The Gaming Den

Kevin Mack wrote:Frank how do you feel the chances of Scotland are relative to the rest of the uk (Since health is a devolved issue far as I know?)

The Scottish health service is partially different and also partially the same and it's really complicated. Scotland has the advantage that Nicola is like a lot more competent than Bojo. It's not like Hillary versus Donald or even Biden versus Ryan... but it's pretty close to the power level difference between Biden and Ryan.

Scotland moved to ban large gatherings before the rest of the UK started doing that, but there's literally nothing they can do about the border with England. The Scots are looking at having a much slower infection rate than the rest of the UK, and the death total and death rate should be lower.

But I'm not sure how much better the numbers are going to be, and England's numbers are going to be really bad really soon.

-Username17

So, that is basically a graph of open beds a country has per 1000 population, with the results ranging from .1 to 2.5. Let's put that in perspective.

1000 * .4 infection rate * .05 hospitalization rate = 20. Now, those are lowish estimates for infection rate and hospitalization rate, so it'll probably be worse, but on the flip side not everyone is going to get sick at once - realistically even if your country peaks hard and fast, no more than half of that number should require hospital beds simultaneously. But you'll note that "we need 10 hospital beds per 1000 people and have 2.4" is still a gap of 7.6 people per 1000. If I remember correctly, China's lockdown cut new cases by as much as 85%. That would drag out 10 to a much more manageable rolling 1.5. "We need 1.5 hospital beds per 1000 people and have 2.5" is a solved problem. "We need 1.5 hospital beds per 1000 people and have .1" is a gap of 1.4 and basically not having any hospital beds at all.

Again, this is all napkin scratch bullshit. I'm landing in the ballpark, so the general point stands, but actual magnitudes of fuckitude are best left to experts. But it illustrates the moral of the story pretty well: any country that doesn't lean heavily into quarantine is completely fucked no matter how many hospital beds it has. Countries that don't have at least ~1.0 hospital beds open per 1000 people are still pretty fucked even if they do.

Doing napkin scratch estimates for my own region -- the Pittsburgh Greater Metropolitan area is going to have very roughly 3000 to 5000 people hospitalized due to Covid-19 in very roughly 90 days. And that's not the peak, just the point where saturation and recoveries mean the rate of new cases slows so the simple formula can't estimate it. The very likely undercount of confirmed cases means that such an estimate is very likely either lower and/or slower than the actual number.

But instead of me sharing the link to the consultants whining about how we had too many underused hospital beds a few years back, here's something to laugh at:

https://babylonbee.com/news/nations-ner ... -forbidden

The chart is for unused acute bed capacity. It's a first order approximation of each country's preparedness on apocalypse eve. Now countries can, have been, and will continue to take measures that free up acute beds. Delayable procedures will be delayed, the threshold to come into hospital will be raised and the threshold to be discharged from hospital will be lowered.

I haven't seen really good data on how many beds different countries can reasonably free up without busting out the plague masks and wheelbarrows. I do know that in the UK the number is catastrophically low because the last 10 years of Tory government has been handling the slow motion beds crisis by implementing increasingly severe bed flow measures rather than building more capacity. So most of the measures you might consider taking to free up beds for COVIDs have already been implemented to one degree or another.

For example, here's total hospital beds:

Now the thing about total hospital beds is that it includes low acuity and psychiatric beds and stuff that won't have a lot of utility for putting people with Acute Respiratory Syndrome in. So it might be better to look at just acute beds:


Unfortunately, that data is really old, it's hard to find good graphs for some of this.

People don't normally get put into acute beds for no reason. During a pandemic, people will still stubbornly have heart attacks and cancers like the medical profession didn't have its hands full. Every currently occupied bed you "free up" comes with harsh choices. What I'd really like to know is how many beds countries have that are "soft" occupied that can be emptied at relatively low risk to the patients and how many are "hard" occupied and there's fuckall we can do about them.

-Username17

Germany is shutting down as well.
Most of the borders have been closed.
Most public life has been suspended.
Guess who still has to go to work though.

Stahlseele wrote: Guess who still has to go to work though.

Angela Merkel?

If you had a few months to prepare but not more, how would you add a significant number of acute care beds? Could it be done?

I'm asking because we're more or less in that situation in NZ and I'd like to know what to look for in gov't actions and what to put pressure on them to do.

Orca wrote:If you had a few months to prepare but not more, how would you add a significant number of acute care beds? Could it be done?

I'm asking because we're more or less in that situation in NZ and I'd like to know what to look for in gov't actions and what to put pressure on them to do.

I have no expertise, but it seems that the obvious move is to offer crash-course training to all the suddenly sidelined retail and hospitality workers so they can serve as orderlies or other medical support staff in the coming crush.

Stahlseele wrote:Germany is shutting down as well.
Most of the borders have been closed.
Most public life has been suspended.
Guess who still has to go to work though.

First, thank you for your service, Bruder.

Second, be thankfull you have a job. I am looking at the financial part of the crisis and slowly waving goodby to any chance of getting employment in 2020. And I think there are a lot of people like me. I mean yeah, it's not dying, but still, scary stuff.

sandmann wrote:

Stahlseele wrote:Germany is shutting down as well.
Most of the borders have been closed.
Most public life has been suspended.
Guess who still has to go to work though.

First, thank you for your service, Bruder.

Second, be thankfull you have a job. I am looking at the financial part of the crisis and slowly waving goodby to any chance of getting employment in 2020. And I think there are a lot of people like me. I mean yeah, it's not dying, but still, scary stuff.

I can do my current work from home and still being paid, although some of my friends weren't so lucky and are stuck in work limbo now.

So Azar said that he can't tell us how many ventilators the United States has due to national security concerns. After all, we wouldn't want the virus to know our capabilities and adjust strategy accordingly. Of course, like many things involving this administration, this bar door was closed after the cows had left. An accounting of respirator stockpiles was made last month and there's no reason to believe it's changed much in the interim.

Bottom line, after full mobilization we probably have about 170,000 ventilators of various qualities and age that can be deployed in the United States. At about 5% severe cases, that's about enough ventilator equipment to handle approximately 3.4million simultaneous cases (plus or minus - mostly minus - regional distribution factors).

So the plan would be to do something like this:



Where the crest of the peak is never above three million. Uh... good luck with that?

-Username17

And now we are being sent home to work from there.

Illinois just closed all restaurants (except drive-through and delivery) and last night my place of business implemented mandatory work from home for everyone whose job allows it.

We're all supposed to work from home but my current (temporary) home is an unheated room with a mattress on the floor and no internet connection (necessary for my work).

So for now I work alone in the office (which is walking distance from the appartment) but there are rumors that we'll be forced to stay home so I'll try to find some cardboard to make myself a table and maybe a chair and I'll upgrade my mobile data plan.

You work in an office but can't afford a table or AC? Goddamn, son, what the hell?

I can afford them but it's a temporary place and it's 6th floor with a staircase just wide enough for a human so makeshift cardboard furniture looks like the most convenient option

Aren't all places temporary?

All places are temporary if you ask Cthulhu, but by the measure of mortals a temporary place is generally somewhere with a rental term measured in months. Somewhere where if you get new decent furniture, it won't have time to depreciate before you move out.

Rio de Janeiro is shutting down schools and events. I'll work from home for the time being.

What will happen to all the people who can't work from home? They still need to eat and such.

Our school district still provides two meals on weekdays to kids. That's a help at least.

NY State of Health Website wrote:State Will Organize National Guard, Building Unions and Private Developers to Identify Sites to Retrofit Existing Buildings and Convert Them to Medical Facilities - Goal of Creating 9,000 Additional Beds

Directs Nonessential State Workforce Statewide to Work from Home Starting Tomorrow

Directs Local Governments to Reduce Workforce by 50 Percent and Allow Nonessential Employees to Work from Home

NYC, Nassau, Suffolk, Westchester & Rockland must have childcare, educational services & meal programs in place by midnight and ultimately approved by State

State to Open Drive-Through Mobile Testing Facility on Staten Island — the First in New York City - and in Rockland County

NYS will waive all park fees in state, local and county parks

https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/during ... e-increase

(since this was posted yesterday, "midnight" has now passed)

San Francisco and the Bay Area are under a Shelter in Place order.

This means "it is permissible for people to leave the house for facilities related to the following activities defined as essential: law and safety; essential government services; health care; pharmacies; child care; farming; groceries; food retailers; telecommunications; reduced capacity restaurants; hotels; social services; establishments; agencies that service the needy; gas stations; banks; laundry businesses; safety and sanitation businesses."

So yeh, shit just got real.

We aren't calling it shelter in place, but WA has been that way also.

K wrote:San Francisco and the Bay Area are under a Shelter in Place order.

This means "it is permissible for people to leave the house for facilities related to the following activities defined as essential: law and safety; essential government services; health care; pharmacies; child care; farming; groceries; food retailers; telecommunications; reduced capacity restaurants; hotels; social services; establishments; agencies that service the needy; gas stations; banks; laundry businesses; safety and sanitation businesses."

So yeh, shit just got real.

Do you know how they are enforcing this? Like, police patrolling and stopping people to ask why they are out? Have to show proof you are out for a permitted reason?

It's really amazing how attractive "socialism" (re: government giving away free stuff) seems to be when it comes right down to it. Food for hungry kids, talk of compensating people who can't work en masse, attempts to get national paid time off. I guess these ideas aren't the scary boogieman/unicorns certain subsections of the population have been making them out to be.