Coronavirus prep

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  • SModa61
    SModa61 Posts: 2,853 Member
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    kimny72 wrote: »
    I don't understand why the vaccine rollout is so terrible. Sounds like some places have extra doses while other places don't have enough. I feel like the phased approach is holding things back in places with extra doses. Those places where they have enough vaccine, but can't give it to anyone because they haven't been told to go on to the next phase yet. Someone needs to take inventory and just get these shots to people. Maybe deploy the national guards and train them to give injections. 100K soildiers working 12 hrs per day would have these vaccines done much sooner. Only question is supply to do that.

    Just my opinion but I think the problem is this needed to be organized from the top down and it wasn't. And I'd bet some states assumed it would be and we're caught unprepared when it wasn't.

    The doctor who gives updates on This Week in Virology works at one of the larger NYC hospitals (I forget which one). He said they were notified back in Nov that they were on the list to get a certain amount of vials for staff vaccinations. So they put a plan together and waited to get more info on timing. And waited. And then 1200 doses of vaccine just showed up on their loading dock one Tues morning in Jan. They had to scramble to look at staff schedules and dept occupancy to come up with a schedule right there on the spot. Luckily they were well organized and they banged out the jabs, but a less well prepared organization might not have been ready.

    I agree,they need to get creative getting in trained personnel to administer the shots and less picky about who their giving them to.

    (This is not a disagreement, rather more just quoting you to continue this subtopic.)

    I agree that some level of central coordination is missing, but I also think that fully-centralized planning might not be ideal, for two general reasons. (BTW, I recognize that I'm oversimplifying, as I go on with this thought.)

    One is that some localities have handled the distribution so far pretty well (within the constraints of supply and such), while others have not. Where would a fully-centralized plan fall on the effectiveness scale? I feel like many people saying "we ought to have a strong central plan" are assuming it would be a *good* plan. Well, maybe. It's challenging to make a good plan, quickly, for a novel situation; and the larger the scale, the harder it gets, IMO.

    The other is that I think more localized governmental entities have a better handle on local constraints and conditions. What will work well for spread-out rural populations with limited big hospitals is probably different than what works in a dense major city with similarly scaled big health-care facilities, for example.

    Now, in reality, it's possible to have central coordination to some degree, with local flexibility within that framework. There's no question in my mind that the federal piece of this, in the US, has been handled poorly.

    The novelty of the situation is very relevant. We don't have some planning luxuries we might in a less urgent scenario.

    I think one of the strengths of the US's multi-tier governmental systems, as a generality, is this: When different approaches to solving problems are tried in different localities, we have an opportunity to review the results, and learn from the best models, over time. In the current situation, the novelty of the needs, and the urgency of getting solutions, isn't really benefiting from that idea of trying multiple approaches in different places and comparing results.

    No one has a moment's time to do a lot of consulting with peers in different localities, as might be the norm in less urgent situations. (That sort of consultation is one of the things that professional associations, etc., are useful for, in many situations. In my professional life, if we needed to do new-thing X, we'd be talking with other similar organizations to see who'd done X, and learning from their experience. This train is just rolling faster than that, at the moment; and no one's done this before. We haven't had time for "pilot projects".) I assume more of that review/consultation/adjustment will happen, over time, since this crisis/process will be going on for a while.

    There's a tendency amongst the public, I think, to expect things to work well right out of the gate (they pretty much never do, IME, but the stakes aren't usually this high, or the results this visible). In other situations new processes sometimes look to the general public like they work well at the start, because trials/pilots were not very well publicized, but were helpful in working out kinks before going full-scale. (In a way, this is similar to the way some people saw the learning process by scientists early on, with findings and results changing the experts' minds, as flip-flopping or wishy-washiness.)

    There's also a tendency to believe that a strong central authority (like a national pandemic czar) and strict authority structures with rigid rules are going to be the best way to get things done. I think that's mostly not true, either.

    I keep reminding myself that all (well, most) of the health systems, governmental entities, etc., are just collections of regular people like me, doing the best they can in these difficult circumstances, and that in most cases they're aware of factors and considerations that I as a non-specialist have no expertise about. It's always pretty easy to second-guess how someone else should be doing a job I'd have no idea how to do myself, if I were challenged to try. 😆

    I agree with this post. I used to think government coordination would have stopped this thing, and it might have had a plan been ready for this type of disaster. I remember as a kid in school being told what we would do if there were an atomic attack (this in rural Minnesota). We also had fire drills. There used to be the idea of prevention and a plan--preparedness. The federal government would have had to have centers, and stockpiles, and dry runs at every level to make it work.

    Once COVID hit it was too late. In Italy we're under central government control and COVID is still here and going strong. The regions do not like the government mandates and either issue stricter controls or want more opening. This is a much smaller country than the US.

    As Ann said, we can just do our best as citizens, and it's just not easy to understand what it takes to get everything moving.

    I remember this too, suburban Minneapolis, elementary school. We crouched down in the halls covering our heads with our arms during drills 😳 They also talked about loading us into boxcars to get us away from the city. Wouldn’t fly today. No school psychologists then. This was during the Cuban missile crisis.

    There’s definitely no easy solution to covid. It would be nice if everyone took this seriously, and did the basics that slow down the spread. One young girl interviewed the other day about holiday partying, traveling, and socializing, said she has to live her life, and have fun🤷🏻‍♀️

    I remember practicing going under our desks, like that was really going to make a difference. This was likely early 1970's given the classroom I am picturing in my mind? Am I hallucinating? I have no idea what we would have been hiding from.
  • lokihen
    lokihen Posts: 382 Member
    Are students never held back a grade anymore? It wasn't uncommon when I was young. I even remember a set of twins being split up that way just so they wouldn't be in the same classes (which seems very questionable now). Students in my graduating HS class were anywhere in the 17-19 age range and it wasn't a big deal.
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,876 Member
    lokihen wrote: »
    Are students never held back a grade anymore? It wasn't uncommon when I was young. I even remember a set of twins being split up that way just so they wouldn't be in the same classes (which seems very questionable now). Students in my graduating HS class were anywhere in the 17-19 age range and it wasn't a big deal.

    What is this question in reference to on this thread? Little confused...

    I've seen kids held back at my kids' school...it's not terribly common, but wasn't common when I was growing up either. There is a pair of twins down the street from us and they are separated and not in the same classroom. If you're talking about holding a twin back a grade so they aren't in the same classes and that being the only reasons...you'd have a major lawsuit on your hands.
  • Theoldguy1
    Theoldguy1 Posts: 2,454 Member
    SModa61 wrote: »
    AnnPT77 wrote: »
    kimny72 wrote: »
    I don't understand why the vaccine rollout is so terrible. Sounds like some places have extra doses while other places don't have enough. I feel like the phased approach is holding things back in places with extra doses. Those places where they have enough vaccine, but can't give it to anyone because they haven't been told to go on to the next phase yet. Someone needs to take inventory and just get these shots to people. Maybe deploy the national guards and train them to give injections. 100K soildiers working 12 hrs per day would have these vaccines done much sooner. Only question is supply to do that.

    Just my opinion but I think the problem is this needed to be organized from the top down and it wasn't. And I'd bet some states assumed it would be and we're caught unprepared when it wasn't.

    The doctor who gives updates on This Week in Virology works at one of the larger NYC hospitals (I forget which one). He said they were notified back in Nov that they were on the list to get a certain amount of vials for staff vaccinations. So they put a plan together and waited to get more info on timing. And waited. And then 1200 doses of vaccine just showed up on their loading dock one Tues morning in Jan. They had to scramble to look at staff schedules and dept occupancy to come up with a schedule right there on the spot. Luckily they were well organized and they banged out the jabs, but a less well prepared organization might not have been ready.

    I agree,they need to get creative getting in trained personnel to administer the shots and less picky about who their giving them to.

    (This is not a disagreement, rather more just quoting you to continue this subtopic.)

    I agree that some level of central coordination is missing, but I also think that fully-centralized planning might not be ideal, for two general reasons. (BTW, I recognize that I'm oversimplifying, as I go on with this thought.)

    One is that some localities have handled the distribution so far pretty well (within the constraints of supply and such), while others have not. Where would a fully-centralized plan fall on the effectiveness scale? I feel like many people saying "we ought to have a strong central plan" are assuming it would be a *good* plan. Well, maybe. It's challenging to make a good plan, quickly, for a novel situation; and the larger the scale, the harder it gets, IMO.

    The other is that I think more localized governmental entities have a better handle on local constraints and conditions. What will work well for spread-out rural populations with limited big hospitals is probably different than what works in a dense major city with similarly scaled big health-care facilities, for example.

    Now, in reality, it's possible to have central coordination to some degree, with local flexibility within that framework. There's no question in my mind that the federal piece of this, in the US, has been handled poorly.

    The novelty of the situation is very relevant. We don't have some planning luxuries we might in a less urgent scenario.

    I think one of the strengths of the US's multi-tier governmental systems, as a generality, is this: When different approaches to solving problems are tried in different localities, we have an opportunity to review the results, and learn from the best models, over time. In the current situation, the novelty of the needs, and the urgency of getting solutions, isn't really benefiting from that idea of trying multiple approaches in different places and comparing results.

    No one has a moment's time to do a lot of consulting with peers in different localities, as might be the norm in less urgent situations. (That sort of consultation is one of the things that professional associations, etc., are useful for, in many situations. In my professional life, if we needed to do new-thing X, we'd be talking with other similar organizations to see who'd done X, and learning from their experience. This train is just rolling faster than that, at the moment; and no one's done this before. We haven't had time for "pilot projects".) I assume more of that review/consultation/adjustment will happen, over time, since this crisis/process will be going on for a while.

    There's a tendency amongst the public, I think, to expect things to work well right out of the gate (they pretty much never do, IME, but the stakes aren't usually this high, or the results this visible). In other situations new processes sometimes look to the general public like they work well at the start, because trials/pilots were not very well publicized, but were helpful in working out kinks before going full-scale. (In a way, this is similar to the way some people saw the learning process by scientists early on, with findings and results changing the experts' minds, as flip-flopping or wishy-washiness.)

    There's also a tendency to believe that a strong central authority (like a national pandemic czar) and strict authority structures with rigid rules are going to be the best way to get things done. I think that's mostly not true, either.

    I keep reminding myself that all (well, most) of the health systems, governmental entities, etc., are just collections of regular people like me, doing the best they can in these difficult circumstances, and that in most cases they're aware of factors and considerations that I as a non-specialist have no expertise about. It's always pretty easy to second-guess how someone else should be doing a job I'd have no idea how to do myself, if I were challenged to try. 😆

    I agree with this post. I used to think government coordination would have stopped this thing, and it might have had a plan been ready for this type of disaster. I remember as a kid in school being told what we would do if there were an atomic attack (this in rural Minnesota). We also had fire drills. There used to be the idea of prevention and a plan--preparedness. The federal government would have had to have centers, and stockpiles, and dry runs at every level to make it work.

    Once COVID hit it was too late. In Italy we're under central government control and COVID is still here and going strong. The regions do not like the government mandates and either issue stricter controls or want more opening. This is a much smaller country than the US.

    As Ann said, we can just do our best as citizens, and it's just not easy to understand what it takes to get everything moving.

    I remember this too, suburban Minneapolis, elementary school. We crouched down in the halls covering our heads with our arms during drills 😳 They also talked about loading us into boxcars to get us away from the city. Wouldn’t fly today. No school psychologists then. This was during the Cuban missile crisis.

    There’s definitely no easy solution to covid. It would be nice if everyone took this seriously, and did the basics that slow down the spread. One young girl interviewed the other day about holiday partying, traveling, and socializing, said she has to live her life, and have fun🤷🏻‍♀️

    I remember practicing going under our desks, like that was really going to make a difference. This was likely early 1970's given the classroom I am picturing in my mind? Am I hallucinating? I have no idea what we would have been hiding from.

    You’re not hallucinating, I was a child of the 70s too. We were supposed to put our heads under our desks to avoid a nuclear blast. That seems unlikely to work.

    Just developing flexibility so you could give your *kitten* a proper kiss goodbye.
  • SModa61
    SModa61 Posts: 2,853 Member
    cwolfman13 wrote: »
    SModa61 wrote: »
    Catching up on the discussion.

    Anyhow, I too had forgotten about the original 2 week action plan until @kushie1 had mentioned it. But I am surprised that @JaneJellyRoll didn’t have a flashback and remember the “15 Days to Slow the Spread” initiative. If anyone else wants a reminder of where we were at last March, here is the surgeon general: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HK2ypT2xweA
    I occasionally appreciate going back and listening to what various people had to say in those early days and each iteration since.

    @DNARules I totally agree with your comment about people stating or believing they are compliant when they are not. I can make a list of a few people right off the bat. I wonder if I technically should be on the list, though in my estimation I am making sincere efforts to follow guidelines.

    @ahoy_m8 Good question about second doses. The plus is, if I heard correctly, the second doses are not exact on timing. They cannot be done early, but can be delayed.

    @annpt77 Always said better than I can!

    The 15 day slow the spread initiative never came from the professionals and experts...it came from a politician.

    That was the surgeon general in the video. While not an epidemiologist, he is a doctor.