21 April 2020
Breaking news from Germany and France:


https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/ ... st-updates

'Silent hypoxia' (basically, hard af to detect pneumonia)

Covid-19 might not be as asymptomatic as it seems, but rather we are just not noticing the symptoms - shockingly, our own oxygen deprivation. A harrowing tale from a doctor in NYC. Recommended reading.

"During my recent time at Bellevue, though, almost all the E.R. patients had Covid pneumonia. Within the first hour of my first shift I inserted breathing tubes into two patients.

Even patients without respiratory complaints had Covid pneumonia. The patient stabbed in the shoulder, whom we X-rayed because we worried he had a collapsed lung, actually had Covid pneumonia. In patients on whom we did CT scans because they were injured in falls, we coincidentally found Covid pneumonia. Elderly patients who had passed out for unknown reasons and a number of diabetic patients were found to have it.

And here is what really surprised us: These patients did not report any sensation of breathing problems, even though their chest X-rays showed diffuse pneumonia and their oxygen was below normal. How could this be?

We are just beginning to recognize that Covid pneumonia initially causes a form of oxygen deprivation we call “silent hypoxia” — “silent” because of its insidious, hard-to-detect nature."

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/coronavi ... li=BBoPU0R

Here is a good explanation of what The R and the RO numbers are and how they effect the spread.

The fun part is at the end where you get an interactive modelling chart where you get to choose the parameters e,g, RO, fatality, susceptibility and isolation rates. Basically, you can make your own nightmare scenarios. Try it out. Test your inner demons...

https://www.theguardian.com/world/datab ... -the-curve

Russian COVID-19 Cases Rise to Nearly 58,000 after over 5,200 More Reported
22/04/20 16:00
MOSCOW, April 22 (Xinhua) -- Russia has registered 5,236 COVID-19 cases over the last 24 hours, raising the total number to 57,999 as of Wednesday, the country's coronavirus response center said in a statement.
http://en.freshnewsasia.com/index.php/e ... 57-56.html

COVID-19 Infections in Singapore Top 10,000, with 1,016 New Cases
22/04/20 15:38
SINGAPORE, April 22 (CNA) - The number of COVID-19 cases in Singapore has crossed the 10,000 mark, with 1,016 new cases reported as of noon on Wednesday (Apr 22).

The vast majority of the new cases are work permit holders residing in foreign worker dormitories, the Ministry of Health (MOH) said in its preliminary release of figures.

Fifteen cases are Singaporeans or permanent residents.

The new cases bring the national total to 10,141.

"We are still working through the details of the cases, and further updates will be shared via the MOH press release that will be issued tonight," the ministry said.

CIRCUIT BREAKER EXTENDED
Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong on Tuesday announced that Singapore will extend its COVID-19 "circuit breaker" period by four weeks until Jun 1.
Tighter measures, such as closing more workplaces and entry restrictions at popular markets, were also announced.
http://en.freshnewsasia.com/index.php/e ... 39-30.html

April 22, 2020 / 12:38 PM / Updated 4 hours ago
Recovered, almost: China's early patients unable to shed coronavirus
Brenda Goh

9 Min Read

WUHAN, China (Reuters) - Dressed in a hazmat suit, two masks and a face shield, Du Mingjun knocked on the mahogany door of a flat in a suburban district of Wuhan on a recent morning.

A man wearing a single mask opened the door a crack and, after Du introduced herself as a psychological counsellor, burst into tears.

“I really can’t take it anymore,” he said. Diagnosed with the novel coronavirus in early February, the man, who appeared to be in his 50s, had been treated at two hospitals before being transferred to a quarantine centre set up in a cluster of apartment blocks in an industrial part of Wuhan.

Why, he asked, did tests say he still had the virus more than two months after he first contracted it?

The answer to that question is a mystery baffling doctors on the frontline of China’s battle against COVID-19, even as it has successfully slowed the spread of the coronavirus across the country.

Chinese doctors in Wuhan, where the virus first emerged in December, say a growing number of cases in which people recover from the virus, but continue to test positive without showing symptoms, is one of their biggest challenges as the country moves into a new phase of its containment battle.

Those patients all tested negative for the virus at some point after recovering, but then tested positive again, some up to 70 days later, the doctors said. Many have done so over 50-60 days.

The prospect of people remaining positive for the virus, and therefore potentially infectious, is of international concern, as many countries seek to end lockdowns and resume economic activity as the spread of the virus slows. Currently, the globally recommended isolation period after exposure is 14 days.

So far, there have been no confirmations of newly positive patients infecting others, according to Chinese health officials.

China has not published precise figures for how many patients fall into this category. But disclosures by Chinese hospitals to Reuters, as well as in other media reports, indicate there are at least dozens of such cases.

In South Korea, about 1,000 people have been testing positive for four weeks or more. In Italy, the first European country ravaged by the pandemic, health officials noticed that coronavirus patients could test positive for the virus for about a month.
Full article: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-heal ... SKCN2240HI