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Covid 19 - Truth or Dare?3/17
![]() Without getting lost in dead end political name calling, what is going on with this virus stuff? Some people appear to be paralyzed with fear, some seem to laugh it off as a political move, some know a whole lot, and some know nothing about it. I avoid most people as a matter of course. A handy predilection since it now matters to keep your distance. For me, it could be life or death since I am in the high risk group. I now plan on not engaging any live humans except at a distance. I am thinking of the bell curve, not for infection rates, but for belief in infections, if you will. Where is the 'fat' of the bell? Who is at the thin ends of the curve, and why? NPR has some good reporting, everyone else is inaccurate, breathless, don't care, care to much, or just runs gov't power show over and over. They are wrong more than they are right. Whom to believe? 3/17
![]() All our bay area jobs are shutdown for 3 weeks, laminated panel company closed for 3 weeks. Hardware companies can ship currently. Submittals not being approved for 3 weeks. We prepared last week to make sure everyone in the office can work from home and tested it yesterday. I doubt the death toll will in the US be much higher than a bad season of the flu. We have 2 jobs that have exemptions that we can work on. I can see needing more cash in 4-5 months as payments aren't going out. My cruise to Alaska in May out of Vancouver will be cancelled in the next few days. The worse thing for me is my 401k and future retirement accounts have taken a huge hit to where I will have about 15k-20k a year less in income A- 3/17
![]() The death toll in the US may not be worse than a bad year of the seasonal flu in a 3 month span as opposed to a 12 month span. I cant see any way possible that covid is going to kill 20,000 US citizens with 136 of them being children. (the flu) The problem as always is the uncertainty. The effect on the economy is going to be catastrophic. The flu doesn't close restaurants and business. It doesn't effect supply chains. Im finding the drama of the mainstream and cable news to be extremely nauseating as Im sure most are. Foolish dramatic unrealistic questions posed to officials who are damned if they do and damned if they dont with an answer. I would completely agree, NPR has some of the most calm, unbiased, and fact based coverage. I am very concerned that virtually no small business is going to be able to weather 2 months of down time (if thats all it is). I am thankful to have plenty of work and after a couple of lean years be in an uber low overhead situation that we may be able to hang on. My blind optimism is that the thing peters out and blows over in a month. But several of my customers are schools and health care facilities and they are all speaking to mid/late summer.
3/17
![]() Advantage of being a sole proprietor single guy is I'm isolated. Wife works from home and my youngest (22 yo) is still in college and since that's closed he's now isolated too. I called up my main supplier and their people don't plan on closing down unless the FED forces them to. I think it's a big overreaction. It seems to be much easier to transmit to others, yes. But for the most part I'll bet that the mortality rate will be similar if maybe a little higher than the normal flu. The govt is basically destroying the economy over this. From what I've seen in reports the average age of people who have succumbed to this is 81. So far they've said children 10 and under don't seem to be affected. Up to about 50 yo the chance of death is less than .4% and as the age goes up so does the percentage, mostly due to compromised systems that tend to happen as you age. The outrageous claims of some saying millions will die from this is scare tactics. The biggest problem I see is that they haven't figured out exactly how it is transmitted from person to person. I've heard touching, airborne, surface contact. That it can't hang in the air, then all of a sudden they say it can hang out for 3 hours. One of the consistent things they have said is 3hrs on smooth surfaces like glass and metal. I won't get into the political side of it because I think there is a big area of mistrust towards governments (around the world). 3/17
![]() Leo, I think your position is overwhelmingly the norm. The problem is the metrics if just left to run their course could be disastrous (may be a better option). Ive long had a philosophy that the fish tank needs a good purge once in a while. In this scenario that means a lot of people are going to hav eto sya goodbye to their 70+ parents and grandparents in a, perhaps, less than pleasant way (not that any way is pleasant). To sound like a total douche, my concern isnt really the unpleasantry, (my entire family has passed and none of them were pleasant) but the cost to try to save it all on the way down. To me the transmission and fatality rates when extrapolated out of the course of a year to compare to the average flu would be something I would never wish on anyone.
3/17
![]() Well I may get a little political here.
He came back last week, and already has gotten notice that since he's back, payments are due ! It Was a FSA Loan-WTF ?....
Big Biz Get Bailouts... Small Biz gets loans we have to pay back... I am an "Essential Worker" ! If I don't work -my family doesn't get health insurance !....To pay for those tests ! So-When our Illustrious leader today said he gives himself a 10! for what's happened so far LOL !
1). It's one BIG HOAX folks
And # 11. I stocked up on T.P. for all the ... 3/17
![]() Well like David, I've been practicing "social distancing" for most of my life!! 3/17
![]() Mark, when this finally finishes up I think the mortality rate will be in the area of 0.1-0.3%. The way they are measuring it now is stupid. Known cases vs known deaths equals mortality rate. They brought these numbers up before any widespread testing was available. When they start doing 1000s of tests a day the mortality rate is going to plummet. I don't wish death on anyone. But as it stands a normal flu season in the US is 20-80K deaths. And that's without shutting the country down and destroying the economy. 3/17
![]() Serious people are taking this seriously. You think the pro sports leagues just cancel their seasons on a whim? That schools and restaurants all over the country shut down for no reason? The nonsense from the President isn't what's frightening. It's the projections from people who know what they are talking about. Maybe it will be less terrible than expected. That would be great. 3/17
![]() I don't care what anyone thinks. I don't care about people dying. There's about five people on the entire planet I care about. It doesn't matter what you do, if It wants to spread, it's going to spread. That's going under the very ballsy assumption that it hasn't already. If this spirals outta control, you're gonna wish they just let the virus burn through the population. If it goes to civil breakdown, a whole lot more people are gonna die from violence and starvation, or accidents involving avoiding the previous two. This place will go Walking Dead sans zombies in hurry. This whole debacles does put into question whether or not the 1st Amendment is a power the people can handle. 3/17
![]() Our shop is four people total. One of my builders uses a couple of shops, one of which is good sized. I called the builder today and told him if the other shop is forced to stop work because of their size, I'll take the jobs and we WILL hammer them out. I will not let this stupidity kill my company, and if grants me an opportunity, I will take it. 3/17
![]() Two of my favorite quotes: From Persian folklore: "This too shall pass." From Phillip K. Dick: "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." Both seem applicable in the current situation. I think that the low numbers are reflective of a diminished capacity to test people, as if to say "We can't test you for it, so you must not have it." Perhaps the number of confirmed cases will be in direct proportion to the number of test kits available. Sounds like one of Donald Rumsfeld's "unknown knowns". Or maybe one of his "known unknowns". Two weeks ago, this was a hoax, and it was all Obama's fault. Now, the government encourages "social distancing" and are looking to put forth a trillion dollar bailout. The complete turnaround would be funny if it weren't true. Like others here, I was social distancing when social distancing wasn't cool, and long before it was a Presidential recommendation. I truly feel bad for those who don't have the situational flexibility or financial resources to endure this dilemna. Good night and good luck.
3/18
![]() I am with Paul Downs, good practices prepare for the worst, then hope for the best, this has always been a good principle. I mean really is asking someone to wash their hands multiple times in a day such a bad thing. My 85 YO mother is Quarantined, Once it gets close you will care.
3/18
![]() It is group think driven my media hyperbole. The scary part is the mass hysteria and the fallout from that. I doubt very much that this will be worse than any flu season 3/18
![]() I hope you are right. 3/18
![]() Do I think this is a hoax? absolutely not. This is very real, but is it worth tanking the economy over? not a chance. They keep talking about a nationwide quarantine, what happens to guys like Karl, myself and all the other small shops that can keep our employees going through this? I know my guys rely on that paycheck being there as we all do. How come Tesla is still operating normally as of yesterday afternoon? Even though Alan said the bay area is shut down for 3 weeks. Don't get me wrong, I do take this seriously as my parents have compromised immune systems and are at the most risk. We are in the north part of Chicago which increases or odds of exposure anyway. But me at 38 i'm not worried. But do I think this is a media induced panic frenzy with the election coming up, Absolutely! A nationwide quarantine would most definitely push us into what Karl describes above. I apologize for the rant, I'ts just been many years of hard work to get the company at a good place and now the outcome is very uncertain... 3/18
![]() In my state of CT we currently have 68 cases and 0 deaths. The front page of my local rag say there are likely thousands of cases in CT, sighting this without evidence. And reading the article they are guestimating there are 6000 cases that have gone undiagnosed. So what this means to me for the most part is this is very overblown if we have all these cases and no one is dying from it. The overblown estimate of 2-5% mortality is more like .1-.3%, just like the normal flu. They have destroyed the entire planets economy over this. Over in China there were 3200 deaths out of 1.5 billion people. 3/18
![]() Here is a are the real numbers on this Real Data
The reported numbers are low because no one is tested. The number of infections is almost the same as the number of test kits. Why? Think about it. Without testing, we are blind. Trump told the WHO the US did not need any test kits. He also cut $700M from the CDC budget and closed the fast response office of the CDC that was formed to respond quickly to these threats. He and his gang of buddies have repeatedly misinformed his subjects to the point where confusion is the most prevalent response.
The best science is estimating there are 10 times more cases than now known in US. Today's number is 600, or 6,000. That number will double about every 3 days. In a 10 days, that is over 6 million. The math is where it is scary. Then it doubles again, and again.....
Our leaders are idiots. Our medical community is hamstrung/unprepared (due to the prevailing thought stated in the above posts) and on the verge of being overwhelmed.
120,000 ventilators in the US. 6 million cases will require every one of those ventilators for up to 2 weeks. Zip! We are out of those, and that is when we will have to just let people die because we can't help them. No rooms in the hospitals, so stay home and please wait for the wagon to come by before you bring out the dead.
There will be too many sick people to deal with.
Paul Downs said it best - "Serious people are taking this seriously." Cancel the NCAA???!!! Cancel SXSW??!! Hundreds of millions of dollars lost not by overreacting, but by biting the bullet.
Pat's link is excellent for a big picture, but remember, there is almost no testing being done, so we are only counting about 1 in 10 cases.
What I keep waiting for is when is a real, global, conversation going to emerge with regards to tradition/ritual/whatever, eating bush meat is at the root of many of these nightmares and needs to come to a quick end. Fruitcakes pecking the skull caps off monkeys anteaters and consuming bats and lord knows what else, in a global economy, needs to get whittled down and fast.
Kansas killed school for the rest of the year. Many small business in my state (West By God, the last state to have a confirmed case) are just closing because the cost to stay open with such reduced revenue is a hemorrhage worse than closing for a period. The conversation has been going on here for a week now that school will not be resumed this school year. And how will those hours be made up?
Ive yet to hear of any health care projects being idled but my guess is in this industry that will be soon to come. We have a heath care facility job going now and anyone entering the building must go through the front, temp check, sit at nurses station, answer questions, be logged in. If anything gets worse I would imagine the other 10 locations slated for renovation will be shelved.
Some other customers are still issuing P.O.'s that are in the retail trade with trade shows in the near future that have all been canceled. I had assumed all those P.O.s would go on hold but not yet.
Got this a short while ago,, the Lawyers are now involved
Yeah, and the guy who thinks this is all a hoax or needs his paycheck for his family or his truck payment just signs it so they can get paid. Then of course the fear is if its found you consciously lied about your exposure or symptoms.....
Gonna get freaky.
Regardless of our own opinions of how this is being handled, there is no doubt at this point that business is going to slow down drastically for all of us at some point. For me, I'm booked for about 6 weeks and after that I expect it to dry up completely.
The question in my mind is what to do at that point? I have enough saved to weather a storm for 6 or 8 months. But do I pay my overhead costs? Who is going to evict me if I don't? Do I pay my insurance premiums?
Cash is going to be king. The more effective our government is at "flattening the curve", the longer the economic downturn is going to be.
David
As the quantity of testing goes up the mortality rate as percentage will go down because the denominator will be larger and numerator will remain the same.
After seeing the reaction by the public to this virus, it's no wonder the government would never tell us about aliens....
Matthew,
Option #3 is to just kiss it up to god and go on, hope it blows over and is nowhere near as bad as it could be.
My gut feeling is the blows over option but I have several markers in my life where I was like "bah.. there is nothing to worry about" and someone sitting next to me said, "dude, your nuts Im getting out of here" and had I sat there thinking they were a bunch of chicken littles things would have gotten real bad, real fast.
I try to find the balance in there somewhere but that idiot invincible 18 year old is still in there somewhere 40+ years later...
When you see these big virus balls in the street run you know you are near infection, that's what I am looking for.
Star Trek Voyager had an episode that had Macro Viruses that grew the size of basketballs. LOL
Pats Johns Hopkins site has gone up 8K confirmed cases in 6 hours.
The truth of the matter is that it is really not in our control.
The plan is simple, conserve cash and wash your hands. There is really not much else you can do.
I believe the media coverage is causing the panic that is tanking the market. That's a problem.
Mark
You need to take the site into context. It counts worldwide population (minus Greenland for some reason) so another 6K isn't really that many.
The US is now going to be testing furiously and that is going to produce a new and ongoing spike.
It also looks like S. America and Africa are starting to be put into the equation whereas they weren't really that active as of yet.
Remind me how many people are on the planet?
John's Hopkin interactive CV19 map
If you look at S Korea where are doing the most testing the mortality rate is around 1%,
Ergo more testing lowers the mortality statistics.
Also the median age of the population may be a factor. Italy is at 45.5 years, S Korea is at 41.8 years, US is at 38.1 years
Median age by country
Everyone keeps saying we don't really know how many people have it b/c everyone hasn't been tested. So what? Does everyone get tested for the flu every year? You don't think the number of cases of the flu isn't higher every year than those tested for it? I've had what was most likely the flu many times and have never gone to the doctor to get tested or treated for it as I'm sure many other people haven't either. It's highly likely that if I or others contract COVID-19 that the symptoms won't warrant a visit to the doctor for testing.
If you're in the high risk category you should have every right to your social distancing, and there should be charitable programs in place to get necessities to those who would prefer to avoid going into public as a precaution; or maybe just wear nitrile gloves and medical masks when going out like they do in China. On the flip side of that, everyone else should be able to continue going about business as usual with a few well advised sanitary precautions, or not.
We're all going to die one way or another. This one particular way isn't worth shutting down the global economy over. The virus isn't the hoax; the hoax is the blowing out of proportion to cause hysteria by those who would see the economy shut down for political and power gains. And so what if the NBA shut down it's season or schools closed down? Monkey see, monkey do(toilet paper, Hello?); no one want's to be seen as the bad guy who didn't heed the dire warnings if this really does turn out to be the Black Death of the 21st century; which is highly unlikely according to facts from CDC website. I'm good with being that guy. What good is all the precaution going to do when you're sitting around a campfire by the river in a loincloth trying to catch your dinner or standing in a breadline with your hand out?
Our county is only reporting positive cases, tests done by physicians through private labs that are negative are not reported so the numbers are skewed.
The WHO stats for China had the high mortality rate at over 80, smokers with other health issues, then over 70, then over 60. The mortality rate drops with age and health.
If negative tests aren't reported then the stats are useless.
If you want to manage it you have to measure it.
No statistics is worse than some/flawed statistics.
I think Steven has it right though
If this were as deadly as the Spanish flu and the global mortality rates were the same we are talking about 225 million to 375 million dead over 18 months.
Fortunately healthcare, sanitation, drugs have all vastly improved in 100 years. I just can't see the mortality rates hitting those numbers over the next 18 months.
(1000^3)*7.5*.03 (1000^3)*7.5*.05
The real race is a global race to a vaccine that works at an accelerated timeline.
There are some other efforts out there that are closer than 18 months. The most promising is the link below, based on a similar strain used to treat animals.
Link to article
Because the virus mutates that is tough.
Slowing it down is a good target
It seems to me that targeting the most vulnerable should be key.
Quarantining the economy is more about politics and very bad for business
Too much normalcy bias in the States. States very soon to be like Italy. If you are running around without a mask and goggles then you are asking to get it. It is airborne. To say that you do not care about people dying...you need mental help.
2008-09 best case outcome (25% chance my opinion)
The dominoes are days from falling beyond a point they can be tipped back up. There is simply way to much debt at every level- government, corporate, private and especially at the leveraged speculative level.
Anyone that lives in the world today should have enough basic science to understand the spread of disease. Whether public water well, snee |