Official Coronavirus Non-Political Thread: Facts and Updates ⛑

Science & Technology
166

New York hospitals are quietly testing HEARTBURN drug Pepcid as treatment for COVID-19 and will know whether it’s effective in ‘a few weeks’

  • Doctors in China discovered that those over 80 with heartburn issues and used Pepcid had a higher coronavirus survival than those using pricier drug Prilosec
  • Pepcid contains famotidine and Prilosec contains omeprazole
  • Scientists suspect that in COVID-19, famotidine binds to the papainlike protease which helps pathogens replicate in the body and stops them replicating
  • Northwell Health has been injecting patients in New York with famotidine
  • Interim results from 391 patients should be available in ‘a few weeks’ Kevin Tracey, a former neurosurgeon in charge of Northwell’s research said
167

Coronavirus: New Zealand claims no community cases as lockdown eases

New Zealand says it has stopped community transmission of Covid-19, effectively eliminating the virus.

With new cases in single figures for several days - one on Sunday - Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the virus was “currently” eliminated.

But officials have warned against complacency, saying it does not mean a total end to new coronavirus cases.

The news comes hours before New Zealand is set to move out of its toughest level of social restrictions.

From Tuesday, some non-essential business, healthcare and education activity will be able to resume.

Most people will still be required to remain at home at all times and avoid all social interactions.

“We are opening up the economy, but we’re not opening up people’s social lives,” Ms Ardern said at the daily government briefing.

New Zealand has reported fewer than 1,500 confirmed or probable cases of coronavirus and 19 deaths.

New Zealand’s Director-General of Health Ashley Bloomfield said the low number of new cases in recent days “does give us confidence that we have achieved our goal of elimination”.

He warned that “elimination” did not mean there would be no new cases, “but it does mean we know where our cases are coming from”.

Ms Ardern said there was “no widespread undetected community transmission in New Zealand”, adding: “We have won that battle.”

But she said the country “must remain vigilant if we are to keep it that way”.

How did New Zealand respond to the virus?

The country brought in some of the toughest restrictions in the world on travel and activity early on in the pandemic, when it only had a few dozen cases.

It closed its borders, started enforcing quarantine of all arrivals in the country, brought in a stringent lockdown and mounted an extensive testing and contact tracing operation.

Beaches, waterfronts and playgrounds were shut on 26 March, as were offices and schools. Bars and restaurants were also closed, including for takeaway and delivery.

Ms Ardern said modelling indicated New Zealand could have had more than 1,000 cases a day if it had not brought in the lockdown so early.

She said the country could never know how bad it would have been, but that “through our cumulative actions we have avoided the worst”.

New Zealand’s remote location and easily sealable borders played in its favour when the virus broke out, experts say.

But the government has also been praised for the clarity of its messaging throughout the crisis.

At midnight local time (12:00 GMT on Monday), New Zealand will move from Level Four lockdown to Level Three. That means most businesses will be able to reopen - including restaurants for takeaways - but not those involving face-to-face contact.

New Zealanders are being told to stick to their “bubble” - a small group of close friends or family - and to stay 2m (6ft) away from people.

Mass gatherings are still banned, shopping centres remain closed and most children will remain away from school. New Zealand’s border will remain closed.

What’s happening in Australia?

In Australia, the rise in infections has also slowed considerably in recent weeks. There were just 16 new cases recorded on Sunday.

Much like in New Zealand, its government has been praised for its response to the crisis and opinion polls show that trust in the country’s leadership has risen.

Restrictions are easing in some areas, with some states planning to relax social distancing rules to permit larger outdoor gatherings this week.

In Queensland from Saturday, people will be free to go shopping for clothes, have a picnic in the park or go for a swim at the beach as long as it is within a 40-minute drive from home.

Western Australia is also joining South Australia in expanding the national two-person limit on gatherings to 10 people.

However, most Australians are still required to stay at home unless they have essential work, shopping or exercise reasons to go out.

More than a million Australians also downloaded a coronavirus contact tracing app within hours of it being released by the government.

Users of the app will be notified if they have had more than 15 minutes of close contact with another user who tests positive for Covid-19.

There are reports that Australia and New Zealand are considering opening up travel between them, but no decision has been made.

168

You want to link it so we know what you are referencing?

169

Out in the open doctors know it’s a fake pandemic.

3 Likes
170

ReOpen NC leader tested positive for COVID-19

171

Coronavirus Antibodies Present In Nearly 25% Of All NYC Residents, Cuomo Says; Un-PAUSE In Certain Regions Of NY Might Begin In May

ALBANY, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) – Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Monday that the number of statewide random antibody tests has expanded to 7,500, which reveals a better picture of the extent of coronavirus spread in New York.

Cuomo said 14.9% of those tested statewide tested positive for COVID-19 antibodies, which is up from the initial 13.9% statewide when a previous sample of 3,000 people was done on April 22. Cuomo said the 1% increase is statistically in the margin of error.

Regionally, the results suggest:

  • 24.7% positive in New York City
  • 15.1% positive in Westchester/Rockland
  • 14.4% positive on Long Island
  • 3.2% positive in the rest of the state

The governor said he’s going to conduct antibody surveys of 1,000 NYPD and FDNY personnel to determine the infection rate in those organizations. A similar survey will be done with 3,000 health care workers and 1,000 transit workers.

“We want to un-PAUSE. May 15 is when the PAUSE regulations expire statewide. I will extend them in many parts of the state. But in some parts of the state, some regions, you can make the case that we should un-PAUSE on May 15. But you have to be smart about it,” Cuomo said. “Start thinking through what it means to reopen.”

173
174

Wrapped my entire body in Lysol wipes just to go to the store and they were out of E.L. Fudge Stripe cookies why the fuck do I even bother leaving the house

1 Like
175

Cut 'em some slack whydoncha, they’re just bored. We’ve built two fully equipped and staffed-around-the-clock hospitals, with two more under construction, to deal with this ‘emergency’, and the two that are operational have never been used in anger. How would you like to be a nurse who’s scanning the horizon for patients to come flooding into sight, but don’t see any - wouldn’t you wanna dance to while away the time!

1 Like
176

177

Turkey claims success treating COVID-19 with broad use of drug touted by Trump

Istanbul — Turkey has the biggest coronavirus outbreak in the Middle East, with more than 117,000 confirmed infections. More than 3,000 people have died. But the government claims to have a lower fatality rate than the global average estimated by the World Health Organization at over 3%.

The Turkish government imposed weekend-only lockdowns and banned only those under the age of 20 and over 65 from leaving their homes during the week, in an effort to limit the economic impact of the pandemic.

Turkey’s Ministry of Health says the relatively low death toll is thanks to treatment protocols in the country, which involve two existing drugs — the controversial anti-malaria drug hydroxychloroquine touted by President Trump, and Japanese antiviral favipiravir.

“Doctors prescribe hydroxychloroquine to everyone who is tested positive for coronavirus” Dr. Sema Turan, a member of the Turkish government’s coronavirus advisory board, told CBS News. Hospitalized patients may be given favipiravir as well if they encounter breathing problems, she said.

Turan said the combination of drugs appeared to “delay or eliminate the need for intensive care for patients.” But it’s important to note that Turkey’s use of the drug is not a clinically controlled trial; there’s no control group of patients not given the medication to compare the results against.

Clinical trials have been underway in the U.S. and elsewhere, but the results aren’t yet clear. Preliminary studies on hydroxychloroquine have yielded uninspiring results thus far.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved emergency use of hydroxychloroquine for coronavirus patients, but has warned it should only be used in clinical trials or under the close observation of doctors, citing an observed risk of heart complications.

Measuring mortality

Comparisons between countries’ reported mortality rates, as offered by Turkey, are of limited use, as different nations tabulate the statistics used to determine those rates in different ways, and with varying reliability.

Mortality is essentially a measure of the proportion of people diagnosed with a disease who go on to die, so having an accurate picture of the number of infections is key.

Turkey has so far conducted about 948,000 COVID-19 tests, according to the data-gathering website worldmeters.info. That equates to a testing rate of about 11,200 people per million residents. By comparison, the U.S. has tested almost 19,000 people per million, and proactive Germany almost 25,000 per million.

While Turkey’s relatively low test rate might suggest even more impressive mortality figures, there are also concerns that the official death toll for the country — the other half of the mortality equation — could be a significant underestimate.

The Turkish Medical Association, the country’s largest doctors’ union, has criticized the government for not using broader diagnostic criteria approved by the World Health Organization in its counting of COVID-19 deaths, saying it could be obscuring the “real dimensions of the problem.”

Asked about those claims, an official at the Ministry of Health told CBS News that the broader WHO criteria are meant for countries with limited testing capacity and Turkey, the official said, has “extensive capacity to conduct tests” and “is acting in line with the international standards.”

The problem of questionable statistics may well be universal. The global death toll from COVID-19 could be as much as 60% higher than currently stated, according to a recent investigation by the Financial Times that cites data from 14 countries.

1 Like
178

Coronavirus may lurk deep in lungs after patients recover, study suggests

  • Postmortem of woman finds she had undetected traces in lungs after testing negative three times and being discharged from hospital
  • As WHO investigates why some recovered patients test positive again, the medical community works to assess any lasting effect on the body
179

Scientists are perplexed by the low rate of coronavirus hospitalizations among smokers. Nicotine may hold the answer

No experts are remotely advocating for people to take up smoking to prevent COVID-19, but some researchers have theorized nicotine may be playing some role in keeping the virus at bay, Vice reports. That’s because there’s a surprisingly low rate of smokers among coronavirus hospitalizations.

In France, for example, 25 percent of the population smokes, but only 5.3 percent of coronavirus patients have been recorded as smokers, and studies have found low rates in China and New York City, as well.

Greek cardiologist and tobacco harm-reduction specialist Konstantinos Farsalinos thinks nicotine (crucially, not tobacco) might be lessening the intensity of cytokine storms, an overreaction of the body’s immune system which seems to be the cause of the most severe coronavirus symptoms. French researchers have a slightly altered theory that nicotine prevents the virus from entering cells (the difference lies in the type of receptors the virus latches onto), and they’re hoping to test out nicotine patches on patients to see if they help fight off COVID-19. The French government suspended the online sale of patches to make sure people don’t buy in bulk and try to treat themselves that way.

The seemingly out-there theory has piqued the interest of scientists across the world, though many are urging caution. The lower rates could be a result of some other chemical in tobacco producing a protective effect, or it could be that the number of smokers is being underreported.

“Smokers who have developed chronic disease have likely quit because of their disease,” Michael Siegel, a community health sciences professor at Boston University, said. “Many of the smokers who are continuing to smoke are doing so because they don’t have disease yet. So this would be expected to skew the sample of hospitalized patients toward people who do not smoke.” Read more at Vice .

https://www.yahoo.com/news/scientists-perplexed-low-rate-coronavirus-170200046.html

180

So after the solid year it took me to quit smoking…I guess I should just start again :crazy_face:

1 Like
181

Nobel Prize-Winning Scientist Who Discovered HIV Says Coronavirus Was Created In Laboratory

In a highly significant development, Professor Luc Montagnier, the French scientist who shared the 2008 Nobel Prize in Medicine for discovery of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), has added his voice to those who believe the new coronavirus was created in a laboratory. Interviewed on the CNews channel in France, Montagnier asserted that the virus had been designed by molecular biologists. Stating that it contains genetic elements of HIV, he insisted its characteristics could not have arisen naturally.

Asked by the CNews interviewer what the goal of these molecular biologists was, Montagnier said it wasn’t clear. “My job,” he said, “is to expose the facts.” While stressing that he didn’t know who had done it, or why, Montagnier suggested that possibly the goal had been to make an AIDS vaccine. Labeling the virus as “a professional job…a very meticulous job,” he described its genome as being a “clockwork of sequences.”

“There’s a part which is obviously the classic virus, and there’s another mainly coming from the bat, but that part has added sequences, particularly from HIV – the AIDS virus,” he said.

Growing evidence that the virus was ‘designed’

Montagnier also pointed out that he wasn’t the first scientist to assert that the coronavirus was created in a laboratory. Previously, on 31 January 2020, a research group from India had published a paper suggesting that aspects of the virus bore an “uncanny similarity” to HIV. Taken together, the researchers said their findings suggested the virus had an “unconventional evolution” and that further investigation was warranted. While the researchers subsequently retracted their paper, Montagnier said they had been “forced” to do so.

1 Like
182

Who else thinks Anthony Fauci is a whore for China and looking for cash cow drugs?

2 Likes
183

A novel treatment is a new treatment…heretofore not patented and subject to recovery of R&D costs via exorbitant pricing to the public for its use. Dr. Fauci is a pimp for Big Pharma. Big Pharma pays Dr. Fauci for his efforts to guarantee the ability to fleece the American public for decades to come.

Screw Dr. Fauci!
Screw the Communist Chinese government!
Screw the Democrats!
Vote RED in November! Get rid of Democrats (Socialists) in our government!

184

Russia is the only sane country on the planet.

186

“Captain Tom Moore’s fundraiser ends as war veteran, 100, raises nearly £33m for NHS”

And the NHS will get about 20p in the pound. I trust that all of those on the receiving end of the rest of the £33m will be very grateful to Captain Moore. (or ‘Captain Tom’ - how fucking childish and patronising?)

187

I hear he was just promoted to colonel - shoulda made him a major
‘‘take your protein pills and put your helmet(hazmat) on’’

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNuSD49chY8