Day 8: Friday
I've missed two days, and have an excuse for one of them.
On Wednesday afternoon my second son came home, and I realised that I had been a little bit anxious. I hadn't seriously doubted that he would be all right in the end, but the way home might have been difficult. In the end it was easy; the aircraft had plenty of empty seats and even the baggage claim was not crowded. His suitcases were also heavy, especially as his roommate had departed in a great hurry and left some things behind. There was some hand sanitiser and a box of disinfectant wipes left in his room (?), and he had the sense to bring them home.
First son cooked a celebratory salmon for us while I finished work. We stayed up some time after that, while his brother related what a stressful week it had been.
The numbers from China aren't final (nothing is), but they report no new infections, a total of nearly 81,000, and over 3,200 deaths, with 70,000 recoveries. That ratio is not reassuring, especially from a technologically advanced country, and Italy is even worse. I think I'll wash my hands more often, and use those wipes on hard surfaces that we touch often, mostly handles of one sort and another. For many controls, and for doors, there are ways to use a clothed elbow or shoulder or foot instead of a hand, or at least to use a knuckle rather than a fingertip. It's a game of numbers, flattening the curve by reducing the probability of transmission. Yes: I can and do see myself as part of a statistical aggregate that can perform better or worse, on top of being a person who can fall ill and will eventually die. When I was a child, I played in a lot of team sports; my parents sent me to that sort of a school (I suspect most English schools emphasised sports, and most of those were team sports, but don't quote me).
On Thursday, I think, Governor Newsom announced "shelter in place" for the entire state. Quite how this will be interpreted in remote rural areas is a bit of a puzzle, but for the cities and suburbs it should help. My wife listened to the press conference, and describes a vivid contrast between the Governor's fact-packed speech and the one earlier (I think) by the President. The numbers, when compared with China, make quite a contrast: we expect 30% or more of the state to be infected, whereas less than 1% of Wuhan was. I'm not going to draw any sweeping conclusions, not in this blog, but when the corpses are counted, there will be some conclusions drawn. On the optimistic side (!), a Chinese colleague of mine says that 4% fatality rate reflects the breakdown of the medical system in Wuhan, and that the rate in the rest of China was under 1%.
Thursday's dinner was that stew I made on Monday, and it went down well.
Today, I got up and did the usual exercise routine (which I had not skipped on Wednesday or Thursday, in case you wonder). I took a look at my investments ... they're not in good health, but trying to sell into a declining market (that could turn round) is a game I won't try to win. The boys got up earlier than I had expected. Work was rather quiet, and in late afternoon I went outside to weed the garden. Quite a number of people came by with their small children -- it's a lovely afternoon.
Still no new cases in China; much wailing and gnashing of teeth about the shortage of test kits in the West. A preprint (i.e. not a reviewed article) from China claims that the test they've been using has a large fraction of false positive results. So that reduced fatality rate is 1% of what? The apparent decline in number of new cases in this county is also questionable. The UK gov't's plan seem to have been based on a misguided belief that the course of the outbreak could be predicted with anything like accuracy.
There is now speculation about how politics, economies, and in fact nearly everything could change in the wake of the pandemic. Obviously there is some motivated reasoning but also a good deal of sense. I don't think any sane person disagrees that far-flung, fragile supply chains will be so last year. Personally, I hope to devise a way to hold my next discussion group (the 29th) online.
On Wednesday afternoon my second son came home, and I realised that I had been a little bit anxious. I hadn't seriously doubted that he would be all right in the end, but the way home might have been difficult. In the end it was easy; the aircraft had plenty of empty seats and even the baggage claim was not crowded. His suitcases were also heavy, especially as his roommate had departed in a great hurry and left some things behind. There was some hand sanitiser and a box of disinfectant wipes left in his room (?), and he had the sense to bring them home.
First son cooked a celebratory salmon for us while I finished work. We stayed up some time after that, while his brother related what a stressful week it had been.
The numbers from China aren't final (nothing is), but they report no new infections, a total of nearly 81,000, and over 3,200 deaths, with 70,000 recoveries. That ratio is not reassuring, especially from a technologically advanced country, and Italy is even worse. I think I'll wash my hands more often, and use those wipes on hard surfaces that we touch often, mostly handles of one sort and another. For many controls, and for doors, there are ways to use a clothed elbow or shoulder or foot instead of a hand, or at least to use a knuckle rather than a fingertip. It's a game of numbers, flattening the curve by reducing the probability of transmission. Yes: I can and do see myself as part of a statistical aggregate that can perform better or worse, on top of being a person who can fall ill and will eventually die. When I was a child, I played in a lot of team sports; my parents sent me to that sort of a school (I suspect most English schools emphasised sports, and most of those were team sports, but don't quote me).
On Thursday, I think, Governor Newsom announced "shelter in place" for the entire state. Quite how this will be interpreted in remote rural areas is a bit of a puzzle, but for the cities and suburbs it should help. My wife listened to the press conference, and describes a vivid contrast between the Governor's fact-packed speech and the one earlier (I think) by the President. The numbers, when compared with China, make quite a contrast: we expect 30% or more of the state to be infected, whereas less than 1% of Wuhan was. I'm not going to draw any sweeping conclusions, not in this blog, but when the corpses are counted, there will be some conclusions drawn. On the optimistic side (!), a Chinese colleague of mine says that 4% fatality rate reflects the breakdown of the medical system in Wuhan, and that the rate in the rest of China was under 1%.
Thursday's dinner was that stew I made on Monday, and it went down well.
Today, I got up and did the usual exercise routine (which I had not skipped on Wednesday or Thursday, in case you wonder). I took a look at my investments ... they're not in good health, but trying to sell into a declining market (that could turn round) is a game I won't try to win. The boys got up earlier than I had expected. Work was rather quiet, and in late afternoon I went outside to weed the garden. Quite a number of people came by with their small children -- it's a lovely afternoon.
Still no new cases in China; much wailing and gnashing of teeth about the shortage of test kits in the West. A preprint (i.e. not a reviewed article) from China claims that the test they've been using has a large fraction of false positive results. So that reduced fatality rate is 1% of what? The apparent decline in number of new cases in this county is also questionable. The UK gov't's plan seem to have been based on a misguided belief that the course of the outbreak could be predicted with anything like accuracy.
There is now speculation about how politics, economies, and in fact nearly everything could change in the wake of the pandemic. Obviously there is some motivated reasoning but also a good deal of sense. I don't think any sane person disagrees that far-flung, fragile supply chains will be so last year. Personally, I hope to devise a way to hold my next discussion group (the 29th) online.
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