SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Cell-tower attacks by idiots who claim 5G spreads COVID-19 reportedly hit US:
US warns carriers to boost security, citing reports of attacks in several states.
The Department of Homeland Security is reportedly issuing alerts to wireless telecom providers and law enforcement agencies about potential attacks on cell towers and telecommunications workers by 5G/coronavirus conspiracy theorists. The DHS warned that there have already been "arson and physical attacks against cell towers in several US states."
The preposterous claim that 5G can spread the coronavirus, either by suppressing the immune system or by directly transmitting the virus over radio waves, led to dozens of tower burnings in the UK and mainland Europe. Now, the DHS "is preparing to advise the US telecom industry on steps it can take to prevent attacks on 5G cell towers following a rash of incidents in Western Europe fueled by the false claim that the technology spreads the pathogen causing COVID-19," The Washington Post reported last week.
<no-sarcasm>
FACT: 5G mobile networks DO NOT spread COVID-19!
</no-sarcasm>
(Score: 4, Touché) by Thexalon on Wednesday May 20 2020, @06:53PM (3 children)
Which has nothing to do with liberalism versus conservatism, and everything to do with another variable, namely population density. As soon as conservatives get together in a large building on a Sunday morning, they spread it just as quickly as liberals do on an underground train.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 20 2020, @08:56PM (1 child)
Not *just* population density. Also the prevalence (at least until the lockdown) of public transportation usage.
NYC subway ridership: ~5.6 million/day [wikipedia.org] (2017 numbers)
NYC bus ridership: ~1.9 million/day [mta.info] (2017 numbers)
Regional commuter rail line ridership: ~900,000/day [wikipedia.org] (4Q 2019 numbers)
Note that social distancing is essentially impossible on trains and buses in the NY Metro area with normal ridership numbers.
During commuting times, a subway car can be considered not too crowded if you can *shove* your way onto the car -- that means there's likely an inch or two between passengers -- well, until more people shove their way in.
Morons have tried to portray the high infection rates in NYC as some sort of failed policy issue, rather than issues with density and high rates of use for public transportation.
The population of Manhattan (which is ~29 miles2) goes from ~1,600,000 [wikipedia.org] to over 3,000,000 on a normal workday. Should all of those ~1,500,000 commuters drive cars into Manhattan, those 1.5 million people would require more than 25,000 miles2 for parking*. On an island that's just 30 miles2, that would be quite a trick.
As such, there is really no way around using public transportation in NYC on a large scale. As such, the high (which have dropped by an order of magnitude over the past six weeks [nyc.gov]) number of COVID-19 cases can be directly related to use of public transportation (subway ridership is down 92% [brooklyneagle.com]).
And that's why it's going to take a while longer for NYC to get back to normal. Assuming large scale testing/contact tracing gets done and social distancing continues, things could *start* getting back to normal in a couple months -- unless we see spikes in cases again, at which point we're back to square one.
tl;dr: Population density and use of public transportation correlated strongly with the number of COVID-19 infections, at least until shelter-in-place policies were implemented. Compare the number of cases in various places with public transport (especially subways) use:
Public transportation usage by city (US only): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._cities_with_high_transit_ridership [wikipedia.org]
Number of COVID-19 cases by county (US only): https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/us-map [jhu.edu]
*Average car size: ~15x6 feet or 90 feet2 [reference.com]
Number of people who commute to Manhattan: ~1.5 million [citylab.com]
Calculation:
(90 feet2 x 1.5 million = 135,000,000 feet2
That's 135,000,000 feet2/5280 = 25,568 miles2
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Friday May 22 2020, @01:54PM
Of course, one could reasonably argue that public transit use is also a function of population density: Dense cities are much more likely to have public transit networks compared with rural areas and suburbs, for the simple reason of more potential passengers within easy distance of a station.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 2) by legont on Thursday May 21 2020, @01:05AM
I agree with you. However, liberal science currently suggests that liberal's covid brain damage is four times conservative's.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.