Coronavirus and You - Page 257

On October 06 2020 12:37 TheTenthDoc wrote:
Just want to point out, the two meters is not arbitrary-it's based on the fairly well understood safe zone for the spread of "typical" droplet-based respiratory contagions via non-expelling events (think talking vs sneezing/coughing; the safe range for the latter is much farther). And, for that purpose, it serves pretty well for COVID-19. The issue is exacerbating factors like poor air circulation or consistent expelling events people don't think about because they don't think of them as "sickness" (i.e. choir practice and workouts).

On October 06 2020 14:11 [Phantom] wrote:
I've been thinking about lately....I think the next pandemic will be worse.

People will have already picked a side, and I think we are learning all the wrong lessons.

On October 06 2020 14:21 cLutZ wrote:


Basically none of this is correct. I've never seen a 6 foot guidance before. Almost no place of relevance doesn't have either horizontal people movement or horizontal air circulation. In addition, most C-19 spreaders do actually expel at least a bit. The only way the 6 foot rule would be a hard rule is if you built some sort of retail store where all the ventilation was totally vertical, like floor vents and ceiling vents everywhere.

Sure, high effort things like singing spread more, but that has nothing to do with the dots on the floor of Wal Mart. But its always been obvious that if I have C-19 and I'm breathing and farting in spot 1 which is 6 feet away from you, then I move, you are just moving into my C-19 cloud.

On October 06 2020 14:21 cLutZ wrote:


Basically none of this is correct. I've never seen a 6 foot guidance before. Almost no place of relevance doesn't have either horizontal people movement or horizontal air circulation. In addition, most C-19 spreaders do actually expel at least a bit. The only way the 6 foot rule would be a hard rule is if you built some sort of retail store where all the ventilation was totally vertical, like floor vents and ceiling vents everywhere.

Sure, high effort things like singing spread more, but that has nothing to do with the dots on the floor of Wal Mart. But its always been obvious that if I have C-19 and I'm breathing and farting in spot 1 which is 6 feet away from you, then I move, you are just moving into my C-19 cloud.

On October 06 2020 08:39 Danglars wrote:
France is imposing new measures, as it's infection rate tops the US. The lockdown was lifted months ago, and everything looked fine for a while after it. Now it's >250/100k and 30-35% positive. Restaurant owners are unhappy. The same thing happened in the states when draconian lockdown rules were put into place.

the percentage of those who’ve tested positive for the novel coronavirus who require intensive care is now hovering between 30 and 35 percent.

In Paris and in the surrounding communes, Véran said that 30 to 35 percent of intensive care beds are currently occupied by coronavirus patients, above the critical level of 30 percent.

Confirmed cases in France, Spain, and the U.K. are now higher on an average day than at the peak of this spring’s emergency, although the trend also reflects better detection of the virus.

On October 07 2020 01:56 Nouar wrote:

What the hell is this shit.

The positivity rate is around 10% country-wide (worrying), and definitely not 30% even in the worst hubs (Paris is at 13%).


This is also pure bullshit. Can you imagine ? 30% of the positive cases being in ICU ??
You have the ICU data here : https://dashboard.covid19.data.gouv.fr/vue-d-ensemble?location=FRA and click on "Carte des patients en réanimation" at the top left of the map.
There are 133 ICU patients today total in the Marseille departement.

I suspect very poor translations from French articles. I can't read the WSJ one as it's behind a paywall. The 30% figure is most likely the share of total available ICU beds in use by Covid patients, that would make more sense. The current usage of ICU beds in Marseille region is around 36% (https://dashboard.covid19.data.gouv.fr/suivi-indicateurs?location=DEP-13) and the same in Paris.

edit : yes, it's a shitty translation as suspected.
https://www.france24.com/en/20201001-paris-could-face-new-covid-19-restrictions-from-monday-health-minister-says


Paris has definitely crossed thresholds, and the virus is propagating. R0 is estimated at around 0.8 currently, so it's not spreading uncontrollably, but the worrying figures are the positivity rate and the ICU numbers slowwwwly rising. So more measures are definitely needed, and were activated in Paris today (bars closed, restaurants open).

Restaurants are reopening though in Marseille, and will finally have to do the sensible thing that they have been doing in Thailand since day 1 : a tracing book with contact infos of clients...

The positivity rate would have been the best measure, except we had issues with testing (too much of it, free for everyone and on demand, not enough time for labs to actually produce results) that it lead to unacceptable delays (with often a week before getting the result, rendering it close to useless). Thus, you see our testing numbers a little bit more focused on people with symptoms, and with fast results. Most labs are now on a strict reservation basis with people being referred by a doctor being prioritised. Other labs are still fully open, and queues have rescinded a bit.
https://dashboard.covid19.data.gouv.fr/suivi-des-tests?location=FRA (the daily graph test is interesting, the others not so much as you cannot filter them by date)

So it is somewhat normal now to see the positivity rate slightly increasing, but it's still not on the right slope. R0 is better though, below 1, and hospitals are still very far from overwhelmed, it does in NO WAY compare to what happened in April when we had to shuffle patients around in dedicated trains, and even across Europe.
ICU beds are at around 25% capacity. Some hospital staff have seen their holidays for the end of the year cancelled though, to prepare for a potential load.


We have definitely overtaken the US in the amount of cases per day per capita, though the ICU and daily deaths are stil FAR below the US daily totals (per capita also). We have around 50 deaths/day, which is roughly equivalent to 250 deaths/day if you were to look at USA.
Cases are also increasing in I believe 37 states on a rolling-7day basis (can't remember the source, probably the Guardian's live).


That's what happens when you test 180k a day instead of 10k... Absolutely can't compare those numbers. Compare ICU cases and daily deaths, and we are still 7-fold below the spring's emergency for ICU (25% vs around 140%), and around 10-fold below the amount of daily deaths (50 vs 500+).

On October 07 2020 03:16 Danglars wrote:

I have to rely on English reporting, since I do not read French. Thank you for the correction. It's very valuable to have an international forum in a time like this.

On October 06 2020 14:10 BlackJack wrote:


That's an excellent question. Clearly there is some number that we have decided is an acceptable amount of death and some number that isn't. We could shut down every year for flu season and thousands of lives would be saved but we don't because obviously the thousand of lives that would be saved would not be worth the damage to the economy.

Is 200k dead a lot? There are 300+ million people in my country and 80 years from now most of them will be dead plus many more that aren't even born yet. Compared to 350 million dead over 80 years, 200k over 8 months doesn't really seem that much.

I think it's a problem when hospitals are overrun and patients aren't getting seen in the emergency room and floor nurses are taking care of ICU patients. I think ideally you want open things up as much as possible to get as close to that mark as possible without going over it. I would say by that metric Florida has been doing remarkably well.

On October 07 2020 06:31 Artisreal wrote:

200k/8 months is 300k a year is 24 million in 80 years is about 7 % of 350 million in 80 yrs.
Think of 10 friends. 3 will die because you don't wear a mask. You can't choose who will.
(Not you personally)

On October 07 2020 06:31 Artisreal wrote:

200k/8 months is 300k a year is 24 million in 80 years is about 7 % of 350 million in 80 yrs.
Think of 10 friends. 3 will die because you don't wear a mask. You can't choose who will.
(Not you personally)

On October 07 2020 07:08 Simberto wrote:


I think some of your maths is broken, or at least i don't follow how you end up with 3 in 10.

On October 07 2020 08:34 BlackJack wrote:



Absolutely none of this makes sense. You can't just extrapolate the same numbers year after year until the end of time. After COVID-19 kills off the vulnerable it will fewer people to kill. But even if you could, it still doesn't explain how you made that leap to 3 out of 10 of my friends will die from a virus that kills off roughly 1% of the people it infects. 1% and 30% are way different numbers. This is the type of misunderstanding that leads to confusion and fear.

On October 07 2020 14:33 Artisreal wrote:

this makes exactly as much sense as the post I quoted.

On October 07 2020 15:10 Harris1st wrote:


R0 is at 1,15 from 1.21
R7 at 1,08

We got some new hubs, like sport teams and immigrant homes but mostly the rise is from private parties and stuff.
In some areas numbers are almost at 50 infected per 100.000 because of that. But we have very few "red alert" parts.

Next measures will be to restrict private parties. Everything else stays the way it is (for now)