March 28, 2020

CovidNearYou.org?

Anyone seen this? Just stumbled upon it, no idea how legit it is, but could be useful.

https://twitter.com/johnbrownstein/status/1241826747798216706

March 28, 2020

PSA: Season 3 Ozark, tonight, Netflix

That is all. Carry on.

March 28, 2020

Abbott Labs launches rapid Covid19 test

https://abbott.mediaroom.com/2020-03-27-Abbott-Launches-Molecular-Point-of-Care-Test-to-Detect-Novel-Coronavirus-in-as-Little-as-Five-Minutes

ABBOTT LAUNCHES MOLECULAR POINT-OF-CARE TEST TO DETECT NOVEL CORONAVIRUS IN AS LITTLE AS FIVE MINUTES
- The Abbott ID NOW™ COVID-19 test brings rapid testing to the front lines
- Test to run on Abbott's point-of-care ID NOW platform - a portable instrument that can be deployed where testing is needed most
- ID NOW has the largest molecular point-of-care installed base in the U.S. and is available in a wide range of healthcare settings
- Abbott will be making ID NOW COVID-19 tests available next week and expects to ramp up manufacturing to deliver 50,000 tests per day
- This is the company's second test to receive Emergency Use Authorization by the FDA for COVID-19 detection; combined, Abbott expects to produce about 5 million tests per month

CLOSE
ABBOTT PARK, Ill., March 27, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Abbott (NYSE: ABT) announced today that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has issued Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for the fastest available molecular point-of-care test for the detection of novel coronavirus (COVID-19), delivering positive results in as little as five minutes and negative results in 13 minutes. The test will run on the company's ID NOW™ platform, providing rapid results in a wide range of healthcare settings such as physicians' offices, urgent care clinics and hospital emergency departments.

The ID NOW platform is small, lightweight (6.6 pounds) and portable (the size of a small toaster), and uses molecular technology, which is valued by clinicians and the scientific community for its high degree of accuracy. ID NOW is already the most widely available molecular point-of-care testing platform in the U.S. today.

"The COVID-19 pandemic will be fought on multiple fronts, and a portable molecular test that offers results in minutes adds to the broad range of diagnostic solutions needed to combat this virus," said Robert B. Ford, president and chief operating officer, Abbott. "With rapid testing on ID NOW, healthcare providers can perform molecular point-of-care testing outside the traditional four walls of a hospital in outbreak hotspots."

Abbott will be making ID NOW COVID-19 tests available next week to healthcare providers in urgent care settings in the U.S., where the majority of ID NOW instruments are in use today. The company is working with the Administration to deploy tests to areas where they can have the greatest impact.

The arrival of the Abbott ID NOW COVID-19 test comes a week after the company launched its Abbott m2000™ RealTime SARS-CoV-2 EUA test, which runs on the m2000™ RealTime System located in hospital and reference labs around the world. Between the two platforms, Abbott expects to produce about 5 million tests per month.

About the ID NOW™ Molecular Platform
As the world leader in point-of-care diagnostics, Abbott is adding its expertise and scale to help fight the COVID-19 global pandemic. First introduced in 2014, ID NOW is the leading molecular point-of-care platform for Influenza A & B, Strep A and RSV testing in the U.S.

ID NOW is a rapid, instrument-based, isothermal system for the qualitative detection of infectious diseases. Its unique isothermal nucleic acid amplification technology provides molecular results in just minutes, allowing clinicians to make evidence-based clinical decisions during a patient visit.

About Abbott
Abbott is a global healthcare leader that helps people live more fully at all stages of life. Our portfolio of life-changing technologies spans the spectrum of healthcare, with leading businesses and products in diagnostics, medical devices, nutritionals and branded generic medicines. Our 107,000 colleagues serve people in more than 160 countries.

March 27, 2020

Should CPAP use be curtailed during this pandemic?

Just read another thread that raises a very disturbing prospect: that a CPAP machine aerosolizes virus when used by infected people.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/114222954

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2020/03/27/822211604/cpap-machines-were-seen-as-ventilator-alternatives-but-could-spread-covid-19

So, someone using the device for sleep apnea, who may unknowingly be Covid-19 positive, but asymptomatic, could inadvertantly be spreading the virus very effectively to housemates.

I wonder what role this device may be playing in the spread of coronavirus??

March 27, 2020

Cheerleading. Rally 'round the flag. Etc.

Seems to me that the whole purpose of "rallying around the leader in a time of war" has much to do with projecting an image of strength to the enemy, a psychological tool.

In times of natural disasters, what's the purpose of such cheerleading? There is no "enemy" to give appearances to.

If it has to do with calming a panicked populace, then rallying around the competent responders is appropriate.

But what rationale is there for rallying around an incompetent leader at a time like this? The virus isn't watching, getting a boost from our suffering.

After 9/11, ok, there were human enemies watching, and showing them a unified front, solidarity, had meaning and purpose.

But now? All it does is ensure that certain incompetents will benefit from the unearned and undeserved good will of a suffering populace.

S.M.D.H.

March 24, 2020

Now that Trump has declared war on us, it's time for the gloves to come off

We've been holding back while this crisis developed, giving him room to do the right thing, with only very mild criticism, compared to what he deserved.

But now? It's time to pull out all the stops, to ramp up the Bloomberg money machine and anti-Trump ads, and just plaster this country with the raw, unvarnished truth about this monster.

This isn't just politics, its life and death.

To start, a truth campaign needs to blast out the message that HE ALONE OWNS THIS DISASTER.

He had time. He could have mobilized all of the machinery at his disposal to create as much PPE as we needed. Testing could have been running at full capacity. Contact tracings would have minimized the need to shut the whole economy down. We could have been prepared! WE COULD HAVE BEEN PREPARED!! We all knew for 3 months now what was happening. WE KNEW! He chose to not do anything. That is now on him!

Why did we have to resort to these measures? Because when it was still just one guy in Washington state who had returned from China, before Trump allowed the cruise passengers to return here, before the HHS people without PPE interacted with them at Travis AFB, before this thing got out of control here -- WE KNEW. We were watching China intently, we knew.

But at every possible point where he could have taken consequencial action, he declined. Yes, he stopped flights from China, that was good, but then he welcomed the virus in the backdoor and then neglected to contain it.

THIS IS ALL ON HIM!

Everyone has been cutting him slack on this, hoping that he'd take strong measures now, so criticism of him has been very light, compared to what he deserved. And during severe crises like this, people generally hold back out of a sense of unity in calamity.

But after today, I hope the gloves come off, and the facts are laid bare for all to see over and over and over, until it's clear to EVERYONE: that this is ALL on him! The economic and human tragedy, all his.

Shove it in his face and make him OWN it!!

It didn't have to go this way.

March 24, 2020

I've no doubt that many who heard Trump today (or read about it)

are already easing up on their restrictions, figuring that hey, in a week we will all be back at work. I bet starting tomorrow you start seeing evidence of this in your community. He just sabotaged the whole flatten the curve effort.

Everything Trump touches turns to shit. He couldn't even go more than 7 days of nominally doing the right thing.

He's a monster.

March 24, 2020

It may be time to seriously consider secession

I've never really thought that, but if Trump, in 7 days, declares the emergency over (in effect), it may be time for some of us to just GTFO.

March 23, 2020

Trump explains what a presser is

to the relief of all the baffled reporters who didn't know why they were there.

Asshole

March 23, 2020

Now you understand why widespread testing was important

Took you long enough to get it