No Time to Die... from COVID-19

[LynnInDenver]

Small towns in Colorado have been pretty much demanding that only residents can be in town - no visitors, or even landlords (read: own property but rent it to residents to live in), coming in.

Denver has also been closing parks now because of the handfuls NOT doing the social distancing as asked. Red Rocks and Civic Center are closed to the public. For those who don't know, Civic Center is the park structure located in Denver's downtown, pretty much between the city court building and the State Capitol Building, and is also bordered by the main branch of the Denver Library and the Denver Art Museum. I'm waiting for the entire park system to close because people are being asked to keep their outdoors stuff local, and there's enough people not doing that, that they've already had to put up "if the lot's full, move along" signage at pretty much every parking lot feeding open space areas.

[robkelk]

Remember the million dollar gold coin?

The Royal Canadian Mint is now using the machine that made those coins to make face shields. And they've stopped making collectible coins in order to make hand sanitizer.

From gold coins to plastic shields and hand sanitizer

[robkelk]

Bad news: 2m (6'6") might not be far enough apart for social distancing

[LynnInDenver]

So the big pinball convention in town is still planning on going full tilt (sorry not sorry). I'd commented earlier, I think, that the financial realities for us personally means that the virtual machine I just "finished", we can't take it, and likely we can't afford to go at all even for a day, but there are other issues.

Part of what I'm seeing is a comment made from, I think Midwest Gaming Classic, who welcomed their state announcing a health-based lockdown that enabled them to cancel without having to basically shutter the convention for good. Even then, they had financial obligations they still couldn't discharge for being cancelled by their state. I'm expecting part of it is in play here with The Pinball Showdown, that they need to proceed as if it's going to happen because otherwise, they might as well close up shop because the penalties for cancellation will financially wreck them without having extenuating circumstances. As things have been going, I'm expecting that if there is relaxing of the lockdown, it won't include large conventions where hundreds to thousands of people are in the same enclosed space, and we aren't even getting into the unfortunate issue of massive communal hands-on with surfaces on games.

[Dartz]

extenuating circumstances.

That said, all Cons here are cancelled for the forseeable future. In most cases, with the cooperation of the venue. There're some sunk costs - like flights for guests and all their freaky riders - but it's not as bad as it would otherwise be.

[Black Aeronaut]

So, apparently there's an experimental treatment for people who are on Death's Door with COVID-19.

https://www.latimes.com/world-nation/sto...rus-doctor

Also, the reason why COVID-19 kills healthy young people and adults: sometimes it triggers something called a Cytokine Storm.

https://www.knowablemagazine.org/article...kine-storm

[Matrix Dragon]

*Mad cackling*

An asshole in Adelaide brought thousands of dollars worth of sanitizer and toilet rolls at the start of the panic buying, planning to price gouge. Then Ebay shut down his account. So he went back to try and get a refund. The supermarket told him to piss off.

[Black Aeronaut]

Nice. Serves that dickwad right.

[Jinx999]

https://www.tasnimnews.com/en/news/2020/...e-detector

Some dipshit has just sold a dowsing rod to the Iranians.

[Matrix Dragon]

MAGNETS!

[LynnInDenver]

So, it's at least been implied very heavily now that big gatherings will likely still be on the ban list even if the big "stay at home" order gets lifted in Colorado.

https://denver.cbslocal.com/2020/04/14/c...acilities/

“We are not going to get back to that normal of large stadiums, large events, large concerts, bars for many, many, many months. Probably not until there’s a vaccine,” Polis said.

I'm expecting that pretty much the rest of the year's convention slate is not happening, through Mile Hi Con in October.

[robkelk]

Aargh! I haven't done my taxes yet... No, wait. The Canada Revenue Agency says the deadline for individuals to file has been extended to June 30.

But I should still file soon; I'm expecting a refund.

[DHBirr]

Are we prepared for maybe another year and a half or more of social distancing?

In their findings, the Harvard researchers said: “Intermittent distancing may be required into 2022 unless critical care capacity is increased substantially or a treatment or vaccine becomes available.”
...
The study added even after its “apparent elimination”, the virus should be monitored because it could reemerge as late as 2024.
The WHO has said that the number of infections has “certainly” not yet reached its peak, with 2 million global infections reported so far and more than 124,000 deaths from the virus.

-----
“We’ve had our differences, but he’s seen the light … and I made sure he moved toward it, instead of coming back.”

[Dartz]

One month's worth of data. 278, to 15,472

If growth rates hadn't gone down we would've hit 15,000 two weeks ago.

I'd say we're doing ok. Aside from 1/3 nursing homes being infected because a lot of them use rotating agency staff.

The situation is stabilised. Infection rate's somewhere between 0.7 and 1 now.

How the hospitals are doing.

[LynnInDenver]

Are we prepared for maybe another year and a half or more of social distancing?

I did discuss it with my husband, and we're going to operate under the assumption that the entire year's slate of conventions isn't going to be happening.

We've had a couple of friends get laid off as a result of this. On the other hand, my employer is to be commended for making every effort to keep people on the payroll.

My husband did an in-person job interview at a place earlier today, hopeful that he'll be able to be working again, even if it's limited or from home, but we're taking what we can get. I'm still going to maintain like we're going to be hurting, but it may mean we can pay off some debt stuff (namely: the car loan) to help clear some extra margins.

[robkelk]

Disclaimer: this article is on a union website. That said, it still makes sense to me. All numbers reflect the situation in Canada.

How should we react to a $185 billion deficit?

Pandemics are real. People are real. Jobs are real. Federal deficits are just a construct. Sometimes we forget.

There’s only one reality we live in and, in the last few weeks, policy makers have broadcast loud and clear which one it is. We live in a world where the responsible policy to meet the challenge is to spend whatever’s necessary. “Conventional wisdom” about debt and deficits is completely out of whack and seems petty in hindsight. It may be tempting to compartmentalize debates into two categories, before and after COVID-19, but it would be wrong to do so.

It is crucial that we not return to pre-existing deficit politics once the crisis is contained. There will need to be years of enhanced stimulus spending to ensure people get back to work.

During the 2008 financial crisis, a minority parliament agreed on a substantial fiscal stimulus package. However, shortly thereafter, the Conservative government began dismantling it. They aggressively attacked the deficit, restricting growth at a time when the economy needed investment. Estimates show that austerity measures in 2014-15 alone stunted GDP growth by 0.84% and resulted in approximately 90,000 job losses across the public and private sectors. All for the political goal of balancing the budget before the 2015 election.

Recall that to combat the early 1980s recession federal deficits reached this same peak in the mid-80s (8.1% of GDP). Mobilization during World War II required deficits almost three times as large (22.5% of GDP). The Canadian economy persevered.

[Dartz]

While the US is fucking the rattle out of its pram, Ireland quadruples contributions to WHO in response

[LynnInDenver]

And we're seeing our first protests in Colorado saying that the whole lockdown is an extreme overreaction.

(I thought that was the point, to be accused of doing too much to combat this thing and letting people get kicked out on the street yet have a low death toll, instead of doing nothing and being accused of letting people die in the streets and have a high death toll instead.)

[robkelk]

Look at how many provinces in Canada have banned assemblies of more than two, three, or five people who aren't related to each other.

Look at how many businesses in Canada have been closed altogether because they aren't essential services - food, medicine, medical gear, or the manufacture or shipment thereof (and, more recently, daycare for the children of doctors and nurses).

Look at how many parks are closed in Canada.

Look at how many businesses have retooled to make protective gear or hand sanitizer.

Then tell me Colorado's overreacting. I'd laugh in those people's faces if I could get within two meters of them.

[Norgarth]

And we're seeing our first protests in Colorado saying that the whole lockdown is an extreme overreaction.

(I thought that was the point, to be accused of doing too much to combat this thing and letting people get kicked out on the street yet have a low death toll, instead of doing nothing and being accused of letting people die in the streets and have a high death toll instead.)

According to the most up to date info I have access to (the Washington Post's Covid19 mapper) which last updated around 90min ago, the US has 667,000 cases of Covid19, dispite only testing at most 5 or 6 million people nation wide (so less than 2% of the population), and this is a virus that is none to take 2 weeks to show symptoms after being infected.

*sigh*

[DHBirr]

And we're seeing our first protests in Colorado saying that the whole lockdown is an extreme overreaction.

We're getting them in Michigan, too.  A bunch of StormTrumpers, some waving the Johnny-Reb battle flag of treason no less, held a bitch session outside the state capitol Wednesday.

-----
I'm a very forgiving person ... on Lord Vader's terms.  "Apology accepted, Captain."

[LynnInDenver]

Look at how many provinces in Canada have banned assemblies of more than two, three, or five people who aren't related to each other.

Look at how many businesses in Canada have been closed altogether because they aren't essential services - food, medicine, medical gear, or the manufacture or shipment thereof (and, more recently, daycare for the children of doctors and nurses).

Look at how many parks are closed in Canada.

Look at how many businesses have retooled to make protective gear or hand sanitizer.

Then tell me Colorado's overreacting. I'd laugh in those people's faces if I could get within two meters of them.

Yeah, here's the thing. I know Colorado isn't overreacting to this thing, those people aren't watching the numbers and what's happened in Italy and France, they're just concerned that they're having to cut their spending habits considerably for the literally foreseeable future. Does it suck? Yes. Would it suck more for me to attend the funerals of perhaps a half dozen family and friends at the minimum? Oh fuck yes.

Hells, we're strong introverts here, and the strain of being forced instead of voluntary shut-ins is actually starting to be felt. We've both seen at most a half dozen people in the past week outside ourselves, me being five to six people at work, and I don't even see them that much because I'm working in a completely separate part of the building from everyone else, and my husband, if he's seen that many, it's been pretty much at the grocery store. Everyone else it's been voice or email. Even we need to get out and see people on a semi-regular basis, and we haven't seen any of our friends in over a month. But we're not whining at the government to please let us out to see even one person, we know what's at stake.

[Norgarth]

I posted this in the images thread as well:

[robkelk]

Canada just closed the borders, to anybody who isn't a citizen or permanent resident.

EDIT: "If you're abroad, it's time to come home." While you still can.

No, wait - Americans are still allowed in. For now.

Not any more. And the closure is both ways.

The borders are remaining closed for another 30 days.

[robkelk]

The day oil was worth less than $0 — and nobody wanted it

tl;dr: There's so much oil available because of self-isolation that the producers can't even pay people to take it off their hands.