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What if COVID-19 Never Goes Away?


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Article from today’s WaPo discussing the realities we need to face around the likelihood this virus is NEVER “going away”.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/05/27/coronavirus-endemic/?utm_campaign=wp_post_most&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_most
 

The article rightly points out we already have 4 coronaviruses today, which cause the common cold and which have never been stamped out. Vaccinations will help with managing this virus, but we have to stop looking for a quick-fix solution to “get us back to normal” and understand that the presence of COVID-19 is the new normal.

I don’t think for a second this means that we’re all going to be isolated for the rest of our lives, or that cruising is done as a form of travel and vacation, or that we’re done for as a species. But I think it does mean we really should stop saying things like, “Things will be back to how they were once 2021 comes around”, and start planning on lives where this new virus is going to be a thorn in our side for at least the next decade.

Hopefully our favorite cruise line and all the others are already taking that long-term view.

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I think we need to keep perspective here. This isn't the first pandemic, or even the worst pandemic we've faced.

Most recent one I remember is the Hong Kong flu of 1968/69. It is remarkably similar to Covid in many ways.

The US death toll was 100,000, which on a percentage basis is worse.

How did we respond then? We put men on the moon and celebrated with a ticker tape parade in Times Square.  We held Woodstock.  Royal Caribbean started sailing just a few years later.

A vaccine was in development, but the virus burned out before it was available. 

 

I expect something similar with Covid 

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Sigh. I just want to live in a world where this isn't our every day talk. I'm fine with a new normal. I'll wear masks if I need to. I'll learn to not touch my face as much. I just want to have this not be every topic of conversation.

@JLMoran I don't mean to be a jerk on your post. This is valid information and I'm not directing my jerkiness at you. 

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2 hours ago, steverk said:

I think we need to keep perspective here. This isn't the first pandemic, or even the worst pandemic we've faced.

Most recent one I remember is the Hong Kong flu of 1968/69. It is remarkably similar to Covid in many ways.

The US death toll was 100,000, which on a percentage basis is worse.

How did we respond then? We put men on the moon and celebrated with a ticker tape parade in Times Square.  We held Woodstock.  Royal Caribbean started sailing just a few years later.

A vaccine was in development, but the virus burned out before it was available. 

 

I expect something similar with Covid 

 Funny thing I heard about that flu was, (not to make this political, but) for the most part, it was never reported on the news. The Vietnam war was the big newsmaker back then.

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3 hours ago, steverk said:

 

A vaccine was in development, but the virus burned out before it was available. 

 

I expect something similar with Covid 

Precisely this. It's just the way viruses work. The go away they come back they go away they come. This one has been dying down since April. Yes it's worse then the regular flu but I can all but guarantee that if there is a new wave in the fall we will not quarantine like we did these last few months. It won't happen. Yes the virus was deadly but it's long term effects on businesses and economies world wide is insane. Many will be suffering for a very long time.

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I KNOW this virus is here to stay, like most viruses. This one has multiple strains and continues to mutate. I truly think the problem is the news cycle. Every hour there are conflicting reports and think-pieces. In all the other instances of epidemics, pandemics and outbreaks...way less media was involved. People relied on their own personal sense to do the right thing. Now we have far too much access: too many facts, that can be contradicted and contradictions that can be facts. All are peppered/reported with personal feelings. Anyone can edit a Wiki, write an article and pose as an expert...before a fact checker catches up with them.

My two issues are: the fact we care so much more about the economy than actual lives, and that after a few months and/or mere weeks of slowness our economy cannot survive. I too can shrug off the former, as people live to work and work to live. The latter blows my mind...are we REALLY one of the riches nations?

Also note that the virus has long term affects as well...reduced lung capacity, deficiencies, organ failures....

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15 hours ago, Marlena said:

I also dont think it's going away any time soon. We need to find a way to live with it and not keep ourselves locked inside for years. 

As I understand it, the Hong Kong flu, the Spanish flu, SARS, MERS and most others are still with us and are part of our regular annual flu season.  They come back, but we've worked up enough immunity (or they've mutated to be less dangerous) so they are no big deal.  Eventually, Covid will probably do the same.

It's interesting to theorize why we are treating this one so different and if we'll ever get over it (from a medical perspective, we will.  From a social/economic perspective?). I'm convinced we will and quicker than most think. I just hope we don't lose too many more people between now and the "end."

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18 hours ago, USFFrank said:

 Funny thing I heard about that flu was, (not to make this political, but) for the most part, it was never reported on the news. The Vietnam war was the big newsmaker back then.

I was too young to have paid attention to the news at the time. I mostly referenced iconic events of the time.  Next time I talk to my aunt, I'll ask her though. 

Certainly, the 1968/1969 is not known for the pandemic that occurred, so it probably wasn't a big news story like Covid.

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I know it's not the same, however I had H1N1 when it went around, was in my mid 20s. Certainly wasnt pleasant and didnt eat for about 10 days and lived in the bathroom...but made it though. Now it's part of our flu vaccine I believe. 

That being said, my biggest fear in all of this has and still is with all the people we are trying to save from covid, we are killing them from many other things. Cancers not being diagnosed, or treated. Disease not being caught because people are scared of the ER etc. Not to mention people who suffered financially before ( and even people who weren't) are now going to be so much worse.  Malnutrition etc. Not to mention the rise in anxiety, depression and suicide. 

Just my opinion...

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1 minute ago, Marlena said:

I know it's not the same, however I had H1N1 when it went around, was in my mid 20s. Certainly wasnt pleasant and didnt eat for about 10 days and lived in the bathroom...but made it though. Now it's part of our flu vaccine I believe. 

That being said, my biggest fear in all of this has and still is with all the people we are trying to save from covid, we are killing them from many other things. Cancers not being diagnosed, or treated. Disease not being caught because people are scared of the ER etc. Not to mention people who suffered financially before ( and even people who weren't) are now going to be so much worse.  Malnutrition etc. Not to mention the rise in anxiety, depression and suicide. 

Just my opinion...

The amount of people who are ignoring their own health because the media has them terrified they will catch covid are astonishing. Worked on a woman last week who had a stroke but was to scared to come into the ER when her symptoms first presented. She said the news said she would be a burden on us if she came in. It's heart breaking.

The truth of the matter is the hospitals in my state were not overun or at the brink of collapse at any point of covid 19. The media scared people to death when they shouldn't have been scared. And now my governor is changing his tune saying quarantine wasn't just for hospitals ?

Fauci goes back and forth with what he thinks covid will do in the fall and even with quarantining or not quarantining

No one knows what will happen and some people we have in power are just trying to save face at this point. It's disgusting.

I feel for all those who are ignoring their own health and who may very well die from soemthing that couldn't have been treated all bc of being worried about covid 19

 

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19 minutes ago, Kcusack89 said:

The amount of people who are ignoring their own health because the media has them terrified they will catch covid are astonishing. Worked on a woman last week who had a stroke but was to scared to come into the ER when her symptoms first presented. She said the news said she would be a burden on us if she came in. It's heart breaking.

The truth of the matter is the hospitals in my state were not overun or at the brink of collapse at any point of covid 19. The media scared people to death when they shouldn't have been scared. And now my governor is changing his tune saying quarantine wasn't just for hospitals ?

Fauci goes back and forth with what he thinks covid will do in the fall and even with quarantining or not quarantining

No one knows what will happen and some people we have in power are just trying to save face at this point. It's disgusting.

I feel for all those who are ignoring their own health and who may very well die from soemthing that couldn't have been treated all bc of being worried about covid 19

 

Exactly!!! I also have worked in healthcare for about 16 years and am seeing it here as well. As well as 80something year olds taking all their meds at once because they don't want to live like this....

In our hospital we have definitely seem an influx at the beginning. And ended up with most of our patients because the long term care facilities have basically shown to be a disaster. At most we had 32ish in ICU. Now have been holding steady at under 15 for last while. Very manageable for the system so far.

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On 5/29/2020 at 3:09 PM, Kcusack89 said:

The truth of the matter is the hospitals in my state were not overun or at the brink of collapse at any point of covid 19. The media scared people to death when they shouldn't have been scared. And now my governor is changing his tune saying quarantine wasn't just for hospitals ?

In the county I live in we have a population of 292,406 people. Our Health Department has posted that there have been less than 5 people hospitalized for COVID-19 during last three weeks. Yet we are still stuck under what amounts to house arrest by our Dictator Governor.  

None of this makes any sense anymore.

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4 hours ago, bcarney said:

In the county I live in we have a population of 292,406 people. Our Health Department has posted that there have been less than 5 people hospitalized for COVID-19 during last three weeks. Yet we are still stuck under what amounts to house arrest by our Dictator Governor.  

None of this makes any sense anymore.

Sounds like we are in similar situations! The hospital I work for actually closed out covid floor about three weeks ago and have not had any patients admitted with covid for over a week. So we're a bit behind you but still we won't have our businesses open here till probably mid july

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Its going away on its own..like most virus's do, at the end of the day this will be a really bad flu that hit, but nothing more once the truth and factual numbers come out(never mind the blame games for China and the WHO which could have prevented it from probably ever getting as bad as it was)...….this was WAY overblown by the mainstream media and the governments fell for it...causing massive lay offs, debts and other health and mental issues as a result.

 

Lets hope we learn from this and then next time something like this comes along, we dont act so dramatically and draconian about it!!

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Just MHO but are things not as bad as predicted BECAUSE of the extreme safety measures taken?  Again IMHO, if the stay at home orders had not been in place, an awful lot of people would have been out spreading Covid.   Hindsight is easy but I believe if we had not taken the measures we did, we would not be talking about any light at the end of the tunnel.

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31 minutes ago, Pooch said:

Just MHO but are things not as bad as predicted BECAUSE of the extreme safety measures taken?  Again IMHO, if the stay at home orders had not been in place, an awful lot of people would have been out spreading Covid.   Hindsight is easy but I believe if we had not taken the measures we did, we would not be talking about any light at the end of the tunnel.

That had something to do with it for sure...but during any flu season we are supposed to be more vigilant and careful. Certainly putting sick Covid ppl in nursing homes was NOT what should have been done and lead to many more deaths then needed to be. You wouldn't do that with a "regular" flu, never mind amore deadly virus.

 

The flip side of this of course is to think about all the emotional, mental, physical, financial  issues it has caused for millions of people and a lot of deaths that will be indirectly related to the shutting down of the world for 2 months to deal with Covid….

 

Hindsight is 20/20 and I hope we learn from the hysteria and overreaction of this flu(along with things that could have been done earlier and disclosed etc) as to what NOT to do the next time something like this comes along!

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and perhaps being less complacent about preparations for this kind of thing!  And I respectfully disagree about comparing this to our "regular flu".  There is a significant segment of the population that is already immune to whatever seasonal flu strain comes through and there are already vacines that can be moderately successful in preventing it.  No one was immune to this which vastly increased the number of people suseptable to it.

Really I think the answer probably lies somewhere between your take and mine.  As you suggest, hope we can learn from this!

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11 minutes ago, Pooch said:

and perhaps being less complacent about preparations for this kind of thing!  And I respectfully disagree about comparing this to our "regular flu".  There is a significant segment of the population that is already immune to whatever the seasonal flu strain comes through and there are already vacines that can be moderately successful in preventing it.  No one was immune to this which vastly increased the number of people suseptable to it.

Really I think the answer probably lies somewhere between your take and mine.  As you suggest, hope we can learn from this!

At one point, the very large hospital I work at (550 beds, Northern NJ) had, I believe, one adult floor with no Covid pts on it (cardiac & general medical care only), our pediatric ICU had several adult patients in it, our Same Day surgery unit & Recovery room areas were housing Covid patients -- and that was with strict stay in place orders.  We had 3 or so very bad weeks, and are just now finishing re-converting most of our nursing units to their regular uses.  We have also started allowing non emergency surgeries, but are still restricting visitors.  I shudder to think what it would have been like without the shelter in place orders.

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Funny how certain states are SO bad(NJ, NY, CAL etc), and others not at all compared.....same thing in Canada.....if Covid doesn't discriminate, then the only thing that resulted in what happened was our reaction and over reaction to it....be interesting once this is done to hear and see what really happened.

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8 minutes ago, monctonguy said:

Funny how certain states are SO bad(NJ, NY, CAL

....but these areas are highly populated with mass transit...so it makes sense. Public transport. Not a lot of personal space. A lot of travel, in and out of the cities. Can't speak for Canada, but in my own state it's happening in largely populated areas.

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Yes, and in the case of the tri-state area, the constant influx of international travelers from, for example, Italy prior to the beginning of screening/banning.  My guess is the same can be said for California.  North Dakota on the otherhand, probably not so much!

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I will forever stand by my assessment that if a person/business/country/nation cannot abide a minor shutdown then that's the problem. Not the so-called "overreaction" to an unknown virus/variable. We all shut down globally, which should have allowed for a bit of leeway when it came to the global and local economies. Lets also not forget that essential business still functioned...truly only the entertainment, travel and restaurant businesses were massively affected. My mother manages a grocery store, hasn't closed until the riots/looting started. My brother is an Mechanical Engineer, projects were just starting to be cancelled, and my firm is still handling cases. The vast majority of shutdowns involved anything where people gathered for leisure and the shutdown worked...until people decided the whole thing was hyperbole. While the reaction to the virus will diminish, the virus itself won't become less potent until we build immunity and solutions. I think in the case of the US, our president made things worse by politicizing the virus. Without the constant stream of polarizing and theorizing media, this would not have nearly been so bad.

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If you want to see what no major action to curb the virus at all looks like as far as the long-term effect, you only need to look at Sweden. Sweden has the highest daily coronavirus death rate in the world – and it's getting worse

They decided early on, partly due to complications in their constitution that prevent non-war governmental interventions, that there would be no lockdowns or enforced stay-at-home policies. People were not allowed to gather in groups of more than 50, bars and restaurants had to exercise crowd management, and everyone was expected to take personal responsibility for their social distancing and wearing of masks. Elder care residences and homes were banned from visitors, and a few other relatively basic recommendations were put in place.

In the beginning, they were doing no worse than any of their Scandinavian neighbors. But now they have the highest mortality rate per capita in the world. Their elder care residences have been absolutely hammered.

Quote

Public Health Agency figures show that almost half of the country's fatalities linked to coronavirus happened in residential homes.

There has been no clear reason for how elderly care home deaths rose so sharply in the country, although it is believed factors could include new arrivals to the homes, residents returning from hospital, asymptomatic staff and a lack of testing early on.

But Sweden’s health minister Lena Hallengren said the responsibility lay with ‘countless actors’ – and described the tragic number of care home deaths as a “society-wide failure”.

 

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On 6/2/2020 at 4:35 PM, Marlena said:

Quebec has the same problem . Our elder care residences are on absolute disaster.  The staff literally abandoned some of them and people were found on the ground, malnourished and many passed on....its horrible.

And again, like in the U.S., population density and international arrivals played a big role initially in the hardest hit areas, like Montreal and Toronto. Many other countries, such as Brazil, are just beginning their course of escalating infection and death rates.

To think that the global spread will not keep hitting us in various waves and new hotspots is foolish, IMO.

Our governments, public health authorities, and the medical community is going to have to get very good and efficient at playing whack-a-mole for the next few years. And, we will have to come to some new “social contract” as to how we move to protect the more vulnerable among us... beyond the “you do you & I do me” approach, for the long run...

I have far more faith in the development of effective treatment protocols, at this point in time, than in a vaccine - this is where my own hope for future “normalcy” lies. Then I can reconsider cruising, without the inherent gamble that it implies right now.

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5 hours ago, Marlena said:

Quebec has the same problem . Our elder care residences are on absolute disaster.  The staff literally abandoned some of them and people were found on the ground, malnourished and many passed on....its horrible.

It’s everywhere. Our county the retirement homes account for the vast majority of COVID related death. 

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9 hours ago, Andrew72681 said:

It’s everywhere. Our county the retirement homes account for the vast majority of COVID related death. 

Because:

A) Groups of people living in close proximity (which is why the poorest neighborhoods in large cities have the highest infection rates), and

B) EVERYONE in the facilities has a minimum of one significant risk factor (age) and most likely have several more.

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21 minutes ago, HeWhoWaits said:

Because:

A) Groups of people living in close proximity (which is why the poorest neighborhoods in large cities have the highest infection rates), and

B) EVERYONE in the facilities has a minimum of one significant risk factor (age) and most likely have several more.

If you ever want a good laugh check out that populations with the highest occurrence of   STD’s. It’s the same population of nursing homes. 

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Well then dont remain hopeful as Dr. Fauci said yesterday than it will be spring of 2021 at least before there would be enough vaccinations for the US alone.....and even then they are not sure how long the vaccination will be effective.

 

So if that's the case...we need to accept to live with it...or shut down the world and we can all stay locked down in  our homes and die peacefully in our old age, but not from Covid...:42_confused:

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On 6/3/2020 at 7:24 AM, monctonguy said:

Well then dont remain hopeful as Dr. Fauci said yesterday than it will be spring of 2021 at least before there would be enough vaccinations for the US alone.....and even then they are not sure how long the vaccination will be effective.

 

So if that's the case...we need to accept to live with it...or shut down the world and we can all stay locked down in  our homes and die peacefully in our old age, but not from Covid...:42_confused:

Or we do what we can now (not travelling, social distancing, staying out of the bar and the amusement park and the public pool, encouraging workplaces to implement work from home as much as possible) so that we're not risking our neighbor's life because we can't be bothered with a little temporary restriction.

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8 minutes ago, Jencendiary said:

The US had a full-fledged plan and infrastructure for this sort of thing. It was dismantled by our current president because it was put into place by our previous president.

Just as a reminder. @matt has asked for no discussion of politics. It’s the sticky post at the top titled “don’t do these things”

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