Coronavirus, Again

The numbers in my first post were meant as a best/worst analysis. And, again, go find a real expert.

By best/worst, I mean the best mortality/hospitalization needs in a situation where we just let the virus run its course. Not counting the deaths of an overwhelmed medical system, but also not taking into account the measures we could take to slow the spread.

So if it spreads too fast, and healthcare is overwhelmed, things will be worse. 

But if we lock everything down (or, what would have been even better, conduct massive testing and lock down the places actually dealing with cases), things will look better.

And this is where I don't have a good sense of where we're going. Each state, and sometimes even cities and counties, are making choices that will effect what happens. 

Some states have gotten serious about that, so it's slowing the spread and things might not get that bad. 

Others? Well, I could wish the governor of Florida was more concerned about reducing transmission within his state, instead of acting as though all they had to worry about was outsiders coming in. I mean, any reduction in travel will prob help, but a) how will they know who is coming from a hotspot? As many pointed out, people often rent cars with license plates from other states and b) as widespread as this is, with cases in every state, it doesn't make sense to pick and choose who you're going to try and force to take precautionary measures. If you're going to ignore all the people already infected within your state, and try to keep 'outsiders' from bringing more cases in, you really ought to just stop everyone crossing your border.

Its the illogical and inconsistent countermeasures that get me. They just don't make sense. 

Anyways. Point is Idk what the end result will be, I recommend checking with the professionals (Dr Fauci was estimating something like 100,000 deaths? Which may reflect the effort so many of us have made so far), but I can see why they're all taking this so seriously and I hope enough of us are staying home to make a difference. 

Coronavirus Addendum

To avoid a worst case scenario (and the numbers I laid out in the previous post are most definitely NOT the worst case), I'm keeping my eye out for three or four things.

1) (and maybe 2) a vaccine, mass produced enough for everyone. Or a credible antiviral. Careful here, there are definitely snake oil salesmen selling miracle cures.

2 or 3) warm weather reducing the transmission level. Right now nobody knows if it will or not, and it seems to still be spreading fine in Texas and Florida, so... Maybe?  If it does, this will probably just buy us time to find a vaccine or treatment, because it will probably be back in the fall. Like the 1918 pandemic.

3 or 4, and maybe also 5 and 6) social distancing/quarantine/thorough testing to reduce transmission and help identify where it's spreading. This is what we can generally do right now, since we don't yet have a treatment and have no idea whether warm weather will make a difference. It can buy us time to find a vaccine, and/or keep hospitals from being overwhelmed while it runs its course. 

A few more notes. I suspect it's more likely that 3/4 of the population will get it, if not more. Again, though, I'm not an epidemiologist. I'm making that guess because everybody exposed to it seems to get it and spread it, even if they don't show symptoms, so I'm guessing that there might be a quarter of the population (or less) that's isolated enough to somehow miss getting exposed. Probably people in rural areas, for the most part. Or towns with little in the way of shipping and traveling and whatnot. 

If you run my numbers with 225 million people catching it, the numbers are obviously going to be even worse.

There's apparently other factors, like the average age, average number of smokers, and (the big one for us) obesity - which means we'll have different results than South Korea and Italy, purely for demographic reasons. 

Plus, ofc, the socioeconomic elements. 

But ultimately, the biggest factor (outside of vaccines and antivirals) is making sure we don't overwhelm our medical resources... 

Because when doctors have to decide who gets a ventilator and who doesn't, or they're so exhausted that they make mistakes, or there's nobody trained to hook people up to the ventilators, people will die. 

And the worst part is that their deaths will not be inevitable. They might have survived, in other circumstances. 

So that estimate of 900,000 deaths might easily become 2 million, and even much, much, worse. 

So yeah, I'm all about flattening the curve and social distancing right now. 

I hope I'm overestimating things. I'd heard a possible mortality rate of 6%, if hospitals get overwhelmed, and plugging that into my crude calculations is just horrific. 

But I am pretty ticked at all the people who are supposed to be smart, and know better, that still - still! - are acting like we're all blowing it out of proportion, or that we should just let all the vulnerable people die and get back to work. 

Coronavirus Update

So the US now has the most coronavirus (shouldn't we call it the 'bat flu'? I mean, we had 'avian flu' and 'swine flu', and people are clearly looking for a name that isn't 'coronavirus' or 'COVID-19'... why not 'bat flu'?) cases in the world. 105,052 as of midnight, according to one of the tracking sites. And there's been a bit of a debate this week, still, about whether things are as bad as epidemiologists say... and whether 'the cure is worse than the disease', and whether we need to open up the economy, and a bunch of other things.

Which makes me furious, so let me lay out all the reasons why.

I've seen various arguments going around that 'it's not really all that bad', though most of the arguments saying that have some serious flaws to them. I want to go through my own thinking on this matter, with the caveat (of course) that I'm not an epidemiologist.

So... the US has over 300 million citizens. Technically it's more like 327 million, but 300 is a nice even number to work with so it's what I've been using for my own calcuations.

I suppose not everyone will get infected, depending on where you are and how isolated you are (which is why these calculations will change depending on how good we are at social distancing.) Right now I'm trying to look at what will happen if we don't do much of anything - if we all go back to our normal routines, reopen businesses, etc. I suspect, in that case, that we'd still see a good three quarters get infected, but I'll be generous and say only half get the disease.

So let's say 150 million get infected. Now, South Korea has done the most testing, so they're numbers are probably the most accurate in terms of mortality rate (as long as there's adequate healthcare. Ventilators, oxygen tanks, etc. This is a best case scenario where everyone gets the best treatment.)

South Korea has a mortality rate of 0.6%. That's only part of the story, though, because many people still need hospitalization (and ventilators, and oxygen) even though they will survive. Numbers are still hard to get right now, but let's say about 14% are severely affected and need hospitalization.

150,000,000 x .006 = 900,000
150,000,000 x .14 = 21,000,000

So we are talking, best case scenario, 900,000 deaths. That's almost a million deaths, but since people think this has been overhyped already, I won't try rounding that up. 900,000. And 21 million people who will need ventilators/oxygen tanks/hospitalization.

Every argument that claims it's not so bad, that tries to say the death toll would only be in the thousands, is misleading. (I want to know where they get their numbers. Are they assuming only a third of the population catches it? Do they think the mortality rate is really .04%? How are they figuring it?)

Every.

Single.

One.

The ones talking about 60,000? Even 600,000? I want to know where they get that number from. And it better not be 'the flu', because with flu shots and some level of immunity, the flu is not going to go through our population as fast as a new disease that nobody has immunity to.

That's not even talking about the hospitalization aspect. 21 million.

Million.

21 million people who will need oxygen and ventilators and nurses and doctors...

And we apparently have about 924,107 hospital beds. Many of which are already occupied. We are short on hospital beds by a couple of orders of magnitude.

I'm using that to give a sense of the scale of the problem, because it's not a count of ventilators or oxygen tanks... and without proper availability of masks and protective equipment, a lot of medical professionals will also get sick... which also means we'll be short doctors and nurses and so on and so forth.

Which is where the real problem starts. Because South Korea's mortality rate comes from having the ability to give everyone the best treatment, but if you don't have the capacity to treat those 21 million people (who can and would survive with treatment), then they will die.

The mortality rate will be much worse than .6%, not because the new coronavirus is that deadly, but because we weren't able to provide the treatment they needed.

This is why flattening the curve is such a big deal. Because we need to make sure we have the resources to adequately treat everyone, and if we don't a lot of people will die completely unnecessary deaths.

So much of it depends on when it hits, and whether it's spread out or happens all at once. Do nothing, and the hospitals are overwhelmed and the death toll grows. Not just from people who catch COVID-19... but from all the other people who need medical care when the hospitals are overwhelmed. Have a heart attack? Get in a car accident?

Good luck getting the care you need.

I've run the numbers to my own satisfaction, though I'm sure this is an oversimplified example and would recommend you contact a credible epidemiologist for a more accurate analysis. Like I said, I'm not trying to take into account counter-measures like social distancing. I also don't know how likely it is that only half the population will catch it... this thing seems ridiculously contagious, especially if it can survive on metal for days.

But I call BS on almost every argument (and there have been a lot in the news this past week) trying to say that its not that bad.

And I wonder about that. About the people making those arguments, and how many places are publishing those arguments and pushing that story line.

Because I can't tell if it's just denial (I understand that. I don't want to believe it will be that bad, either.) or if it's something more sinister.

I can't tell if the people pushing these arguments genuinely believe it, or if they really don't care.

Which gets into the second part of this. We've had a couple of people try arguing that 'it's better to let a few of us die, than to ruin the economy'.

I'll highlight two of the most memorable; the Texas Lt Governor who argued that grandparents would be willing to die for the sake of their children and grandchildren, and Glenn Beck - who said he would rather die than kill the country.

First of all - the economy is not synonymous with the country. Or, to put this another way, Thor: Ragnarok got it exactly right when they said Asgard "is not a place, it's a people."

America is not a place, and it's not it's economy. It's a people. Every single American is precious, something I didn't think we'd have to say to the supposedly 'pro-life' faction.

I don't want to minimize the pain and frustration of economic turmoil. There are a lot of people out there right now, scared and worried because they've been laid off, or can't work and don't have enough savings to wait for things to blow over.

But our starting point has to be "how do we take care of our people". Or, to put it in Biblical terms, 'how can we be good shepherds'.

Every single one of the pundits arguing that it's okay to just let people die has shown some serious moral failings, a completely skewed perspective, and I don't trust their judgment in the slightest.

There are things we can do to address the economy, and the people who survive the next few months will eventually recover. The dead will not.

The pressure to reopen the economy, if it's not coming from a place of denial, shows a crass disregard for the lives of the American people. And for what?

So many of the ones arguing for that seem more concerned, tbh, with the stock market... and with regaining the flow of profits they're used to... then it is with the average American.

The only reason why we can't all sit tight for a few weeks -

Well, okay. There's a couple of reasons. a) people need to eat, so unless they've stocked up enough to get through those weeks, they'll have to go out to buy groceries and whatnot. And we'll still need people to produce the food they need, so there still has to be some flow of goods. b) people need to pay their bills. If they've got rent due, they have to have a paycheck. And if they're living paycheck to paycheck, with no paid time off and no sick time, and their workplaces have shut down, then they're screwed.

And yes, it will be hard for businesses to stay in business for similar reasons. They've got rent to pay, business loans to pay, etc.

Which is why I've seen people arguing for policies that, when you put them all together, act as though we can put the economy on ice.

That is, tell everyone not to collect rent/mortgage/loans during this time of crisis (so those bills don't come due... with no penalties) and give people the resources to stock up on food and whatnot so they can get through this.

If you do that, well. Businesses 'shouldn't' go out of business, and can pick back up when we allow people back out. People 'shouldn't' starve. Landlords 'shouldn't' be screwed by the lack of money coming in, because they're bills shouldn't be collected either.

It's like flash freezing everything, and giving everyone enough resources to buy the groceries they  need to stay home.

Would it work? Idk... I'd again encourage you to go find an economist (or really, two or three. Plus some business leaders, small and large, and some average Americans and some financial experts).

I do, however, think that's a better idea than pushing this 'the economy will die, so you all have to go back to work and we don't care how many of you die in the process" policy.

Work, and Various Other Musings.

I want to talk about work for a bit, though I'll probably post something about the coronavirus soon after. I'll try to keep this from getting too technical, so bear with me. :)

My job title is "Technology Integration Engineer". I don't recall if I wrote about that before, so here's a very simplified version of what I do -

Every time you have an app that updates (Windows updates, smartphone apps that update, whatever) it generally involves many, many hours of work behind the scenes. You have programmers that code up some changes, testers to test them, etc.

Because some things change on a regular basis, there are also configuration files for just about everything. That way if you are using a specific url (as one example), when it changes you don't have to change the code, you can just update the configuration files as needed.

Since applications run on multiple machines (generally a machine for the database, which stores all your data. A machine for serving up the webpage, and various machines for other tasks - like verifying you when you log in, or validating your credit card when you pay a bill, and so on and so forth) there's also connectivity settings, messaging, and a lot of other things. It's complicated and messy -

And I actually kind of like it. I do still intend to get into computer security (infosec, cyber security, whatever you want to call it), but it's kind of fun to troubleshoot why the heck something isn't working. I'm getting reasonably good at reading logs and trying to figure out what they mean.

Now, tech is a fast-paced industry, and it seems to me that tech companies that have been around for a while are always in the midst of some sort of transition. There's older, legacy systems - and since they work, and most of the bugs have been sorted out, they don't generally want to replace them unless they have to - and then there's newer technology, and it all makes a rather confusing mess. One of the big changes going on is less about the tech (though that plays a role), and more about how the company is organized.

See, in the older style of software development, you might put out new code one a month, or once a quarter. The developers develop, the testers test, and my job is to help integrate the code with all those various configuration settings so that the environment works. Sometimes that means fixing issues when a new build (i.e. the code changes for whatever version they're working on), and sometimes it means trying to help troubleshoot some defect that the testers have identified.

But once a month is... slow. Faster, more agile companies can push out changes daily... or even faster. Which is what one of the current industry buzzwords is - agile.

As someone who graduated a little over a year ago, I had heard the term but didn't initially have a clue what it really meant - but last Feb I was in Dallas for some corporate training, and we discussed it in more detail.

The biggest takeway, for me at least, is that in order to be more agile they essentially want to restructure how we do things. Instead of having a dev team, and an integration team (mine), with database administrators and the like, and testers... they essentially put those skills all on a small team dedicated to one particular application. That way they can code it up, run it, test it, and push it out in a timely fashion.

Which made me wonder what was going to happen in my own company, because it means my current job would go away. (Maybe. Supposedly the transition can take five years or so).

Now, I want to circle back to something that happened early in my career here. Before I learned enough to actually be busy fixing things, I got sent to some training that discussed the concepts layed out by Google for SRE. I then got tagged to be on a scrum team (which is what they call those small teams in the agile framework, iirc), but tbh I hadn't really been able to do much with it. Most of it was very different from what I do in integration, and the project I found most relevant to my day job was when we tried looking at file system cleanup.

But now that I've learned enough to be more useful, and don't have to spend most of my time dealing with the day-to-day integration issues (we each take turns being 'on call' as the primary point of contact for the days issues, and as a trainee I'd been handling more and more of the non-production issues. Now, though, I should be rotating when I'm on call... so about one week a month I should be busy with that, and the other three weeks I can start working on other things.)

Last week was the first time I had the chance to really dig into some of that, and it sort of amuses me. Because even though I was hired as an integration engineer, and even though I learned java for school, it turns out that I'm apparently also a bit of a python developer now.

Sort of. Still spend most of my time in integration, ofc. It kind of amuses me, as someone who learned an entirely different language. Like, yes... you too can wind up programming in an entirely different language, even if you weren't hired as a programmer in the first place.

The last few months have been interesting. I like learning new things, but I have had to learn soooooo much! It's right at the edge of my comfort zone, tbh. And there's all sorts of things that I feel I only barely understand. (The number of times I've been asked to help fix something, and have no clue what the acronym they're using means, or what it really does for our application... well. I can see why imposter syndrome is such a thing in our industry. I now have a little bit of an understanding of containers, and microservices, and mq, and a bunch of other enterprise level technology... and a bit of sql and Oracle, plus some Couchbase and nosql. Only superficial knowledge, I'd say... barely scratched the surface on a lot of it, but def something that keeps me on my toes.)

There's other parts to the job, non-tech related. Some days we're slammed with issues, all of which they claim are 'Severe 1, high priority, must be fixed right away.' Which, I mean, yeah... we'll all do the best we can. But the true top priority is production, since there are real live people who would get pretty darn mad if things break. If they couldn't pay their cell phone bill, or get a new phone, or whatever.

And the training environments are also pretty important, since our customers have people who are trying to learn the system... and they can't if that system isn't working.

Which is why, as someone still relatively new, my focus has been on non-production. If I screw something up there, it won't have as big of an impact.

But the customers often act as though these testing environments are as important as production (Severe 1, high priority. Fix it now!), and there's only so many of us to do the fixing. Which means I also have to learn how to multi-task, and prioritize, and try to keep the customers happy while also keeping some semblance of work-life balance.

Supposedly, I think as part of that work-life balance our bosses and clients got together and agreed that we wouldn't support outside of working hours, but the clients don't often act like that... and want us to work all hours of the day. (I had been a bit miffed when one of them called on Christmas Eve - Christmas Eve!!! - for one of those issues. It wasn't production, it wasn't the training environment, and what the heck are they doing testing on Christmas Eve!)

I feel a bit guilty saying that. Like, there is so much pressure, maybe mostly self-imposed?, to try and get it done, fix things, and keep the customers happy. But... nobody is getting shot at. It's not production. Especially now, with the coronavirus and everything else going on, I wish I could tell them that they're are more important things they ought to be doing right now.

Like spending time with family.

Whatever. I don't really think I'm wrong, I think I feel guilty for two reasons. One, because I can do it, and it prob wouldn't take all that much time, but I'm putting my foot down because you have to draw the line *somewhere*. It becomes too easy to say, sure... let me knock that out. And then you wind up staying an hour or so after work, and dealing with non-production issues on Saturday and Sunday, and skipping lunch, and no. Not unless it's a true priority.

Secondly, because it feels like most businesses (no matter what they say) don't like people acting as though there's more to life than work,  so I wonder whether or not my company has my back on this.

Except they mostly do? Sort of? I'm on call again this week, and just got a call about an hour or so ago for another one of these things, and basically said "we're not supporting you right now, feel free to escalate to my boss"... and I haven't got a call yet, or been told I'm in the wrong.

It's Saturday. What are the consequences of not testing, right now? A slight delay in releasing to production? Is that really that big of a problem?

Smh. (This touches on something I may or may not get into as I talk about coronavirus, since there's been this whole question about the impact of social distancing on the economy, but I'll get to that if or when I get to it.) 

Leadership

A great article on leadership, from a friend - https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbescoachescouncil/2020/01/09/leadership-as-an-infinite-game/amp/

Systemic Thinking, and Other Things

I've been thinking about - well, lots of things.

Economics, capitalism, the failures made evident by COVID-19... oligarchs and social dilemmas, and various other odds and ends.

I might go into some of that, another time. Because I think, fundamentally, there's something else to be addressed first.

Systemic vs... idk, individualistic?

Let me explain.

When something bad happens, some people shrug and say 's*** happens', and others say 'why did this happen? What can we do to prevent it from happening in the future?'

This is not meant to say one way is better than the other. As with all things, there are advantages and disadvantages to both. The disadvantage to just shrugging and accepting something is that it can (and probably will) happen again. To someone else.

But as anyone who used to climb trees as a kid, and feels sad knowing so many trees have their lower limbs cut off to make it 'safe' and keep kids today from doing the same, there are disadvantages to handling everything systemically.

First, it gives the false sense that you can somehow 'put padding on all the harsh corners of the world'. It means you focus more on making the world itself safer, instead of teaching the resilience, decision-making, and know-how that allows people to navigate safely regardless of the risk. (This is what many on the right get at, when they complain about lawsuits for failures in common sense or attempts to control speech instead of making people less susceptible to the message. Plus there's a bit of paternalism, an "I know better than you and will make sure you make the 'right' choice" tied up, here.)

As I typically say - both sides have good points, and where I fall on any particular issue depends. It's true that there are systemic changes we can make, changes that will reduce the chances of injury or death... and if we can, then choosing not to seems irresponsible.

But there's also something to be said for making people responsible for themselves, and for letting people make their own decisions. Letting them decide for themselves what risks they're willing to take.

This pandemic, btw, puts those issues in stark relief. If a Gen Z college kid evaluates the risks and decides its worth it to go on spring break, is it paternalistic and controlling to force them to stay home?

Or is the good of the larger public - the ability to 'flatten the curve' and ensure hospitals aren't hit with demand all at the same time - enough to justify it?

I'm not going to explore that issue right now, because this post isn't about answering that so much as it is about framing the way we look at the issue, and how we think about it.

Because this is true for a lot of other things, as well. Like healthcare, racism, student loan debt, and a lot of other things.

We can do a "5 Why's" on any of them, we can explore the systemic issues on all sorts of levels -

Or we can shrug and say "you agreed to that debt when you signed the loan agreement. Nobody owes you anything, and if you get sick and can't pay your medical bills too bad. And racism exists, but I'm not racist and if you just showed the cops some respect and don't commit any crime you'll be fine. What's the big deal?"

We can all choose to socially distance ourselves, hoping that we can slow the spread and prevent the hospitals from getting overwhelmed... so that everyone who catches the disease has the best chance of surviving it. And we can use the powers of the federal government to get businesses churning out masks and ventilators and PPE... And we can ask ourselves why testing isn't widely available, and why this disease spread so fast and so quickly, and why it's so much worse here than in a place like South Korea -

Or we can say "it's a virus, s*** happens. Let's not ruin the economy over it."

Coronavirus - Iran

I do wish we'd go ahead and drop the sanctions on Iran right now.

It just doesn't seem like the time, and we can always reinstate it when this is all over. 

Coronavirus Update

I am considering restricting how often I look at COVID-19 news, because I am generally obsessing over it and I don't think it's good for me.

Maybe if (when?) things get bad enough that we no longer have a partisan divide over whether or not there's a problem... Idk.

I am very, very grateful that I have the job I do, and that I can work from home. Primarily because that's a lot less stress to deal with, but also because it means I have something to keep me busy most of the work week.

This has been my first full week working at home, btw, and it's been interesting. In some ways it reminds me of when I was studying for my degree, since I did it all online, but it's also... different. School work was less tied to a schedule, or rather I was able to create my own schedule entirely.

My state has issued a stay-at-home order, which for the most part I agree with. But (again), I don't have to stress over losing my job because of this. The fear and uncertainty everyone is feeling is understandable.

I've heard some people argue that the economic impacts may be worse than the disease, and idk about that. What I do know is that people who are alive can recover, eventually. But our system, which means many Americans live paycheck-to-paycheck with no safety cushion, means there's a serious risk that all the people who aren't getting paid right now will be unable to afford food if this goes on too long. Clearly, there are things good leaders will do to address that... but I don't want to derail this by discussing what's being proposed in Congress right now.

It's crazy, though. In the absence of strong national leadership each state is sort of doing their own thing. California, Washington (state, not DC), New York... and Illinois seem to be taking the most pro-active stances.

And then you get morons like that guy from Kansas who said they don't have a COVID-19 problem because there's so few Chinese in their state. 

Like - Hellooooooo? It's been spreading within the states for a couple of weeks already? Those first few cases of community spread (I think towards the end of February) were my first big indicators that this was NOT going to go the way avian flu and swine flu did. It meant we'd completely lost track of the chain of transmission, and had absolutely no idea who did or didn't have it any more.

And since many people don't show any symptoms, it can pass from one asymptomatic person to another, and then just pop up somewhere else out of the blue.

Does Kansas have truck stops? People who visit relatives in other states? Students who go to college in other states?

Then you, too, probably have COVID-19 cases in your state, and denial just means that you're going to be caught completely off guard when people start needing medical attention for it.

The urban/rural divide is something to watch here, too. Because I think it spreads first to urban areas, ofc, and can spread to more people because of the population density... but that just means it will take longer to penetrate rural areas. And given how remote those rural areas are, and how far they are from medical support, it can actually be pretty devastating there as well.

Maybe. I'm not an expert, so what do I know?

I hope we're all overreacting, and that in a month this will all seem like some sort of fever dream.

Anyways. I've been thinking about how to handle the political situation, and social media, and all the misinformation out there.

Or rather, I've been feeling my way into my own policy, but it also depends on how busy I am and how much energy I have.

See, here's the thing. I think the facts on the ground will speak for themselves, so I don't really want to engage in someone willfully wrong. Like, we'll know soon enough, right?

But sometimes I do think it's important to speak out, because you never know who might be listening, who might decide not to go to a movie, or out for dinner, or what have you.

And it is important not to let misinformation pass unchallenged.

And then there's the issue of blame, which I have mixed feelings on.

Or rather, there's more than enough blame to go around, and it generally doesn't help matters. It's like a discussion we had, years ago, on how to manage healthcare organizations. You don't want to be too focused on blame, because that leads to people trying to hide things and cover them up. You want to keep the focus on identifying problems and coming up with systemic solutions for preventing them from happening again.

For example, let's say someone gave the wrong meds (or wrong dosage). If you focus on blame, they try to hide the mistake. If you focus on systemic change, you might look at what happened and decide to color code the medicine. Or do something to distinguish them by shape or size... anything to help make it easier for tired and exhausted nurses to know right away if they've got the right medicine.

So... the blame game is only useful to a certain extent. Or rather, the blame game is never useful, but you do need an honest assessment of mistakes made if you want to prevent them from happening again - so analysis of what went wrong is important. Just... don't tie it to blame.

This is hard, because every time I see someone try changing the narrative, shifting the blame, and obfuscating responsibility when lives are on the line it makes me really, really mad.

I want their feet held to a fire, I want everyone to know that their awful decisions led to the death of their loved ones, and I want them to lose all political support.

But... I know that's the typical in-group vs out-group, outsiders are all the enemy and must be destroyed, type of thinking.

Not helpful.

So I'm focusing mostly on challenging misinformation when it's being spread - if I have the time and energy - but not trying to get people (especially people determined to believe there's nothing wrong) to see what a disaster certain decisions have been.

But... I'm worried. Because I've already seen people doing the 'oh, it's a virus. Nobody can control it, it's like an Act of God' argument. Which completely misses the effect certain decisions have on the spread of said viruses.

I'm also worried because, well...

Fear brings out the worst in people.

Another Public Figure To Reevaluate

It's interesting how current events make me reevaluate public figures.

For example, Ted Cruz seemed like an elitist prick, but he self isolated over COVID-19, and actually acted better than I'd expected.

Tucker Carlson, and his interview (https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/03/tucker-carlson-on-how-he-brought-coronavirus-message-to-mar-a-lago?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=onsite-share&utm_brand=vanity-fair&utm_social-type=earned) is another one.

Still plenty I don't really agree with, but he makes some good points about how populism wouldn't be so appealing if there weren't some pretty big issues that aren't being fixed. 

I get why elites, experts, and the media are viewed with suspicion... I just think it's better to take them with a grain of salt, and not throw what they know out entirely. (and the way people who distrust the media are left vulnerable to disinformation illustrates the danger there.)

Its why I call myself an independent - Democrat or Republican, neither party does a good job of 'shepherding their flock'. 

Update

Work put out an email, seems a couple of coworkers had contact with someone who tested positive for Covid19 - said contact was on the fourth.

No names, ofc, so might not even have been in my building, but suddenly this minor not-even-really-a-cold could more plausibly be a mild version.

Makes me glad I've been 'social distancing'

No idea for sure, ofc. I debated, and finally decided to call the local hospital. I was pretty sure they'd tell me that they weren't going to test, which essentially they did, but I figured I'd at least check and make sure instead of assuming. 

News is - interesting. Trump finally seems to be taking it seriously (and ofc immediately claims he knew it all along, but whatevs).

There are still stories of people dismissing it, or going to crowded public places. 

For the most part, though, it now feels like a waiting game.

Edited to add:

My Little's birthday is this week, and she'd wanted to get together and make some shirts. I wound up calling to explain that I'm sorry, but I don't know think it's a good idea. Especially since she lives with her grandmother. Hopefully we'll be able to do something fun later, to make up for it.

Crappy time for a sweet sixteen. Especially since - although I'm very skeptical - I came across articles saying we might have to lock down for a year! Or more! 

Supply Chain Security

Seems like a very good and worthwhile thread -

https://twitter.com/TProphet/status/1239329139921833985?s=19

Captain's Log - 14032020

I saw something on Twitter asking people to keep a journal - for future historians, I guess. I know they meant a physical one, but it made me think that I ought to do more to capture current events.

My town had our first confirmed case of COVID-19 today, by the way. And our state governor has said that all restaurants and bars will close as of Monday evening.

So... yeah. Still a lot of uncertainty. Or rather, we still have a large group of people that don't really take this seriously, and I think even the ones that do aren't truly ready for it.

Me included.

It's funny. I mean, plagues have been a topic of interest since forever. I have a friend who had been pretty interested in the history of the Black Death. And I can remember reading Albert Camus' book The Plague (though it was so long ago I don't really remember the details.)

Of somewhat more interest, I had downloaded and read part of someone's account of living (in London, I think?) during an outbreak of plague. I forget when, where, and why... but it was interesting reading. I had this idea of people dying left and right, but here's this guy mostly just going about his day. Journaling about parish deaths, about how they suspected it was plague even though the church reported it as something else. He talked about how some of his friends decided to flee the city for their more remote lands. (Something I think was fairly common back then.)

I never expected to be living through anything like this, myself. I know, this isn't technically the plague. It's also not as lethal, so I'm not living in mortal fear of catching it. (For all I know, my slight too-minor-to-even-really-call-it-a-cold symptoms mean I could have it right now. That slight feeling in the throat. The occasional cough I started having this morning. It's not like I'd be able to get a test for it, so it mostly just reinforces how hard it is to take this thing seriously. If it weren't for the current situation, what I have is so minor I probably would be out and about.)

I've read the reports from Italy. More recently, one from a doctor in Seattle. I don't see any reason why we're somehow going to be different.

And yet I still was going to do something with my Little this weekend. Ended up not doing it, thankfully, as I'd begun to have doubts on how wise that would be.

The reports are coming in faster now, but it's not yet to the point where our healthcare system is breaking. Except, perhaps, in Seattle.

The lack of leadership from the federal government means that each state (and city, and county) is handling this their own way. Some states (like mine) are locking things down. Others... aren't.

It'll be interesting to see how much of a difference that makes. Like the article going around, comparing two cities and their differing reactions to the 1918 outbreak.

Still, though, I see the comments on social media.
"Overhyped." "Media driven panic." "Just the flu."

I'm not sure it's worth trying to persuade the ones saying things like this, though I occasionally try. There's a lot of speculation about what it would take to make them reevaluate those claims.

Unfortunately, it probably won't happen unless things as bad a I fear... which is why I keep saying that I hope I'm wrong. Even if it means they continue believing BS.

Time for Another Update

The last day (and really, week) has been surreal.

Concern about the new coranavirus, COVID-19, has grown. Last Tuesday my company declared a sitewide day of working from home, and yesterday they told us all to start working from home.

For a minimum of two weeks.

On the one hand, as the links I've posted before show, I totally get it. I'm also kind of pleased to see my company taking such proactive steps.

On the other hand, despite my analysis of the situation, it still doesn't feel real.

It's March now. The days are getting longer, and despite today's snow the weather is getting nicer. Sprint is normally such a hopeful time. A renewal, of sorts.

And yet there's this big cloud looming over everything.

Even though, so far as I can tell, only three things will prevent the worst (a vaccine, the possibility that warmer weather will slow the spread, and measures like 'social distancing', working from home, cancelling meetings, etc.) so far things are still pretty normal. Well, other than panic buying and a run on toilet paper.

The truth is, I hope I'm wrong. I hope what I expect doesn't happen, and that in a month or two we look back and laugh at our collective foolishness.

I just can't make myself believe that's what's going to happen, though. I don't see any reason why we'll somehow (magically) avoid what has happened in China, or Italy. Not with the slow and modest measures we've taken. Not with so little testing that we have no idea how widespread the problem is. Not with a good third of the population still saying "it's just the flu. You're all overreacting."

I suspect that a lot of things are going to change, soon.

I hope it's not too bad, ofc. Hope the worst fears aren't realized.

Guess I'll find out for myself soon enough.

Coronavirus

This article matches my own analysis almost completely -

https://ryanavent.substack.com/p/difficult-times

And I so very, very badly hope that we're wrong. 

It seems so crazy to think, right now. To see the weather turn nice, people out and about, and feel this looming over us. 

I don't want to accept the conclusion. I want to essentially laugh about all this in another two weeks, or month...

But I also recognize that urge to dismiss things I don't want to hear. 

And right now, not so much because the disease is all that bad, but for the reasons listed here (slow response, little testing, community spread, a system that disincentivizes staying home sick) I think it's going to get bad.

Very, very, bad. 

And worse, unnecessarily so. 

Coronavirus, cont.

I have debated what more to write about coronavirus...

I hope it all blows over. 

Of course I do, I don't want people to suffer. 

But I have no confidence at all in our current leadership. 

They seem more worried about the stock market. And politics. And getting re-elected...

To bring up a religious reference (which I like doing, mostly because they misuse it so much. Not trying to proselytize to anyone, really)... They're not being good shepherds.

A good shepherd would be more concerned about, you know, people's lives, and less about preserving their own power. 

I hope it all blows over, but right now I feel I have to bite my tongue a lot. 

Like, panic seems premature... But I've been following the news on this, and we're seeing community spread, and not near enough testing, and too many people are dismissive for political reasons. The response is being bungled, and we can all see it happening in real time. 

If you choose to look. 

And that's the part that sucks. Because if it does get out of hand, it didn't have to be that way. 

There's an urge to try and scream the alarm, but as with so much of our political world today - you either already get it, or don't want to. 

Besides, maybe I'm being overly concerned. I mean, the gist of what I'm reading is that it's more about trying to slow the spread so hospitals don't get swamped than anything else. I have no idea how bad that could get, and I'm mostly more concerned about supply chain failures. 

Or rather, I don't want people to die unnecessarily and making sure hospitals aren't swamped is the best way of giving everyone the greatest chance of surviving... But most people are only going to get mildly ill, it seems, so the greatest impact on the majority will be the second and third order effects, which are always hard to predict. 

That is, problems that come from activities meant to slow that spread, like quarantines... And consequences of needing medical treatment when facilities are swamped. So supply chain disruption, effects of not having people doing certain tasks, and possible delays in medical treatment if facilities are swamped.

But Idk. I guess we'll all find out soon enough. 

Coronavirus

Lots of stuff going around on the coronavirus, I'm not sure how much I want to add to that. There's a lot we don't know right now. (I do recommend trying to do at least a little preparation, like stocking up on non-perishable items that might come in handy if supplies are unavailable).

I wanted to post instead about what this virus makes crystal clear - which is that the systems and structures we create have a great deal to do with what happens.

For example - when people live paycheck to paycheck, don't have paid time off, can't do their job from home, and have to worry about large out-of-pocket medical expenses (like a large quantity of employees) there are immense incentives to come to work even when sick, and to avoid going to the doctor if it's at all possible.

In other words, such a system is practically tailor made to spread a disease like the coronavirus. 

I saw talk about a similar problem on Twitter - its apparently really, really hard to stock up on your prescription medications.

I do hope things don't get too bad, of course. But as they say - "hope for the best, but plan for the worst"