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Corona / Covid-19 Virus - General Discussion (politics go to the Off Topic / Politics thread)

Quite an interesting video



Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom

LeSving wrote:

I wonder when we will start with masks, as this can reduce this distance considerably.

When and if ever they manage to get sufficient supplies to equip the general population with enough masks to cover the daily needs.

My take is that our governments have massively deceived us in their claim that masks are not useful. The main bit is they wanted to stop a hype such as in toilet paper hype and stop people from stealing from hospitals or doctors practices, as that has been happening quite massively in the beginning.

Taiwan, Korea, other places have proven that a general use of masks is highly desirable. While it’s not perfect, when practiced in ADDITION to the 2 m rule and hand washing (as gloves are as rare as masks) and when practiced the way it should be, that is masks are discarded after use. This again means, people will have to have a steady supply.

While it has been stressed that masks will not protect you from infection, it will reduce the amounts of droplets you emit. As nobody can be sure that they are not infected and therefore it is generally assumed that the most transmissions are accomplished by people who are asymptomatic, imho this is one precondition to release some of the measures we have in place once the first wave has passed.

The other one is testing. We need the capability to test EVERYONE regardless of symtoms or not with tests which give negative/positive/immunity results with near 100% accuracy.

I suppose this is what may be possible to accomplish in the next 2 or 3 months, as production of masks, gloves and tests are increased to a useful level.

LSZH(work) LSZF (GA base), Switzerland

LeSving wrote:


LeSving
02-Apr-20 07:39
53 Please can you tell us what the Government asked / required of its citizens in terms of keeping people off the streets and interacting with others?

The only restriction, or advice is the correct word, is 2 m distance and cleaning of hands, especially when entering and exiting shops. People are encouraged to be outside, take walks, jogging etc, but 2 m distance.

Schools and universities are closed, but teaching is not. Everything is done by web. Everybody who can work at home, should work at home. My wife has to, ordered by her boss (not the government). The CEO of the company I am working for has said, it’s up to everyone to do as best they can. I work at the office.

Since schools are closed, lots of people simply have to be home, and work there as best they can.

Everything with close human contact is closed down, except health care. The basic principle is 2 m distance from others. I wonder when we will start with masks, as this can reduce this distance considerably.

The big problems are for travelling businesses, hotels, airlines, buses, professional sport, restaurants, entertainment. It all became closed over night more or less. Some due to restrictions (gathering of people), some due to people staying at home (hotels, airlines) or a combination.

Are you able to comment on the restrictions of using vehicles and travelling please? Would anyone else like to comment with regard to their countries please?

Are you able to comment on the restrictions of using vehicles and travelling please.

The same restrictions apply, 2 m distance between people. Of course this does not apply to people living together. People are asked to not take public transport if possible and to keep travelling to a minimum, but there are no restrictions.

All public transport go as before, although much more infrequent. Travelling abroad is another matter. It’s as good as undoable right now. Not because of restrictions here, but because there simply are no international flights available. SAS, Norwegian and Widerøe have been chattered by the government to get people home. But even that is becoming increasingly difficult due to restrictions at foreign airports, as well as restrictions to get to those airports from wherever they are.

As far as private flying goes, close to impossible right now. There are two reasons for this. One of them is being lifted tomorrow, or eased. Will have to see tomorrow how it ends up. The other one is up to the ATC and LT, and nothing has changed there as of yet.

The elephant is the circulation
ENVA ENOP ENMO, Norway

In Croatia we can’t leave the place of residence without special permission issued by the government (on request of employer, medical reasons, etc.). Luckily, from this week they are issued directly via some eGov service rather than sending e-mail request as it was case previous week.

LDZA LDVA, Croatia

Fuji_Abound wrote:

Would anyone else like to comment with regard to their countries please?

As you know, Sweden has very few legal restrictions, but a number of strong recommendations. These recommendations are mostly being followed, e.g. both observations and mobile phone statistics show that the number of people moving in central Stockholm has dropped dramatically.

The number of deaths per day have been essentially constant for six days and the number of new ICU cases have also been essentially constant for over a week. So right now we are seeing a linear and not exponential increase. Of course, this still puts an increasing strain on hospitals. The number of new cases daily are rising, particularly in the Stockholm area, so things could well get worse in the future.

(My sources here are the diagrams shown by the Public Health Agency at their daily press conferences.)

ESKC (Uppsala/Sundbro), Sweden

LeSving wrote:

One of them is being lifted tomorrow, or eased.

Let us know about this when you see a change, I’d but more than happy to do some flying soon… My medical is valid until April 15th, I’m hoping that the DGAC will announce that this can be extended…

ENVA, Norway

In theory, if you could control this precisely, the best way to get through this would be to flatten the curve just below the hospital ICU capacity. Any more flattening, and you will just drag out the measures unnecessarily and hurt the economy (and thus people’s livelihood, health and wellbeing!) for longer than necessary.

In an even more ideal world, you would pool all European ICU beds and try to have them all filled to 80 % at all times instead of each country doing this on their own, as each region is on a different point of the “curve”. This is already happening on a small scale between France and Switzerland, but I doubt any one population would be willing to accept such a plan on a bigger scale, out of selfishness and fear. This would be the moment for the EU commission to shine, but it is nowhere to be seen to be honest. All these initiatives are purely bilateral, in our case between the president of the “région Grand Est” and some Swiss cantons.

Last Edited by Rwy20 at 02 Apr 14:00

As well known, the situation in Spain is as dramatic as it is in Italy, although the first positive signs are showing. The hotspots are Madrid and Barcelona. Fortunately, in Mallorca, where I live, the situation is less severe and the IC-capacity is sufficient for the moment. Also goes for large parts of rural Spain.

Unlike in Germany, there is simply not enough testing going on due to lack of equipment. So we can only guess what the real infection rate is.

As to the lockdown, it is pretty severe. Early this week construction work also was ordered to be stopped. Basically, people can only go out shopping for food and medical supplies and short walks with their pets. It is extremely stressful in particular for people living in an apartment in a city, kids and all. We are extremely fortunate and count our blessings living rurally on a pretty large patch of land where we can move freely. Our squadron of cats (sorry, I’m an outlier here it seems!) are a bit confused by our daily walks but join in.

GA is frozen, and very limited commercial traffic.

Economy-wise the gov’t is doing its best to support companies and the population at large through credits, postponements of tax payments and funding temporary lay-offs, and attempt to convince banks and tenants to be lenient when it comes to mortgage payments and rents etc. As you would expect, there is criticism on their decisions how to share the pain, but put yourself in their shoes. My general feeling is that the gov’t is keeping their head, in spite of the internal complication that the coalition is not a marriage made in heaven; pretty moderate socialists + pretty far left socialists with somewhat different priorities on their minds The economic consequences will be very pronounced in Spain because the tourist industry cannot not just be switched on like that after restrictions get lifted, whenever that may be. It takes airlines and tour operators to start bringing people in, and they need their time to saddle up. Plus of course there is much fear that Europeans may have different things on their minds this summer than to go and sit on the beach here.

Private field, Mallorca, Spain

The post mortem – to use an unfortunate phrase – on this fiasco will be very interesting.

It would seem that Germany saw the writing on the wall back in January and bought up a load of testing kits. Nobody else saw it coming until February or even March and then since everybody dived in at the same time, nobody could get any kits.

The reason South Korea had so many kits was because they got hit by some other virus a few years ago and stocked up. The reagents were the wrong type for this one but they had the other parts.

In the UK, the NHS predictably runs a centralised purchasing system which is good (effective planning, best pricing, etc, in theory) and bad (loooads of corporate empire building and turf wars, ably assisted by millions of “managers” with – obviously – MBAs, usually ones from the Univ of Upper Warlingham). Loads of stupid restrictions, and today’s papers are full of it. Testing centres set up for NHS staff which were allowing in only those who got a booking, and most didn’t get a booking. Lots drove there and saw a big sign saying basically “no booking → f-k off” and drove back.

I hope that lots of heads roll at the end.

The interviews with govt officials are really cringeworthy, but to be fair they have everybody after their balls so they are fighting an impossible PR battle. And nobody is going to criticise anybody in the NHS, while staff are dying due to unsuitable PPE (although you would really need Ebola-level PPE).

Lessons will be learnt for sure, especially on letting people come back from infected regions and just letting them get back to work.

Just seen this

Administrator
Shoreham EGKA, United Kingdom
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