Coronavirus COVID-19 Thread

[Jolly_Green_Giant]

I went back and edited this first post just so people can easily navigate the thread now. I asked GPT to break it all down.


Quick Retrospective: Four-Year COVID Journey in One Post
(Pulled from 5,400+ replies across 275 pages – use the page jump at the top of the thread to dive in.)

1. Spark – Feb 2020
   • 26 Feb 2020: @Jolly_Green_Giant opens the thread after Wuhan reports go global.
   • Early replies focus on China’s data lag, cruise-ship outbreaks, and first U.S. cases.
   
2. “It’ll blow over…right?” – Late Feb → Mar 2020
   • Daily BNO tracker links and mask-supply jokes.
   • @Montoya warns against pump-and-dump “vaccine stocks”;
   • Resident pharmacist @Glum explains why Phase-I trials ≠ ready vaccine.
   
3. First Global Surge – Jun → Aug 2020
   • 27 Jun: “COVID Catharsis Corner” nightly data drops start (world > 10 M cases).
   • 1 Jul: U.S. sets a new single-day record; furlough talk kicks in.
   • 23 Jul: U.S. blasts past 4 M cases.
   
4. The Long Autumn – Sep → Nov 2020
   • Thread breaks 3 k replies.
   • 6 Nov: world passes 49 M; first million-case day logged.
   • 11 Nov: debates over UK “fire-break” vs. Swedish laissez-faire.
   
5. Vaccines & Second Wave – Dec 2020 → Jan 2021
   • 14 Dec: first Pfizer shipments noted; world at 72 M cases.
   • Early Jan: UK’s 3rd lockdown; U.S. > 21 M cases.
   • Forum weighs side-effects vs. “jab & go.”
   
6. Roll-out & Variants – Feb → May 2021
   • 23 Feb: U.S. crosses 500 k deaths.
   • April: India’s explosion and B.1.617 flagged “variant of concern.”
   • 14 May: WHO warns Year-2 may out-kill Year-1.
   
7. Delta Summer – Aug 2021
   • 3 Aug: world > 199 M / 4.24 M deaths; herd-immunity politics, vax-hesitancy wars.
   
8. Living with COVID – 2022 → Now
   • Thread rolls past 5 k replies.
   • Latest posts look at booster fatigue, long-COVID research, and whether the pandemic ever really “ends.”

Why This Thread Matters

• []Crowd-sourced history: daily case counts + first-hand reports from NA, EU & AUS members.
  []Tone shift archive: skepticism → panic buying → fatigue → hope → “new normal.”
• Lots of hard-to-find context (supply-chain notes, local policy changes, personal anecdotes).

How to Skim Quickly
• Pages 1–20 = Initial shock & data uncertainty (Feb–Mar 2020)
• Pages 120–160 = Second wave + vaccine-trial buzz (Oct–Dec 2020)
• Pages 190–210 = Global roll-out, variant chatter (Jan–May 2021)
• Last 50 pages = Endemic-era reflection & booster debates

Huge shout-out to everyone who logged numbers nightly – especially “COVID Catharsis Corner” posters – and to the mods for letting this living archive run for four straight years.

BEGIN FIRST POST:



As this is an important topic and with the blessing of Montoya,

I am creating this thread for all things relating to the emerging coronavirus out of China. It will be a good repository for information, a good forum for discussion / speculation, and a great place to post memes. Some may say this is a nothingburger, however the information that is coming from world governments and health agencies is undeniable at this point. I do however understand there is a huge optimism bias that some people will need to overcome as we have never dealt with anything like this before in our lifetimes. Some of us have been discussing this in g-loc on discord for over a month now and its quite obvious this is getting serious (please join us there if youd like). The CDC has told us to start preparing, mostly for socioeconomic disruption.

As for where the information comes from, a lot of what I have been seeing has been coming from Twitter news aggregates for the latest news updates, so I ask that everyone understands there will be a lot of unverified posts in here. Take what you see with a grain of salt and use your own judgement to determine what you can trust. I would hope that most tweets link to an official / trusted authority on the matter but that can't always be guaranteed. I know most of you aren't dummies so it shouldn't be an issue.

Politics should obviously stay to a minimum, but I understand wanting to point out competence / incompetence. Please try to keep it civil.

Don't panic. Have fun. Ask questions. Play nice.


- JOLLY

 

[placid]

I hope China has their feet held to the fire for sand bagging this until it was too late.

 

[Jolly_Green_Giant]

So far for the most up to date counts of infections / deaths BNO on twitter has been the best resource.

https://twitter.com/BNODesk

 

[Jolly_Green_Giant]

Here's a good summary of where were at sparing all the details.

 

[Bambooza]

A good read on what is the clinical findings so far published.

Study of 72,000 COVID-19 patients finds 2.3% death rate

www.cidrap.umn.edu

 

[ColdDog]

I thought Vancouver was the gateway to the East.

 

[Jolly_Green_Giant]

A good read on what is the clinical findings so far published.

Study of 72,000 COVID-19 patients finds 2.3% death rate

www.cidrap.umn.edu

Nice. This is a great bit of info I hadnt seen. Watching this come up, people seemed to only focus on infected vs deaths. The amount of those in serious / critical condition was what was really concerning because without care, they would also die. Theyre the ones taking up most of the resources as they need round the clock care. Even if you are young and healthy, if you dont get the treatment you need to at minimum treat the symptoms youre kinda screwed. If these cases overload our healthcare system, they are also going to take resources away from other patients with other medical issues.

 

[Jolly_Green_Giant]

 

[Sraika]

neat :p

 

[Jolly_Green_Giant]

Report on the effects of the virus on Kidneys and Testis

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.02.12.20022418v1.full.pdf

 

[Jolly_Green_Giant]

Pretty cool picture of what South Korea is implementing. Drive through COVID19 testing centers.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1232618450482163713

View: https://twitter.com/BBCLBicker/status/1232618450482163713

 

[Jolly_Green_Giant]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1232831756140732416

View: https://twitter.com/BNODesk/status/1232831756140732416


This is the thing that starts to make things difficult.

 

[Glum]

Buzzy biotech Moderna is 'looking at all options' to ramp up production just days after shipping the first potential coronavirus vaccine

The disease called COVID-19 has killed more than 2,700 people and sickened more than 81,000. It's spread to every continent except Antarctica.

www.businessinsider.com

 

[Montoya]

I thought Vancouver was the gateway to the East.

Same, I was expecting way more numbers here, but its pretty low so far. 12 cases in all of Canada? Hopefully it stays low!

Italy was surprising!

 

[Montoya]

Perhaps @SeungRyul could chime in with some additional expertise. He was mentioning that the big risk is some sort of mutation.

 

[Jolly_Green_Giant]

Buzzy biotech Moderna is 'looking at all options' to ramp up production just days after shipping the first potential coronavirus vaccine

The disease called COVID-19 has killed more than 2,700 people and sickened more than 81,000. It's spread to every continent except Antarctica.

www.businessinsider.com

This is the time for these companies to shine. Theyre so happy. I hope they do find a way to manufacture them in quantities needed.

Perhaps @SeungRyul could chime in with some additional expertise. He was mentioning that the big risk is some sort of mutation.

I would love to hear from Seung too. If anyone knows how things are going down it would be him.

 

[Montoya]

This is the time for these companies to shine. Theyre so happy. I hope they do find a way to manufacture them in quantities needed.

Caution there, this is company Moderna also rushed out press releases that they can cure Zika. Thing is, pouring bleach into a dish and killing the virus does not mean they found a safe way to cure anybody!

I have not followed up too closely in this particular case, but its fairly common to get a few publicly traded biotech companies rushing out press releases saying they have a cure when these things happen.

 

[Jolly_Green_Giant]

The headline reads:

North Korea has successfully developed Wuhan pneumonia target vaccine

(I'll just assume shes telling us all the good news)

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1232681050888785921

View: https://twitter.com/u9dkRfv45sNZlgy/status/1232681050888785921

 

[Blind Owl]

I hope China has their feet held to the fire for sand bagging this until it was too late.

On the contrary, I think China may have bought the world time to prepare.
https://globalnews.ca/news/6595226/world-braces-coronavirus-outbreak/

 

[Glum]

Caution there, this is company Moderna also rushed out press releases that they can cure Zika. Thing is, pouring bleach into a dish and killing the virus does not mean they found a safe way to cure anybody!

I have not followed up too closely in this particular case, but its fairly common to get a few publicly traded biotech companies rushing out press releases saying they have a cure when these things happen.

Moderna shipped the Covid vaccine to NIH for phase I trials, so I don't believe this to be smoke and mirrors. Flu vaccine isn't hard to produce, but hard to design to account for mutations that will inevitably happen as the virus runs through the population. Phase II trials will start to give us feedback on effectiveness.

Moderna did receive fast-track approval from the FDA for testing their Zika vaccine, so that isn't smoke and mirrors either. Remember that vaccines are preventative, not curative--those two terms should not be conflated. Bleach analogy doesn't apply.

While this isn't my area of expertise, I do have a doctorate degree in pharmacy and have a good grasp on the approval process and science.