Coronavirus 2020

[Steve Sells]

Beware of crossing over into politics, lets get back on track

[CrazyGoatLady]

CtG, your dinner looks good. I'm not a great cook, but I'm decent. I find myself cooking a lot more than I was with everyone home in the evening now. I've been scouring my cookbooks and you tube videos for recipes using what we have on hand for nice meals for us. Some nights are sandwich nights to conserve the good stuff. I was given a sourdough bread starter a couple of weeks ago and I made the first bread I've ever made in my life as much as I hate to admit that. But there is something very satisfying  about making things from scratch and using meat and eggs and produce you've raised and grown yourself. My daughter made the comment that one good thing that may come out of this is a whole generation of people that didn't know how to, wil learn to cook. Both of my kids are good cooks. It's what my son does for a living so I've learned good things from him. My bread came out good and he was proud of it. He said, " My mom can blacksmith AND bake bread! What can your mom do!?" 

[JHCC]

As far as flattening the curve goes, here's a really interesting graphic, screenshotted a couple of days ago from the Ohio health department. This shows the projections made by the Ohio State University's infectious disease wizards, comparing infection rates (that is, the number of new cases reported each day, not the total number of cases) in Ohio both with and without mitigation. It's interesting to note that without mitigation, we would actually be about a week past the peak, and with mitigation, we're only in the early stages of the climb. However, that hypothetical peak a week ago would have been a fast moving catastrophe of epic proportions, and while it's going to get bad, there's still hope that it won't get that bad.

[CrazyGoatLady]

Texas is on stay at home orders now. From what I hear, everything is closing by 5-7 PM now. I remember when things closed early and even wal mart was closed on Sunday's. Our current state reminds me of the way things were when I was a little kid in so many ways 

[Frosty]

I can't say for sure, I'm trying not to follow too closely but it's looking like Alaska's curve is pretty flat for now, a testament to being fairly isolated and aggressive action by the Governor. We've been on stay home, people entering at the border and airport are under mandatory stay home / quarantine for several weeks with violators liable for $25k fine per violation and up to a year in jail. People scalping supplies:  masks, face shields, gloves, hand sanitizer, disinfectant wipes, etc.  are on notice and under investigation, the 1st. perp. was arrested and charged day before yesterday. The couple is looking at $25k and a year in jail PER VIOLATION, that's per item though I'm pretty sure the judge won't sentence them to a few hundred thousand years in jail. Talk about deterrent!

Where did you get it and how are you keeping your sourdough start Chellie? Live and working in a jar or as a dry lump buried in the flour? I've know a couple people who dry a smear on a piece of wax paper and keep folded up and sealed. A fast pass with a flame will melt the wax together and seal the packet. I've never tried the dried method but hear it works for a long time, especially if frozen..

Keeping it live and working is excellent IF you're using it every day, leave it more than a few days and you have to take a careful look for mold before stirring it and using. A good consistency is thick pancake batter. When you add flour and water use equal quantities and tweak a little. You want it a LITTLE dry and thick when you first recharge it, it'll thin out as the yeast eats the starches and makes the vinegar and hooch. 

Have you made hot cakes yet? If it's a sour culture it makes great quick breads like biscuits and hot cakes. If it's a sweeter culture it'll be better for raised breads and cakes. Either will make either but sour dough tends to be more talented one way or the other. 

Frosty The Lucky.

 

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

At least our powers that be have reversed the do not wear masks when in public policy. That was the stupidest decision in my humble opinion. Other countries encouraged the wearing of masks and have flattened the curve and the excuse of masks are in short supply was just stupid because most folks I know had already made effective masks but were told not to wear them.

[tanglediver]

Projections and estimates are only as good as the factors you feed them. 

I heard Japan is simply having everyone in masks, (which is not that unusual there) and everybody just go to work. (Direct from rumor control, so it's gotta be true.)

The story making the light of day concerns patient "zero" (the first person with covid19) with reasons to believe it was a woman in Wuhan who ate shrimp, then was covert about her illness and spread it to 27 people. ... (paraphrasing Dr. Lu Wing). Dr. Lu actually knows a thing or two about virus buggers, and was a podcast guest on the alloutwar podcast, episode #76. https://alloutwar.transistor.fm/episodes/76-the-truth-about-coronavirus-with-dr-lu-wing 

[Steve Sells]

Sourdough thread has been moved to the food section

[Frosty]

I figured something like that happened or my memory was worse than I thought. Thanks Steve, we sidetrack and forget ourselves.

Frosty The Lucky.

[Shabumi]

I had someone ask me if the corona virus has effected my daily life today and it was the first time I stopped to think about it. Besides my mom staying home from work, my daily life hasn't changed much at all. I have enough work to keep 3 people from going stir crazy. Our ranch is far enough out that unless they're specifically coming here, people don't just show up. We put up alot of our own produce so we shop out of our pantry, cellar and freezers and go into town every other week for fresh groceries and errands. We aren't preppers, it's just the way our family has done it since they got here in the mid 1800s. Worst comes to worst, we still have the salting barrels if the power goes out and we need to salt the freezer meats. Water is free, gravity fed from a spring 3 miles up the road. Wood for heat. Hot water coils in our stove, so long hot showers are available at any time even after 3 others have taken long hot showers.

A couple of things have changed. I now only watch 30 minutes of news, in the morning, can't handle it before bed. If it weren't for catching the weather report it would be down to the first 10 minutes where I actually hear the new bullet points of info. Its made a big difference in my mental health being ignorant of the minute by minute updates that seem to be everywhere. Don't they realize that stress weakens your immune system? Also our phone hasn't stopped ringing from 8am-9pm for the last 5 days from people wanting to adopt a puppy since they are stuck at home with little to do, some as far away as the east coast. Since I've been out doing the back and leg work of the ranch, my dad has been answering, returning calls and fielding emails full time all week. Unfortunately we won't have any puppies available until June, which is on our website, but that doesn't stop them from calling and you can't ignore a potential future customer.

[Steve Sells]

I may have had it last Feb. A friend I work with was around 2 nurse friends that both tested positive.  A week after that, he and I both developed a cough that would not stop for 4 days for me, 5 days for him; both of us had a mild fever. We are electricians but never got tested because we didnt know about corona until after we recovered, Now there is no reason to test us, other than knowing we may now be immune. not much of a story,   He may or may not have given it to me, but even if we did have it what does it matter now?

[CtG]

Similarly, I developed a funky cough, minor fever, and gnarly headache back in February after a coworker came back from South Korea. Lasted a week and a half, but at that point I figured it was likely a minor cold. Didn't hinder work and was nothing dayquil couldn't handle. Worked it's way around the shop. May have been it, or may have been a different coronavirus, influenza, etc... hard to say. Was still early enough the doc wasn't that concerned that I had a coworker who came back from 2 weeks in S. K. Didn't test for anything. Who knows now?

[SLAG]

S. S.  &  CtG,

There is a blood test that can confirm whether you had Covid-19, and also determine whether you are completely recovered.

If the blood sample shows that you only have immunoglobulin M,  (IgM),  for the virus you would have been incubating the bug and were probably infectious, and could go on to suffer from the disease.

This is not the case for both of you . because you probably had the disease and fought it off.

During the disease people test positive for both immunoglobulin M,  (IgM), and immunoglobulin G. (IgG).

rapidly disappears but IgG lasts for a longer time.  It is residual, (in some diseases, it lasts for for life).

If the test reveals that you that no immunoglobulin M  (IgM).

It has has disappeared but you still have immunoglobulin G  (IgG).

That shows that both of you have beat the disease and that you are not infectious anymore.

If the test has not shown either immunoglobulins  then you have not caught the disease,  at all,  and are still susceptible for catching it. (like most of us).

Some 40% of people successfully fight off the virus and show no symptoms of the disease at all.

In some laboratories,  the blood serum of survivors is,  now,  being used to treat patients with severe Covid-19.  (such a procedure was used during the Ebola epidemics.)

I suspect that this entry is not very clear.

But I tried my best.

Regards to all and stay safe,

SLAG.

 

[pnut]

7 hours ago, Shabumi said:

I had someone ask me if the corona virus has effected my daily life today and it was the first time I stopped to think about it.

I work in the hotel industry. It's completely upended my life. I went from gainfully employed and getting ready for the slog through the busy season to preparing to apply for unemployment benefits today. We've not had enough guests at either hotels owned by the company I work for to justify me coming to work for the last 11 or twelve days. Fortunately I am a compulsive saver in order to make it through the off season. I managed to stash enough money to make it through the slow season, buy a used car and still have a bit of a cushion. One good thing is that looming destitution has finally motivated me to file my taxes lol. I'll be fine due to the fact that I live like a monk and don't have much overheard. Providing this state of emergency doesn't linger on for much more than six months I should be okay except I'll be going into the slow season again without a savings so next winter could be lean but we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. I hope everyone else is doing okay. Staying sane and safe and enjoying Coronacation 2020. 

Pnut

[Chris C]

10 hours ago, Steve Sells said:

but even if we did have it what does it matter now?

Steve, it matters a lot!  If I were you, I'd pay to be tested because they are saying the blood of someone infected and recovered can be used to treat a lot of people who have it and aren't recovering.

[CtG]

I'll have to shoot my doctor an email and ask about this. 

If it can be helpful.....

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

Debi was also down for about 5 days in Jan. (before covid19 hit the headlines) we thought it was just the seasonal flu, even though we have both had the flu and pneumonia shots. I had zero symptoms, but since having chemo 5 years ago, we are pretty good about sanitizing around the funny farm and she had more contact with folks than I.

[BartW]

In Belgium, we've had succesfull treatments of very bad cases with serum from people who fully recovered (same blood-type).  However; we've also found that a lot of people "thought" they had it; but turned out just then normal flue. People really would like to believe they are immune; I understand, but here we only test people based on 4 factors: Flue-like symptoms after february, and 3 of the usual symptoms; most of the time: Fever; cough and loss of taste/smell. Usually they report all 3. This "seems" different from the normal flue; as the flue usually has only one symptom. I've never had a flue anyway with all three symptoms mentionned above anyway.

Keep in mind; there's still a LOT more flue going around than the cerveza-virus

Stay strong, and help others, together we'll get through this.

[Selph]

I know I'm new here, but felt like jumping in.

I'm only 36, but I ended up in the ER for 3-4 hours back on Thursday. Got the test while I was there, and came back the next day as positive. I'm in great shape (I'm a bike commuter year round 10 miles every day), but I have a long history of lung problems that were eventually fixed with surgery. Anyway, back on Thursday evening I walked up a small 10 foot hill in our driveway and from just walking up that hill I got so out-of-breath that I almost passed out. I continued to be light headed and needed to take 2-3 breaths in the middle of every sentence for the next 4-5 hours. Hence the trip to the ER!

I've still never had a fever. Just a minor cough, and a very minor runny nose. On Thursday, I could tell it was getting a bit harder to breathe, but the weird thing is how quickly I lost my breath and then that it just got better after 4-5 hours. I'm obviously still sick now, but breathing has been getting easier again over time. A little bit better each day since. My wife has had the exact same symptoms minus the difficulty breathing, but we chalked it up to just a cold from one of the kids back before we isolated. I'm hoping to come out the other side here soon. Then I'd love to donate as much blood as they'll let me.

And maybe then I can finally get around to making that JABOD forge...

[Frosty]

You may be a recent addition but you're one of us now, we're here for you. It's good to hear you're getting over it. I hear different stories about symptoms from survivors, unnoticed to debilitating for weeks or months. I'm gad you recovered so quickly and I hope fully.

I hope you're a good blood producer!

Frosty The Lucky.

[Chris C]

Amen to what Frosty said.  Once an IFI member, you're a member of the family.  Hang in there.  I'm glad you are 36 and physically active.................that will help you a lot to fight this off.  Keep us informed, Selph................most of us are really active "pray-ers" and will do our part for you.

[Fowllife]

SLAG, is that test readily available? My wife had one of her people looking into it lat week so she could test her staff members and was not having any luck finding anything currently available.

The thing you need to remember also is these test are not very accurate. I have heard they are only about 60% accurate with a lot of false negatives. Granted there are a lot on different test out there right now and some are better then others. The facility she is at has sent out quite a few test and they have all been negative. There have been patients that have every symptom and still test negative multiple times. My personal thought is there is either a mutated strain they aren't testing for, or something going around with very similar symptoms.....or the test are just that bad.

There are more test available now so it might have changed, but previously most places in Ohio were only testing people that needed admitted into the hospital, and health care workers/first responders.

[pnut]

7 hours ago, Frosty said:

hear different stories about symptoms from survivors, unnoticed to debilitating for weeks or months.

It's not COVID-19 but when I got the flu a couple years ago it took months before I could walk up a flight of stairs without being completely winded. Turns out it scarred my lungs and caused some permanent damage. So please take it seriously and if you think you are showing symptoms get treatment as early as possible. If I wouldn't have waited I wouldn't have as much damage. 

Hope you continue on your way back to good health Selph. 

Pnut

2 minutes ago, Fowllife said:

My personal thought is there is either a mutated strain they aren't testing for, or something going around with very similar symptoms.....or the test are just that bad.

A few people around me have been tested and they all had other infections that have similar symptoms such as flu or strep throat. 

[Fowllife]

As far as I know these people tested negative for all strains of flue/ strep they were tested for. There has been some questions on if this stuff ran through SE Ohio, WV in the December-January time frame. There was a "bug" going through that area with very similar symptoms and also a fairly high death rate that tested negative for everything they tested for. That's why so was so interested in the "recovery" test since her and a lot of the staff had the earlier "bug"

Since we all know we can't trust any info from China, and the US didn't stop flights out of China until the end of January I think it's somewhat short sighted to think that we didn't have cases in the US in some areas way earlier then they are saying.

[SLAG]

Mr. Fowllife,

I am not current on the availability of those tests.  (I left medical research a long time ago, that being said, I still read medical research developments daily).

I suggest that you get in touch with the Ohio state medical people, or the C.D.C.   (center for disease control).

There is a lot of research work being going, right now, by laboratories world wide.

Some are working on virus RNA tests. (using radio , and enzyme immuno-assays) RIA  & EIA,  for example.)

Mr. Pnut, 

 Your description of your symptoms resemble RSV  (respiratory syncitial virus), more than flu.

I had it about four years ago and it took about six weeks to clear the bug. I was a basket case for first two weeks, then improved and relapsed several times. I had a cough for the duration of the disease.

SLAG.