# Coronavirus COVID-19 (2019-nCoV) Thread - 2020 Breaking News **URL:** \ **Category:** The Quarantine Zone\ **Tags:** covid-quarantine\ **Created:** [February 11, 2020, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758 "2020-02-11T01:16:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 96
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2020, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1903 "2020-04-03T18:20:44Z")
Federal agents seized over a million hoarded medical supplies from a guy in Brooklyn who was selling them at highly marked up prices. > **[Medical supplies seized from alleged price gouger to be distributed to hospitals](https://abcnews.go.com/amp/Politics/medical-supplies-seized-alleged-price-gouger-distributed-hospitals/story?id=69938363)** > > Hundreds of thousands of masks and other pieces of medical equipment seized from a Brooklyn man will be distributed to medical workers treating coronavirus patients. ---
**Author:** ![El\_Kabong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/el_kabong/32/496_2.png) [@El\_Kabong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Kabong)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2020, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1904 "2020-04-03T18:46:31Z")
It’s generally assumed that not all countries are accurately reporting COVID-19 related deaths, but anecdotal evidence from Ecuador strongly suggests they most likely are being wildly underreported. Worldometer, as of this afternoon, shows 145 deaths out of 3368 cases for Ecuador, yet several media outlets are reporting [bodies piling up in the streets](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ecuador-bodies-streets-guayaquil-coronavirus-covid-19/) as hundreds of people die at home. The cited article suggest the total in the past few days is more than 400 just for Guayaquil alone. The excuse being made here apparently is that most of these have not had testing done to confirm whether or not COVID-19 was the actual cause. ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2020, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1905 "2020-04-03T18:53:29Z")
Today in Austria: [ul] [li] Parliament’s lower house has passed a third coronavirus aid package, increasing the overall crisis management fund from €4 billion to €28 billion. The upper house is expected to approve it tomorrow. In addition to the provisions I mentioned yesterday, it provides for:[/li][list] [li] An extra €30 million to help low-income families in need.[/li][li] €2 billion more for companies and self-employed workers, particularly in the agricultural sector.[/li][li] Various tweaks to tax and labour law to make sure that health professionals who work, or who delay or come out of retirement, during the crisis are not economically disadvantaged.[/li][li] A waiver for alcohol tax for the production of disinfectants.[/li][li] Reform of occupational health and safety laws to make sure that home-office workers are covered by statutory accident insurance, retroactively to the start of the crisis.[/li][li] An extension of the government’s previous grant of three weeks’ special leave to all workers who need to care for their children so that it now also covers workers who need to care for other relatives.[/li][li] An extension to the maximum contract length for seasonal agricultural workers, and the possibility for such workers, if they are here on work visas, to extend these visas.[/li][li] An extension to the statutory deadline for contesting dismissals from work.[/li][li] A halt on payment of dividends, and restrictions on payments of bonuses to managers of large companies.[/li][li] A moratorium on the repayment of loans. It’s not yet clear to me whether this includes credit card debt.[/li][/ul] [li] The Chamber of Commerce and Ministry of Health have agreed to ease one major restriction on restaurants: it’s now permitted to pick up food orders yourself rather than having them delivered. Eating on or near the premises is still prohibited. Good news, I suppose, for the city’s many sausage and döner stands, though pedestrian traffic is so low these days that I’m not sure they will reopen soon.[/li][li] Hospitals are reporting a marked increase in treatments for injuries sustained at home, including scalding, burns, and entire separation of limbs. They attribute this to an increase in cooking, repair work, and home improvement by people self-isolating at home.[/li][li] Regarding the declaration indirectly condemning the power grab in Hungary that certain EU states signed yesterday, it turns out that Austria refused to sign it because the declaration didn’t go far enough. (In particular, the declaration didn’t even mention Hungary by name.) The Austrian government has proposed its own statement calling on Hungary to immediately rescind its emergency laws and calling on the EU to institute financial sanctions on Hungary.[/li][li] Current statistics: 11,383 confirmed infections, 168 deaths, 2022 recovered.[/li][/list] ---
**Author:** ![Hermitian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hermitian/32/470_2.png) [@Hermitian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hermitian)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2020, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1906 "2020-04-03T19:23:45Z")
One thing that has been a bit surprising to me is that Italy’s lockdown began almost 4 weeks ago and their number of new cases has dropped, but not by that much. I would have expected to see more of a cliff. See daily new cases: [https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/](https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/) I suppose what would better explain this is that early on and during the peak, those numbers were artificially low due to testing limitations and that the current numbers better represent reality? So if you could actually see reality, there would be more of a reduction? ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2020, 7:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1907 "2020-04-03T19:30:56Z")
> [@Hermitian](#): > > One thing that has been a bit surprising to me is that Italy’s lockdown began almost 4 weeks ago and their number of new cases has dropped, but not by that much. I would have expected to see more of a cliff. > > See daily new cases: [https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/](https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/) > … IMHO a couple reasons based upon what a friend of mine in Italy told me- they arent taking the lock down seriously. Altho masks are worn, not properly, and they take them off to smoke, etc. Many italians smoke The population there is fairly old. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2020, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1908 "2020-04-03T21:02:46Z")
[CNN’s Brooke Baldwin has tested positive for Covid-19](https://apnews.com/1091c428cec639cd83cbd8ea1e4ea079). ---
**Author:** ![bobot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobot/32/21622_2.png) [@bobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bobot)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2020, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1909 "2020-04-03T21:22:56Z")
In my county, Will, in Illinois, the Will County Health Department has just announced that there are 15 new cases… in the Will County Health Department. There are 400ish confirmed in my county of many farms and also a few cities. Illinois had 4000 or so yesterday and 8000 or so today. I still don’t have it, yet. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1910 "2020-04-04T00:55:04Z")
> [@Ike\_Witt](#): > > [Trump orders medical supply firm 3M to stop selling N95 respirators to Canada](https://globalnews.ca/news/6772979/coronavirus-3m-n95-respirators-trump-canada/). > > FTR, I heard last night, Ontario would need something like 9 million masks for a month (or was it a week?). > > I don’t really know how long 2 billion masks would last if they were available now - I’m guessing 12 months from now is too late to really make a difference. I think a protocol, to ensure that the masks can be safely cleaned and reused, needs to be a priority because new masks will not be coming in sufficient numbers anytime soon. I think part of the problem here is the medical field has gone far too long on its reliance on one time use, then throw away, PPE equipment. The thought I guess was their would always be more in the supply cabinet. Thing is each nurse or doctor can go thru several gowns and masks a day. It was a disaster waiting to happen. We should have been developing some method of reuse and sanitizing. This one has really come back to bite us. ---
**Author:** ![bobot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobot/32/21622_2.png) [@bobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bobot)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1911 "2020-04-04T00:59:52Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > I think part of the problem here is the medical field has gone far too long on its reliance on one time use, then throw away, PPE equipment. The thought I guess was their would always be more in the supply cabinet. > > … Really? Really for real really? ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1912 "2020-04-04T01:00:32Z")
New Jersey police ordered to commandeer needed medical supplies.[LINK](https://newyork.cbslocal.com/2020/04/02/coronavirus-nj-gov-orders-state-police-to-commandeer-needed-medical-supplies/) ---
**Author:** ![Chingon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chingon/32/17645_2.png) [@Chingon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chingon)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1913 "2020-04-04T01:34:58Z")
> [@bobot](#): > > Really? Really for real really? You guys keep feeding him. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1914 "2020-04-04T02:00:27Z")
Cuomo has ordered the New York National Guard to raid hospitals that are hoarding equipment to distribute it to places that need it. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 2:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1915 "2020-04-04T02:25:49Z")
When the San Francisco Bay Area issued that shelter-in-place order a few weeks ago, someone in one of these threads asked what was being done to address the homeless population. Here is another recent article on that, focusing on the City of San Francisco: [San Francisco has the authority, vacancies, and funds to house homeless people in hotels](https://www.sfexaminer.com/opinion/san-francisco-has-the-authority-vacancies-and-funds-to-house-homeless-people-in-hotels/), _San Francisco Examiner_, March 31, 2020. The gist of the article is that S.F. has thousands of vacant hotel rooms, and the legal emergency authority and funds to commandeer those to house homeless people (and also infected medical personnel who can’t return home to their families). Thousands of hotel rooms have been offered to the city for this, but many more thousands of rooms are vacant and are needed. The article also criticizes the city for developing plans to shelter only those homeless people who are diagnoses with covid-19, arguing that this will just create an explosion of cases down the road. They should instead be housing all homeless people. ---
**Author:** ![madsircool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madsircool/32/3432_2.png) [@madsircool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madsircool)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1916 "2020-04-04T02:34:27Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > When the San Francisco Bay Area issued that shelter-in-place order a few weeks ago, someone in one of these threads asked what was being done to address the homeless population. Here is another recent article on that, focusing on the City of San Francisco: > > [San Francisco has the authority, vacancies, and funds to house homeless people in hotels](https://www.sfexaminer.com/opinion/san-francisco-has-the-authority-vacancies-and-funds-to-house-homeless-people-in-hotels/), _San Francisco Examiner_, March 31, 2020. > > The gist of the article is that S.F. has thousands of vacant hotel rooms, and the legal emergency authority and funds to commandeer those to house homeless people (and also infected medical personnel who can’t return home to their families). Thousands of hotel rooms have been offered to the city for this, but many more thousands of rooms are vacant and are needed. > > The article also criticizes the city for developing plans to shelter only those homeless people who are diagnoses with covid-19, arguing that this will just create an explosion of cases down the road. They should instead be housing all homeless people. And who is going to police them to insure social distancing? Who is going to insure they dont become drug and alcohol dens? Who is going to pay for the damages and stolen goods? Its probably safer to give them small tents and a safe place to camp. ---
**Author:** ![Urbanredneck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ea5d25/32.png) [@Urbanredneck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Urbanredneck)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1917 "2020-04-04T02:36:23Z")
> [@bobot](#): > > Really? Really for real really? Always such a productive comment. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1918 "2020-04-04T02:38:32Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > I think part of the problem here is the medical field has gone far too long on its reliance on one time use, then throw away, PPE equipment. The thought I guess was their would always be more in the supply cabinet. > > Thing is each nurse or doctor can go thru several gowns and masks a day. It was a disaster waiting to happen. We should have been developing some method of reuse and sanitizing. > > This one has really come back to bite us. In all seriousness, did your health class in middle school cover disease transmission? I seem to remember getting that bit of knowledge in elementary school, middle school, and even in the one food science class I took at university. Do you really want your nurses, anesthesiologists, and surgeons to be wearing the same PPE as they wore in a number of surgeries prior to operating on you? That would kind of negate the whole washing the hands up to the elbows bit before the surgery wouldn’t it? Oh, I forgot. Soap would have been in that cabinet, too, right? ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1919 "2020-04-04T02:47:08Z")
> [@Hermitian](#): > > One thing that has been a bit surprising to me is that Italy’s lockdown began almost 4 weeks ago and their number of new cases has dropped, but not by that much. I would have expected to see more of a cliff. > > See daily new cases: [https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/](https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/italy/) > > I suppose what would better explain this is that early on and during the peak, those numbers were artificially low due to testing limitations and that the current numbers better represent reality? So if you could actually see reality, there would be more of a reduction? The effect of the lockdown appears to have been to stop the increase in cases. So it may have taken the R0 down from 3 or 2 or whatever it was to 1.001 … but not actually \*under \* 1 Whether they could manage to shift it just that little bit further by being even more strict about isolation, I don’t know. There’s a certain amount of inevitable contagion possibilities from people going shopping for groceries and medicine, and in hospitals. But where they are at the moment, although they’re getting the same (-ish) number of new cases each day, it’s still more than the number of new recoveries each day, so the number of active cases is still increasing … and that means more opportunities for infection from active cases. ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1920 "2020-04-04T03:03:02Z")
> [@madsircool](#): > > And who is going to police them to insure social distancing? > Who is going to insure they dont become drug and alcohol dens? > Who is going to pay for the damages and stolen goods? > Its probably safer to give them small tents and a safe place to camp. Article doesn’t really address any of that, of course. But I did notice two maybe-sort-of-relevant hints. First, it mentions that some means will be needed to get food and medicine to all those people. Reading between the lines, this suggests that there will be some kind of social workers making the rounds there. Whatever that can accomplish towards addressing these problems. Second, the article did note that some homeless people will be more successful in living in hotel rooms (as opposed to living on the streets) than others. People who have lost their jobs or otherwise have recently become homeless should be better able to adjust to hotel living. The (unstated) implication is that the truly long-term feral homeless people probably wouldn’t do well in hotels. ---
**Author:** ![Eva\_Luna](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/e495f1/32.png) [@Eva\_Luna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eva_Luna)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1921 "2020-04-04T03:23:05Z")
> [@Eva\_Luna](#): > > Definitely in the U.S. too. I am on a bunch of cooking Facebook pages, and everyone is looking for yeast…[snip] People also reporting lots of shortages of bread, flour, and other baking supplies. And I definitely wasn’t imagining it - [yeast purchases are up by A LOT, even more than disinfectants?our](https://www.npr.org/2020/04/03/826939405/whaddaya-knead-yeast-and-baking-powder-top-americas-shopping-lists?utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&fbclid=IwAR3tuiI4INOtbWdJXHLTIR_LagS__T8iDg69GWlmTnu1XvLGEq7iNz0NVuE) But razors are down, which isn’t surprising if you think about it for half a second. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [April 4, 2020, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758/1922 "2020-04-04T03:23:43Z")
Not to mention that hotels already have security protocols in place. After all, it’s not just some random homeless folks who have been trashing hotels through the years. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758.md?page=95) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/coronavirus-covid-19-2019-ncov-thread-2020-breaking-news/847758.md?page=97)