Since we are on the topic of people suck I will add this in. My wife’s uncle has terminal brain cancer and has 2-3 months probably to live. My wife’s family has planned a get together at his house for July 4. We were invited and my wife requested that the people who have been traveling to Florida, hitting the bars every night and otherwise engaging in super risky behavior get Covid tests (and that we would be getting them also) in order to go to this thing.
Not only were zero of 30 or so people willing to get one they all also decided that masks are not even allowed. I really don’t get it at this point. In addition to her uncle there will be probably 8 of the 30 or so people going who are extreme high risk for one reason or another. Her sister and family are in Orlando right now…
It’s tough to know how to handle it because of course they are trying to make us feel like nutters for taking the bare minimum of precaution.
Probably. My gym doesn’t know when it can reopen yet (we’re in NJ), but they sent an email with a huge list of things they’ll be changing as far as screening, contactless sign in, different things about the cleaning regimen including closing the locker room for a 30min deep clean multiple times a day, etc.
I mean lots of people will certainly “feel” way more comfortable reading this and go back, I’m sure. But I don’t see how they’ll really make it low enough risk unless they do something like let an insanely small number of people into each section (weightroom is all I care about) for predetermined time slots or something.
That’s exactly what we are doing. We are going over before the super spreader event begins and leaving before they all get there. We are both going to get tested prior to going.
This is the bit I’m talking about (emphasis mine).
The entire study hinges upon the proportionality of reason for seeking care (whether non-flu ILI or other), which was adjusted from NYC observations, being the dominant input.
Changes in care-seeking behavior
We estimated the ILI surge in each US state as an increase in the proportion of outpatients with ILI in that state compared to all outpatient visits in that state. Consequently, changes in the care-seeking behavior of individuals with ILI or of non-ILI during this time period could each affect our estimates of disease prevalence during the ILI surge. If patients with mild ILI were more likely seek medical care during the month of March 2020 than in prior years, then our estimates of COVID-19 prevalence based on the ILI surge would be falsely elevated. Additionally, if non-ILI patients were less likely to seek medical care during the month of March compared to prior years, then this too could falsely elevate our estimates of COVID-19 prevalence based on the ILI surge. Although ILINet does not provide information to ascertain care seeking behavior, we were able to obtain syndromic surveillance data from New York City’s emergency departments, which provided up to date information on care seeking behavior of both ILI and non-ILI conditions (16, 17).
If the ILI surge reflected higher rates of detection of typically mild ILI, then we would expect emergency department ILI rates to increase yet the proportion of those ILI cases admitted to the hospital to decrease. However, although the daily number of ILI visits to emergency departments across New York City increased in March 2020, the proportion of those patients who went on to be admitted also increased by as much as 3-fold compared to the baseline rate prior to March (fig. S3A). This observation suggests that patients with mild ILI presented less often to hospital emergency departments. Such a decrease in care-seeking behavior for mild ILI, if similar across the US, could deflate the estimated size of the ILI surge in the later weeks of March by a factor of approximately 3.
If non-ILI patients were less likely to seek medical care, then we would expect that the number of patients complaining of other symptoms not typically associated with COVID-19 (for example vomiting) would also decrease compared to prior years. In the month of March, the daily number of patients presenting with vomiting decreased by as much as a factor of 3 compared to the baseline rate in prior years (fig. S3B). Assuming that all non-ILI conditions were similarly decreased during March, this would suggest that our estimates of the ILI surge could be inflated by as much as a factor of 3. This assumption is conservative as it assumes that even individuals with severe conditions (such as severe trauma) would avoid seeking health-care in response to COVID-19 at the same rate as those with more mild conditions such as vomiting. However, the potential 3-fold decreased care-seeking behavior for non-ILI conditions cancels out the potential 3-fold decreased care-seeking behavior of mild ILI, suggesting that our estimates of prevalence based on the ILI surge may be insensitive to recent changes in care-seeking behavior (fig. S3C). Overall these estimates suggest a conceptual model in which health care utilization for both mild ILI and non-ILI conditions declined at similar rates as COVID-19 increased in the US.
Work Update: I think my continued mask wearing Has helped other people start wearing them. Either out of confidence or guilt, I’m not sure, but the amount of people has risen to probably close to 50%.
I don’t know any reason this would have changed much. If you test negative you have high confidence. If positive, not so much. In that case maybe get a second test?
The accuracy of these tests depends on the prevalence of the virus.
