With respect to you Mr Mac. This has brought about little change for likely a good part of the worlds population, including a lot of people here in the the states. I do not like the inconveniences of masking up and stocking up when planning trips to town, but do it for respect of others that I have not become callous to. I wish people would reciprocate.
There are luxury activities I'd like to participate in and I have not curtailed spending. I believe if society as a whole takes a break, or at least cuts back we can get through this substantially complete.
It's a given we will have to heal up for 6 to ten years as it is now. If the pandemic broadens it could take longer. idk how many have kids or grand kids here, I feel bad that they will not enjoy the same life we enjoyed. The toll falls on the middle class workers that may look at life differently.
We can't fault people that worked hard, lived a modest life and retired. I continue to work hard and have suggested food gardening as a outlet for boredom and saving money. I'll throw out there canning or preserving food. I would not wait It's time to plant and get any supplies one might need.
A water and pressure canner, some cheap canning jars, a dehydrator, and some inexpensive (for now) ingredients.
I know it's saddening and I'm in the same boat of others of having investements in cars, tools, and other things that fall into the luxury category. Some diversified and have other means to get by, for now.
I do worry about the long term and hope we are not laid bare ripe for picking, even though hyped up, when the second, or succeding waves of this pandemic appear.

Hey, don't bark at me. If people are going to say they'd just rather get the virus, then why not do some good and help out the people who really need it? Don't get me wrong, I really really feel the pain for those who have lost a lot in this situation. I'm one of the lucky ones who still have a job, though we have had to take involuntary days off resulting in a 20% pay cut. There's a lot of nasty crap going on out there surrounding the virus, lots of elephant vs donkey crap that doesn't help anything either. The thing about it is that this really is a nasty virus, and it has affected the entire human population on the planet, regardless of political affiliations or whatever theories they hold about whatever conspiracies must be happening... lots of countries have put their economies into the toilet over this, so commons sense tells me that this is something to pay attention to - no politician wants to look bad by having their economy suffer, so why are we still thinking that this is some sort of plan made up by 'the other party'? Seems kind of ridiculous to me.

What perplexes me is that, while I understand that people are upset that they can't race their car or whatever, it's not going to go away unless we want it to. Racing happens in the first place because people want to do it, and others will pay to watch it - pausing for a while to help the most vulnerable people maintain their health isn't going to kill racing, unless it was going to die on its own anyhow. For that matter even if it did, it would resurface in some form or another. So why are we panicking that it will all go away? If we don't all die off (we won't), then we will come out of this thing stronger than ever and we will work hard to do the things we believe in, and the things we enjoy - that's the way it works. We don't have to go all Chicken Little and fear that the sky will fall and it will never be good again.

For some reason you automatically assume that I'm some kind of a nutjob that is cowering in a corner, afraid of life. It blows my mind that some of you don't think for a moment that maybe it makes sense to just lay low for awhile and try to understand what's happening out there. If not for yourself, then maybe for someone you know who has health issues... but no, we're all just sitting shivering in the corner with the blinds drawn watching Seinfeld (which was a good show, by the way...). I'm keeping abreast of what's going on, listening to the health experts (and not the politicians), trying to figure it out for myself and making decisions that are best for me. If you want to do what's best for you, I suggest you just go ahead and do it - or hang on for a little while longer and you will soon have free reign to do so. Stick your head up out of the hole, and have a look around - things are opening up all over the place. Hopefully it continues like that, but if tons of people start dying again, then maybe things will slow down, I don't know as I have never lived through anything like this before in my life - which is why I am not going to assume that I know everything. I don't... and neither do you.

We're all in this together, trying to figure it out, so why not try to be a little more positive about it? We need to get back that spirit that got us here in the first place, and stop all the bickering once and for all. Enough.

Luxury items? Inconvenience? I decide what is luxury and necessity for myself. Do you have any idea of the economic, quality of life and social impact of all of this intentional destruction of millions of lives? And not because they got sick, but because the governors decided to make them stop doing what they've always done?

Not going to go away? A race track? A race shop? They aren't flush with cash to be able to sit around playing pocket pool for a year. It ain't Sheetz, there isn't one on every corner. You think they can just sit dormant and be turned back on just like that? After someone has spent decades keeping it going hand to mouth because they're too hardheaded to do anything else? Shutdown at the whim of a Governor who's likely getting bogus information from some expert with his own agenda??

Not just drag racing, but NASCAR, football, baseball and any other spectator activity? Churches, concerts, flea markets, shows. This has been all I've done for 45 years and it is in danger of being no longer viable if these tracks close for good - if people can't or won't spend money to do it. These race tracks and shops aren't GM or Amazon. Most live hand to mouth and are kept going because the people running them love it. To my mind the threat of trashing so much of what we've come to assume would always be here is far greater than this illness could ever be.

I've been "laying low" for a while, doing all the masks and social distancing that they asked, waiting for common sense to prevail. And 2 months into it, it doesn't appear to be anywhere close to being the threat to humanity that we were told it was. Not even close. You think when we get the all clear, a business owner or track operator can just unlock the gate, flip the switch and pick up where they left off? Maybe they could have if the shutdown had been short until we saw that the numbers weren't what they had predicted. But at some point, that can't be done. We are fast approaching that point. Especially for seasonal businesses that are slaves to the weather and have to make their money over a limited number of weekends a year.

You don't want to go? Fine. I never try to tell people what to do. But the small risk is acceptable to me and a lot of others.

On the 2pm daily PA Health news conference today, the he/she was asked during the question & answer period, how they plan to count anyone that goes in and gets an "antibody test" to see if they had the Corona at some point in the past and didn't know it... He/she said that "Anti-body positive" tests will be counted as "New Cases" as soon as they are actually reported to the State. The fact they are not sick, and do not currently HAVE corona and likely recovered months ago is completely irrelevant. They will be counted NOW, as a NEW case. Thus giving the appearance that new Covid cases are rising, when in fact what is rising are the number of anti-body tests being given now and merging those numbers with actual real new cases.

Also said they will finally release the real PA Nursing Home stats by Friday, that they have been refusing to release for weeks.

Basically nothing being reported in PA now reflects the actual CURRENT condition of the State.
They are mixing the old with the new, and reporting it all as NEW.

Oh and the Gov held a morning press conference to proclaim he will withhold State funding from all of the counties (6-8 so far) refusing to follow HIS orders. Since his credibility is now shot, and local Sheriffs & District Attorneys are refusing to enforce rules they say are too hap hazard and nonsensical to implement... he has resorted to EXTORTION.

It's getting interesting living in this State these days...
If sky high Property taxes weren't enough to get people to leave it... maybe becoming Little Russia will do the trick.

Fair enough. Thanks for taking the time to explain your point of view.

I don’t have to agree with everything you say to respect where you’re coming from. Best of luck to you.

Interesting point. It’s strange they aren’t breaking it down between active cases and inactive cases. Then a newly found inactive case found through antibody testing could be correctly recorded as an inactive case, but also one they hadn’t known about before.

You are applying common sense...
While they need things to fit within their narrative...

Explain the common sense difference between an "inactive" and an "active" case of a COVID-19 infection, because anybody at this point that "thinks" they have the definite answer, is blowing smoke, and should be in the WH.

Anybody know the difference between inactive and active herpes, because your partner that just infected doesn't.

I'm not trying to be an a-hole. Just call it like I see it. What I see is crap like Runner2go just posted occurring all over the place as these people scramble to maintain appearances, justify their tyranny, and keep their foot on the necks of the citizens. Again...if the truth is so bad that we have to ruin the economy and people's livelyhoods, why do they have to make stuff up and cook the books to make it worse? In what universe is having had an illness maybe months ago, with little or no symptoms and no longer being sick or infected able to be called a "new case"? If I die from alzheimers or a stroke or heart failure and I have a broken leg, on what planet do they list the broken leg as cause of death? On planet Rachel Levine, that's which planet.

They should be making a list of people known to have HAD it, or have the anti-bodies, and are now well so we can see how large that group is. Can't do that. The percentages would make them look even worse. Instead they pad the stats to create even more lies.

Some folks are inconvenienced. I'm looking at having something I have 45 years invested in taken away by crooked, dishonest hacks and liars having their little power trip. Making threats of extortion that they know won't stand up in court for a second. Unqualified circus clowns on a power trip. And no one seems to be able to do anything about it. So yeah, I'm a little hot under the collar.

Contagious. Or not. You catch the AIDS, it's never inactive. Likewise herpes, but the way of spreading, or not, is different.

I had a little cold 6 months ago. Call it inactive if you like, I can't give it to anyone. But the anti-bodies from that infection are still floating around in my body.

If this crap wasn't so contagious, it would be a non issue.

Are you suggesting that people don't recover from COVID-19? I haven't seen a study that confirms that yet, just speculation.

Even the Johns Hopkins map includes data on recovered cases - which are considered to be inactive cases IMHO.

Its been said half of the deaths in NJ come from them.

No my point was mainly, nobody knows, and society has been behind the curve of its progression since day 1, and it ain't over, except it appears for those who do want to guess/speculate.

Regarding herpes, a person infected can easily spread it to other places on their bodies, eyes being the worst, and herpes can be infectious with almost no symptoms of the carrier.

You're kidding right??
Inactive vs Active in the way they are currently applying it, is pretty much irrelevant.
PA is basing all decisions to re-open the State, on whether or not Covid is "CURRENTLY spreading". Then in order to "claim" corona is still spreading wildly, they are now combining the numbers of "new infections" with the numbers of "new anti-body results" of infections that happened months ago... and then CLAIMING that the combined numbers prove the virus is still spreading out of control today. Which it may or may not be... but no one really knows, because the combined figures they using now are worthless for determining that particular trend. And the State is refusing to provide a breakdown of what are NEW virus positives and what are new Anti-body only positives.

That's like counting all the people that got cancer 2 weeks ago... and then counting all the people that got cancer LAST week and plotting those 2 figures on a chart... And then counting all the people that got cancer THIS week, and adding to it all the people that got cancer since the beginning of the year to that figure(because you just got the old figures)... and claiming that people identified with cancer increased 100 fold THIS WEEK.... Just because you finally decided to count past occurrences, and add them to this weeks numbers.... Then next week count all the new cases for that week and adding in all of last years cases to it, and putting the combined plot point even higher than prior weeks on the same chart. This is a gross exaggeration.... but it makes the point.

You can't make a valid case that covid is still spreading once you start contaminating the current figures, by adding infections that occurred months ago, and calling them all "New Infections".... Whether they still carry the virus is irrelevant to whether or not the "NEW infection count is still trending up"... When you are counting old cases you just found out about, and adding them to actual new cases, and calling them all NEW... the numbers are worthless.

Doing that may help determine how many people in TOTAL ever had Covid...
but that is a completely different statistic.
And it has no place being used in stats trying to plot a "current" NEW infection trend.

You could even tell the person reading the submitted question was shocked by the answer when it was given.

Which is why I said any Stats coming out of PA right now regarding the current growth rate of Covid are worthless.
If they split out the new anti-body stats for what they really are "Historical trends"... then they might be useful.
But that is unlikely now that the Governor called portions of the State "Cowards" & threatened them this morning.

You are correct, the economy has to re-open or else the cure will be worse than the disease. Most people understand that although it does seem like we have a few idiot governors who haven't figured it out yet. They'll be forced to back off within a few weeks though. The UN is now starting to say that more people will die from poverty or starvation caused by economic problems than from the virus itself. Once the UN starts to make sense you know something weird is happening in the world.

I saw an interview with the gov of Illinois today and he was explaining his rule about only allowing two people max to be in a boat together. So a family of four who all live together and drive to the lake together in the same car can't get in the same boat together. And he seemed to think that his rule was a good idea. My guess is that he must be smart about something, but he can't quite figure out the puzzle of boating in a pandemic. That isn't the dumbest thing I've heard though. In Washington state the governor said that boating is okay but that you can't fish. So he must have thought that while riding around on a lake in a boat is safe, as soon as you throw a line in the water you catch the virus somehow. Evidently the virus turned a bunch of politicians into morons. Who knew it had that effect?

I'm not super worried about the USA, I think we'll manage to work thru it okay but I am starting to hear of some major problems around the world. I think we're going to be seeing some big time problems with starvation later on this summer in some countries. When things get that bad all bets are off. People will do desperate things to avoid having their families starve to death.

With the government paying hospitals for every COVID death, and extra for those put on a ventilator, like a bounty or something, administrators are directing doctors to report anything remotely believable to be caused by C19. Die in a car wreck with a runny nose? COVID. Get shot robbing a liquor store and have a fever? COVID. Silly, but I would bet it's not such a wild exaggeration. Drive the numbers up and get paid. The "sky is falling", "respect mah authoritah" types and hospital bean counters all win. I don't believe anything coming from liars who have much to gain by making people believe their crap.



They've always been morons. The Chinavirus crisis just allowed them to put it on full display. Reminds me of the old Pantera album title - Vulgar Display of Power.



I expect that to be true, mostly because of the food chain being privately held and we are still a civilized nation. With what is going on, I expect prices to spike up and maybe some spotty shortages for a while.

Doing some simple math (I was bored raining today) I projected some stats provided on John Hopkins Univ site.
Today confirmed cases are reported @ 1,347,881 and deaths @ 80,882
If everyone in USA @ 328,000,000 became ill nd using the above ratio the deaths would settle @ 760,711
It's highly unlikely that everyone will become ill. Will re-infection occur, will there be mutations that affect age groups and change mortality within. will treatment of vaccine appear. No stats have been forthcoming and it difficult to achieve transparency..
In view of everything, it's safe to say deaths will settle between 80,882 and 760,711 although that number is likely to be less because of research being done and statistical fallacy to shield public view from what it really happening.
Either way there is a lot of people dying and a lot of national and private wealth being wrung out of coffers and accounts.
I can't put a price on acceptable deaths and glad I am not the sort or being paid to do that.

Didn't say I wished, or hoped for it. Just drawing some possible likelyhoods from what I see/observe/hear. The US came into "this" later then say S.Korea, which supposedly handled this "properly", but isn't still out-of-the-woods. Flattening-of-the curve only shows death rate (per year/week/day) hasn't increased.

Until that curve drops drastically; we'll be into this for some months. How many? 3, 6, or more? Then into Fall season: & that tosses another turd into this punch-bowl-of-a-mess.

With so many "snake-oil" cures/remedies/treatments/drugs/tests surfacing these days; makes one wonder who/how they'll be narrowed down to an "accepted" few for treating the general population AND when..

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/coronavirus/country/united-states/

I have posted this state by state table before.
Notice you can reorder each column high to low by clicking on the top header.

Increased testing per day does influence the number of Confirmed cases reported and the
“confirmed case fatality rate”
and you can see it in differences between states.

For example, compare Kentucky and Tennessee.
Or compare your state to Utah.