UKMT April 2020 - The Betacoronavirus and the Virgin Atlantic

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Tesseraction: Apr 5, 2009

Beefeater1980 posted:

Let us say, for the sake of argument, that this all passes in a couple of months. 2020 was a write off; working from home has been shown to not do that much harm; people have been proved, yet again, to have the memories of goldfish, the world still turns on its axis, chickens still lay eggs etc.

The system has been tested, and has not collapsed. How best to challenge it then?

[kissinger voice] more diseases

# ? Apr 24, 2020 15:26

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# ? May 26, 2024 22:48

Barry Foster: Dec 24, 2007; What is going wrong with that one (face is longer than it should be)

Beefeater1980 posted:

Let us say, for the sake of argument, that this all passes in a couple of months. 2020 was a write off; working from home has been shown to not do that much harm; people have been proved, yet again, to have the memories of goldfish, the world still turns on its axis, chickens still lay eggs etc.

The system has been tested, and has not collapsed. How best to challenge it then?

I think that propaganda techniques are so advanced and so utterly saturate the public sphere in the 21st century that the majority of people can never be deprogrammed

but I would really like to be wrong

# ? Apr 24, 2020 15:33

dispatch_async: Nov 28, 2014; Imagine having the time to have played through 20 generations of one family in The Sims 2. Imagine making the original two members of that family Neil Buchanan and Cat Deeley. Imagine complaining to Maxis there was no technological progression. You've successfully imagined my life

This is an interesting article about some of the potential problems in creating a vaccine: Avoiding pitfalls in the pursuit of a COVID-19 vaccine

quote:

Researchers need to understand in particular whether the vaccine causes the same types of immune system malfunctions that have been observed in past vaccine development. Since the 1960s, tests of vaccine candidates for diseases such as dengue, respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), and severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) have shown a paradoxical phenomenon: Some animals or people who received the vaccine and were later exposed to the virus developed more severe disease than those who had not been vaccinated (1). The vaccine-primed immune system, in certain cases, seemed to launch a shoddy response to the natural infection. �That is something we want to avoid,� says Kanta Subbarao, director of the World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Reference and Research on Influenza in Melbourne, Australia.

This immune backfiring, or so-called immune enhancement, may manifest in different ways such as antibody-dependent enhancement (ADE), a process in which a virus leverages antibodies to aid infection; or cell-based enhancement, a category that includes allergic inflammation caused by Th2 immunopathology. In some cases, the enhancement processes might overlap. Scientific debate is underway as to which, if any, of these phenomena�for which exact mechanisms remain unclear�could be at play with the novel coronavirus and just how they might affect the success of vaccine candidates.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 15:34

OwlFancier: Aug 22, 2013

Beefeater1980 posted:

Let us say, for the sake of argument, that this all passes in a couple of months. 2020 was a write off; working from home has been shown to not do that much harm; people have been proved, yet again, to have the memories of goldfish, the world still turns on its axis, chickens still lay eggs etc.

The system has been tested, and has not collapsed. How best to challenge it then?

I don't think it's all or nothing, this is putting buckets of people out of work and forcing actual left ideas into the public sphere even if only as "oh we can't do that that would be silly" but that itself is a reaction to people saying we should.

I don't think change happens because of one big hammer fall that shatters the old and brings in the new, it happens over time in fits and starts as things collapse piece by piece.

A massive chunk of the economy just evaporated overnight and that's not going to just reappear. That's a lot of people who are faced with the material reality every day that they were never needed.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 15:38

ThomasPaine: Feb 4, 2009; We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror.

atm my greatest hope is that by the time climate change starts to gently caress everything even in the west I have made enough money to buy a croft in the Highlands and have learned enough to realistically achieve subsistence farming

I'll still die of ketoacidosis a year or two after the supply chains break down, but you work on the things you can change, you know

# ? Apr 24, 2020 15:39

Guavanaut: Nov 27, 2009; Looking At Them Tittys
1969 - 1998; Toilet Rascal

dispatch_async posted:

This is an interesting article about some of the potential problems in creating a vaccine: Avoiding pitfalls in the pursuit of a COVID-19 vaccine

# ? Apr 24, 2020 15:40

willie_dee: Jun 21, 2010; I obtain sexual gratification from observing people being inflicted with violent head injuries

JeremoudCorbynejad posted:

I go to a club called antichrist and if they don't do a biohazard theme night as soon as the lockdown is lifted I will be mortified

I go to Torture Garden which is quite similar (but a little less gothic apparently?) and some others, considering the kind of interaction people have there I don't think we are going to be anything like that in a long long time. It's really depressing me.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 15:50

Microplastics: Jul 6, 2007; It's what's for dinner.

In 20 years there'll be a hit HBO drama about the coronavirus pandemic and it'll open with a croaky voiceover delivering the line "what is the cost of lies?" shortly before an elderly Fauci hangs himself

# ? Apr 24, 2020 15:51

Tesseraction: Apr 5, 2009

as opposed to the prime youth Dr Fauci displays currently?

# ? Apr 24, 2020 15:57

ShaneMacGowansTeeth: May 22, 2007; I think this is it... I think this is how it ends

So the site I'm doing cover for next week hasn't had anyone doing any form of cover for six weeks since the guy I'm covering for apparently went and self-isolated, told his boss and his boss didn't communicate this to anyone. Plus the site is on some sort of ridiculous lockdown over who can go where on which days it's going to be hilarious

# ? Apr 24, 2020 16:10

ThomasPaine: Feb 4, 2009; We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror.

Wait am I the weird one for not going to fetish metal clubs

# ? Apr 24, 2020 16:12

happyhippy: Feb 21, 2005; Playing games, watching movies, owning goons. 'sup; Pillbug

ThomasPaine posted:

Wait am I the weird one for not going to fetish metal clubs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THBe0DoHLUQ

If you aren't doing this at least weekly, you are.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 16:22

XMNN: Apr 26, 2008; I am incredibly stupid

an infectious disease professor also thinks that the government's prevarication about masks is based on economics/politics rather than any actual scientific rationale

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/24/face-masks-mandatory-spread-coronavirus-government posted:

Passing through the new Beijing Daxing airport on my way to an international scientific meeting on 25 January, two days after Wuhan had been put under lockdown, one sight in particular was unsettling. Close to 100% of people were wearing masks (myself included). Even in pollution-stricken China, this was highly unusual. Arriving in Europe, masks were nowhere to be seen.

Three months on, even as more than 30 countries, including Germany, have mandated face coverings outdoors for the public, the UK government has been adamant that there’s not enough evidence to support such a move here. The government, advised by the scientific advisory group on emergencies (Sage), is expected to make a decision shortly on whether face masks will be mandatory. Reports suggest that the advice will be a compromise, with the public allowed to choose to wear scarves or face-coverings rather than medical-grade masks. So why has there been such a divergence on this issue?

Most of us would probably ask how well a mask, especially a one made from cloth, may protect us from Covid-19. But the notion of “personal protection” misses the major reason why calls for increased use of masks and face-coverings have gained momentum around the world. From February, data was emerging that, unlike Sars – where patients were most contagious several days after showing severe symptoms – people infected by Sars-Cov-2, the cause of Covid-19, were “shedding” most viruses (that could infect someone else) just before or at the time symptoms first appeared, often in very mild form. This had two implications: first, efforts to “contain” coronavirus would be orders of magnitude more difficult than for Sars. Second, and as it has turned out more contentiously, the official World Health Organization and UK government advice that masks should only be worn by members of the public showing symptoms, and members of their immediate households, is probably wrong.

In the field of infectious diseases, stopping a contagious patient infecting others is known as source control. For respiratory infections, source control would include wearing a mask when not under isolation. By advising symptomatic individuals to wear a mask, the government was advocating source control. But what if symptomatic individuals were only half the story? When people have been systematically tested for Covid-19, be it passengers on the Diamond Princess cruise ship or women about to give birth in New York, the number of individuals who test positive but display no symptoms is about half the total number of those who test positive (the range is 20-90%, but most agree it’s 40-60%).

So can completely “well” people transmit Covid-19? We know that even normal speech can spread droplets, and this is dramatically reduced by the use of cloth masks. And for symptomatic people infected with common-cold coronaviruses and influenza, normal breathing also results in shedding of virus, which again, is blocked by wearing a mask. While we don’t know for sure how contagious a truly asymptomatic Covid-19 patient might be, evidence suggests that around 40% of cases of transmission arise from people without symptoms.

So what are the objections that have been raised against masks in public as policy? There have been repeated statements that the evidence in favour of masks is flimsy and ambiguous. For medics, the “gold standard” of evidence is the randomised controlled trial (some people take the medicine or undergo the intervention, and some don’t, and we look to see if there were benefits or risks). There have been a few trials looking at masks for preventing influenza, and results were disappointing – although crucially, most of the group meant to wear masks actually didn’t: it turns out we’re just not that scared of catching the flu.

But if one looks at the same level of evidence for the other measures strongly advocated by the government, for example hand-washing, studies have been similarly disappointing. And for other advice, such as the two-metre rule, or lockdowns, there have been no trials at all. So masks seem subject to a different standard of evidence than other measures. And while controlled trial data is not available, “natural experiments” do suggest at least a correlation between mask-wearing and reduced Covid-19 transmission. The city of Jena in Germany introduced mandatory mask-wearing on 31 March and recorded no new infections for eight days, while surrounding cities continued to see a rise.

Other objections include claims that wearing a mask increases other risky behaviours, such as a relaxed attitude to distancing (comparable to the idea that dangerous driving would increase when seatbelts became law), or that contaminated masks will increase rather than decrease infections. In Hong Kong, where mask uptake is an astonishing 98%, there have been no reports of harms associated with the practice, indeed, only four people have died from Covid-19 since the beginning of the outbreak.

That perhaps leaves the final objection, which is that the public wearing masks will divert this scarce resource away from hospitals and care homes. In this sense, the government may simply be dragging its feet because of scarcity – which is a political and economic issue, not a scientific one. It might also explain the recent focus on cloth masks or face-coverings over masks: by advocating these, there is no competition with the NHS. And although less PR-worthy than collaborations with Rolls-Royce to produce ventilators, other partnerships between government and industry could ensure high-quality cloth masks for everyone in the country.

As the government equivocates, unlike our European neighbours, the British public may end up being the “control group” for the face mask experiment the government has been demanding all along. But do we want to be?

also just an incredibly bleak story

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/24/new-mother-dies-of-coronavirus-six-days-after-giving-birth

hundreds of thousands of individuals like this is the price that Boris Johnson was happy to pay to keep the number up, and he's going to get away with it

# ? Apr 24, 2020 16:24

blunt: Jul 7, 2005

Now that we're talking about the Oxford vaccine, here's a deep dive on the nine(!) different vaccine studies currently happening around the world:

https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2020/04/23/a-close-look-at-the-frontrunning-coronavirus-vaccines-as-of-april-23

Interesting to note both the different methodologies and that several have already completed phase one trials and are moving on to phase two.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 16:31

Z the IVth: Jan 28, 2009; The trouble with your "expendable machines"; Fun Shoe

ThomasPaine posted:

atm my greatest hope is that by the time climate change starts to gently caress everything even in the west I have made enough money to buy a croft in the Highlands and have learned enough to realistically achieve subsistence farming

I'll still die of ketoacidosis a year or two after the supply chains break down, but you work on the things you can change, you know

Learn how to extract the insulin from the pancreas of the Highlanders you hunt.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 17:22

OwlFancier: Aug 22, 2013

I thought you just had to cut off the head and the insulin flies out the neck hole in a bolt of electricity and zaps you?

# ? Apr 24, 2020 17:24

Active Quasar: Feb 22, 2011

Do any of you know anyone in the Leftist Gypsy/Roma/Traveller groups? I know there was a LabourGRT group a while ago which left in disgust at the casual racism they received but I've not been able to make contact.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 17:27

Melissa McCarthyism: Jan 18, 2007

https://twitter.com/TIME/status/1253617676657844224

loving LOL are we seriously doing this again

# ? Apr 24, 2020 17:49

ThomasPaine: Feb 4, 2009; We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror.

Melissa McCarthyism posted:

https://twitter.com/TIME/status/1253617676657844224

loving LOL are we seriously doing this again

I legit cannot conceive of this level of cognitive dissonance lol

# ? Apr 24, 2020 17:56

Barry Foster: Dec 24, 2007; What is going wrong with that one (face is longer than it should be)

Melissa McCarthyism posted:

https://twitter.com/TIME/status/1253617676657844224

loving LOL are we seriously doing this again

I literally exclaimed 'No!' out loud when I saw that picture, lol

# ? Apr 24, 2020 17:57

kingturnip: Apr 18, 2008

Barry Foster posted:

I literally exclaimed 'No!' out loud when I saw that picture, lol

Maybe social media is the real disease

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:24

Jose: Jul 24, 2007; Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster and writer

so Cummings is on the science panel for coronavirus

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:31

Gonzo McFee: Jun 19, 2010

Jesus

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:32

Jose: Jul 24, 2007; Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster and writer

https://twitter.com/NigelCl42240730/status/1253738647268048897?s=20

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:33

XMNN: Apr 26, 2008; I am incredibly stupid

lmao

well that absolutely confirms that "following the science" is just a figleaf

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:34

Wachter: Mar 23, 2007; You and whose knees?

I'm crawling through the Marx-Engels reader so that I actually know what half you lot are on about here, and I just got to the really racist bit in "On The Jewish Question". I can skip this bit right?

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:35

Ms Adequate: Oct 30, 2011; Baby even when I'm dead and gone
You will always be my only one, my only one
When the night is calling
No matter who I become
You will always be my only one, my only one, my only one
When the night is calling

crispix posted:

In this house we bleach our innards and that's that

You drink your Jeye's Fluid or there'll be no puddin!!!!

I read this in my granmy's voice and lol'd offline

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:37

OwlFancier: Aug 22, 2013

lolol'd

laugh out loud off/on line'd.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:38

goddamnedtwisto: Dec 31, 2004; If you ask me about the mole people in the London Underground, I WILL be forced to kill you; Fun Shoe

https://twitter.com/TheOnion/status/1242899581924446212

Check the date, the lag between The Onion being ridiculous satire and cold hard reality is shortening by the day.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:38

Doccykins: Feb 21, 2006

agc (

)
https://twitter.com/wefail/status/1253659287349583874

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:46

ThomasPaine: Feb 4, 2009; We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror.

Wachter posted:

I'm crawling through the Marx-Engels reader so that I actually know what half you lot are on about here, and I just got to the really racist bit in "On The Jewish Question". I can skip this bit right?

What are they saying?

I know a lot of Marx and Engels' stuff on Jews looks pretty loving bad today, but given the former was himself Jewish I generally tend to assume that a lot of what they're saying looks significantly worse to a 21st century reader than was intended. But who knows, Engels' stuff on the 'savage races' did not age well either. The 1800s were a hell of a time!

ThomasPaine fucked around with this message at 18:50 on Apr 24, 2020

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:47

Coohoolin: Aug 5, 2012; Oor Coohoolie.

Josef bugman posted:

How does one make a good veggie curry that can be frozen? I've been making veggie Chilli and, although it is not my favourite, it isn't bad.

I'd imagine given that things like coconut milk come in cans and will keep, you could do the most labour intensive aspect, chopping the veg, as prep and then bag and freeze the chopped parts.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 18:48

keep punching joe: Jan 22, 2006; Die Satan!

Josef bugman posted:

How does one make a good veggie curry that can be frozen? I've been making veggie Chilli and, although it is not my favourite, it isn't bad.

Big onion diced
Bulb of garlic minced/crushed
Big bit of ginger minced
2 big carrots diced

cook in a big pot with some oil for about ten mins then add

(if you don't have all these spices in your pantry it doesnt mater much you can get by with curry powder, chilli flakes or garam masala alone)

2 tablespoons cumin powder
2 tablespoons garam masala or curry powder
1 tablespoon cinnamon powder
1 tablespoon of tumeric powder
2 tablespoons of chilli flakes (or less if you like it mild).
teaspoon of salt

then add

2 tins of tomatoes
1 bag of lentils (500g)
2 litres of vegetable stock or water

bring to boil and simmer for at least 45 mins (stirring occasionally to stop it sticking/burning).

Makes around 12 servings, freezes just fine.

Serve with rice/nan bread/rotis etc.

edit: if you have other root veg like turnip, potatoes etc they are fine to also throw in at the start. Fresh chillis are optional, but I've been making do with dried flakes for the past month.

keep punching joe fucked around with this message at 19:12 on Apr 24, 2020

# ? Apr 24, 2020 19:09

Ms Adequate: Oct 30, 2011; Baby even when I'm dead and gone
You will always be my only one, my only one
When the night is calling
No matter who I become
You will always be my only one, my only one, my only one
When the night is calling

OwlFancier posted:

lolol'd

laugh out loud off/on line'd.

lol out loud

Oh also fetish clubs good, go.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 19:20

Wachter: Mar 23, 2007; You and whose knees?

ThomasPaine posted:

What are they saying?

I know a lot of Marx and Engels' stuff on Jews looks pretty loving bad today, but given the former was himself Jewish I generally tend to assume that a lot of what they're saying looks significantly worse to a 21st century reader than was intended. But who knows, Engels' stuff on the 'savage races' did not age well either. The 1800s were a hell of a time!

They? It's an abridgement of Marx's work.

Marx, not me, don't ban me posted:

What is the worldly religion of the Jew? Huckstering. What is his worldly God? Money.…. Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist. Money degrades all the gods of man – and turns them into commodities…. The bill of exchange is the real god of the Jew. His god is only an illusory bill of exchange…. The chimerical nationality of the Jew is the nationality of the merchant, of the man of money in general.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 19:21

OwlFancier: Aug 22, 2013

Generally do not listen to the views of anyone writing before the past 70 years on judaism.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 19:27

josh04: Oct 19, 2008; "THE FLASH IS THE REASON
TO RACE TO THE THEATRES"
_{This title contains sponsored content.}

ThomasPaine posted:

Wait am I the weird one for not going to fetish metal clubs

Don't worry; plenty of people simply enjoy their expensive fetishwear from the comfort of their own homes.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 19:27

Darth Walrus: Feb 13, 2012

OwlFancier posted:

Generally do not listen to the views of anyone writing before the past 70 years on judaism.

The Talmud is sometimes acceptable.

Sometimes.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 19:30

Ms Adequate: Oct 30, 2011; Baby even when I'm dead and gone
You will always be my only one, my only one
When the night is calling
No matter who I become
You will always be my only one, my only one, my only one
When the night is calling

josh04 posted:

Don't worry; plenty of people simply enjoy their expensive fetishwear from the comfort of their own urethras.

# ? Apr 24, 2020 19:30

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# ? May 26, 2024 22:48

ThomasPaine: Feb 4, 2009; We have no compassion and we ask no compassion from you. When our turn comes, we shall not make excuses for the terror.

Wachter posted:

They? It's an abridgement of Marx's work.

lol oh dear

e: also sorry, you weren't clear as to whether it was marx or engels so I just went with both

# ? Apr 24, 2020 19:30

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > UKMT April 2020 - The Betacoronavirus and the Virgin Atlantic

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