Bah I fell for your Trump impression again.

Spain is also cured btw, after resurrecting over 1900 people, they are now down to reporting 1 or 2 deaths a day, maybe even 0 today.
Reported cases are screwed up since Spain is adding anti body tests to the numbers, so basically no new cases ;)
Last week: 482, -372, 859, 510, 1137, 658, 664
Total Cases is the sum of total cases detected by PRC and antibodies tests

France is just throwing out random numbers at this point obfuscating any trends.
Last week: 115, 358, -220, 191, 3325, 559, 1828
'Total Cases' is the sum of confirmed cases in hospitals and EMS and probable cases in EMS

Got to keep that possible second wave coming impossible to see!


Germany is trying to re-infect China

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/german-engineer-on-china-charter-flight-tests-positive-for-coronavirus-1.4962316

A German engineer on the first flight carrying European workers back to China has tested positive for coronavirus as an asymptomatic carrier. The man was on a Lufthansa flight from Frankfurt to the northeastern city of Tianjin which landed with around 200 passengers, mainly German workers and their families. Tianjin authorities said in a statement on social media Sunday that the 34-year-old engineer had tested positive, although he had a regular temperature and reported no symptoms. All passengers were tested for coronavirus after landing and have to quarantine for two weeks.

Or China is trolling Germany by putting their engineers in the hospital with false positive tests ;)



Brazil is getting attention here now
https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/brazil-virus-death-toll-hits-28-834-surpassing-hard-hit-france-1.4962321

Brazil on Saturday reached 28,834 coronavirus fatalities, authorities said, surpassing hard-hit France and becoming the country with the world's fourth-highest death toll. At the epicenter of South America's coronavirus outbreak, Brazil also saw an increase of 33,274 cases in the past 24 hours -- a new daily record, the Health Ministry said. That number brings Brazil's total caseload to 498,444, the second-highest in the world, lagging only behind the United States.

Brazil's Ministry of Health has indicated "there is no way to foresee" when the country's outbreak will peak, and experts say the number of cases could be 15 times higher than the confirmed figure because there has been no widespread testing. The pandemic is spreading across Brazil under a cloud of confrontation, as governors and mayors implement restrictive measures while President Jair Bolsonaro, who has pinned his hopes of re-election on a booming economy, has berated them for imposing what he calls "the tyranny of total quarantine."

Brazil is currently doubling up in 17.5 days and accelerating.
6821 deaths last week, 974 per day. A 107% increase to the week before, not yet rising as fast as reported cases.

https://www.dn.se/nyheter/sverige/fler-doda-i-covid-19-doljs-i-statistiken/

From March 23rd and up to May 3rd, approx. 1000 unaccounted for deaths beyond regular mortality rates, it's not likely that all 1000 are directly linked to Covid-19 but a significant portion would be (even only half would mean a margin of error well beyond 10%). One of the most significant statistical trends though is the very slow downward slope of Swedish deaths per capita compared to the rest of Europe, and indeed most of the world. And even countries that simply don't do anything at all (Brazil, for instance) have lower deaths per capita in the past few weeks total.

As with poor economic growth, where Sweden celebrated when they corrected analysts statistics on OECD stats, and it turned out they were only the third-worst in all of OECD in GDP  growth per capita and not the worst, they seem to be falling back on the fact that 2-3 tiny states with an immensely different population per square kilometer and a few other countries whose famous dallying cost tens of thousands of lives are still a little bit worse in total figures. These disaster-struck regions have now reduced their daily fatalities enormously, going from north of 1000 per day and down to mere double digits or even less, while Swedish numbers are still at around 1/3 of peak numbers or above, many weeks after said peak. Only in Sweden would this be considered a success or signs or proper progress. To make matters worse, regions outside Stockholm seem to be having an increase. Meanwhile, Iceland, Denmark, Norway, and Finland's combined weekly deaths are well below that of a single day in Sweden.

Even smug journalists who were brandishing the Swedish genius and dubbing Europe alarmist victims of mass hysteria have now turned one after one and more and more chronicles are focusing on the obvious faults and flaws in the strategy as well as the incredibly anemic leadership throughout the pandemic.

As for excess death, there's appears to be 2 different numbers coming from our government, one from SCB and the other one from Folkhälsomyndigheten. My wikipedia source is from SCB, I'm not sure how they manage to get different numbers.

As for GDP growth, everything is just forecasts atm. Our own government estimate -4-10% gdp but most likely land in the middle and a budget deficit of -5-6%. I saw news that our big bank Nordea expect -6% gdp this year and +5% next year. This are justs forecasts and we won't be able to compare to different countries intill next year.

You seems to be a downer, you should w8 atleast 1 year before being a downer on our strat.

Edit: Another swede haft to confirm this, but from what I gathered, SCB just compares excess death to last year while folkhälsomyndigheten are doing an estimate of excess deaths, that's why they get different numbers.

There are indeed two figures, as you say, but both show excess and statistical anomalies.

My GDP comment was regarding a long-term economic trend, Sweden has chosen to focus on celebrating an increase in total GDP, but their GDP per capita has shown very poor growth compared to EU and OECD standards. This was a trend long before the pandemic and is likely an effect of the slow erosion of taxpayer base and overall slow growth in productivity (where Scandinavia has been king for a long time) due to a large amount of the workforce working in the service industry and a significant portion working parttime in other jobs which do not specifically generate direct wealth or produce/products (such as healthcare and caring for the elderly, for instance) paired with an absurdly large administrative force for its population and needs. Its goal of having the lowest unemployment rates in the EU have also gone to blazes.

https://arxiv.org/abs/2005.04630

The above study should be read by every Swede who uses the "look at the longterm effects on the economy" or "lockdowns are too costly", as it more or less nullifies this argument. Yes, it's only one, but more are likely to show up in the wake of it, and it's extra interesting from a Scandinavian viewpoint since it compares two very similar economies and populations (a hint; is suggest that lockdown measures aren't really the thing that stalls the economy, and it appears as if not locking down has adverse effects on the elderly population).

Some also mention the adverse health effects of lockdowns, with suicide being a sudden and overhanging danger for some reason.

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2015/02/the-link-between-unemployment-and-suicide/

There are likely links between longterm unemployment and suicide, but the total figures are quite small. The financial crisis in 2008 seems to have yielded an approx. 12% increase in suicides over unemployment-related trouble and depression. Even if we see a much larger increase, twice that increase, due to the Corona crisis, the number of extra suicides in Sweden with its 0.13% of the world's total population would likely amount to somewhere between 15-20. Far from anything to be considered for a pandemic strategy. As for unemployment in and on itself; Sweden is set to basically double their unemployment rate, which is pretty much the same as Norway's expectations, despite the allegedly insane and costly lockdown. The healthcare and longterm adverse effects of extra pressure on the system can't be applied either, as lockdown is a specific measure to decrease the toll a pandemic takes on the healthcare system, whereas a nation with more infected will have more patients in the ICU at all times and for a much longer period. As it stands today, for instance, the total number of patients in the ICU in all of Norway is significantly lower than a regular Swedish daily death toll, which are telling numbers for anyone.

The death toll speaks for itself. I'm not really being a downer, so much as Swedes are being remarkably chipper and unaffected by the severity of the situation. I think my main issue with the Swedish strategy (or, rather, lack thereof) is two-fold, the first is that it seemingly has zero advantages long or short-term and the second is how incredibly chaotic and flip-flopping the communication between state and population as well as government and regions and interest organizations has been. It's a political disaster from where I'm sitting, and as per usual, Sweden is more concerned with how they're perceived by others than with solving the actual issues. "Sverigebilden" must be among the highest trending words in the media here.

But hey! I want this to go well for everyone, I'm going home to my family in August, at this rate it would appear that I will either not be allowed into the country at all, or I'll have to spend my entire vacation in quarantine (and miss my dad's 60th birthday party) or face a fine of about 2000$.

Who honestly believes China and Russia death toll ?

No one, I hope. Two huge outliers in international relations for decades, very few have any actual insights into what's going on at all times. China seems more bent than anyone on using the pandemic to basically rebuild their former territory (look at the Hong Kong situation). With all the massive cities in China, I find it hard to believe that they've been able to keep the virus at bay, despite their long and broad experience in dealing with epidemics (50 cities or more with 2 million + population).

Russia has only been counting deaths by pneumonia complications in hospital with confirmed covid19 test result. Yet studies have already estimated that up to 40% of covid19 deaths are due to blood clots.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/covid19-clots-coronavirus-1.5585582

It seems Russia is going to adjust their figures
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/russia-coronavirus-deaths-stats-covid-19-1.5591150
April death toll under new criteria could be nearly 60% more than previously tallied

The Russian government on Friday presented more detailed mortality figures for last month that include more deaths linked with the coronavirus, in a bid to dispel suspicions from some Russian and Western experts that authorities were trying to lower the toll for political reasons. But officials also defended the way they register deaths, which only includes people confirmed to have died of COVID-19, and not those who succumbed to other causes — even if they also tested positive for the virus.

Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova said that 1,675 people died of COVID-19 in April. Of that number, 1,136 deaths were directly caused by confirmed COVID-19, while the remaining 539 tested negative but most likely died of the virus. In addition to that, she said, 1,038 others tested positive for the virus but died of other causes. If all three categories are counted as COVID-19 deaths, the nation's total toll for April would stand at 2,713 or nearly 60 per cent more than the previously announced number.

May will face a huge adjustment...

I don't believe France and Spain anymore either. They screw more with the numbers than China did. Changing criteria all the time, miscounting, removing cases and deaths, lumping anti body tests, presumptive cases and confirmed new cases all together. Spain's daily reported deaths dropped under 5 for the past week after deleting 1900 deaths.

Russia is very consistent in reporting cases though, no weekend wobbles, no huge spikes up or down, yet also not fake like Iran's and Turkey's buttery smooth decline a month ago. At least they're consistent in testing.

Germany seems to the most trustworthy in regards to the numbers.

Austria,Germany,Switzerland,Denmark seem to have passed the first wave. Same goes for Italy, Spain, Croatia, Greece and Bulgaria. Only UK and Sweden show no clear picture from Europe.

Nitric Oxide (NO) looks promising
https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/could-a-simple-gas-produced-by-our-bodies-be-used-to-treat-covid-19-canadian-trials-underway-1.4962611

Nitric oxide, a two-part nanomolecule made in the cells that line the blood vessels, is being examined as an experimental treatment for the disease caused by the novel coronavirus. Studies show it plays a role in helping to relax blood vessels and open the airways in the lung -- critical in treating those with advanced cases.

Nitric Oxide has many properties -- it’s produced by cells that line our blood vessels to helps control blood pressure and open the airways in the lung, allowing more oxygen to be absorbed.

But researchers have also found nitric oxide has a antibacterial and antiviral effect.

SaNOtize's nasal spray is designed designed to “disinfect” your upper airway using nitric oxide. Initial tests of the company's product suggest that the spray inactivated more than 99.9 per cent of SARs-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, within two minutes during laboratory tests.

They just got funding for phase 2 clinical trials. Side effects include hypotension (too low blood pressure) and possible headaches (migraines). So don't just go self medicating! So far the gas has mostly been used for premature babies.

Discovered in the 1980s, nitric oxide is already approved for use in helping improve oxygen levels in premature babies and is used in some cardiac procedures and drugs for erectile dysfunction.

(Kinda odd they say it was discovered in 1980, NO was discovered in 1772. But for medical purposes and biological processes, they are correct)