Pandemic links

[conuly]

All-Girl Robotics Team In Afghanistan Works On Low-Cost Ventilator... With Car Parts

Missi Wimberly: Alabama Woman Gets Backlash for COVID-19 Pedicure Tweet (Such a delightful and refreshing viewpoint! "People shouldn't wear masks because then I'm sad during my pedicure. My feet aren't contagious! Also, Jesus!" I think that about sums it up. It's charming, really. Pity nobody ever taught her how to make an apology, or at least gracefully extract her foot from her mouth.)

How We’ll Learn to Sing Together When We’re Far Apart

Coronavirus Threatens China’s Devotion to Chopsticks and Sharing Food (The Chinese government is branding chopstick sharing "uncivilized", which seems to be their go-to word for any social behavior they don't like but which is currently very widespread.)

Coronavirus toll on Italy's elderly strains "nonni" safety net

Through kids' eyes: Virus outbreak brings sadness, fear, joy worldwide

Inflamed brains, toe rashes, strokes: Why COVID-19's weirdest symptoms are only emerging now

NYC Is No Longer The Epicenter Of The United States' Coronavirus Epidemic

Tracing 'patient zero': why America's first coronavirus death may for ever go unmarked

COVID-19 cases among health care workers top 62,000, CDC reports

The Coronavirus Is Deadliest Where Democrats Live

Across U.S., COVID-19 takes a hidden toll behind bars

ICE Detainee Who Died of Covid-19 Suffered Horrifying Neglect

29 Pictures Of Memorial Day Weekend During A Deadly Pandemic (I am recoiling at some of these pics.)

Spread of coronavirus fuels corruption in Latin America

Comments

[brokenallbroken]

If her foot has been in her mouth, it's definitely contagious.

[conuly]

Oh yeah.

[adrian_turtle]

"How we'll learn to sing together when we're far apart" is written by somebody who sings for different reasons than I do. And who values singing together for VERY different reasons. I don't do it to perform for outsiders. I do it to share an experience with the people I'm singing with, as we hear each other and adjust our singing, our breathing, in response to each other.

[hudebnik]

On that subject, take a look at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8a9QhR7LS0
It's an online lecture/demo by Adam Gilbert, one of our favorite medieval-music teachers, on how he's kept working with his collegium in isolation.
None of the techniques he describes will give you the sense of singing in the same room with a bunch of other people simultaneously, adjusting your breathing to one another in real-time, although JamKazam and its ilk are attempts in this direction.

[lightbird]

Holy shit, some of those pics of Memorial Day Weekend.

The Coronavirus is Deadliest Where Democrats Live

I'm wondering how much that has to do with numbers being fudged or not being reported accurately, in addition to urban areas tending to be blue and having denser populations.

[hudebnik]

Well, in pretty much ANY outbreak of a contagious disease, urban areas are going to be hit first and worst because of population density, so that's probably the main reason.

Of the non-urban areas that have been hit, I gather it's largely
1) majority-black areas in the Deep South,
2) prisons and immigration detention centers filled largely with racial minorities, and
3) meat-packing plants staffed largely by immigrants
all of which are largely Democratic for racial reasons, and get lousy health care for the same racial reasons.

[lightbird]

This is my impression as well.

But I'm wondering about the numbers in the red areas, and if there maybe is also under-reporting and under-testing happening in those places.

[hudebnik]

There's "under-testing" EVERYWHERE, of course, but if you mean substantially lower levels of testing in "red areas" than "blue areas", yes, that's certainly plausible. Even likely, on the reasonable grounds that you're not highly motivated to test for what you expect not to find.

As for under-reporting... this was probably a problem in China, with local officials not wanting to report large disease numbers for fear it would make them look bad with the Party. And the same thing *could* be happening in the U.S, with local officials who happen to be Republican not wanting to report large disease numbers that conflict with the party's stance that this isn't a serious problem in Real America. But I don't have any evidence of that *actually* happening in the U.S. And I wouldn't expect local doctors to do that, regardless of their political views.