The Core

My takeaway is that the risk to my Mum is higher from Mental Illness than it is from coming to Supper with us.

How are you getting from that tool to that conclusion? I really don't understand the tool.

- How do I decide which RR to choose?
- What is the meaning of full suppression vs mitigation? The only one of the four scenarios they define is full suppression (only essential workers allowed to leave the house). All the others are not even minimally defined.

And then for comparing vs mental illness, I assume you are finding those numbers elsewhere and comparing them?

I'm very curious about this because
1. I have some friends who are actually having mental health issues due to Covid stress

2. I find myself asking a lot of questions about what level of risk is acceptable.

Regarding #2, the question I keep asking people is "What criteria do you need to meet before you will invite friends into your home or hop on a plane?"

Most people have no answer to that and they basically seem to be pinning their hopes on a vaccine. And that leads me to a basic followup question:

"We could have a vaccine in 18 months, but we've been looking for an AIDS vaccine for 35 years with no success. We've been looking for a malaria vaccine for decades with no real success. Let's say a vaccine is five years away and I'm not going to get on a plane until there's a vaccine. Our parents are aged 91, 87 and 84. If I don't get on a plane at all in the next five years, we are most likely deciding that we will never see one or more of our parents ever again. Are you so afraid of Covid you would never see your parent again?"

So to me, the gating condition is whether or not the healthcare system will be overwhelmed, not whether or not people will die. If it were the latter, we would have a 45mph speed limit on our highways and require drivers to wear helmets, but we don't.

What Buckworks said.

However dont  you only need a meter if you are using it in an unheated room?

I don't need a meter at all until RC buys one and lets me borrow it.

I think you *need* a meter if you are selling disinfection services and are making a business of it.

I'm not 100% sure how I'll use them yet, but my plan is to let the run longer than I think I need and then let them sit idle longer than I think I need. It would be nice to have a meter just once or twice to calibrate.

I'm also thinking of using one in the sauna which, in that small space, should get it to a concentration to kill mildew. I really like that idea, because I don't like the idea of cleaning the sauna with chemicals that absorb into the wood and then volatilize when thing heats up.

Quote from: Chunkford on May 07, 2020, 12:04:20 PM

I'm trying to get my head around this - https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/medicare-hospitals-covid-patients/

No wonder there are conflicting views around the place

Don't know about the specifics of that but for sure of course hospitals understand the more work they do the more money they get. The real question is do they let that influence the treatment they do. Of course.

Yes, that is a problem with the fee-for-service model in the US. But remember, almost any condition that puts you in the ICU in the US is likely to get billed at $30,000/day or more. It was more than that 15 years ago after my wife had an accident, and she was not on a ventilator or subject to any extreme measures, just hooked up to a lot of monitors and with one nurse split with one other patient 24 hours per day. So I'm not surprised at all by those numbers for a Covid diagnosis with ventilator support.

A friend who is an anesthesiologist told me that as a result of Covid they were looking at bankruptcy in 6 months if the hospital stayed on a full-time Covid footing. Why? Because Medicare reimbursements, but in particular Medicaid reimbursements, are at a much lower rate than private insurance and the real money that makes their practice run is private insurance paying for non-urgent surgeries.

When the Medicaid For All proposal gained a lot of traction, they had a study done to see what would happen if all their patients paid at Medicaid rates. The answer was that if they did not reduce salaries of receptionists, nurses, etc, the physicians would earn $15/hr as their best guess.

Mayo Clinic is facing a three billion dollar loss as a result of Covid 19.
https://www.twincities.com/2020/04/10/facing-3b-loss-mayo-clinic-announces-payroll-spending-cuts-for-remainder-of-2020/

As far as I can tell from what I read and what I hear from doctor friends, the big effect of Covid is not a financial bonanza, but a major financial stress many parts of the US healthcare system.

The cynical side of me is thinking, however, that the AMA is getting their comeuppance for opposing healthcare reform for 40 years and we, as a nation, are getting our comeuppance for allowing the corporatization of hospitals. But that's for another day. And, within the utterly screwed up system we've built for ourselves in the US, this is going to take a big chunk out of healthcare revenue.

I'm thinking the HEROES Act is just a grandstanding pre-election ploy by the Dems, knowing that the GOP would kill it.

The House’s latest coronavirus relief bill gives stimulus payments to unauthorized immigrants
https://www.vox.com/2020/5/16/21260906/house-stimulus-check-immigrants-heroes-act

If I were trying to design a bill that couldn't possibly pass the Senate, but could pass in the House, my first choice would be to allot millions of dollars to fund emergency abortion clinics. My second choice would be stimulus checks for unauthorized immigrants.

That said, it is shameful that we live in a country where 50% of the workers in agriculture and food processing are illegal immigrants, now considered essential workers. How did we get here?

One of my favorites. Gets said a lot around here.

>>China

Watch what happens there. I previously recommended HR McMaster's article in The Atlantic. I would recommend it again. A former Trump insider in a well-known liberal magazine feels like it has balance and credibility.

Ouch!


>>pain
Yup. A couple of rest days here after getting a substantial impact on my left arm. Can't open jars now. After the initial impact, I thought I was going to throw up. But probably not as bad as your finger.

>>'If I'm not bleeding, I'm not working.'

The carpenter who was doing the finish work on our house was almost done when he double-tapped with the nail gun and drove a nail right through his thumb and nailed it to the wall. Pulled out his hammer, pried the thumb and nail out of the wall, grabbed some pliers and extracted the nail, pulled out some electricians tape, wrapped the thumb, and finished putting in the last closet shelves. He lived about 1.5 hours away and he said, "Yeah, no way I was doing that drive again just to come back for a few quick shelves." Tough guy.