Help the Fight Against COVID-19

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I think even if we would have known about it earlier, we might have done a little prep, but certainly not anything major. I think even now, we should be on a war era mobilization to build the equipment we need, extra places to put people, fast tracking drug studies. How much of that is happening. Just about none from what I see. Lots of talk of course, but how many are doing anything? Lots of red tape, lots of bean counters. Probably lots of lawyers trying to figure out how much liability a corp like GM wants to take on building ventilators, since lawsuits for deaths are inevitable.
 
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The whole chloroquine thing is just a means to quell the markets and give some false hope. Chloroquine helps but it's not a cure, not a panacea.

We're screwed. We're headed for a severe depression. Millions will lose their jobs. Banks will fail. Chaos. I'm so pissed. I've been screaming about this for at least two months and no one would listen. The idiots in charge did the usual: procrastinate, downplay and underestimate. Now the people will pay the price. The elite will be fine. They'll ride in out in luxury. The rest of us will suffer.
 
nccarg said:
These days the media blows everything out of proportion or just makes things up so much that people don't believe it anymore.
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Certain people have an agenda of getting people not to believe anything in the media unless it comes from them or certain approved outlets.
 
FractalAudio said:
The whole chloroquine thing is just a means to quell the markets and give some false hope. Chloroquine helps but it's not a cure, not a panacea.

We're screwed. We're headed for a severe depression. Millions will lose their jobs. Banks will fail. Chaos. I'm so pissed. I've been screaming about this for at least two months and no one would listen. The idiots in charge did the usual: procrastinate, downplay and underestimate. Now the people will pay the price. The elite will be fine. They'll ride in out in luxury. The rest of us will suffer.
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Assuming you're right, what should we do with our money? Under the mattress?
 
FractalAudio said:
The whole chloroquine thing is just a means to quell the markets and give some false hope. Chloroquine helps but it's not a cure, not a panacea.
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How is it false hope if you can give it to infected people for several days, and the result is 70% test negative for the virus when you're done?

For the person who's currently testing positive, a 70% likely cure doesn't sound like false hope, to me. It sounds like hope.

Or are you confining the term "hope" to the economic realm?

FractalAudio said:
We're screwed. We're headed for a severe depression.
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Recession is two consecutive quarters of negative economic growth. Depression is something significantly worse than that: Typically four quarters plus dropping real purchase value of wages that takes over a year to recover.

I doubt we see a Depression, let alone a severe one.

Since I'm unwisely making a prediction here, let me put some specifics on it: Since there's no fixed definition for a Depression, nor for a "severe depression," I'm going to say that we will not have:
  • more than 4 quarters negative economic growth before it starts heading upward again;
  • more than 20% drop in the real (inflation-adjusted) buying power of the mean U.S. household income from March 2020 to March 2021
That'll stand as my definition for "severe depression," which I don't think we're going to see.

If I'm wrong, or the news shifts and I change my mind 15 days from now, I'll loudly admit I was wrong. (I don't wear hats, and thus have no hat to eat, with or without sauce.)

But right now, I'm saying: No severe depression. Recession? I'll buy that. A bad, sharp recession is likely. (In fact, it's basically started, but the numbers aren't released yet.)

FractalAudio said:
Millions will lose their jobs. Banks will fail. Chaos.
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Millions will lose their jobs. A fair number will get different jobs, or the same ones back, within 6 months. Not sure very many banks will fail. Some of them ought to, but I'm not sure they will.

But, how do you define "chaos?" Are we talking shutdown of water, of electricity? Will the police disband? Will the only areas with law enforcement be those under martial law? Will there be no food on the shelves?

I don't think any of that's going to happen, unless some other Black Swan event occurs.

If we get a meteor strike or a hostile power launches an EMP, or the data about COVID-19 that we all currently have at hand turns out to be radically, earth-shatteringly wrong, then, okay. But if all we're dealing with is (a.) COVID-19 and (b.) the voluntary and imposed social-distancing in reaction to COVID-19, and nothing radically new ("This just in! COVID-19 causes sterility!") emerges, then I'm pretty positive we won't see the "chaos" items described above, at least not in the U.S. (I make no predictions about Iran. And it seems like Italy, sadly, is in pretty bad shape.)

FractalAudio said:
I'm so pissed. I've been screaming about this for at least two months and no one would listen.
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If you turn out to be correct in your predictions, then you should wave the I TOLD YOU SO flag proudly, and I, at least, will listen far more attentively next time.

BTW, here's the latest on Case Fatality Rates: Trending downwards, probably approaching a lower limit of 0.1%:
https://www.cebm.net/global-covid-1...nykUSvpfoJL1S7rbCxRSrREOec0s6fnH5aOMWEl6itLQ8
 
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FractalAudio said:
The whole chloroquine thing is just a means to quell the markets and give some false hope. Chloroquine helps but it's not a cure, not a panacea.

We're screwed. We're headed for a severe depression. Millions will lose their jobs. Banks will fail. Chaos. I'm so pissed. I've been screaming about this for at least two months and no one would listen. The idiots in charge did the usual: procrastinate, downplay and underestimate. Now the people will pay the price. The elite will be fine. They'll ride in out in luxury. The rest of us will suffer.
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Ok, intervention time. You need to pull yourself together and cool it with the “we’re screwed” bullshit. It’s not helping anyone. Instead, try thinking of ways you can redirect your business resources in a manner that would help the situation. Do you have any means of working with suppliers or manufacturers to make medical equipment, for example? You’re a creative problem solver, so do what you do best and solve the problem creatively.

So are you going to shut it all down and run for the hills, or are you going to stay here with the rest of us and try to beat this thing? What do you say, soldier?
 
Dr. Dipwad said:
Right now we have a new story that chloroquine has a 100% cure-rate for coronavirus. Maybe that doesn't pan out, but for my money, a situation is far more nightmarish if there's no cure anywhere on the horizon.

If it does pan out? If we have the ability to just cure this, using a well-known, available-as-generic, widely-tolerated pill? We might look back on March 2020 as a hiccup and warning-shot that was just bad enough to kick our butts a bit and get us into gear.

We'll see.
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Even if a drug works wonderfully, it needs clinical trials, ramped up production, hospitals need to be ramped up, etc. Let's say that takes half a year (no idea) and then we can loosen lockdowns and treat people in mass for another half year. Gonna take at least a year to get out of it, so seems like a depression to me.

Dunno. I don’t see any other picture being painted right now, looks pretty bleak.
 
The Schwartz said:
Ok, intervention time. You need to pull yourself together and cool it with the “we’re screwed” bullshit. It’s not helping anyone. Instead, try thinking of ways you can redirect your business resources in a manner that would help the situation. Do you have any means of working with suppliers or manufacturers to make medical equipment, for example? You’re a creative problem solver, so do what you do best and solve the problem creatively.

So are you going to shut it all down and run for the hills, or are you going to stay here with the rest of us and try to beat this thing? What do you say, soldier?
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this is the first time this has ever happened and it will permanently change things. many small businesses will go under, I know several that fight to survive month to month with a bad month putting them under. big business will survive and have more a monopoly than before. working people that fall behind on their bills will be a year catching back up. people on fixed incomes can't hoard supplies and when they get their money many things won't be available if they can get to the stores. the economy will be screwed for some time. if you do have a business and make it things will be tough for a while.
I can't guess what toll the virus will take on individuals or the population but the above is sure to happen at some level.
 
bjjp2 said:
You mean I shouldn’t take investment advice from someone called “Dr. Dipwad”?
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You ABSOLUTELY should not take investment advice from anyone who calls themselves "Dr. Dipwad." Y'think anyone who's made respectable money in the markets would go 'round with a name like that?

Who calls themselves that, anyway? It's like a bad combination of haughtiness and cloying self-deprecation.

Somebody like that, I doubt his own family listens to him. Why should anyone else? Probably has to write uninvited graduate-thesis-length posts on otherwise-respectable internet forums, just to get a hearing. What an a**hole.

;)
 
hawaii just hit 26 confirmed cases. it was 16 yesterday, 14 the day before. yes, increased testing is making numbers appear faster, but that still means the number is going up.

they are still telling us no community transmission and that everything is related to tourists coming in. our beaches are full. restaurants are refusing to close and tables are as close as they always were.

if it's tourists, then close the airport. they aren't.

if you don't close the aiports and it's not tourists, then it's community spread. it can't NOT be both.

i'm so pissed off with my state's response.
 
yeky83 said:
Even if a drug works wonderfully, it needs clinical trials, ramped up production, hospitals need to be ramped up, etc. Let's say that takes half a year (no idea) and then we can loosen lockdowns and treat people in mass for another half year. Gonna take at least a year to get out of it, so seems like a depression to me.

Dunno. I don’t see any other picture being painted right now, looks pretty bleak.
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This is not a new drug. It’s FDA approved. The questions need to be answered are a. Is it effective and b. At what dosage.
It’s available as generic so I’m confident that production can be ramped up as necessary.
 
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