Nationals and Coronavirus.

Your invective towards the "mass media" was much less thinly veiled than anything Elaine said. 4-5 times more contagious than the flu and a good solid order of magnitude more lethal. Ignoring that is like saying that people driving under the influence of alcohol going 150+ MPH don't cause as many accidents as those driving under the speed limit completely sober shouldn't be cited or reeled back in. It really isn't that tough to figure out. I do not veil anything. I say what I mean. Contagion rate is something to be considered, but the mortality rate is far lower than most strains of flu.

Love the graphic michael. I know you didn't create it, but I am irked by the note about the Plague of Justinain and it saying that it hastened the fall of the Roman Empire. The plague occured from 541-542 AD. The fall of the Roman Empire is typically marked on September 4th, 476 AD...so not sure how a plague that occurred almost three quarters of a century later hastened its demise :P

I do not veil anything. I say what I mean. Contagion rate is something to be considered, but the mortality rate is far lower than most strains of flu. "The mortality rate for the seasonal flu is 0.1%, or 1 in 1,000 people. According to the World Health Organization, the latest estimate for the fatality rate for the coronavirus stands at 3.4%" Let's see how accurate that pandemic chart ends up being when all is said and done, and we'll see who is enlightened or not. Although I am hoping for the best, I'm a realist, and I know how real this virus has become around the world.

I am irked by the note about the Plague of Justinain and it saying that it hastened the fall of the Roman Empire. The plague occured from 541-542 AD. The fall of the Roman Empire is typically marked on September 4th, 476 AD...so not sure how a plague that occurred almost three quarters of a century later hastened its demise :P Yeah, everybody knows The Plague of Justinian affected the Byzantine and Neo-Persian empire...duh! The problem quoting mortality statistics this early is it's not really known. I work for the largest hospital system in Arizona (2nd busiest hospital in state) and we are currently only testing high risk people (travel or exposure to known coronavirus positive peeps). Obviously, this will skew the denominator (and thus mortality rates) if we are only testing the sickest people. My hospital is way past capacity most all the time and I bet most run this way chronically (can't be paying people to sit around when we have administrators making 25 millon per year). Coronavirus is not going to change that. Don't worry though I saw a neat you tube video yesterday and learned how to connect 4 people to one ventilator. I am sad by cancellation but it seems to be necessary in this legal, risk-adverse world we now live in. I was planning on rolling the dice with me and all my family (y'all were about to witness an all Dickson mixed free and medley relay) but then again, I have nothing to live for. See you all in Richmond. Be nice!

Yeah, everybody knows The Plague of Justinian affected the Byzantine and Neo-Persian empire...duh IKR?

Hi All, There has been alot of "decisions made too quickly" - like cancelling the NCAA championships that involves a population group that is low risk. There have also been some very timely decisions to help out the at-risk population that includes the older masters swimmers. I have ceased being critical. And, for all of us to remember: this is a new virus to the human population that is more contagious than other strains. As such, at some point, this means everyone of us will contract it. I just hope my immune system can handle it like a mild cold or flu. Right now, because my pool is shut down, I wish I had an endless pool in the back yard. :)

Glenn, The real killer historically in the USA is any version of the annual influenza season, killing an average of 20,000 citizens per year. COVID-19 is up to about 55 as of this writing. We do not cancel sport seasons for the flu. So why this, which is reportedly less intense and has a mortality rate of under 1%? You may want to do your research on the CDC website and inform yourself about percentages of influenza deaths vs COVID-19. The percentage of deaths makes COVID-19 more deadly. Until more people get tested here, we won't know just how widespread the virus has become. You WILL see that 55 number explode, just as it has in Italy-- precisely the reason why I suggested we all look back on your first post at the end of the month. Don't think we will be out of the woods by then, either. Look how long the virus circulated in China before the numbers started tapering off. This won't be just a couple of weeks; it will be at least a couple of months. I am not expert; I'm not even in the medical field. I do educate myself on the FACTS, though, rather than listening to politicians. I have listened to the experts at John Hopkins, Cleveland Clinic, Stanford, CDC, etc. They would be shaking their heads at your first post. Call it an insult, call it whatever you want. Glenn was right. USMS did the right thing for so many different reasons.

Hey Elaine back off on the attitude. I have a lot of things going on in my life to worry about other than your snarky comments! Ok, guilty as charged; I was snarky, and I apologize. I do want to say, though, that you often post questions or comments before doing a little research yourself. There have been several times the other Forumites and I have patiently responded to your posts by providing links to guide you to answers to your questions that you could (and should have) been able to find yourself. If you are computer literate enough to post on the forums, you are capable of finding answers to your questions in the Nationals section of this website for information such as NQT's, the location of Nationals, and other information you have asked for in your posts. The same goes for Senior Games. Do a google search on "National Senior Games" and it will take you right to their site where you can learn all you need to know about state game qualifying meets. Your recent question about Nationals being cancelled could have been found by going to www.USMS.org . There it is: COVID-19 update. It was posted the day before you posted your question. One simple search of me clicking on the logo above got me to the home page where the link provides information about Nationals being canceled. Instead of just looking in the most obvious places first, you wrote your post. Hey, we all have a lot of things going on in our lives right now. These are difficult times. I wouldn't give my snarky comments another thought, if I were you. Take care of yourself and your family, stay healthy, and be well. My suggestion for the future: Do a little research first on your own before you ask questions about Nationals, Senior Games, etc. It's amazing how much you can learn online when you set your mind to it.

Your invective towards the "mass media" was much less thinly veiled than anything Elaine said. 4-5 times more contagious than the flu and a good solid order of magnitude more lethal. Ignoring that is like saying that people driving under the influence of alcohol going 150+ MPH don't cause as many accidents as those driving under the speed limit completely sober shouldn't be cited or reeled back in. It really isn't that tough to figure out. Thank you for supplying facts that I am guessing you had confirmed by your medical doctor wife :agree:. I had heard the same statistic. I am thankful for the mass media (such as CNBC and CNN) for bringing on doctors and scientists from the institutions I mentioned in my previous post to provide the FACTS to help form my opinions. I also refer to the CDC's website, because I trust science more than politicians. Edit: Michael Heather, according to an article in the Atlanta Journal Constitution: "The mortality rate for the seasonal flu is 0.1%, or 1 in 1,000 people. According to the World Health Organization, the latest estimate for the fatality rate for the coronavirus stands at 3.4%" "Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a member of the White House coronavirus task force, warned lawmakers last week that, without aggressive efforts, the number of those infected would go way up to the "many, many millions." Michael, read that last word: millions.

Michael Heather - none of the other pandemics are currently increasing at 15% per day. Not even 1. I don't think that even a single one of those historical pandemics spread that fast even at their prime. Not even the plague that killed a third of Europe. It's widely acknowledged that the 3.4% mortality rate is an artifact of under-IDing cases. Still it's likely that this will be far more fatal than the flu. COVID19 is still in the early part of the exponential stage - it's too early to tell whether total US deaths will get up the 7 figures or not. The latest figures from China are very encouraging - but I don't believe them. I don't believe China went from 5,000 new cases a day to under 20 a day in a week or so. I roll my eyes at the idea that most of China's new cases are foreign-originated. But *IF* the Chinese are telling the truth on this, COVID could pass in a couple of months with a few thousand fatalities. It's possible that some existing drugs, such as remdesimir, chloroquine, or some cocktail of other drugs, will prove effective on COVID. But maybe not Cuomo, in New York, is being realistic when he says it's likely that the 100,000 or so ventilators in the country will be an inadequate number. Any thing to slow down the virus RIGHT NOW will help enormously with that. Even if the eventual numbers of people needing respirators is the same, if we can spread the peak out, we can reduce fatalities. If we can delay the peak by days, weeks, months the chances of effective treatment goes up. We can expect other emerging diseases to occur - and some worse than Covid. So even if we look back on this as some kind of hysteria (unlikely, I think), the knowledge we gain from trying to stop this is well worthwhile.