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IMPORTANT // Please look after your loved ones, yourself and be kind to others. If you are feeling that the world is too hard to handle there is always help - I implore you not to hesitate in contacting one of these wonderful organisations Lifeline and Beyond Blue ... and I'm sure reaching out to our PRE community we will find a way to help. T.
Coronavirus
- Thread starter Tigers of Old
- Start date
A note to all contributing to this thread I'd like to refer you to the site rules regarding site behaviour.
I've closed down the Racial Tolerance thread because of the same issues. Please be respectful.
Also, I am tolerant on swearing but please do not attempt to bypass the filter - this will warrant an instant warning.
T.
I've closed down the Racial Tolerance thread because of the same issues. Please be respectful.
Also, I am tolerant on swearing but please do not attempt to bypass the filter - this will warrant an instant warning.
T.
I've customarily used an exclamation mark in s*!* because the swear filter implies something worse. It's such a common and versatile word... can the filter be configured to use an emoji in its place?
e.g.
'Coronavirus is airborne': More than 200 scientists write open letter to WHO, asking to revise recommendations
More than 200 scientists from 32 nations have written to the WHO, saying there is evidence that the coronavirus is airborne and even smaller particles can infect people, a significant departure from the UN health agency's claims so far that COVID-19 is spread primarily through coughs and sneezes.
A report in The New York Times says that clusters of infections are rising globally as people go back to bars, restaurants, offices, markets and casinos, a trend that increasingly confirms that the virus lingers in the air indoors, infecting those nearby.
"...in an open letter to the WHO, 239 scientists in 32 countries have outlined the evidence showing that smaller particles can infect people, and are calling for the agency to revise its recommendations," the report said, adding that the researchers plan to publish their letter in a scientific journal next week.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has long held that the coronavirus is spread primarily by large respiratory droplets when an infected person coughs or sneezes.
In its latest update dated June 29 on the coronavirus, the WHO said airborne transmission of the virus was possible only after medical procedures that produce aerosols, or droplets smaller than 5 microns.
The guidance that the health agency has given to deal with the virus, such as wearing masks, maintaining social distance and frequent handwashing, since the pandemic first broke is based on its claim that the virus spreads through large droplets when an infected person coughs and sneezes.
"If airborne transmission is a significant factor in the pandemic, especially in crowded spaces with poor ventilation, the consequences for containment will be significant. Masks may be needed indoors, even in socially-distant settings. Health care workers may need N95 masks that filter out even the smallest respiratory droplets as they care for coronavirus patients," the NYT report said.
It said that ventilation systems in schools, nursing homes, residences and businesses may need to minimise recirculating air and add powerful new filters.
"Ultraviolet lights may be needed to kill viral particles floating in tiny droplets indoors," it said.
WHO's technical lead on infection control Dr Benedetta Allegranzi, however, said in the report that the evidence for the virus spreading by air was unconvincing.
"Especially in the last couple of months, we have been stating several times that we consider airborne transmission as possible but certainly not supported by solid or even clear evidence. There is a strong debate on this," she said.
Interviews with nearly 20 scientists, including a dozen WHO consultants and several members of the committee that crafted the guidance, and internal emails "paint a picture of an organization that, despite good intentions, is out of step with science," the report said.
"Whether carried aloft by large droplets that zoom through the air after a sneeze, or by much smaller exhaled droplets that may glide the length of a room, these experts said, the coronavirus is borne through air and can infect people when inhaled," it said.
Experts pointed out that WHO's infection prevention and control committee is "bound by a rigid and overly medicalised view of scientific evidence, is slow and risk-averse in updating its guidance and allows a few conservative voices to shout down dissent".
"They'll die defending their view," one longstanding WHO consultant was quoted as saying in the report.
The WHO was relying on a dated definition of airborne transmission. The agency believes an airborne pathogen, like the measles virus, has to be highly infectious and to travel long distances, said Linsey Marr, an expert in airborne transmission of viruses at Virginia Tech.
WHO's chief scientist Dr Soumya Swaminathan said in the report that agency staff members were trying to evaluate new scientific evidence as fast as possible, but without sacrificing the quality of their review. She said the UN health agency will try to broaden the committees' expertise and communications to make sure everyone is heard.
"We take it seriously when journalists or scientists or anyone challenges us and say we can do better than this. We definitely want to do better," she said.
As the pandemic spread across the world, a lag by the global health agency in issuing critical guidelines was seen as hampering efforts to control the outbreak.
It lagged behind most of its member nations in endorsing face coverings for the public. While many organisations, including The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have long since acknowledged the importance of transmission by people without symptoms, the WHO still maintains that asymptomatic transmission is rare.
The NYT report says that many experts said the WHO should embrace what some called a "precautionary principle" and others called "needs and values" - the idea that even without definitive evidence, the agency should assume the worst of the virus, apply common sense and recommend the best protection possible.
"There is no incontrovertible proof that SARS-CoV-2 travels or is transmitted significantly by aerosols, but there is absolutely no evidence that it's not," said Dr Trish Greenhalgh, a primary care doctor at the University of Oxford in Britain.
"So at the moment we have to make a decision in the face of uncertainty, and my goodness, it's going to be a disastrous decision if we get it wrong. So why not just mask up for a few weeks, just in case?" she said.
More than 200 scientists from 32 nations have written to the WHO, saying there is evidence that the coronavirus is airborne and even smaller particles can infect people, a significant departure from the UN health agency's claims so far that COVID-19 is spread primarily through coughs and sneezes.
A report in The New York Times says that clusters of infections are rising globally as people go back to bars, restaurants, offices, markets and casinos, a trend that increasingly confirms that the virus lingers in the air indoors, infecting those nearby.
"...in an open letter to the WHO, 239 scientists in 32 countries have outlined the evidence showing that smaller particles can infect people, and are calling for the agency to revise its recommendations," the report said, adding that the researchers plan to publish their letter in a scientific journal next week.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has long held that the coronavirus is spread primarily by large respiratory droplets when an infected person coughs or sneezes.
In its latest update dated June 29 on the coronavirus, the WHO said airborne transmission of the virus was possible only after medical procedures that produce aerosols, or droplets smaller than 5 microns.
The guidance that the health agency has given to deal with the virus, such as wearing masks, maintaining social distance and frequent handwashing, since the pandemic first broke is based on its claim that the virus spreads through large droplets when an infected person coughs and sneezes.
"If airborne transmission is a significant factor in the pandemic, especially in crowded spaces with poor ventilation, the consequences for containment will be significant. Masks may be needed indoors, even in socially-distant settings. Health care workers may need N95 masks that filter out even the smallest respiratory droplets as they care for coronavirus patients," the NYT report said.
It said that ventilation systems in schools, nursing homes, residences and businesses may need to minimise recirculating air and add powerful new filters.
"Ultraviolet lights may be needed to kill viral particles floating in tiny droplets indoors," it said.
WHO's technical lead on infection control Dr Benedetta Allegranzi, however, said in the report that the evidence for the virus spreading by air was unconvincing.
"Especially in the last couple of months, we have been stating several times that we consider airborne transmission as possible but certainly not supported by solid or even clear evidence. There is a strong debate on this," she said.
Interviews with nearly 20 scientists, including a dozen WHO consultants and several members of the committee that crafted the guidance, and internal emails "paint a picture of an organization that, despite good intentions, is out of step with science," the report said.
"Whether carried aloft by large droplets that zoom through the air after a sneeze, or by much smaller exhaled droplets that may glide the length of a room, these experts said, the coronavirus is borne through air and can infect people when inhaled," it said.
Experts pointed out that WHO's infection prevention and control committee is "bound by a rigid and overly medicalised view of scientific evidence, is slow and risk-averse in updating its guidance and allows a few conservative voices to shout down dissent".
"They'll die defending their view," one longstanding WHO consultant was quoted as saying in the report.
The WHO was relying on a dated definition of airborne transmission. The agency believes an airborne pathogen, like the measles virus, has to be highly infectious and to travel long distances, said Linsey Marr, an expert in airborne transmission of viruses at Virginia Tech.
WHO's chief scientist Dr Soumya Swaminathan said in the report that agency staff members were trying to evaluate new scientific evidence as fast as possible, but without sacrificing the quality of their review. She said the UN health agency will try to broaden the committees' expertise and communications to make sure everyone is heard.
"We take it seriously when journalists or scientists or anyone challenges us and say we can do better than this. We definitely want to do better," she said.
As the pandemic spread across the world, a lag by the global health agency in issuing critical guidelines was seen as hampering efforts to control the outbreak.
It lagged behind most of its member nations in endorsing face coverings for the public. While many organisations, including The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have long since acknowledged the importance of transmission by people without symptoms, the WHO still maintains that asymptomatic transmission is rare.
The NYT report says that many experts said the WHO should embrace what some called a "precautionary principle" and others called "needs and values" - the idea that even without definitive evidence, the agency should assume the worst of the virus, apply common sense and recommend the best protection possible.
"There is no incontrovertible proof that SARS-CoV-2 travels or is transmitted significantly by aerosols, but there is absolutely no evidence that it's not," said Dr Trish Greenhalgh, a primary care doctor at the University of Oxford in Britain.
"So at the moment we have to make a decision in the face of uncertainty, and my goodness, it's going to be a disastrous decision if we get it wrong. So why not just mask up for a few weeks, just in case?" she said.
its a flow on effect from racial intolerance lock out.
the dogs are loose.
back on CV,
IF (big if), it was shown that a security guard rooted a quarantined infected foreign traveller,
then its fair to say that little conjugation cost The Nation a billion or so bucks?
wouldnt a billion bucks worth of exceptional stupidity and selfishness be worth a few years in the clink for the horizontal plaguetango partners?
I don't have an issue about re-opening. Community transmission at the time was very low. Other states have all opened up and they are now doing very well; including NSW which was the worst performer by far early doors.
But the hotel quarantine debacle is what separates Victoria from the rest of the country. They all got it right and we *smile* it up; royally. Then people who worked in hotel quarantine decided to ignore the physical distancing directions and attend mass family gatherings subsequently spreading the virus throughout family groups and into the wider community in the northern and western suburbs. Selfish and self indulgent.
Now we are where we are. The government needs to wear the hotel quarantine debacle. Some members of the public need to wear responsibility for the spread of the virus in that specific part of Melbourne. These are the major reasons we are where we are and not in lock step with the rest of Australia.
Nice. I’ll look into it.I've customarily used an exclamation mark in s*!* because the swear filter implies something worse. It's such a common and versatile word... can the filter be configured to use an emoji in its place?
e.g.
One of the most infected localities is the City of Melbourne (82 active cases). Not sure how they expect to shut it down while people are passing through the city and taking it home with them.
The feature is not supported, good idea though.I've customarily used an exclamation mark in s*!* because the swear filter implies something worse. It's such a common and versatile word... can the filter be configured to use an emoji in its place?
e.g.
I don't understand why everyone is pointing to other states.
Victoria started earlier with our shut down, and tried to hold out longer than other states because our situation was different.
We always, at every point, had higher numbers of unidentified community transmission than other states. NSW had a couple of larger outbreaks, but they knew where their cases were coming from.
I don't understand why people are saying this is purely a hotel quarantine issue. I've said that it's a significant contributing factor.
But how do people think this moved through our population after those breaches? How do we explain the clusters with no link to returned travellers?
It's just blind to say, everything we did is right (except hiring security guards).
We *smile* this up by not holding out longer. I'll say it again, unlike other states, we never had a point where we knew the source of all our infections, and while that was the case, it was going to be invisible, making social gatherings a huge risk.
This is a virus that can be transmitted asymptomatically. You only need one person to have it and not know, to infect a whole country.
That's actually how a pandemic starts.
We have seen social gatherings cause an explosion in these cases, even without links to hotel quarantine failures. I don't know why people are suggesting that hasn't happened.
BTW, we are currently still *smile* this up.
Yesterday we had the single biggest rise in Victoria ever at any point during this pandemic. And most of the state is still wandering around, having dinner parties, going out for coffee, playing sport...
Yeah this will turn out well.
Even though it's school holidays for public schools, a lot of private schools /childcare facilities are being closed to deal with infections.
Early childhood and school closures
This page lists early childhood services, schools and bus routes that are currently not operating. Updated 8:30 am and 4:30 pm.
www.education.vic.gov.au
Over 150 Victorian facilities shut down today.
If school holidays end this week, and we all end up back in those buildings, prepare for the mother of all explosions.
People like simple answers. They've thrown up a number of culprits and this is the one that has been made to stick, as culpable as it is. The hotel quarantine plan was announced in March, so it isn't a new issue.
Perhaps preceding this problem are the 16,000 people who travelled outside Australia in the fortnight after the federal government's do-not-travel advice was issued for every other country in the world and who are continuing to return in dribs and drabs.
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There has to be a case for locking down Melbourne, rather than regions that have no known active cases, and have only ever had 1 or 2, if that.
These school holidays might stuff that up though.
191 new cases. Lockdown inevitable.
Australian reporting "Well-placed sources say the Andrews government is preparing to announce a four-week statewide lockdown from this afternoon."
Australian reporting "Well-placed sources say the Andrews government is preparing to announce a four-week statewide lockdown from this afternoon."
Too too late.
I can't believe how idiotic these postcode lock downs are and have been.
Had we done a proper lockdown a week ago, we may have shaved a month off this inevitable lockdown we're all going into now.
Even the people in charge don't understand exponential growth.
Agree.
HS is reporting:
"Victoria’s spiralling coronavirus threat has been likened to 'a public health bushfire' — and make no mistake, they are now drawing up plans to build a massive fire break to contain it.
For this blaze, a fire break is a lockdown, with residents across Melbourne — and possibly Victoria — ordered to stay at home so the coronavirus has nowhere to spread and simply burns out."
Hopefully that means an elimination strategy, like NZ.
*smile* me. Lockdown again is going to send this state into a massive crisis.
Jobkeeper is due to stop soon yet ,more people than ever will be out of work.
It's a disaster.
Jobkeeper is due to stop soon yet ,more people than ever will be out of work.
It's a disaster.
That's what should have happened the first time however Federal pressure wanted things to open up. I honestly think Andrews wanted to take a more conservative approach.
The irony is now after the quarantine stuff up is that we are now more screwed than ever.
