid-19 stratified by age. I'm not sure what you mean by not as deadly as feared considering the 5.72% CFR in the US, is much higher than the 2% we had been discussing back in February and March.

 

[will1066]

How do you pronounce remdisivir? Asking for a friend.

 

[sbjnyc]

so this stimulus, etc had nothing to do with preventing everybody from having their 401K crash, trying to help many small business owners while dropping the rates to 0% didn’t allow companies to maintain payroll, etc?

Yes, we have criminals who bet against the market and made billions which is absurd but i know this stimulus was intended for everybody. The rich would have made a lot more money had their been no stimulus and allowed the market to hit 12K and then buy back in.

Are you suggesting it is a crime to short stock or buy put options?

Oh please

Anyone who's under 40 should be furious about the bullshit the Fed is doing right now. Saddling the future generation with issues so the market is flat or up slightly right now

Exactly what is it that you think the Fed is doing? The last time the Fed acted to prevent the financial markets from collapsing, the government wound up with a tidy $100+ billion in profits. I don't expect that to happen this time but it's not like they are creating trillions of dollars of debt like congress.

 

[eco's bones]

 

[Machinehead]

We're already in trillions of dollars of debt with a fiat currency backed up by nothing tangible.

The cat is out of the bag.

 

[Oscar Lindberg]

Exactly what is it that you think the Fed is doing? The last time the Fed acted to prevent the financial markets from collapsing, the government wound up with a tidy $100+ billion in profits. I don't expect that to happen this time but it's not like they are creating trillions of dollars of debt like congress.

The Federal Reserve is blatantly manipulating the market in the name of putting the “economy back onto the road to recovery”. Printing up billions a week and dumping it into the market.

Meanwhile companies are declaring bankruptcy or laying off massive amounts of staff left and right. I’m sure the millions of Americans that have been laid off recently really care that the stock market is holding up, while they’re looking for a job

And clearly none of the people coming up with the monetary policies have thought about the downsides of infinite leveraging.

Or they just don’t give a f*** because they’ll be dead when the chickens come home to roost

 

[Machinehead]

The Federal Reserve is blatantly manipulating the market in the name of putting the “economy back onto the road to recovery”. Printing up billions a week and dumping it into the market.

Meanwhile companies are declaring bankruptcy or laying off massive amounts of staff left and right. I’m sure the millions of Americans that have been laid off recently really care that the stock market is holding up, while they’re looking for a job

And clearly none of the people coming up with the monetary policies have thought about the downsides of infinite leveraging.

Or they just don’t give a f*** because they’ll be dead when the chickens come home to roost

The Federal Reserve blatantly manipulates the market and dumps billions into executive pockets 365 days a year.

They spend trillions on healthcare alone, most of which goes into the coffers of insurance companies.

 

[eco's bones]

The Federal Reserve blatantly manipulates the market and dumps billions into executive pockets 365 days a year.

They spend trillions on healthcare alone, most of which goes into the coffers of insurance companies.

You can say that again and anyone who doesn't realize that is living under a rock.

 

[Off Sides]

They changed the rules so they could manipulate like 10 years worth into a couple months.

However the "rules" that have been changed have been allowed, or nor forbid by congress.

It's not a partisan issue, both sides have their hands in the cookie jar.