Category Archives: pandemic

Health Officials Recommended Canceling Events with 10-50… — ProPublica

As COVID-19 fears grew, public officials and sports execs contemplated health risks — and debated a PR message — but let 33,000 fans into a Seattle…

Source: Health Officials Recommended Canceling Events with 10-50… — ProPublica

Despite concerns about the new coronavirus, more than 33,000 fans attended the Seattle Sounders soccer match on March 7, 2020, at CenturyLink Field. (Lindsey Wasson/Sounders FC Communications)

In Italy, a Feb. 19 soccer match, later dubbed “Game Zero” and described by a respiratory specialist as a “biological bomb,” has been cited as a possible reason that one province became an epicenter of the pandemic.

But that match was played before the country’s first confirmed case of locally transmitted COVID-19. In Washington, community spread had been recognized at least a week before the Sounders match. The governor declared a state of emergency on Feb. 29, the King County executive on March 1.

On the evening of March 7, a Saturday, hundreds gathered in Occidental Park for their traditional March to the Match. They stood shoulder to shoulder and marched three blocks down Occidental Avenue to CenturyLink Field.

Wuhan Virology Lab Deputy Director Again Slams Coronavirus Conspiracies

Wuhan Virology Lab Deputy Director Again Slams Coronavirus Conspiracies – Shi Zhengli disputes unsubstantiated claims of a link between the high-security research facility at the Wuhan Virology Institute and the deadly virus

Source: Wuhan Virology Lab Deputy Director Again Slams Coronavirus Conspiracies

Coronavirus Advice From Abroad: 7 Lessons America’s… — ProPublica

To help you and your aides think about this decision over the next few weeks, we’ve interviewed experts and frontline officials from Italy, Germany, Spain, Singapore, Taiwan and South Korea. While they differ on the details, their views formed a startlingly united consensus of what’s needed: Massive, ongoing testing to detect where the disease is spreading, a real-time ability to trace contacts of those infected and isolate them, a willingness of people to wear masks in crowded public spaces, reserves of personal protective equipment (PPE) and other equipment for hospital workers to handle any surge in cases, and reliable, easily administered blood tests to find out the number of people who have been infected. If they work well, such tests could eventually be used to identify people with immunity who could work at higher-risk jobs.

Source: Coronavirus Advice From Abroad: 7 Lessons America’s… — ProPublica

Thousands of Americans backed by rightwing donors gear up for protests | US news | The Guardian – willing to kill and kill more – sedition.

The two groups behind the “operation gridlock” rally in Michigan on Wednesday have ties to the Republican party and the Trump administration. The Michigan Freedom Fund, which said it was a co-host of the rally, has received more than $500,000 from the DeVos family, regular donors to rightwing groups. The other host, the Michigan Conservative Coalition, was founded by Matt Maddock, now a Republican member of the state house of representatives. The MCC also operates under the name Michigan Trump Republicans, and in January held an event featuring several members of the Trump campaign.

Source: Thousands of Americans backed by rightwing donors gear up for protests | US news | The Guardian

Federalism has become another casualty of Trump and the coronavirus | Andrew Gawthorpe | Opinion | The Guardian

The particular way that Trump exercises power has also contributed to the reaction of governors from both parties. Trump has made clear that he will dole out federal largesse according to political loyalty, even preventing Colorado’s Democratic-led government from purchasing ventilators on the open market and later sending a hundred units “at the request” of the state’s Republican senator, who is facing a tough re-election battle. The message is clear: Democratic governors need to help themselves, because Trump sure won’t. And Republican governors need to stick close to a president who sees himself as his party’s feudal patron rather than the leader of the entire nation. The result has been an inversion of what the Founders intended, with some states slavishly following federal dictate in flagrant disregard of local needs, and others hung out to dry as a national crisis looms and Washington does little to shepherd a national response. Democratic governors cannot rely on the president to protect the lives of their citizens, and Republican governors find themselves acting more as the lackeys of a monarch than representatives of the interests of their states. Taken together, these de

Source: Federalism has become another casualty of Trump and the coronavirus | Andrew Gawthorpe | Opinion | The Guardian

White House touts coronavirus testing capacity in face of criticism – Reuters

The White House on Friday rejected criticism that the country has not ramped up its testing capacity enough to begin safely reopening state economies shuttered to slow the spread of the deadly coronavirus.
— Read on www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-pence-testing/white-house-touts-coronavirus-testing-capacity-in-face-of-criticism-idUSKBN21Z3FW

Ireland to test 100,000 a week – when can we do that a day?