CoronaVirus ==> Empty Shelves

[fxst]

I have a couple rifles and ammo, hunting permits etc so food isn't a problem or isolation.Toilet paper on the other hand...........

[GraemeCook]

Thousands of cruise ship passengers told to self-isolate due to coronavirus days after disembarking

(Source: Thousands of cruise ship passengers told to self-isolate due to coronavirus days after disembarking - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation))
On March 18 Health Minister Greg Hunt issued an emergency biosecurity order preventing any cruise vessels from docking in Australia for the next month.

The Australian Border Force Commissioner has said 13 passenger cruise ships were still at sea at the time the order came into force.

Of those 13, the Voyager of the Seas and the Ovation of the Seas docked on March 18, the Ruby Princess docked on March 19, and the Celebrity Solstice docked on March 20.

Some passengers from each of those ships have now tested positive for coronavirus.

People who had been on the Ovation of the Seas were assured in writing by NSW Health officials, and verbally while on the vessel, that they did not need to go into self-quarantine.

But four days after they arrived, passengers began receiving emails and calls from NSW Health officials on the morning of Saturday, March 22 advising them they urgently needed to self-quarantine.

On (the) arrival (of the Ruby Princess) in Sydney on Thursday, March 19, Mr *** expected a long wait at the port for border and health checks, given the concern around cruise vessels in the past. But that never happened. "It was just rush, rush, getting off," he told 7.30.

Forty-eight people who were onboard the Ruby Princess have since been confirmed to have coronavirus.

The above is alarming. What follows is worse.
(The) NSW Health director of communicable diseases, said NSW Health had undertaken risk assessments on all vessels that had arrived in port

"We recognised that risk was there and had a pragmatic approach towards trying to assess that risk," ...
...(The Director) ... said the Ruby Princess was considered to be low risk based on a number of factors.

"No passengers or crew had come from a high-risk country before boarding the ship," .....

"The rate of acute respiratory illness was very low.

"Putting these factors together, it didn't appear there was a significant outbreak of COVID-19 on the ship."

Two notes:

• the NSW Director of Communicable Diseases acknowledged that there was a low rate occurence of acute respiratory illness on the ship, and
• What level of outbreak of COVID-19 is insignificant?

[BobL]

Kiwi friend emailed me yesterday:

"... Jacinda Adern has just announced Level 3.....all non essential businesses must close, we must stay away from all outside public places, playgrounds etc. all schools are closing as of tomorrow....apart from children of essential workers who have 48 hours to arrange alternative arrangements.

In 48 hours (midnight from Wednesday) we are Level 4.... everyone is in lockdown, everyone must stay at home, for 4 weeks!!!!! Supermarkets, Pharmacies, medical services remain open.

NZ is trying to save thousands of lives, (the consequences if we don’t) ..."

We should have done this two weeks ago.

Here's an interesting testing data table (ordered in terms of #tests/million people)
From COVID-19 testing - Wikipedia
Australia was 4th or 5th on the list for test/million a few days ago, but now we are 15th (OK 13th if we remove the underpopulated Canadian provinces)
Another thing we have going for us is low numbers of positives/1000 tests (12), we are ~16th on the list for this but that includes dubious places like Russia and china.
BTW NZ has only done 8000 tests and has 17 cases per 1000 tests.
If we hold our nerve and institute a total lock down ASAP we have as good a chance as anyone with this thing.

Contrary to popular belief Taiwan only has 1000 tests/million? and 7.1 cases per test.


Screen Shot 2020-03-24 at 11.07.47 am.jpg

[BobL]

I have a couple rifles and ammo, hunting permits etc so food isn't a problem or isolation.Toilet paper on the other hand...........

If you are truly isolated you can always drop yer daks in de backyard and use a hose.

If it's raining take daks off and ride around on bike (standing off the saddle) will eventually wash it all off - and down your legs as well.

[BobL]

Thousands of cruise ship passengers told to self-isolate due to coronavirus days after disembarking

(Source: Thousands of cruise ship passengers told to self-isolate due to coronavirus days after disembarking - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation))
On March 18 Health Minister Greg Hunt issued an emergency biosecurity order preventing any cruise vessels from docking in Australia for the next month.

Nope not a misprint someone from these cruises died a few hours ago.

But what a cock up of the highest order. The whole self quarantine has been a crock from when it first started.
"Oh I will just go to the shops, or work until the test results come in" etc.

[NeilS]

Checking in late on this thread.

Ordered ingredients for hand sanitiser three weeks ago and no problem sourcing back then. Was thinking ahead for family and friends who might not get themselves organised before supermarket supplies ran out. Yet to make up a batch as our regular pre-virus supplies are still holding up. Have always had a spare bottle on hand as an essential with snotty young grandkids.

I've been in voluntary isolation for two weeks now. Our immunologist son recommended that I go into early isolation ahead of the curve; being an asthmatic and (just) a bit over the hill I'm a prime candidate. This far into strict isolation I'm thinking it's going to feel like an eternity if it goes on for six months of incarceration, or more. I have toyed with the idea of getting it early before the hospital system is overwhelmed, but no guarantee that I wouldn't still be in an ICU when the peak hits.

Here are a few websites/articles, if you haven't come across them already.

First one has daily stats by country. Nothing new there other than the fact that it is run by a 17yr old. There is some hope for us yet!

Coronavirus Dashboard

I love a graph and here are a couple of recent articles with curves and projections.

As I write the first article/page was current 7 hours ago (I'm not sure how regularly they update it). Helpful to have the data plotted from the same base; ie. since 10th death (so Australia not included) in first graph and since 100th confirmed case in third graph.

Coronavirus tracked: the latest figures as the pandemic spreads | Free to read | Financial Times

The second article is from a financial analyst having a go at some projections. My epidemiologist friend says that financial people should stick to their knitting. Anyway, here it is for those who like do a bit of forecasting with a few coefficients and slopes.

Peak Virus: Forecasting the Peak in COVID-19 Infections in the US and Australia - Christopher Joye | Livewire

Having an immunologist in the family I've been primed to the high probability of all of this for decades, but that doesn't reduce the discomfort and disquiet from the daily impact that it is having now that it is here with us.

This will pass with hopefully as few casualties as possible, but on the other side of the 'bridge' the bigger challenge still awaits us.

Back now to the sanctuary of my workshop where everything seems quite normal. It's where I'm going to keep me sanity through all of this...

[ian]

Thousands of cruise ship passengers told to self-isolate due to coronavirus days after disembarking

(Source: Thousands of cruise ship passengers told to self-isolate due to coronavirus days after disembarking - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation))
On March 18 Health Minister Greg Hunt issued an emergency biosecurity order preventing any cruise vessels from docking in Australia for the next month.

The Australian Border Force Commissioner has said 13 passenger cruise ships were still at sea at the time the order came into force.

Of those 13, the Voyager of the Seas and the Ovation of the Seas docked on March 18, the Ruby Princess docked on March 19, and the Celebrity Solstice docked on March 20.

Some passengers from each of those ships have now tested positive for coronavirus.

People who had been on the Ovation of the Seas were assured in writing by NSW Health officials, and verbally while on the vessel, that they did not need to go into self-quarantine.

But four days after they arrived, passengers began receiving emails and calls from NSW Health officials on the morning of Saturday, March 22 advising them they urgently needed to self-quarantine.

On (the) arrival (of the Ruby Princess) in Sydney on Thursday, March 19, Mr *** expected a long wait at the port for border and health checks, given the concern around cruise vessels in the past. But that never happened. "It was just rush, rush, getting off," he told 7.30.

Forty-eight people who were onboard the Ruby Princess have since been confirmed to have coronavirus.

The above is alarming. What follows is worse.
(The) NSW Health director of communicable diseases, said NSW Health had undertaken risk assessments on all vessels that had arrived in port

"We recognised that risk was there and had a pragmatic approach towards trying to assess that risk," ...
...(The Director) ... said the Ruby Princess was considered to be low risk based on a number of factors.

"No passengers or crew had come from a high-risk country before boarding the ship," .....

"The rate of acute respiratory illness was very low.

"Putting these factors together, it didn't appear there was a significant outbreak of COVID-19 on the ship."

Two notes:

• the NSW Director of Communicable Diseases acknowledged that there was a low rate occurence of acute respiratory illness on the ship, and
• What level of outbreak of COVID-19 is insignificant?

funny, my wife and i discussed this earlier tonight ...

as I understand the facts considered by NSW Health, especially in relation to the Ovation of the Seas
1. The ships loaded in Sydney and headed towards NZ. (so far, so good.)
2. Boarding passengers were temperature "checked" before boarding.
3. The ships didn't make any port calls or stops in NZ because, before they arrived in NZ, all NZ ports were closed. (so the passengers hadn't actually traveled anywhere they could be exposed to the virus.)
4. The ships returned to Sydney where the passengers who had originally boarded in Sydney were permitted to disembark because, in effect, they hadn't been "anywhere". (so the passengers could be classified as "well" as they hadn't been anywhere they could be "exposed" to a source of the virus.)

Taking the above into account, I see two possible scenarios:
A. among the passengers was a person (or persons) who was asymptomatic to the virus, who then went on to infect the other passengers. (would this be a case of community transmission ?)
B. one or more of the cruise line crew is an asymptomatic carrier of the virus.

There is a third scenario,
C. testing in Australia is so poorly targeted that it's not so much people slipping through the cracks in the testing system, but one of people passing through the gaping holes in the system.

[FenceFurniture]

The other possibility is that the virus was already on the ship - I read somewhere this morning that it lasted for 17 days on a surface (which I think may have also been a ship cabin). I don't what the turnaround time is for those ships but I imagine that they are constantly full of people.

(edit) Here it is:
CDC: coronavirus survived in Princess Cruise cabins up to 17 days after passengers left

[GraemeCook]

...
Back now to the sanctuary of my workshop where everything seems quite normal. It's where I'm going to keep me sanity through all of this...

Thanks, Neil

Enjoy your voluntary social separation!

[FenceFurniture]

You'd have to think that the Cruise ship industry will be buggered for years, if not permanently, after this. They must be massively profitable when you consider what the cost of those behemoths must be, and how many of them there seems to be. Personally I'm not even remotely interested in a cruise.

More info from New Cruise Ships in 2019 - Cruise Critic
The cruise ship building boom that began in 2018 continues in 2019 with 18 brand-new oceangoing cruise ships hitting the open waters (that's four more than in 2018), including some first-in-class vessels and more new expedition ships than the industry has ever seen before.

Ships launching in 2019 will range in size from 70-passenger expedition ships to 6,600-passenger mega-ships. More small ships will debut in 2019 than large ships -- just seven of the 18 ships will carry 1,000 cruisers or more.


And from another source:
Total worldwide ocean cruise capacity at the end of 2018 will be 537,000 passengers and 314 ships.


I'd be pretty sure that building boom just stopped in it wake.

[GraemeCook]

"... Without serious action, Australia may run out of intensive care beds by early April ..."


Without serious action, Australia will run out of intensive care beds | Medium

This paper is based on the simple premise that at the existing exponential rate of growth of COVID-19 and that 5% of cases will be classed as serious requiring intensive care beds, then Australia will simply run out of available ICU beds between 7-9 April 2020. That is, Tuesday to Wednesday the week after next. A little earlier in NSW, a little later in some other states.

It is probably unrealistic to think that the government can obtain more such beds within the next two weeks, and it probably understates how many beds will be required for other, non-COVID-19, patients. Anecdotal evidence is that ICU's already have very high occupancy rates.

This is scary!

[GraemeCook]

This is an interesting article about testing for immunity to COVID-19. There would be a lot of peace of mind knowing that you could not catch the virus.

Finding ways to forge through the COVID-19 pandemic – Harvard Gazette

[kungsleden]

UQ, with help from some Pharma, is working on a vaccine.

Race to develop coronavirus vaccine - UQ News - The University of Queensland, Australia
Looks quite promising. But it won't be available tomorrow.

[Lappa]

NSW currently has 874 ICU beds. At this point in time, of the 818 confirmed cases, 12 are in ICU and 8 require ventilators.
Thats 1.4% in ICU - hope those percentages don’t increase.

[BobL]

NSW currently has 874 ICU beds. At this point in time, of the 704 confirmed cases, 12 are in ICU and 8 require ventilators.
Thats 1.7% in ICU - hope those percentages don’t increase.

We haven't reached peak infection but simple scaling suggests that once the 704 cases reach ~50,000 there will be enough serious cases amongst them to require all the ICU beds. That of course assumes assumes similar rates of seriousness and no deaths or recoveries amongst the current serious cases. It also leaves no beds for any other ICU cases.
Hopefully the recent changes will help slow things down other wise it will be too late.