https://apnews.com/article/san-francisco-virus-empty-downtown-965a5a419ef7a1405a04bc4665dbb64c

Boo boo. They've been charging 3 to 10x the price of other cities for the past 40-years and they haven't had a chance to save enough to get through a lull?

Also, the tech corridor of SFO to San Jose has been at risk of a housing price drop-out for several years. Ever since the big tech companies started converting conference rooms to more cubes and "open work spaces" and staff have been attending meetings through their laptops while all the attendees sit in various parts of the building. It took only the slightest motivation to test the work from home concept. Few tech companies will ever go back to "normal". Some companies are already offering exit SFO packages (slight salary cut with permission to move to any city with non-stop flights to SFO area). I'd move out of a $3000/month studio in San Fran in a heart beat.

Seems like only last year, local SFO politicians were complaining about lack of affordable housing - by next year, they'll have so much they won't know what to do with it.

 

Coronavirus: England to enter month-long lockdown from Thursday, PM announces

https://news.sky.com/story/coronavi...-lockdown-from-thursday-pm-announces-12120114

Mr Johnson said there was a need to be "humble in the face of nature" with the virus "spreading even faster than the reasonable worst case scenario of our scientific advisers".

 

Just found out my niece in Cincinnati, Ohio contracted it. She is in her mid 30s and been working from home. Best they can figure it she contracted it through her exercise center. I have been offline for the last 4 weeks or so, motorcycle accident so just now getting back to things. Niece complains of normal flu like symptoms, slow at the onset. Till now I have not personally known anyone who had tested positive. During my hospital time I was tested twice, both negative.

Ron

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/h...us-increasingly-they-have-no-idea/ar-BB1azq1G

Gone are the days when Americans could easily understand the virus by tracking rising case numbers back to discrete sources — the crowded factory, the troubled nursing home, the rowdy bar. Now, there are so many cases, in so many places, that many people are coming to a frightening conclusion: They have no idea where the virus is spreading.

 

https://www.mercurynews.com/2020/11...rades-spike-with-fall-term-distance-learning/

 

"They have no idea where the virus is spreading."
I haven't heard any recent authoritative update on how long the virus can remain viable on packaging. With increased use of mail-order, couriers and home collection/delivery of goods, those services would provide an ideal vector for virus transmission from household to household if the viability period were two or three days.

 

"They have no idea where the virus is spreading."
I haven't heard any recent authoritative update on how long the virus can remain viable on packaging. With increased use of mail-order, couriers and home collection/delivery of goods, those services would provide an ideal vector for virus transmission from household to household if the viability period were two or three days.

the least of my worries for a tacky virus that transfers by inhalation or wiping into eyes. Just don't wipe anything into your eyes - wash your hands after you dump the box.

 

the least of my worries for a tacky virus that transfers by inhalation or wiping into eyes. Just don't wipe anything into your eyes - wash your hands after you dump the box.

Much easier said than done.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25637115/

 

Much easier said than done.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25637115/

Learning to work in certain roles helps, optics labs teach you quickly that wearing don't keep lenses and mirrors clean if you keep touching your oily nose with your glove. The good part of training in an optics lab is that the penalty (dirty lems) is usually* much less than those of learning in a chemical lab or bio lab or unloading coronavirus laden groceries. can suffer the same issues with much greater consequences than a dirty lens.

* I know someone who was burned by a laser because of a reflection caused by a smudge on a lens so, not a completely safe error. The whole laser should have been in a protective box but, hey, OSHA safety rules didn't apply to grad students back then.

 

I've worked in a clean room environment for 30 years so it helps to enforce not to touch anything but under stress we revert to our natural instincts and do things without awareness.

 

Agreed, but according to Darwin, the next generation will be better at it.

 

Agreed, but according to Darwin, the next generation will be better at it.

At not touching their face, maybe.

 

At not touching their face, maybe.

That's what I meant.

 

https://www.theguardian.com/science...t-on-health-blamed-on-tiny-genetic-variations

It has been one of the most baffling aspects of the Covid-19 pandemic. Healthy young men and women have become infected with the virus and developed life-threatening side effects. But at the same time, many of their contemporaries have simply shrugged off the condition.

Unknown factors are clearly leaving some people vulnerable to the pandemic’s worst effects even though some of them are young, are not overweight and do not suffer from other obvious health problems. Scientists think that tiny genetic differences are causing some to be struck down while many others are spared.

And these differences in DNA are now being tracked by researchers who believe they offer a route to developing new drugs that could halt many of the worst consequences of suffering from Covid-19.

 

https://nationalpost.com/news/world...rgence-of-coronavirus-and-a-grim-winter-ahead

Lofven warned that the latest development is putting Sweden’s health-care system under pressure, as more intensive care beds get filled.
“The brief respite that we got during the summer is over,” he said. “How we act now will determine what kind of Christmas we will be able to celebrate, and who will be able to take part.”

Sweden, which has shunned lockdowns throughout the pandemic, on Tuesday registered 10,177 new coronavirus cases, recorded since its previous update on Friday, Health Agency statistics showed.
As of Tuesday, a total of 134,532 Swedes had been infected with the virus, with 5,969 deaths.

 

https://nationalpost.com/news/world...rgence-of-coronavirus-and-a-grim-winter-ahead

Something's changed in Sweden ... perhaps they're back from their summer break and back in the cities?

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/h...us-increasingly-they-have-no-idea/ar-BB1azq1G

You can swing a cat and hit someone who has got it.

Sounds like a reasonable alternative to testing.

 

What? Being hit by a dead cat being swung in the Cemetary at midnight?

 

What? Being hit by a dead cat being swung in the Cemetary at midnight?

That would be irresponsible. Imagine the number of corpses that'd catch the dead cat's virus...

 

Something's changed in Sweden ... perhaps they're back from their summer break and back in the cities?

My personal belief is that the effective Coronavirus Re has increased or is being underestimated. R0 was estimated to be 2.2 to 2.7 but several studies show the upper end today to be multiples of that to at least the 6 range for actual transmission when numbers are rising. Quarantine, masks, social distancing and contact tracing of positive testing individuals will be ineffective at the higher levels while increasing the percentage needed for herd immunity. So far deaths and serious illness have been falling percentage-wise so gains in contagiousness are at the cost of severity.

https://www.the-scientist.com/features/why-r0-is-problematic-for-predicting-covid-19-spread-67690