Covid-19 in OKC (coronavirus)

[jn1780]

I was looking at Texas numbers, they are showing signs of a curve flattening. I think it goes to show that social distancing is a lot more effective for city's that are more spread out.

[The Shadow]

"Per capita, our number of cases now equals where Los Angeles was on Friday."

Mayor David Holt

[FighttheGoodFight]

Press release from the OK Dept. of Health:

**************************

Sanitize, sanitize, sanitize!

Oklahomans are doing a great job implementing social distancing recommendations and observing guidance from state and local authorities, and while that means we are staying home and limiting our exposure to others, we still have essential needs that must be met. To meet those needs, Oklahomans still need to go to the grocery store to pick up bread and milk and eggs. We still have to put gas in the car. For others, delivery services have been critical – bringing food, toilet paper, and other items straight to our doors.

But wait. All those items that are coming into our homes, have been touched by multiple hands, traveled by plane, truck and car to reach you. But what can you do about that? You have to have these items, so how will you maintain your individual and household needs and also protect yourself from potential spread of COVID-19. Should we be worried?

Good news folks – the risk of COVID-19 spreading through your delivered groceries and bars of soap are pretty low. In fact, the CDC doesn’t recommend anything special for how you handle packages received in the mail, or that you pick up at the grocery store. The CDC does recommend you continue to observe social distance practices and remain vigilant in your personal hygiene. There are a few extra precautionary measures you can take to reduce risk even more when you are bringing goods into your home.

• If you are having food delivered, avoid direct contact with the food courier by leaving payment (if needed) outside the door and instructions on where to leave your food package.
• When returning from a trip to the grocery store, gas station or food pick up, be sure to immediately wash your hands and any re-useable bags you may shop with.
• Don’t leave empty take out boxes on your counters or other hard surfaces, make sure they land in your sink or your trash bin.
• Continue to regularly disinfect high touch areas in your home – doorknobs, faucet handles and light switches are examples.

As long as we all keep doing our part, we can continue to slow the spread and flatten the curve here in Oklahoma. Let’s do this!

I figured grocery and mail would be an issue. I have been sanitizing those like wild

[TheTravellers]

I figured grocery and mail would be an issue. I have been sanitizing those like wild

I don't quite understand the CDC's recommendation - if it lives on hard surfaces for up to 3 days (last I heard, that was the case), all kinds of jars and bottles at the grocery store are hard surfaces, and if someone that had the virus sneezed or coughed on them, then it's got the virus on the surface and it can be there for 3 days. And if you touch it in those 3 days, then touch your nose, mouth, or eyes, you've gotten infected. Isn't that one of the ways it's transmitted? Cardboard and paper are a different matter, heard it can only exist for hours, maybe a day on those.

[BBatesokc]

I don't quite understand the CDC's recommendation - if it lives on hard surfaces for up to 3 days (last I heard, that was the case), all kinds of jars and bottles at the grocery store are hard surfaces, and if someone that had the virus sneezed or coughed on them, then it's got the virus on the surface and it can be there for 3 days. And if you touch it in those 3 days, then touch your nose, mouth, or eyes, you've gotten infected. Isn't that one of the ways it's transmitted? Cardboard and paper are a different matter, heard it can only exist for hours, maybe a day on those.

I would think they are talking about likelihood of transmission and you are talking about possibility of transmission. Meaning, it's certainly possible under your scenario, but also highly/statistically unlikely.

[Ross MacLochness]

The virus is detectable on certain surfaces for up to 3 days, but that doesn't mean it is able to infect up to 3 days. AFAIK, scientists don't know how long this virus can live on a surface and still be infectious.

[mkjeeves]

From the CDC's youtube channel, how to handle groceries and food coming in your house. (Combined with the State of Oklahoma's statement from above...mixed messages much?)

With people in my household at high risk, we aren't taking chances on splitting hairs between possibility and likely. It's easy enough to exercise caution on everything coming in. Mostly, we just quarantine it for three days, in the trunk of the car, garage or just inside the door. If it needs to go into the refrigerator we sanitize it using the above method. We haven't bought any prepared food in two or three weeks.

That means everything. And wash your hands!

[FighttheGoodFight]

The virus is detectable on certain surfaces for up to 3 days, but that doesn't mean it is able to infect up to 3 days. AFAIK, scientists don't know how long this virus can live on a surface and still be infectious.

That makes more sense to me. It can live on surfaces but might not be infectious. Still a lot we don’t know about the virus.

[catch22]

Since a virus can only reproduce itself inside of a living cell, I don't think it would survive in a state that could be infectious for long outside of the human body. I'm not concerned with groceries or mail or anything. I wonder how long it can survive even on the human skin? Say you do shake someone's hand, how long could you go without washing your hands before it stops replicating itself?

[Snowman]

Since a virus can only reproduce itself inside of a living cell, I don't think it would survive in a state that could be infectious for long outside of the human body. I'm not concerned with groceries or mail or anything. I wonder how long it can survive even on the human skin? Say you do shake someone's hand, how long could you go without washing your hands before it stops replicating itself?

Similar viruses can be to the point unlikely to transmit after a few minutes on someone's hand. Though the classic case of transmissionability of a similar virus outside the body is snot from an infected person getting on money can transmit the flu for several days.

[mkjeeves]

A choir decided to go ahead with rehearsal. Now dozens of members have COVID-19 and two are dead

MOUNT VERNON, Wash. —

With the coronavirus quickly spreading in Washington state in early March, leaders of the Skagit Valley Chorale debated whether to go ahead with weekly rehearsal.

The virus was already killing people in the Seattle area, about an hour’s drive to the south.

But Skagit County hadn’t reported any cases, schools and businesses remained open, and prohibitions on large gatherings had yet to be announced.

On March 6, Adam Burdick, the choir’s conductor, informed the 121 members in an email that amid the “stress and strain of concerns about the virus,” practice would proceed as scheduled at Mount Vernon Presbyterian Church.

“I’m planning on being there this Tuesday March 10, and hoping many of you will be, too,” he wrote.

Sixty singers showed up. A greeter offered hand sanitizer at the door, and members refrained from the usual hugs and handshakes.

“It seemed like a normal rehearsal, except that choirs are huggy places,” Burdick recalled. “We were making music and trying to keep a certain distance between each other.”

After 2½ hours, the singers parted ways at 9 p.m.

Nearly three weeks later, 45 have been diagnosed with COVID-19 or ill with the symptoms, at least three have been hospitalized, and two are dead.

The outbreak has stunned county health officials, who have concluded that the virus was almost certainly transmitted through the air from one or more people without symptoms.

“That’s all we can think of right now,” said Polly Dubbel, a county communicable disease and environmental health manager.

In interviews with the Los Angeles Times, eight people who were at the rehearsal said that nobody there was coughing or sneezing or appeared ill.

Everybody came with their own sheet music and avoided direct physical contact. Some members helped set up or remove folding chairs. A few helped themselves to mandarins that had been put out on a table in back.

Experts said the choir outbreak is consistent with a growing body of evidence that the virus can be transmitted through aerosols — particles smaller than 5 micrometers that can float in the air for minutes or longer.

The World Health Organization has downplayed the possibility of transmission in aerosols, stressing that the virus is spread through much larger “respiratory droplets,” which are emitted when an infected person coughs or sneezes and quickly fall to a surface.

But a study published March 17 in the New England Journal of Medicine found that when the virus was suspended in a mist under laboratory conditions it remained “viable and infectious” for three hours — though researchers have said that time period would probably be no more than a half-hour in real-world conditions.

One of the authors of that study, Jamie Lloyd-Smith, a UCLA infectious disease researcher, said it’s possible that the forceful breathing action of singing dispersed viral particles in the church room that were widely inhaled.

“One could imagine that really trying to project your voice would also project more droplets and aerosols,” he said.

With three-quarters of the choir members testing positive for the virus or showing symptoms of infection, the outbreak would be considered a “super-spreading event,” he said.

Linsey Marr, an environmental engineer at Virginia Tech and an expert on airborne transmission of viruses, said some people happen to be especially good at exhaling fine material, producing 1,000 times more than others.

Marr said that the choir outbreak should be seen as a powerful warning to the public.

“This may help people realize that, hey, we really need to be careful,” she said. <You think?

https://www.latimes.com/world-nation...choir-outbreak

[Martin]

A choir decided to go ahead with rehearsal. Now dozens of members have COVID-19 and two are dead

wow... 121 people in close proximity for an extended period of time during which they deeply and continuously move air into and out of their lungs... seems like a worst-case virus inoculation scenario.

[mkjeeves]

wow... 121 people in close proximity for an extended period of time during which they deeply and continuously move air into and out of their lungs... seems like a worst-case virus inoculation scenario.

^That just about describes the last Homeland I was in,

[GoOKC1991]

Unacceptable: Oklahoma City families tear down caution tape around closed playgrounds.

https://kfor.com/news/local/oklahoma...ource=facebook

[mugofbeer]

Unacceptable: Oklahoma City families tear down caution tape around closed playgrounds.

https://kfor.com/news/local/oklahoma...ource=facebook

Willfull violation? Fine their butts.

[SoonerDave]

From the CDC's youtube channel, how to handle groceries and food coming in your house. (Combined with the State of Oklahoma's statement from above...mixed messages much?)

With people in my household at high risk, we aren't taking chances on splitting hairs between possibility and likely. It's easy enough to exercise caution on everything coming in. Mostly, we just quarantine it for three days, in the trunk of the car, garage or just inside the door. If it needs to go into the refrigerator we sanitize it using the above method. We haven't bought any prepared food in two or three weeks.

That means everything. And wash your hands!

I have some problems with this video. First, if you are seriously disinfecting something from a grocery store (or anywhere else), you set up an *external* "contaminated* zone, a sterilization area, then a " clean" area. No items from the contaminated area go to the clean area without being sterilized. The *right* process is to remove each item from the bag in the external area, clean it (sudsy soap and water with a rough towel or rag), THEN place it in the "clean" zone for someone else to move into the house. Bags *never* come into the house and are discarded. The most at-risk surfaces would be any hard, non-porous containers like glass jars or bottles, and secondarily smooth cardboard containers. Paper containers, like sugar and flour, are least risk, but can also be handled by simply sitting in the sunlight for a time. You then decontaminate the car with wipes and lysol, and even deposit clothes worn to the contaimated area directly to the washer to be laundered. Finish by spraying shoes with Lysol.

Yes, my mom's cleaning instincts finally kicked in. You could do heart surgery on her kitchen countertop.

If you are taking groceries to an elderly or immunocompromised person, I'd darned sure err on the side of safety.

[Bunty]

wow... 121 people in close proximity for an extended period of time during which they deeply and continuously move air into and out of their lungs... seems like a worst-case virus inoculation scenario.

Fortunately, around 700 people present on March 12 for Stillwater Jazz Band with Emily Sutton apparently has not resulted in mass cases, even though the band conductor started off saying, "Wow, look at this. These are the bravest people in the world. And dumbest."

[PhiAlpha]

Unacceptable: Oklahoma City families tear down caution tape around closed playgrounds.

https://kfor.com/news/local/oklahoma...ource=facebook

[soonerguru]

The online accounts I've seen of people jamming Lowe's locations, Home Depot, and other big-box retailers have me petrified. Add to that Governor Stittiot's county-by-county approach to containment, which, as dumb as it is, is further undermined by his robust exemptions to the federally determined "non-essential" list: he is exempting virtually every retail establishment in the state. This is a waking nightmare. Stitt has Oklahoma following the Italy model, albeit with a much dumber population. The next two to three weeks will be telling.

[Canoe]

Willfull violation? Fine their butts.

They don't believe that the City will enforce it, and they are unable to regulate themselves. If a law is worth having it is worth being enforced.

[rezman]

wow... 121 people in close proximity for an extended period of time during which they deeply and continuously move air into and out of their lungs... seems like a worst-case virus inoculation scenario.

The article says only 60 showed up to the rehearsal, which to me is even more sobering. That was completely irresponsible on the choir director’s part.

[Greggo71]

The online accounts I've seen of people jamming Lowe's locations, Home Depot, and other big-box retailers have me petrified. Add to that Governor Stittiot's county-by-county approach to containment, which, as dumb as it is, is further undermined by his robust exemptions to the federally determined "non-essential" list: he is exempting virtually every retail establishment in the state. This is a waking nightmare. Stitt has Oklahoma following the Italy model, albeit with a much dumber population. The next two to three weeks will be telling.

The jury is still out on how dangerous this actually is - that's a fact. For all the talk of high transmission rates, the mortality rate seems to be pretty low since those catching the virus outside the high risk groups are not being tested now, it is very likely the vast majority of people have caught the virus but not had symptoms necessitating medical care. The point of flattening the curve is to reduce the strain on medical services while still developing heard immunity, which is the real key to ending alleviating the situation, unless you want to hide in your closet until a vaccine arrives. The fact that certain portions of the media are whipping up a panic does not change the fact that for tested populations, those displaying symptom bad enough to need medical attention, the mortality rate is running at less than 1%.

[catcherinthewry]

The jury is still out on how dangerous this actually is - that's a fact. For all the talk of high transmission rates, the mortality rate seems to be pretty low since those catching the virus outside the high risk groups are not being tested now, it is very likely the vast majority of people have caught the virus but not had symptoms necessitating medical care. The point of flattening the curve is to reduce the strain on medical services while still developing heard immunity, which is the real key to ending alleviating the situation, unless you want to hide in your closet until a vaccine arrives. The fact that certain portions of the media are whipping up a panic does not change the fact that for tested populations, those displaying symptom bad enough to need medical attention, the mortality rate is running at less than 1%.

No sources cited for any of your claims. Sounds like this belongs in the political COVID-19 discussion.

[jn1780]

Fortunately, around 700 people present on March 12 for Stillwater Jazz Band with Emily Sutton apparently has not resulted in mass cases, even though the band conductor started off saying, "Wow, look at this. These are the bravest people in the world. And dumbest."

Its probably what the choir did between singing that caused the greatest spread. Touching handles in bathrooms, hugging, food and drinks, etc.

[Greggo71]

No sources cited for any of your claims. Sounds like this belongs in the political COVID-19 discussion.

Yeah, this whole thing is pretty political, like people's views on COVID 19 seem to be tied to their political affiliation, which is kind of strange right? I didn't think I pointed out anything other than common sense but here are some BBC graphs on the mortality rate - the entire article is linked below and discusses the difficulty in determining the actual mortality rate, spoiler: most people have none to mild symptoms and don't go to the doctor. One of the reason Germany's quoted mortality rate is so low is their high testing capacity- they are actually testing people with mild symptoms as opposed to the US where testing hasn't ramped up to their level. At any rate, it's worth a look.








https://www.bbc.com/news/health-51674743