…The camp implemented several precautionary measures against the virus, but stopped short of requiring campers to wear masks. The virus blazed through the community of about 600 campers and counselors, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported on Friday.
The staff and counselors gathered at the overnight camp in late June. Within a week of the camp orientation, a teenage counselor developed chills and went home.
The camp, which the C.D.C. did not name, started sending campers home the next day, and shut down a few days later. By then, 76 percent of the 344 campers and staffers whose test results were available to C.D.C. researchers had been infected with the virus — nearly half the camp.
…Of the 344 campers and staff for whom test results were available, 260 tested positive. Of children ages 6 to 10, over half were infected; 44 percent of those ages 11 to 17 were infected, as were one-third of those ages 18 to 21. Only seven staffers were older than 22, and two of them tested positive.
…
17,758,802 total cases
682,999 dead
11,161,510 recovered
In the US:
4,705,889 total cases
156,747 dead
2,327,572 recovered
Yesterday’s numbers for comparison:
By the end of tomorrow, there will be over 18,000,000 total cases worldwide. We are adding over 250,000 per day now, so every four days is over 1,000,000 new cases.
Unless things change radically for the better, by mid-September there will be over 1,000,000 dead from Covid-19 (47-53 days from today, I figure). By then, there may be over 30,000,000 total cases worldwide.
First, the punch line:
… [Texas Renaissance Festival Marketing Manager Marlena Solomon] added that in anticipation of capacity limitations that could be issued closer to October, the festival grounds will be limited to 22,500 guests per day.
The Festival runs for about 60 days, from Oct 3 through Nov 29.
Here’s the beginning of the article:
… .Houston Chronicle. The 46th Annual Texas Renaissance Festival will go on as scheduled this year, but things will look a little different due to the pandemic.
Beginning Saturday, Aug. 1, tickets will be available for the 2020 festival, which starts Oct. 3 and runs through Nov. 29. Tickets will be date-specific, sold in advance online only and will not be available at the gate, according to the festival website. …
The most visible change at the nine-week-long festival is that all staff, performers and vendors will be required to wear a face-covering and receive daily temperature checks before each shift, according to a press release.
If a statewide mask order is in place at the time of the festival, patrons will also be required to wear face masks. If no state order is in place, patrons will not be required but “strongly encouraged to do so.”
…
Maybe Greg Abbott will change his mind about the masks if several thousand more people have died by then. Maybe not.
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the nasal excretions of patriots in support of tyrants.
Though, like most Ren Faires, they’re only open on weekends. (I still think it’s a terrible idea to open it, but I wanted to clarify.)
You are so right. So there won’t be 20K+ people there every day. But the staff and many of the performers and vendors do live there the whole time. Hey! They can act out the Black Death for reals, amirite? 
It’s okay, CV-19 only takes out Hispanics and the elderly.
She died from COVID- trigged multisystem inflammatory syndrome, that scary thing initially documented in children.
Welcome to the Texas Chapter of the Covid-19 Suicide Cult.
For anyone who was thinking that Europeans have their shit more together than we do in the USA.
…Protesters who came from across the country held up homemade signs with slogans like “Corona, false alarm,” “We are being forced to wear a muzzle,” “Natural defense instead of vaccination” and “We are the second wave.”
They chanted, “We’re here and we’re loud, because we are being robbed of our freedom!”
…
That’s something we haven’t tried. At an appointed, agreed-upon time (adjusted for time zones, so it will be simultaneous all over the country), everybody in the US should step out into the street and shout at the top of their lungs, “The pandemic is over!” Maybe just do it five times for good measure.
That should take care of it. <Dusts off hands>
Maybe they’re re-enacting the plague.
If they want to be authentic, they should require plague masks.
That reminds me of the scene in Fahrenheit 451 where the entire population were ordered onto their porches to look for Montag. They did not catch him.
Re-enact the classic Monty Python:
Fast COVID testing:
Normal PCR testing is slow, because the amplification stage is slow. This is using direct detection. There is another direct-detection method (antigen testing), but that is, I think, a kind of blood test. This is a spit/swab test.
Related: spit tests are being trialed in the UK and in AUS (and probably in other places). Spit tests are less accurate, partly because they aren’t done by trained personal (for a better test, you should snuffle from your nose, clear your throat, then spit). But they have the advantage that they don’t require trained personal. Up until now, test rates have been limited by the availability of test kits and PCR machines, so there has been no point in using a less accurate test on more people. If more PCR capacity become available, getting everybody to do spit tests all the time becomes reasonable, and even more so if the results can be turned around in an hour.
18,013,236 total cases
688,722 dead
11,326,433 recovered
In the US:
4,764,318 total cases
157,898 dead
2,362,903 recovered
Yesterday’s numbers for comparison:
So–running cruise ships again was just an excellent idea.
That is not a vacation; that is a cognitive exam.
Nobody involved passed.
“Hurtigruten”? Sounds like something the Swedish Chef would say…