onfocus

"With an immunization specifically targeted against the pandemic-causing Covid-19 disease at least a year away, the World Health Organization says it’s important to know whether the BCG vaccine can reduce disease in those infected with the coronavirus, and is encouraging international groups to collaborate with a study led by Nigel Curtis, head of infectious diseases research, at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute in Melbourne."

"The third scenario is that the world plays a protracted game of whack-a-mole with the virus, stamping out outbreaks here and there until a vaccine can be produced. This is the best option, but also the longest and most complicated."

“This is a really dire situation statewide and I was really impressed by how OSU responded,” said Mike Bamberger, Oregon State University’s emergency preparedness manager. “We gathered everything from a single box of gloves to a pallet of them. University programs really stepped up at a time of great need.”

"Illustrators and designers know the power of good design to communicate a message or a feeling or an idea," Morris explained. Right now everything is changing so fast, and there is so much uncertainty and so much information flying around, I think everyone is really hungry for clarity and understanding.

"Our primitive mind knows something bad is happening, but you can’t see it. This breaks our sense of safety. We’re feeling that loss of safety. I don’t think we’ve collectively lost our sense of general safety like this. Individually or as smaller groups, people have felt this. But all together, this is new. We are grieving on a micro and a macro level."

"Getting and giving tech support is one of the most helpful things technologists can do during hard times. Right now everyone feels a little powerless, but great software empowers people. When times are tough, the Settings area of the best apps give people a little bit more control of their world."

“But bringing the economy back ... that’s more of a reversible thing than bringing people back to life. So we’re going to take the pain in the economic dimension — huge pain — in order to minimize the pain in the diseases-and-death dimension.”

"Our brains have a bias toward negativity in order to scan for danger and keep ourselves safe. If we don’t want to become depressed and anxious, we have to make an effort to move toward the positive. If you think of everything that can possibly go wrong all of the time, you will have given your brain the experience of bad things happening even if none of your fears come true. Use this as an opportunity to catch your negative thoughts and identify them as old mental habits rather than as truths."

Are we sure food isn’t a vector of COVID-19 transmission?

No, we don't know for sure. However, there is strong evidence to suggest that food is not a vector. The epidemiology of food-borne pathogens is well studied, with government data going back to 1938. The spread pattern of COVID-19 does not fit models of foodborne outbreaks, which are defined as two or more people getting sick from the same contaminated food or drink.

"By slowing it down or flattening it, we're not going to decrease the total number of cases, we're going to postpone many cases, until we get a vaccine—which we will, because there's nothing in the virology that makes me frightened that we won’t get a vaccine in 12 to 18 months. Eventually, we will get to the epidemiologist gold ring."

"We can create a third path. We can decide to meet this challenge head-on. It is absolutely within our capacity to do so. We could develop tests that are fast, reliable, and ubiquitous. If we screen everyone, and do so regularly, we can let most people return to a more normal life. We can reopen schools and places where people gather. If we can be assured that the people who congregate aren’t infectious, they can socialize."

"According to Keogh, the speed at which this project went from idea to being tested by health authorities highlights the power of open-source as a way to solve hardware problems. “It doesn't matter where you are, it doesn’t matter what your skillset is, what time zone you're in, if you can contribute in a group to these large scale projects, you can have very high-impact results in a very short amount of time,” he says."

"This might seem premature, considering how recently the virus became known to science; is not drug development notoriously slow? But the reasonably well-understood basic biology of the virus makes it possible to work out which existing drugs have some chance of success, and that provides the basis for at least a little hope."

"I mean, people always say, well, the flu does this, the flu does that," Fauci said Wednesday during congressional testimony. "The flu has a mortality of 0.1%. This has a mortality rate of 10 times that. That’s the reason I want to emphasize we have to stay ahead of the game in preventing this."

“Schools are experiencing critical shortages in staff, and superintendents are concerned for school personnel who are at elevated risk such as those over age 60 and those with underlying medical issues.”

"The Oregon Health Authority had recommended against closing campuses where cases of COVID-19 are not present. But Oregon has conducted limited testing for the virus, creating a misleading picture of the virus’s community spread. Not everyone who has wanted to be tested has been."

"This is an exponential threat. Every day counts. When you’re delaying by a single day a decision, you’re not contributing to a few cases maybe. There are probably hundreds or thousands of cases in your community already. Every day that there isn’t social distancing, these cases grow exponentially."

As we’ve discussed, this math isn’t a certainty—China has already shown that it’s possible to reduce the spread by taking extreme steps. Another great example of a successful response is Vietnam, where, amongst other things, a nationwide advertising campaign (including a catchy song!) quickly mobilized community response and ensured that people adjusted their behavior appropriately.

"The state lab had just 130 tests remaining as of Monday night, according to an agency spokesman. That translates to about 65 people, given that it takes about two tests per person to diagnose the disease."

"China’s counterattack can be replicated, Dr. Aylward said, but it will require speed, money, imagination and political courage."

Does that imply that closing schools is pointless?

No. That’s still a question mark. If a disease is dangerous, and you see clusters, you have to close schools. We know that causes problems, because as soon as you send kids home, half your work force has to stay home to take care of them. But you don’t take chances with children.

Isn’t all of this impossible in America?

Look, journalists are always saying: “Well, we can’t do this in our country.” There has to be a shift in mind-set to rapid response thinking. Are you just going to throw up your hands? There’s a real moral hazard in that, a judgment call on what you think of your vulnerable populations.

Ask yourself: Can you do the easy stuff? Can you isolate 100 patients? Can you trace 1,000 contacts? If you don’t, this will roar through a community.

Oregon Department of Education Director Colt Gill: “Keeping schools open is the best option for our state and, most importantly, for our students. Our safety efforts should focus on practicing good hygiene, staying home when we are not feeling well, and cleaning surfaces in our schools. We can all play a part with these simple steps to protect ourselves and our friends, classmates and community.”

In particular, the slide points out that hospitals should prepare for an impact to the system that's 10 times a severe flu season.

"The University of Washington said it would move to online classes for its 50,000 students. With colleges nationwide about to empty for spring break, students fear they might not be coming back."

"Oregon, situated between the California and Washington hotspots, can test only about 40 people a day."

"Today, more than a week after the country’s first case of community transmission, the most significant finding about the coronavirus’s spread in the United States has come from an independent genetic study, not from field data collected by the government. And no state or city has banned large gatherings or implemented the type of aggressive “social distancing” policies employed to battle the virus in Italy, Hong Kong, and other affluent places."

"That is why, in my view, the most important lesson from 1918 is to tell the truth. Though that idea is incorporated into every preparedness plan I know of, its actual implementation will depend on the character and leadership of the people in charge when a crisis erupts."

"Seattle is effectively in the position that Wuhan was on Jan. 1, when it first recognized it had an outbreak of a new virus, but did not realize the scale of the problem or the speed at which the virus was spreading, Bedford said."

"But business ain’t beanbag, and “good enough” clearly isn’t cutting it for Paul Singer. Unless something changes dramatically, it would appear that Jack Dorsey is in for the fight of his life."

38 albums of soundtracks are now widely available to stream.

"Just last year, the Court held that 'merely hosting speech by others is not a traditional, exclusive public function and does not alone transform private entities into state actors subject to First Amendment constraints,'" writes McKeown.

"YouTube’s braggadocio about its commitment to free speech constitutes opinions that are not subject to the Lanham Act," writes McKeown. "Lofty but vague statements like 'everyone deserves to have a voice, and that the world is a better place when we listen, share and build community through our stories' ... are classic, non-actionable opinions or puffery."