A Heartbreaking Work of Very Stable Genius
April 27, 2020
“The most common form of despair is not being who you are.”
“There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.”
― Soren Kierkegaard
The Curious Case of COVID-19
Public and private sector researchers are working around the clock to gain information about Covid-19 and its victims; careful vetting of tests and treatments has been suspended in the interest of rapid-fire solutions.
Diagnosing huge numbers of people to find out who’s positive has proved to be an elusive task. Researchers now eagerly await results from serological tests. These are run on a person’s blood for evidence of an immune response to the virus, which can be found in asymptomatic people and those who’ve recovered. These tests would allow insight into the true infection and fatality rates across age groups, and help answer questions about asymptomatic spread and how long antibodies last.
Early serology tests have been performed in Santa Clara County by Stanford researchers and in Los Angeles County by USC researchers. The Stanford results — released Friday before being peer-reviewed — concluded that the coronavirus death rate was roughly comparable to the flu. This gained immediate attention and was widely shared on social media. “The comparison with the flu can be polarizing. I hope that’s not the headline,” said a co-leader of the study. For those who think the pandemic is overblown, that was the headline. USC serosurvey results were released Monday, with different figures but roughly the same conclusions.
Skeptics note numerous flaws in methodology and basic math; concerns are also widespread about testing devices’ reliability, and the accuracy of blood antibody tests. These first results show but a snapshot of the disease progress in each location, meaning uncertainties abound and more time is needed to accumulate clear numbers of exposure and death. There is consensus that more serosurveys are necessary, ideally involving properly validated tests and representative populations.
- “A Wild West of unregulated tests are now proliferating, and our biggest concerns are that they are unreliable, inaccurate and in many cases making fraudulent claims about their testing results.” from Antibody Tests Go To Market Largely Unregulated, Warns House Subcommittee Chair (NPR)
- “But critics said the results, which have already been widely shared, were an example professors could teach to classes to “show how NOT to do statistics.”” from Scientists feud over hyped Stanford coronavirus antibody study: “The authors owe us all an apology” (Salon)
- Can Antibody Tests Help End the Coronavirus Pandemic? (NYT)
- ‘No Evidence’ Yet That Recovered COVID-19 Patients Are Immune, WHO Says (NPR)
Image via Getty Images
Thousands Die In Unreported Silence
- Ecuador’s death toll from Covid-19 is 15 times higher than the government tally, according to a New York Times analysis. That means the outbreak is among the worst in the world and much more serious than many people in the country realize.
- Official death registration data shows about 7,600 more Ecuadorians died from March 1 to April 15 than the average number in recent years. That spike in deaths sharply contrasts with the number of deaths the government attributes to coronavirus: 503 people.
- It’s a dire indication of the damage the virus can do to developing countries where it can quickly overwhelm health care systems, and even the government’s ability to keep count of how many people are falling ill from the disease.
- A surge of infections has occurred in the province that includes Ecuador’s business capital, Guayaquil, where residents are thought to have brought the virus home after visiting Spain. Fatalities in the first two weeks of April were eight times higher than usual. (NYT)
Additional World News
- Crisis in Yemen as Aden separatists declare self-rule (Guardian)
- Dozens of Gay Men Are Outed in Morocco as Photos Are Spread Online (NYT, $)
- Nova Scotia gunman’s first victim was girlfriend, who survived (BBC)
COVID-19
- ‘We did it to ourselves’: scientist says intrusion into nature led to pandemic (Guardian)
- Pressured by China, E.U. Softens Report on Covid-19 Disinformation (NYT)
- World leaders launch plan to speed COVID-19 drugs, vaccine; U.S. stays away (Reuters)
- The first modern pandemic | Bill Gates (GatesNotes)
- Kashmir, Under Siege and Lockdown, Faces a Mental Health Crisis (NYT, $)
- Amid the Coronavirus Crisis, Heart and Stroke Patients Go Missing (NYT) & Vaccine Rates Drop Dangerously as Parents Avoid Doctor’s Visits (NYT) (As I’ve told my kids: now is not the time to be careless and have to go see the doctor. Or as Larry David best said about what he fears most: “Anarchy and a potential dental emergency — and not necessarily in that order.”)
- Special Report: As virus advances, doctors rethink rush to ventilate (Reuters)
- Police in England warn rural vigilantes not to take law into own hands during lockdown (Guardian)
- Greece preparing new tourism rules with EU in wake of coronavirus (Guardian) & Hawaii to Visitors: We’ll Pay You to Leave (NYT)
- As Testing Falters, Brazil Becoming a Coronavirus Hot Spot (Time)
- ‘A Perfect Storm’ in Brazil as Troubles Multiply for Bolsonaro (NYT, $)
- The Pandemic Shows What Cars Have Done to Cities (Atlantic)
- Covid-19 Death Toll: Numbering the Dead (NY Books)
COVID-19 & Money
- ‘Pure Hell for Victims’ as Stimulus Programs Draw a Flood of Scammers (NYT)
- States like Georgia want to reopen. The restaurant and airline collapse shows that’s not easy. (Vox)
- Reopening Has Begun. No One Is Sure What Happens Next. (NYT)
- The Coronavirus Recession Will Rival the Great Depression (Bloomberg, $)
- ‘Scary Time’ for American Middle Class as Office Jobs Disappear (Bloomberg, $)
- Covid-19 has blown apart the myth of Silicon Valley innovation (MIT Technology Review)
Samuel Corum via Getty Images
No Amount Of Disinfectant Can Wash This From The Record
- Public and private polls reveal Republicans are becoming increasingly nervous that President Trump’s erratic handling of the coronavirus outbreak and the worsening economy could cost them both the presidency and the Senate in November’s election.
- New surveys show Trump trailing significantly in battleground states like Michigan and Pennsylvania that he carried in 2016. He’s also narrowly behind in must-win Florida.
- Much of his declining popularity could be attributed to what should be his best advantage as an incumbent — his access to the bully pulpit. For weeks Trump has used his lengthy, daily coronavirus briefings largely as a substitute for campaign rallies. But his combative tone with reporters and wacky, dangerous suggestions for battling the virus — like recent remarks about taking disinfectants and sunlight internally — have inflicted grave damage on his political standing. (NYT)
- Another Curb Your Enthusiasm reference: Dr. Birx goes viral for reaction to Trump’s ‘injection’ comments (NBC News)
- “Really Want to Flood NY and NJ”: Internal Documents Reveal Team Trump’s Chloroquine Master Plan (Vanity Fair)
- Revealed: leader of group peddling bleach as coronavirus ‘cure’ wrote to Trump this week (Guardian)
- Trump’s Disinfectant Remark Raises a Question About the ‘Very Stable Genius’: The president has often said he is exceptionally smart. His recent suggestion about injecting disinfectants was not. (NYT, $)
- Additional quote: “I like the dark part of the night, after midnight and before four-thirty, when it’s hollow, when ceilings are harder and farther away. Then I can breathe, and can think while others are sleeping, in a way can stop time, can have it so – this has always been my dream – so that while everyone else is frozen, I can work busily about them, doing whatever it is that needs to be done, like the elves who make the shoes while children sleep.” ― Dave Eggers, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
Trump’s Finances Raise Major Red Flags: Red Star Over The White House
- The Trump campaign has repeatedly assailed the president’s most likely Democratic challenger in the 2020 election, Joe Biden, as being soft on China. In a press briefing Saturday Trump warned “China will own the United States” if Biden is elected president.
- Trump surrogate Corey Lewandowski dubbed the former vice president “Beijing Biden” in an online campaign event last week. The campaign has also repeatedly highlighted the Bank of China’s role in a $1.5 billion real estate deal announced in 2013 by partners of Biden’s son, Hunter.
- But Trump himself has numerous financial ties with China. In 2012 Trump’s real estate partner refinanced the building at 1290 Avenue of the Americas, better known as Trump Tower, via a deal that included a $211 million loan from the state-owned Bank of China. The loan — the first of its kind in the US — matures in the middle of what could be Trump’s second term.
- Currently Chinese state-owned companies are constructing two luxury Trump developments in United Arab Emirates and Indonesia. The president and his daughter Ivanka, a White House adviser, have both been awarded trademarks by China’s government, and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner has courted Chinese investors in at least one other real estate deal. A member of the House Oversight Committee said of Trump: “He is highly conflicted with respect to China.” (Politico)
- Additional book: Red Star Over China
Additional USA News
- Why the government makes it hard for Americans to get unemployment benefits (Vox)
- These workers lost their jobs to the coronavirus pandemic. Here’s how they are hustling to survive (CNN)
- As Workers Spread Out to Halt the Virus, Robots Fill the Gaps (Wired, $)
- Jobless Numbers Are ‘Eye-Watering’ but Understate the Crisis (NYT, $)
- Why Mitch McConnell Wants States to Go Bankrupt (Atlantic, $)
- Congress can’t rebuild US infrastructure until America rebuilds Congress (Vox)
- Opinion | Coronavirus is invading Red America, new data show. That’s ominous for Trump. (WaPo, $)
- Stephen Miller has long-term vision for Trump’s ‘temporary’ immigration order, according to private call with supporters (WaPo, $)
- New HHS spokesman made racist comments about Chinese people in now-deleted tweets (CNN)
- Senate Intel report confirms Russia aimed to help Trump in 2016 (Politico)
- ICE Detention Centers Approved in California Farm Town (NYT, $)
A Different Kind Of NSFW
- The office, as we know it, may be changed forever. Work from home is the new normal for millions of white-collar office employees. But discussions are ongoing among business leaders and management strategists about what steps must be taken to bring workers back to America’s offices. “The whole return-to-work thing presents so many different challenges,” said David Lewis, CEO of a human resources consulting firm.
- Some involve retrofitting the workplace. Others involve judgment calls — from deciding about temperature checks and contact tracing to social distancing rules, workplace layouts, tweaking HVAC systems, monitoring school shutdowns and openings, adjusting work shifts and more.
- Masked office workers might start each workday with a temperature check; they could be assigned to staggered shifts to reduce density in the office. Coffee breaks might become hand-washing breaks, while four-seat breakroom tables might be converted to single seats. The water cooler could be off-limits for office gossip. And corridors where co-workers normally congregate and chat may become one-way traffic zones where employees pass briskly to limit face-to-face interactions. (NPR)
Pnut Laughs
My kids are growing up thinking that when they leave the house they are required to look like a bank robber or Bane, the Batman supervillain: Adding A Nylon Stocking Layer Could Boost Protection From Cloth Masks, Study Finds (NPR) I don’t know if to cry or to laugh so I’ll laugh. However, I don’t know if I can laugh away global warming and the effects that will have on their generation. Additional painting: The Lovers II by René Magritte.
