Jackson Jambalaya

On the tv screen is that a stock photo of a skyscraper that doesn’t exist in Mississippi?

How's Pelahatchie dealing with all of this ?

That's always an entertaing cast of characters.

It occurred to me today, and I'm the stupid one for not realizing earlier: This whole thing of sequestering people and masks and gloves and distancing is not about saving their lives at all. And it's not about safety of the masses or old people. It about one thing: Not over-burdening the health care system - which means not stacking too many bodies in hospitals and running out of beds. Period. The government cannot afford to have that occur or admit that they have no beds. Reeves has finally eluded to this and I'm an idiot for not already figuring that out.

@4:29 PM
I can tell you dont listen to Rush Limbaugh because he has literally explained every show he hosts (he's dying you know) that flattening the curve is exactly that. Preventing our broken healthcare system from being overwhelmed.

Yes, 4:29, that's been the only point to any of this. And unfortunately, it is a completely justifiable point.

Our interconnected lives and systems supporting the same are so *efficient and optimized* that the institutions can not stand any blow or the whole damn thing falls. Once an insult is sustained, you have to print trillions of dollars to bail out everything in sight and still have lots of dead people and inadequate provision for the living.

Trying to squeeze every penny out of every system has created a way of life with ZERO anti-fragility. Cutting every bit of fat means systems that are not robust and failure prone.

@4:29pm - You’re joking right

4:29, not to be snide or ugly, but that has been the stated goal since very early on. The whole program has been to make sure that the hospital system, available beds, available health care workers, etc don't get overwhelmed as they did in Italy and elsewhere.

Reeves has said this numerous times in his daily press conferences - probably not as much lately as it would be very repetitive. But your observation is absolutely correct.

And - it appears that the theory has worked, and while it may not have stemmed the number of people who got infected, or died (yet to be seen), it has at least let the medical professionals deal with those that have gotten infected in a reasonable and professional manner.

(Unlike social medicine countries in their everyday medical decisions, our physicians have not had to make the decision as to who gets treated, which patient gets the needed equipment, etc and which ones are tossed to the curb.)

They are telling us so little that trusting them seems imprudent.

The goal of flattening the curve was to keep the medical needs below the point where the system couldn't handle the increase in cases AND to buy time to develop a treatment/vaccine. Yes, it was stated on the front end if a treatment/vaccine wasn't discovered that flattening the curve wouldn't decrease the number of infected individuals over the life of the pandemic, but it was also stated that better treatments would increase the survivability if we could delay infection until after they were discovered.

Those who are engaging in revisionist history to argue that our goal should be to maximize the number of people in the hospital and hit the resulting number of deaths to get this over with as quickly as possible are wrong. It was always a goal to push the infection rate out to a point where survivability was maximized through medical developments.

BS on the medical developments.

Still no SARS or MERS (tested out) vaccines. Not going to be one here anytime soon.

The only point was prevent the healthcare system from collapse. Because once it does...well you do the math if 1/3 of the economy goes down.

Have the hospitals and clinics and physician's offices started setting up screening of their employees before they start work each day? With a loosening of restrictions, this will be the first requirement. Most healthcare facilities are staffed (largely) with 22-50 year olds. As is well known now, most of this population acquire the virus, develop no symptoms, shed the virus, and get over it without symptoms. They are among the great pool of the "healthy" shedding virus. Most of the patients are in another demographic. This is especially true in orthopedics. It should be a requirement that the vulnerable should be protected from those shedding the virus (who don't have fever or cough). That is, healthcare workers (especially for "elective procedures) need to protect their patients from acquiring the virus from them. Obviously this will require daily (morning) screening for the virus with an approved (EUA) RT-PCR test. When will the Governor and state health officer require these as a condition of operation?

The reason there is no SARS or MERS vaccines is simply because we were able to identify and quarantine infected people effectively enough to eliminate the diseases before they became a pandemic. The vaccines were under development, but with no disease there was no further research.

4:29, what's your point? Is it that our society is at fault for not having an unlimited supply of beds/vents/PPE? You couldn't afford to pay for that kind of healthcare system.

All those who were screaming that it was just another flu, didn't get that stacking a flu like virus that we're not immune to could crush the healthcare system. Doctors/nurses/respitory therapists go down, you don't have a shot in hell.

7am, these protections will absolutely be in place. We're all following CDC guidelines on approach to reopening.

7:00, that will NEVER be required. Testing of healthcare workers will be done according to CDC guidelines. The government will start traveling down a slippery slope with mandated testing for every virus that emerges. The costs of healthcare (which are already sky high) will increase to a point where no one will be able to get any care. There are many things that we could screen for to decrease a patient's chance of contracting this virus. Why don't we weigh everyone at the door while we are checking their temperature? ALL of the research has shown that overweight people are more at risk of dying with this virus. I would be wary of asking the governor or any state officials to start mandating daily testing of employees.

dear 7:00 am, you must work for one of the fly by night medical testing companies that brought us gene testing and pain cream. Go fuck yourself.

I agree that a major consideration is that a reduced capacity in our medical system due to " bean counters" whose only consideration is profit, is a significant element.

That flaw exists in all of our service professions. The notion that widgets and services should be produced the same way is the problem.

With widget production, long term planning is not as critical and the focus is on quarters, not years.

You see this in the break down of our supply chain as well. We do not have the rapid trains most other western nations have. A Mississippian, Gil Carmicheal ,in charge of transportation under the Reagan administration saw this clearly. The over-reliance on air and roads while not seeing the updating and advancement in rails as of equal value, was a mistake as rails have more capacity for cargo for less per item if we increased speed and capacity by updating the system.
Again, if profit is your ONLY goal, you don't invest what is needed in "plant and equipment" and in "research and development" to improve your product.
Capitalism is all about competition and innovation...or was. Building the better mousetrap and advancing the economic viability of a society.

Those telling the guy who doesn't want to acquire Covid from asymptomatic health care workers to eff himself can do likewise. And they better save up for a good lawyer. The idiots in elective high profit medicine will crash the court system with a cavalier attitude. But mainly, you aren't going to be seeing many patients at all. Read some. Folks are holding off on appendicitis. Think of what your practice is about to undergo. You ought to be praying that guys that think like that feel safe enough to present. Don't believe he's in sales for anything. Think. Instead of, "taint nuttin, Bubba." What derp.

How do you “hold off” on appendicitis? Doing so usually results in death.

10:30, this may be the most glorious comment I've ever read on JJ. Every sentence is so disconnected to reality and to the sentence before that it just becomes its own fever dream.

"... they better save up for a good lawyer." what does this even mean? to defend against who or what, exactly? Is this because someone told someone else to eff off? that's litigable?

"...crash the court system with their cavalier attitude." how does this happen? I've practiced law for 20 years. Never seen it happen. would watch with wonder, though.

"Read some." uh, ok.

"Folks are holding off on appendicitis." see, Michael Scott declaring "Bankruptcy!"

"Don't believe he's in sales for anything." who is the "he" in this random statement? is this non-salesman the doctor who is crashing the courts? Didn't we know he was a doctor, not a saleman already, and when did he start acting like a salesman to fool everyone?

"Think." hmmm.

"Instead of, 'taint nuttin, Bubba." when did Bubba appear? is he withholding his appendicitis?

How do you hold off on appendicitis? Not suggesting it. Bad idea, usually bad outcome.

But it's a fact: First case below had (NOTE) an IMMUNOSUPPRESSED relative:


https://abc7.com/fearing-coronavirus-people-with-potentially-fatal-conditions-avoid-emergency-care/6126341/

Fearing coronavirus, people with potentially fatal conditions avoid emergency care
By LUCIEN BRUGGEMAN
Friday, April 24, 2020 3:30AM
"Stay home." That's the message public health experts and political leaders have foisted onto Americans in recent weeks, and that was the message ringing in Alan Phenix's mind when the pain crept into his abdomen earlier this month.

"We followed all the guidance very well and we were sheltering in place, basically isolated," Phenix said of his Los Angeles-based family. "So there was this concern that by going to the hospital I would expose myself to the risk of infection."

With an immunocompromised wife at home, Phenix, 62, waited five days after symptoms emerged before seeking treatment for what turned out to be appendicitis. By the time he received medical care, his appendix had ruptured and an infection had set in.

Weeks on, lingering stomach discomfort and an ongoing antibiotic regimen stand as a reminder of what should have been a simple surgical procedure if he had not hesitated to go to the hospital immediately. In hindsight, he said, fears of contracting the coronavirus, at least weighed against the pain he was experiencing, were exaggerated. A diligent UCLA Medical Center staff had taken "every reasonable caution" to prevent the spread, he said.

Another example showing this is not unheard of, especially in an area with a lot of Covid deaths:
https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-news/coronavirus-surges-non-covid-medical-emergencies-take-back-seat-putting-n1175871

One example is appendicitis: “If a patient presents with abdominal pain which is strongly suggestive of appendicitis, which can be treated with surgery or with antibiotics, we would lean very heavily toward the treatment option that minimizes the use of hospital resources, which would be the antibiotic option,” Herron said. But “in cases where there is only a surgical option, then surgery is still available.”

"That goes for doctors working in New York City hospitals as well, though they are carefully weighing treatment options to keep emergency patients from staying in the hospital when possible, said Dr. Daniel Herron, the chief of general surgery at Mount Sinai Health System.

Another, but from NZ: https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12325346 Heart attack.


The point being is folks ARE delaying things, and browbeating patients is not rational or productive. Folks DO have vulnerable family members, or fears. Not all are irrational.

But, hey, delaying an appendectomy, well, I reckon he has a very high pain tolerance. And he nearly died due to excessive fear, I agree.

You can control some appendicitis's with antibiotics for a little while BUT when it finally bursts or is about to, surgery or die.