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NY partygoers get subpoenas after stonewalling COVID-19 contact tracers:
Test, isolate, trace, quarantine: these are the bedrock public health measures proven effective at stamping out an infectious disease before it flares to the point where the only option left is to foist draconian lockdowns on whole populations.
[...] On Wednesday, officials in Rockland County—just north of New York City—reported a cluster of cases linked to a recent party of up to 100 people largely in their early 20s. At the time of the party, the host was infected and had symptoms but held the party anyway.
So far, at least eight attendees have tested positive for the virus. But many partygoers have refused to work with public health officials to track the potential spread and notify others who may have been infected and could go on to spread the disease further.
"We are not receiving the necessary cooperation when we contact those who are positive for COVID-19 or those who have been at some of these gatherings," Dr. Patricia Schnabel Ruppert, Rockland County's health commissioner said at a press briefing Wednesday.
She explained:
My staff has been told that a person does not wish to, or have to, speak to my disease investigators. They hang up. They deny being at the party even though we have found their name from another party attendee or a parent provides us with the information. Many do not answer their cell phones and do not call back. Sometimes parents answer for their adult children and promise that they have been home consistently when they have not been.
This must stop.
In response, Ruppert announced that the county will issue subpoenas to anyone who refuses to cooperate with contact tracing. So far, the county is processing eight subpoenas. In addition, those who do not comply will face civil fines of around $2,000 every day they are out of compliance.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2020, @01:27PM (10 children)
These young folks aside, NYC folks are known to be street wise. It will be interesting to see what smart ways they find to ration a bit of virus exposure to have fun while keeping the virus at bay.
In NYC the symptoms have been somewhere between huh? and your personal spot in a crowded reefer truck.
With so much variance, it seems normal for someone who feels immortal to just go on and get it over with.
Most will be stronger for it. Under carefully controlled conditions, it might actually be a good idea except for the few who have a bad case. Under these crazy party conditions, it is a recipe for another lockdown.
The density of folks makes NYC is a target rich environment for the virus. History shows that without precautions, the number of new cases per day quickly overwhelms the docs and brings the city to a standstill. Exactly what these impatient young adults are tired of.
Lacking herd immunity, there are two numbers.
The number of new infections is the number of current cases (Nc) times the number folks an average sickie infects (R0).
Control neither Nc or R0 and the virus wins.
The bad news is that sufficient control of either number alone is a PITA. (Think lockdown or boy in a bubble.)
The good news is that moderate control of both at the same time is not that bad.
This is an interesting virus.
So far, given it has no brain, it is doing very well at outsmarting the humans.
It's game plan is to get the humans to follow this script.
DO the following
Have a great time without regards to the virus (Fun, easy step)
Notice a big jump in virus cases
Put another wave on the scoreboard
Do a big painful lockdown (PITA step)
Notice a big drop in cases
Continue to be moderately careful without a lockdown (Pretty easy step compared to a lockdown)
Eventually forget about the virus and stop doing simple things like masks (Normal reaction for pesky humans without leadership to remind them of the program)
Repeat (until herd immunity or vaccine)
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Monday July 06 2020, @01:50PM (9 children)
I had surgery in NYC two weeks ago, and the hospital was a virtual ghost town. The doctors, nurses, and other workers were all there, but I was one of only a half-dozen patients in the vast medical complex called Columbia-Presbyterian in Manhattan.
On the ground in Brooklyn, about a third of the few people on the street were not wearing masks at all, a third were wearing masks, and the last third had masks around their necks, not on their faces. In other words, only one-third were wearing masks to prevent transmission of the scary virus, and of those many were bespoke cloth masks that only give the appearance of safety while not actually conforming to medical standards.
My own theory is that any New Yorker who rides public transportation was already infected before the lockdown, and never knew it or had mild symptoms at best and wrote it down to a seasonal cold or regular flu. We won't know that unless tests for antibodies become widely available, of course, but New York is crowded and the MTA is a germ fest and nothing else seems possible.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday July 06 2020, @04:47PM (5 children)
No details - but I was a guest at CHI St. Vincent in Hot Springs for a few days, about the same time. My impression was, it was almost business as usual. Of course, I wasn't exactly free to tour all of the hospital. Trauma and ER seemed a bit slow, probably as a result of fewer people being out and about, doing crazy things. Otherwise, most everything seemed pretty routine and normal.
I only met one Karen who got upset that I wasn't complying with the mask BS. ;^)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2020, @09:23PM
Now this is a first. What have you done with the Real Runaway1956?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 07 2020, @06:21PM (3 children)
Lookit this boomer trying to reclaim Karen, truly a Chad of epic proportions. Throw in some "hospital wasn't busy COVID is a hoax" stupidity and you are peak boomboom.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday July 07 2020, @07:23PM (2 children)
Hiya, Karen. No, I'm not trying to reclaim you. If you can't get along with that meth head you ran off with, you're on your own!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @02:40AM (1 child)
Ok boomer*
* who taught Runaway meme lingo?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 08 2020, @09:27AM
Hopefully not the same person that tried to teach him occupational safety, and failed.
(Score: 2) by epitaxial on Monday July 06 2020, @05:28PM (1 child)
You need someone to follow you around with a shovel for the amount of bullshit you spew. The only hospital you visited was Bellevue.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Tuesday July 07 2020, @11:53AM
Uh huh. What part of it is bullshit, that I live in NYC, that I had surgery at Columbia-Presbyterian, or that there were not many patients there? Were you at Columbia-Presbyterian in Manhattan on June 23rd and 24th and saw differently?
When I first moved to NYC 20 years ago I lived on an apartment on 169th Street & Broadway, a short block away from Columbia-Presbyterian. My roommate, originally from Trinidad, was a nurse there. So I have a good sense of what the regular activity at that hospital looks like. When I went in for surgery two weeks ago, it was quite the opposite of normal.
If that all sounds like bullshit to you, then I submit that you have no ability to discern reality from fiction at all, and that the problem lies with you.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 06 2020, @05:51PM
"and the hospital was a virtual ghost town."
Yep, that sounds as expected at step 6.
The interesting question is if street wise NewYorkers are smart enough to avoid step 7?
(Repeating above with step numbers)
This is an interesting virus.
So far, given it has no brain, it is doing very well at outsmarting the humans.
It's game plan is to get the humans to follow this script.
DO the following
1) Have a great time without regards to the virus (Fun, easy step)
2) Notice a big jump in virus cases
3) Put another wave on the scoreboard
4) Do a big painful lockdown (PITA step)
5) Notice a big drop in cases
6) Continue to be moderately careful without a lockdown (Pretty easy step compared to a lockdown)
7) Eventually forget about the virus and stop doing simple things like masks (Normal reaction for pesky humans without leadership to remind them of the program)
Repeat (until herd immunity or vaccine)