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The Coronavirus - a virus from eating bats, an accident or something sinister gone wrong?


swordfish

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https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-autos/americans-keep-buying-cars-but-coronavirus-concerns-loom-over-industry-idUSKBN20P37Y

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Customers streamed into auto showrooms from California to Florida over the weekend, car dealers across the United States said on Monday, shrugging off concerns that coronavirus worries might dampen sales.

Industry analysts cautioned that a growing number of virus infections could deter Americans in March, and automakers face difficult calls on pricing and production. But dealers and analysts said there was no discernable impact on February U.S. car sales, a strong month for dealerships.

Carmakers are expected to give dealerships details of their consumer discount offers in the coming days. Changes to pricing offers could reflect a drop in supply of some Asian vehicles hit by supply shortages. Automakers could also cut prices to lure worried U.S. shoppers.

...

Larry Laskowski, executive director at the Independent Automobile Dealers Association of California, which represents the state’s roughly 6,000 used car dealers, said the coronavirus has not been an issue for members.

In San Ramon, a city 35 miles east of San Francisco surrounded by counties that have reported coronavirus cases, dealership owner Greg Meier said his business was better than expected this weekend.

“Some people were joking about the virus when they came in this weekend, but no one was panicked or scared,” Meier said.

His remarks were echoed by dealership groups in Texas, Florida and New York.

The hit to auto sales in the U.S. probably won't come from the demand side, but from the supply side.   It only takes a few 2nd or 3rd tier parts suppliers that get their parts from a factory in the Wuhan province and now can't to disrupt the entire supply chain, all the way down to the assembly plants.

 

Edited by Muda69
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1 hour ago, Muda69 said:

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-autos/americans-keep-buying-cars-but-coronavirus-concerns-loom-over-industry-idUSKBN20P37Y

The hit to auto sales in the U.S. probably won't come from the demand side, but from the supply side.   It only takes a few 2nd or 3rd tier parts suppliers that get their parts from a factory in the Wuhan province and now can't to disrupt the entire supply chain, all the way down to the assembly plants.

 

I call on these Tier 1 plants.  Those that mfg like parts to their Chinese/Japanese/Korean  counter parts are bringing that production over here.  But for sure this will impact the industry.  

I love how Trump planted this virus to bring more mfg jobs to the states.

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Just now, Impartial_Observer said:

They didn't teach you how to operate Google at ISU?

There was no Google, nor world wide web as we now know it,  when I attended ISU.    That said, yes, I can translate said french statement.  But I still don't understand the context in which it was typed.

 

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The Fed just hit the coronavirus panic button: https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/03/investing/federal-reserve-interest-rate-cut-coronavirus-emergency/index.html

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The stock market -- and President Trump -- really wanted the Federal Reserve to cut interest rates as soon as possible because of concerns about coronavirus. Everybody got their wish.

The Fed blinked Tuesday morning, slashing interest rates by a half of a percentage point in an emergency rate cut.
The timing of the cut is a bit surprising considering that Fed chair Jerome Powell and US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said just a few hours earlier the US and other G7 nations were prepared to take action but stopped short of saying something was imminent. And the Fed has a regularly scheduled policy meeting in just a little more than two weeks.
But experts said Tuesday that the Fed had to act now. It was the only way to reassure investors the central bank was taking the threat seriously.
"The Fed could not ignore that there would be a real economic impact from the coronavirus," said Tony Fratto, a partner at Hamilton Place Strategies and former Treasury Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs in George W. Bush's administration.
 
"For the Fed to do that and wait until the next policy meeting would not be credible. Things are moving too quickly," he added.
Fratto said the onus is now on health authorities, Congress and the White House to "step up" and follow the Fed's lead. More urgent action is needed to ensure the coronavirus does not spread and that proper funding is in place to handle the crisis, he added.
.....

 

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1 hour ago, Muda69 said:

There was no Google, nor world wide web as we now know it,  when I attended ISU.    That said, yes, I can translate said french statement.  But I still don't understand the context in which it was typed.

 

Ehhh, don't feel bad Muda, there wasn't any Google or WWW when I didn't attend college either. 

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COVID-19 Deaths and Incredible WHO Estimates: https://www.cato.org/blog/covid-19-deaths-incredible-who-estimates

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“Death Toll Hits 9 as Outbreak Spreads,” was the scary Wall Street Journal headline in print before it was toned down online. COVID-19 deaths at a nursing home and hospital in Washington state were unrelated to the virus spreading “across the U.S.” The facts tell us much more about the exceptionally high risks of fatal infection from COVID-19 (or pneumonia or flu) among elderly people living close together in nursing homes or hospitals, many of them already sick.

The ongoing COPD-19 outbreak in Kirkland Washington at the Life Care nursing home and Evergreen hospital represents high‐risk concentrations of vulnerable seniors. Among those who died in Washington, all but two were in their 70s or 80s (the other two in their 50s) and most had “underlying health conditions.” Evergreen hospital has two more in critical condition, in their 70s and 90s, both with underlying conditions.

What we just learned from Washington was already known from China’s experience A February 24 article by Katarina Zimmer in The Scientist provides an excellent summary:

“The latest data from China stem from an analysis of nearly 45,000 confirmed cases, and on the whole suggest that the people most likely to develop severe forms of COVID-19 are those with pre‐existing illnesses and the elderly.While less than 1 percent of people who were otherwise healthy died from the disease, the fatality rate for people with cardiovascular disease was 10.5 percent. That figure was 7.3 percent for diabetes patients and around 6 percent for those with chronic respiratory disease, hypertension, or cancer. While overall, 2.3 percent of known cases [in China] proved fatal—which many experts say is likely an overestimate of the mortality rate, given that many mild cases might go undiagnosed—patients 80 years or older were most at risk, with 14.8 percent of them dying.”

The Scientist article point about the death rate being “less than 1 percent” among the healthy and also the point about the 2.3% Chinese estimate being a “an overestimate” because “many mild cases might go undiagnosed” underscore similar points I made in a March 2 blog. My concern is that misinformation about COVID-19 has fueled excessive fear of the virus by greatly exaggerating the actual death rate per hundred people infected (the infection fatality rate).

I suggested that if we took unreported mild cases into account, the actual death rate among infected people outside China may be as low as 0.5%. Skeptics greeted death rates of 0.5–1.0% as Panglossian heresy. Yet the rigorous February 10 study I cited, from Imperial College London, concluded the global infection fatality ratio was about 1.0. My estimate is lower than 1.0 because I exclude China where (I argue) high fatality rates in Wuhan were exaggerated by overcounting institutionalized elderly with serious infection.

On February 29, Denise Grady, The New York Times’ veteran health and medicine reporter, independently came to conclusions not unlike those Katarina Zimmer and I did within a few days of each other – namely than fewer than 1% of people infected with COVID-19 are likely to die from it, and that the odds of death are lower that that for healthy non‐elderly people. Ms. Grady explained these facts in The New York Times as follows [with emphasis added]:

“Early estimates of the coronavirus death rate from China, the epicenter of the outbreak, have been around 2 percent. But a new report on 1,099 cases from many parts of China, published on Friday in The New England Journal of Medicine, finds a lower rate: 1.4 percent. The coronavirus death rate may be even lower, if — as most experts suspect  there are many mild or symptom‐free cases that have not been detected. The true death rate could turn out to be similar to that of a severe seasonal flu, below 1 percent, according to an editorial published in the journal by Dr. Anthony S. Fauci and Dr. H. Clifford Lane, of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and Dr. Robert R. Redfield, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.”

Despite two health science writers and one economist trying to warn people that widely hyped mortality rates greatly exaggerate the risk (not to mention Drs. Fauci, Lane and Redfield) exaggerated estimates continue to grab the headlines.

On March 4, The New York Times reported, “Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the organization’s director general, said in a news conference in Geneva that… ‘Globally, about 3.4 percent of reported Covid‐19 cases have died.” “By comparison,” he added, ” seasonal flu generally kills far fewer than 1 percent of those infected.”

To the newspaper’s credit, The New York Times apparently felt obliged to caution readers that the WHO’s 3.4 percent death rate is quite implausible, if not wildly inaccurate: “The figure does not include mild cases that do not require medical attention and is skewed by Wuhan, where the death rate is several times higher than elsewhere in China. It is also quite possible that there are many undetected cases that would push the mortality rate lower. Still, it was the first time that the organization had offered a global mortality rate for the disease.”

Ironically, my previous blog quoted Dr. Tedros Adhanom saying, “Most people will have mild disease and get better without needing any special care.

Because most cases are mild, as he said, and because mild cases are excluded by definition from “reported cases,” the WHO’s alleged 3.4% mortality rate is nothing more than sensationalist nonsense.

Indeed it is.

 

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Indiana confirms first presumptive positive case of coronavirus: https://www.jconline.com/story/news/health/2020/03/06/coronavirus-indiana-cases/4973737002/

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As the caseload for the coronavirus tops 100,000 worldwide, Indiana health officials on Friday announced the first confirmed case in the Hoosier state. 

The patient is an adult from Marion County who traveled to Boston where he attended an event, officials said during a news conference. He is being isolated outside the hospital and is in stable condition.

Health officials say they have no signs that the person transmitted the disease in Indiana. 

A doctor from Community Health said the individual called last night concerned he had COVID-19 symptoms. He was taken through a side entrance and did not have any contact with other patients or caregivers.

Gov. Eric Holcomb has declared a public health emergency to ensure the state receives additional funding if needed.

Indiana health officials are reminding people to stay home if they are sick. If you think you may be sick, please call ahead to your doctor, a hospital or your health department so medical providers can be prepared.

....

I had plans to attend an event in the Indianapolis metro area over the weekend.  Guess I will have to cancel.   Time to buy some more seeds................

 

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22 minutes ago, Muda69 said:

Indiana confirms first presumptive positive case of coronavirus: https://www.jconline.com/story/news/health/2020/03/06/coronavirus-indiana-cases/4973737002/

I had plans to attend an event in the Indianapolis metro area over the weekend.  Guess I will have to cancel.   Time to buy some more seeds................

 

I will be at the IHSAA for a meeting Sunday morning...game on!

Flying to Florida next Saturday... game on!

I will drink extra alcohol just to be safe!

 

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9 minutes ago, Impartial_Observer said:

I will be at the IHSAA for a meeting Sunday morning...game on!

Flying to Florida next Saturday... game on!

I will drink extra alcohol just to be safe!

 

As long as you aren't wasting it as hand sanitizer. 😀

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/05/us/titos-vodka-coronavirus-trnd/index.html

 

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Flu has killed 20,000 Americans so far this season, including 136 children, CDC says:  https://www.cbsnews.com/news/flu-deaths-20000-americans-this-season-including-136-children-cdc/

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As the coronavirus outbreak continues to spread in the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provided a grim reminder of the toll that the flu has taken on Americans.  The CDC said that so far this season, about 20,000 people have died of the flu, including 136 children.

The CDC's  most recent flu report says that as of February 29, hospitalization rates among children aged 4 and under were the highest on record at this point in the season, surpassing rates reported during the 2009 H1N1 pandemic.  The 136 children's deaths also mark the highest on record since the 2009 pandemic.

In all, the CDC estimates about 34 million people have gotten the flu so far this season and 350,000 have been hospitalized.

...

Where is the fear from the MSM?  Where are the States of Emergency?  

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For many years, when I fly, go to conventions/trade shows, any time I am in contact with large groups of people, or will be shaking a lot of hands, I have carried a small bottle of hand sanitizer in my pocket. No I've never been a germaphobe, but noticed many years ago after such events I usually came down with some sniffles or a cold. I started using hand sanitizer, and problem solved. So I keep a small TSA compliant bottle in my backpack when we fly, which just happened to run out when we came back from Florida in November. Of course me being me, I threw the bottle away. Fast forward over the weekend I've been all over trying to get another small bottle and I'm staring at empty shelves. Are you kidding me? I don't even care about Coronavirus, I just don't want a cold!

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13 minutes ago, Impartial_Observer said:

For many years, when I fly, go to conventions/trade shows, any time I am in contact with large groups of people, or will be shaking a lot of hands, I have carried a small bottle of hand sanitizer in my pocket. No I've never been a germaphobe, but noticed many years ago after such events I usually came down with some sniffles or a cold. I started using hand sanitizer, and problem solved. So I keep a small TSA compliant bottle in my backpack when we fly, which just happened to run out when we came back from Florida in November. Of course me being me, I threw the bottle away. Fast forward over the weekend I've been all over trying to get another small bottle and I'm staring at empty shelves. Are you kidding me? I don't even care about Coronavirus, I just don't want a cold!

I do the same thing.  But I already have plenty stocked up in my bathroom for packing.  Every January just before show season, I stock up on the small deodorants, shaving gel, etc. that you need to be able to fly.  This year, I've been on both ends of the country (Seattle, Boston) and Canada (Edmonton and Montreal) and many in between, stuck in Detroit, Minneapolis and Nashville.  A cold ALMOST caught me in Toronto last week, but strategic use of Zi-Cam, Benadryl and fishermen's friend lozenges kept me from getting a full blown cold.  AND plenty hand sanitizers and alcohol wipes.....

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48 minutes ago, swordfish said:

I do the same thing.  But I already have plenty stocked up in my bathroom for packing.  Every January just before show season, I stock up on the small deodorants, shaving gel, etc. that you need to be able to fly.  This year, I've been on both ends of the country (Seattle, Boston) and Canada (Edmonton and Montreal) and many in between, stuck in Detroit, Minneapolis and Nashville.  A cold ALMOST caught me in Toronto last week, but strategic use of Zi-Cam, Benadryl and fishermen's friend lozenges kept me from getting a full blown cold.  AND plenty hand sanitizers and alcohol wipes.....

Love the Zicam! It seems like every time I turn around someone is coughing on me. I use the Zicam swabs. 

 

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I ran some numbers last night that I was being spoon fed by Don Le'mon from around the world. The stats seemed pretty consistent, death rate of those who get the virus is about 3.5%. Given other risks, auto accident, heart attack, stroke, murder, medical malpractice, etc., I'll take my chances, but in the process I will buy all the toilet paper and hand sanitizer I can find. 

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