extended rationing

beautiful day,  The Dog got some extra long walks

word is that there is a case or two of COVID-19 in the neighbourhood,
also first case among campus staff confirmed, and first case among Hershey staff

A. called, the true depth of shortages has been revealed by the local news there,
stores in Arizona are rationing ammunition, 200 rounds per customer



Comfortably Numb

TP cores...

Heard a strange tale this week.
My neighbour was looking for supplies, taking relatives with health issues to a vacation home for extra isolation.  Said he'd found small stores up in the mountains which still had stocks and bought what they needed.
Apparently, or so I'm told, there is a toilet paper manufacturer in northern Pennsylvania, which distributes locally (plausible, there is plenty of softwood up there). 

Toilet Paper Seeds

But, the little cores in the centers of the rolls, those are apparently made in China, and are in short supply. So this toilet paper manufacturer is distributing the rolls without a core cardboard cylinder until they can set up to get alternative suppliers, or make their own.

Literally could not make this up. 
So.., it must be true, right?

que sera sera

WHO launches global megatrial of the four most promising coronavirus treatments

very skeptical article on chloroquine or hydroxychloroquine therapy



Lovely day today, long walks with dog,  too many people out and about.

The local hospital has set up a separate outside area for ER patients coming in with fevers and coughs, and restricted all visitors.  Two cases currently confirmed in county, no indication of nuber of tests or lag times.  HIPAA is going to really screw up any efforts to do contact tracing or general public health counter-measures.

Walking the dog through the forest above the bike path, saw people on the bike path couple of hundred yards away,  then one of them had a really bad coughing fit.  They continued in the direction away from us. Wonder what will happen to them.

Managed to avoid news and social media most of the day, then go a somewhat over-concentrated dose around dinner time.

Chloroquine for the 2019 novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2

Chloroquine for the 2019 novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2

So, anyone actually read this?
It is a "hypothesis paper" - referring to some preliminary clinical tests for SARS

Maybe there is something to this, but I don't see any new clinical preprints on medrXiv 

International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents (Elsevier)

Volume 55, Issue 3, March 2020, 105923

‘Virgin-soil’ epidemics

Native Voices - NIH

“Often entire families perished during virgin-soil epidemics because all members were stricken simultaneously, leaving no one capable of fetching water or preparing food.” —Henry Dobyns, “Diseases,” Encyclopedia of North American Indians: Native American History, Culture, and Life from Paleo-Indians to the Present, 1996

non-life-sustaining businesses

Well, PA ordered the closure of "all non-life-sustaining businesses" at 8 o'clock this evening

The list of non-life-sustaining businesses makes for an interesting browse, liqour stores and casinos are not life-sustaining but beer distributors are,  and book stores are not... 😒

McLanahan's claims to have TP, but they closed early

We live in interesting times

Blog in the Time of Covid19

"Advice from a historian in the Boston area: Start keeping a journal today, ideally a hand written one if that’s within your ability. Write about what you’re seeing in the news, how yr friends are responding, what is closed in yr neighborhood or city or state or country. Save it."
A tweet of Great Wisdom 

My handwriting is really bad,  like can't read my own grocery lists bad...


Town is near empty.
Most of the students are gone. 
But the neighbourhood is relatively crowded as people don't go to work, and kids are not in school, and so they go for walks, with the kids, with their dogs, with each other.

Walking The Dog a lot between telecons.  Dog likes it. A lot.
Dogs still haven't quite shaken out the social dynamics of the new sparsely crowded dog space - as people are out more with the dogs but we're all avoiding each other.

Thought the remaining students had thrown a party in the park early evening, but it was a group of students doing dance exercises to loud music in the park, carefully spacing their yoga mats in a big circle 6-10 feet apart.  I infer I was not the first neighbour to have swung by to see wtf was going on.

 Spending too much time on twitter, obsessing about peer situations, news, and science developments.

Fair amount of pressure to make sure coronavirus/covid19  arXiv preprints don't get held up in moderation, they are mostly epidemiology and numerical contagion models, but also need to filter out the usual to keep the noise down.
q-bio mods doing a good job. 

Wegman's had Toilet Paper.  Rationed to two packs per customer.