quote:

Originally posted by RHINOWSO:

quote:

Originally posted by RAMIUS:
My Doctor’s office closed. WTF haha. Straight up canceled my appointment.

ED treatment isn't an emergency brother.

quote:

Originally posted by wcb6092:
A lot of good information here that explains why the drastic measures are needed now.

https://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2...rned-physicians.html

That's a good, factual, calm explanation of why the steps being taken need be taken.

I'd wager it won't convince the die-hard naysayers, though--even those that do bother to read it.

ETA: My dentist's office just re-scheduled an appointment I had later this month to early next month. They're closing-down to one day a week, emergency appointments only. CDC and ADA guidelines.

They announced the first case in my town this morning.
Also heard that over 200 people have been exposed at my employer.

My department has been working from home since last Thursday.
It's more than likely clinical staff. They notify all employees that may have had contact anyone exposed. Haven't heard anything yet, so I figure it's not in my area.

I need my boner pills!!!!

Shit’s getting real for sure.

Kentucky Derby stuff got moved from First Weekend in May, to First Weekend in September (Labor Day Weekend).

https://www.whas11.com/article...LAjbNBmNl1rkCobId30I

quote:

Originally posted by 2BobTanner:
Shit’s getting real for sure.

Bad time for that, considering the TP availability situation.

quote:

Originally posted by 2BobTanner:
Shit’s getting real for sure.

Kentucky Derby stuff got moved from First Weekend in May, to First Weekend in September (Labor Day Weekend).

Dang, think of all those hats that will remain unsold and mint juleps unmade.

quote:

Originally posted by RHINOWSO:

quote:

Originally posted by 2BobTanner:
Shit’s getting real for sure.

Kentucky Derby stuff got moved from First Weekend in May, to First Weekend in September (Labor Day Weekend).

Dang, think of all those hats that will remain unsold and mint juleps unmade.

At least this year I might be able to find some mint.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/0...ource=pocket-newtabs

‘There Is Plenty of Food in the Country’

Americans have been alarmed by empty grocery shelves, but while food suppliers and retailers say they are struggling with surging demand, they insist the supply chain remains strong.

By Michael Corkery, David Yaffe-Bellany, Amelia Nierenberg and Quoctrung Bui

Published March 15, 2020

Updated March 16, 2020

The aisles and aisles of empty store shelves give the appearance that the United States, improbably and alarmingly, is running out of food.

But the nation’s biggest retailers, dairy farmers and meat producers say that isn’t so. The food supply chain, they say, remains intact and has been ramping up to meet the unprecedented stockpiling brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.

Even so, shoppers can most likely expect to see empty shelves intermittently, as the nation’s network of food producers, distributors and retailers are stretched as never before. Industries that are calibrated to supply consumers with just enough of what they need on a given day cannot keep up with a nationwide surge of relentless shopping fueled in large part by fear.

Food suppliers and retailers are now not only struggling to satiate crushing demand for canned soup and oat milk, they are battling a perception that the scary scenes at the grocery store reflect a fundamental breakdown.

“There is food being produced. There is food in warehouses,” said Julie Anna Potts, chief executive of the North American Meat Institute, a trade group for beef, pork and turkey packers and producers. “There is plenty of food in the country.”

“Our stores are getting stocked every day,” Ron Vachris, chief operating officer of Costco, said in an interview on Saturday. “Transportation is functioning, our suppliers are working around the clock and the flow of goods is strong.”

The National Chicken Council said it was not seeing any disruptions in production and noted that there were “ample surplus supplies of chicken in cold storage” — totaling more than 950 million pounds, according to government data.

Still, the fear is palpable. The more empty shelves people see, the more panic-buying ensues, the more food is out of stock.

The panicky buying is testing the food system’s capacity in the near term. Over the past few weeks, sales of rice have increased more than 50 percent, according to data from the research firm Nielsen. Canned meat is up more than 40 percent. And sales of other essentials like beans, pasta, peanut butter and bottled water have also risen substantially, with a sharp spike this month. Kroger told its suppliers that demand had surged 30 percent across all categories in recent days. (For comparison, the company’s sales for all of last year rose about 2 percent.)

Orders for hot dogs at Walmart and Costco increased by as much as 300 percent, meat suppliers say. In response, some hot dog plants have added Saturday and Sunday shifts and have started shipping packages they were storing for Memorial Day cookouts. And hot dog makers say they have a year’s supply of spices like garlic.

Another strategy that is helping ease the strain: Some food supply is being diverted to grocery stores from the restaurants, school cafeterias and college campuses that have closed.

Get an informed guide to the global outbreak with our daily coronavirus newsletter.

“The food is there. It’s just going into different spots,” said David McInerney, the chief executive of FreshDirect. “Cruise ships are not using up all of the avocados. We have a giant surge of avocados.”

Retailers say the frenzy started about two weeks ago, when customers could not find hand sanitizers and wipes, which were actually in short supply. But that set off a wave of panic buying that spread in recent days to include bread, canned goods, milk and frozen food.

These items are moving through the supply chain, but cannot reach the stores quickly enough so retailers have asked suppliers to produce more.

But even as farmers and slaughterhouses ramp up, producing food takes time. In the poultry industry, it takes about three weeks for a chicken egg to incubate and hatch, and then five to six weeks for the bird to grow to maturity. For some chicken suppliers, the process takes even longer, depending on the type of bird.

Across the industry, it takes about 60 days to get a chicken to a customer, said Matthew Wadiak, who runs Cooks Venture, a chicken supplier based in Arkansas and Oklahoma. Sixty days ago, “we didn’t know this was even on the horizon,” he added. “There was essentially no way to plan for it.”

Mr. Wadiak said some of Cooks Venture’s customers — like the Berkeley Bowl grocery stores in California — had quadrupled their orders in recent days.

“People are very short today. Retailers are short on products,” Mr. Wadiak said. “So we’re helping out where we can, and I know that we’re not meeting the full demand.”

It’s clear that the modern supply chain, for all its efficiency and speed, is not equipped to deal with this kind of surge.

Algorithms, perfected by Amazon, can pinpoint exactly how much inventory a warehouse or particular store must keep on hand during a typical week, right down to the soup can. But no algorithm could predict this extraordinary moment, leading to widespread out-of-stocks of hundreds of household necessities.

“When the shelf is emptied in the course of 24 hours and the safety stock was built intent upon protecting a week or two of demand, you get this tremendous dislocation,” said Mark Cohen, director of retail studies at Columbia Business School.

“The trouble is that the hoarding hasn’t abated. We’re just seeing the very beginning of this kind of behavior,” he added. “The question is: How long will it take for industry to catch up?”

If the illnesses surge, of course, there could be a slowdown in production and distribution, food industry official say. But the extent of any problems could vary across the food chain. Slaughterhouse workers tend to work side by side, possibly making them at a higher risk of spreading the virus. But many dairy farmers operate in sparsely populated rural areas, improving their chances of staying healthy.

Still, industries are starting to make contingency plans in case large numbers of workers producing and delivering food are incapacitated by the virus or roads are shut down as part of the effort to control the pandemic. Representatives for companies that deliver food in refrigerated trucks, for example, are working with local and state officials to make sure they can still make deliveries during quarantines. Some refrigerated warehouse workers could rotate in 14 day shifts to make sure there is backup.

On Friday, officials from every part of the food chain — from fresh produce suppliers to refrigerated warehouses — met outside Washington, D.C., to discuss responses to the pandemic, including ideas for how to bolster parts of the system against disruptions.

For now, the most pressing issue is getting more food on the shelves, while the supply chain is largely unaffected by illness.

“Will there potentially be some hiccups, and might you go to the store and not see everything every time?” said Lowell Randel, vice president for government and legal affairs at the Global Cold Chain Alliance, a trade group representing the refrigerated warehouse and delivery industry. “Yeah. But that’s a short-term disruption and not an indicator that the overall supply chain is not functioning.”

As this cycle continues, however, there is less chance suppliers can catch up with demand, stressing retail workers, who are already vulnerable to contracting the virus because of their constant interaction with the public.

Starting on Monday, the grocery chain Stop & Shop will reduce its hours in stores to give employees more time to restock shelves, but also to allow the workers to get more rest and stay healthy, a spokeswoman said.

Many Walmart stores will also no longer be open all night. The company said it was reducing hours at its stores, starting Sunday, to “help ensure associates are able to stock the products our customers are looking for and to perform cleaning and sanitizing.”

Even if these efforts help slow down the current frenzy, retailers are expecting that the panic buying could come in waves, as the illnesses spike.

“Shopping for food is something that makes you feel in control,” said Blake Waltrip, chief executive of the a2 Milk Company’s United States operations, which has increased production in recent days. “Even when everything else feels totally out of control.”

A little bit of levity from George Carlin

NSFW


https://www.youtube.com/watch?...Ulo&feature=emb_logo

I'm posting a couple of videos on possible medicines whose use might aggravate covid-19 conditions, leading to a worse outcome.

Maybe Doc H. or someone else knowledgeable will be able to provide insight.

1. Non-Steroidal Anti-inflammatory Drugs (NSAID) - Asprin, ibuprofen, naproxen etc.
The French government put out information not to use NSAIDS as it makes covid-19 cases worse. The video also covers why an adult should not try to reduce the fever. Fever is the bodies way of fighting an infection by raising temperature, by reducing the the fever you are giving the virus a better chance of winning and you lose.


Link to original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EuWo5lmWuZI

2. Blood pressure medicine - ACE inhibitor / ARBs (Angiotensin II Receptor Blockers)

The ACE-2 receptor on our cells is the binding site for SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.
As a result, the ACE-2 receptor is central to many important questions about coronavirus treatment, a COVID-19 vaccine, and should patients continue taking their ACE inhibitor / ARBs (Angiotensin II Receptor Blockers) medications.
Dr. Seheult discusses the controversy about some of these questions and illustrates the pathway involved with the ACE-2 receptor.


Link to original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vZDVbqRhyM

Trump and his healthcare team are just killing the press conference today.

quote:

Originally posted by 2BobTanner:
Shit’s getting real for sure.

Kentucky Derby stuff got moved from First Weekend in May, to First Weekend in September (Labor Day Weekend).
<snip>

Pretty well makes it certain that there’ll be no triple crown winner this year. Too close to the Belmont and Preakness.

This "crisis" is how the Libs want the Global Warming aka Climate Change "Crisis" to go.

We have family driving back to PA from OH today. Going across 80. Road side rests open in Ohio. Not in PA. In fact they are blocked off so you can't get in the lot.

quote:

Originally posted by Balzé Halzé:

quote:

Originally posted by RHINOWSO:

quote:

Originally posted by 2BobTanner:
Shit’s getting real for sure.

Kentucky Derby stuff got moved from First Weekend in May, to First Weekend in September (Labor Day Weekend).

Dang, think of all those hats that will remain unsold and mint juleps unmade.

At least this year I might be able to find some mint.

If you want to drive down to Texas you can take all you want. My daughters planted some mint in a planter with a lime tree a few months ago and the mint has gone so crazy I think it's killing the lime tree.

quote:

Originally posted by springnr:
1. Non-Steroidal Anti-inflammatory Drugs (NSAID) - Asprin, ibuprofen, naproxen etc.
The French government put out information not to use NSAIDS as it makes covid-19 cases worse. The video also covers why an adult should not try to reduce the fever. Fever is the bodies way of fighting an infection by raising temperature, by reducing the the fever you are giving the virus a better chance of winning and you lose.


Link to original video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EuWo5lmWuZI

^ pretty significant. thanks.

screen grab from video quoted:



Anti-inflammatories may aggravate Covid-19, France advises [ theguardian.com/ ]

French authorities have warned that widely used over-the-counter anti-inflammatory drugs may worsen the coronavirus.

The country’s health minister, Olivier Véran, who is a qualified doctor and neurologist, tweeted on Saturday: “The taking of anti-inflammatories [ibuprofen, cortisone … ] could be a factor in aggravating the infection. In case of fever, take paracetamol. If you are already taking anti-inflammatory drugs, ask your doctor’s advice.”

Health officials point out that anti-inflammatory drugs are known to be a risk for those with infectious illnesses because they tend to diminish the response of the body’s immune system.

The health ministry added that patients should choose paracetamol – which is known in the US by the generic name acetaminophen and commonly by the brand name Tylenol – because “it will reduce the fever without counterattacking the inflammation”.

quote:

Originally posted by springnr:
I'm posting a couple of videos on possible medicines whose use might aggravate covid-19 conditions, leading to a worse outcome.

Sort of collective general updates, and ongoing:

https://www.sciencemediacentre...profen-or-cortisone/

And from the BMJ:

https://www.bmj.com/content/368/bmj.m606/rr-10

Regarding NSAIDs, the concern is that anti-inflammatories in general reduce the body's immune response, hence reduce production of antibodies necessary to fight off the virus (same BTW applies to the flu). Early studies don't necessarily model the way things actually work. Same with ACE inhibitors - although the ACE-2 receptor site is important in developing methods to treat active disease. As far as ACE inhibitors increasing risk for infection or making it worse, the Lancet suggests it but again early, and also suggests alternatives:

https://documentcloud.adobe.co...83-be4c-80f332d98e3a

My personal thinking is that it's far too early to tell from limited studies, or the course of the disease itself, what does or doesn't increase risk (other than well established preventive measures such as limiting contact, and known comorbidities), particularly with existing pharmacotherapy that may be necessary to prevent stroke or cardiac events - from which a patient may be at higher risk. Important as always to ask your own physician.
As we see broader testing and both increased deaths (unfortunately), and increased recoveries, we'll know more and can make better recommendations based on reasonable data.

I thought of starting a new thread in the "What's Your Deal" forum, because this just makes me angry. But since it's coronavirus related...

Iran releases 85,000 inmates as coronavirus sweeps through prisons: 'we're all ill'.

Yeah, that's the ticket, send out 85,000 "Typhoid Marys" where half of them are also "security-related prisoners."

"It is expected that those freed will have to return, but authorities have yet to announce a date."

Yeah, a blurb to assuage the bleeding hearts at the U. N. requested this move.

We've become a planet of morons.

quote:

Originally posted by maladat: My daughters planted some mint in a planter with a lime tree a few months ago and the mint has gone so crazy I think it's killing the lime tree.

Mint grows amazingly fast once it takes hold, very hearty. Be careful though, its complex root system makes it difficult to get rid off, out of control mint is a mistake novice gardeners make.

Mint is really good at keeping spiders and other bugs away, good to plant near window sills.