New Zealand has recorded two new imported cases of COVID-19 after a brief stint of being virus-free. An anti-inflammatory drug may save us all. But as always, prevention is the best method so here’s how to flush the toilet.
Could a common steroid save the day?
A common, cheap and widely-available steroid cut deaths by a third in COVID-19 patients on ventilators, the University of Oxford in the UK has found — though, of course, we’ve been burned by hopeful headlines before.
This study, however, was a controlled experiment. 2104 were patients given a low dose of dexamethasone and their results compared to 4321 patients who received usual care.
Along with reducing deaths among patients who required ventilators, the drug also cut deaths by one fifth in patients receiving oxygen. It had no effect on those who didn’t need respiratory support.
The World Health Organisation has welcomed the initial clinical results.
Did New Zealand celebrate too soon?
After celebrating being virus-free just last week, New Zealand has imported two cases of COVID-19 from travellers from the UK.
The two women were visiting Wellington to attend a parent’s funeral. They travelled via Doha and Brisbane.
The duo had been granted compassionate dispensation leave — meaning they were able to circumvent the 14-day quarantine rule — to travel. New Zealand has since changed its rules so anyone granted leave must first return a negative COVID-19 test result.
Officials say the pair were unlikely to have spread the virus further as they rented a car and had little contact with others.
Your poo is dangerous
A new study has found flushing the toilet releases a huge plume of particles flying above the toilet seat, leading to large-scale virus spread. The virus particles then settle on surrounding surfaces.
Coronaviruses, including the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome-related coronavirus, are spread not just by oral particles — but by fecal particles too. So every time an infected person uses the toilet, the bowl becomes more dangerous.
The moral of the story is simple — shut the lid before you flush, and don’t flush for others.
Disinformation dominates Payne speech
In her first major speech since the pandemic, Foreign Affairs Minister Marise Payne has lashed out at China and Russia for spreading disinformation.
The speech, made at the Australian National University last night, was responded to a report by the European Commission, which found foreign actors and countries led by Russia and China carried out disinformation campaigns. Their aim was to create confusion and undermine democratic debate.
Twitter has suspended 32,000 accounts allegedly linked to state-run propaganda operations in China, Russia and Turkey.
In response to criticism that Australia should stay quiet — lest we feel the wrath of another barley tariff retaliation from China — Payne said Australia needed to make difficult decisions and prioritize sovereignty.
Extra supports for COVID-19
The Victorian government has pledged an extra $23 million to support Aboriginal Victorians throughout the pandemic, including $10 million for local organisations to develop coronavirus responses, and $13 million for Aboriginal Community Controlled Organisations, including health and homelessness organisations.
NSW also plans to announce a $13 million package aimed at boosting overseas sales. Small and medium regional exporters will be given a $10,000 grant to help establish e-commerce channels to sell products abroad.
“The World Health Organisation has welcomed the initial clinical results.”
Of course they would. But only until it does n’t compete too much with their super salvation vaccine. Guaranteed to be a different story then.
Anti-inflammatory drugs combined with specific steroids and large intakes of vitamin C, often work very well with the flu, particularly with chest infection. No antibiotics needed. But I am not a doctor.
Who are you and will you stop calling this rehashed nonsense ”a column” on coronavirus, you sound like a fool.. There are always coronas around the place, they cause hundreds of millions of common colds every year and hundreds of thousands of flu cases every year. This virus is a tiddler, 98% don’t even get sick, it’s still countable and it seriously is not killing many people anywhere, in fact this week it reached .1% of the global population except about 60% of cases are closed already so it dropped back to .04%.
Enough already Crikey, you have become as tedious as the hysterical MSM.
https://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/mf/3303.0 And here is the list of usual causes of death, note the 3100 from flu and pnuemonia in 2018 and the 7900 from chronic chest infections, the 8500+ from lung and other cancers in the region and the 14,000 from alzheimers. Why on earth are the deaths of 102 people average age 84 with a virus this year such a catastrophic thing.
Wait for the 2020 stats. If deaths from those other maladies are lower, we might form a correlation with increased hygiene, physical distancing and other measures taken against COVID-19.
That’s the problem. One doesn’t know what the counter-factuals are, so one can’t make a proper comparison. We do sort know what the counter-factual is with COVID-19 from places like the U.S. and Brazil. But that’s too simple, as there are numerous other factors that might have influenced the spread. And we (well, you, Marilyn) haven’t accounted for differences between those diseases.
It’s the long-term after-effects that are the problem, a bit like polio – people incapacitated for months and who knows how much longer. Also the cases clogging hospitals and needing such a high proportion of available hospital care so that elective and other surgery is delayed. And what happens when hospitals are full? This is happening in the USA, for example, it’s pretty scary. With polio, people were scared to go to swimming pools in summer, a vaccine has made all the difference. Let’s hope for a vaccine, or at least some reasonably efficacious anti-virals.
One hopes that we do “prioritise sovereignty”.
One way to do that is to fund the higher education/research sector appropriately, rather than leaving it dependent on dollars that overseas students bring in to fund education (and research) for locals.