See, the thing here is if you do an actual full lockdown, aka the opposite of what the US did, then you only have do do it for a couple of months, 3 tops, before you can start opening up everything including schools again. After that it's targeted isolation of infected and area based partial lockdowns until a vaccine is ready, however long that may take.

Basically if the US did what it should've done schools would be completely open by now and they'd have 5% of the cases and deaths they have right now. It's really not hard or complicated and the US has a strong enough economy that it could do a full lockdown for 6 months nationwide with full unemployment benefits and healthcare paid. But they just don't because the country is run by sociopaths and brainwashed morons.

That's like Ernst Stavro Bloefeld levels of sinister, if true.

Personally, I'm thinking Trump just hopes than pandemic gets so bad that he can cancel elections; and then blame China and lie about how the US is doing the best in the world while shoving McDonald's grease-ball burgers into that lamprey hole he calls a mouth.

Friday marked my 4th month of lockdown. My city is one of only two Brazilian capitals where the peak have already passed, we started to open commerce and services in second week of July. Probably one more month to go before I can come back to work in office

I'm tired. So far only left home to grocery store or to see a doctor. Never in my life I experienced such level of seclusion, it's really starting to affect my mental health

This is a misconception. Only Belém and Recife are really improving. Rio was doing good, but they opened everything too early. And I'm being city-specific on purpose, Pernambuco and Pará as a whole are far from stable

São Paulo and Ceará were literally the first focus and carried the two main genetic variation of Corona in Brazil, and both aren't really improving. Ceará is about 6 weeks stucked in 15k weekly average, they are hardly improving

He can't, it would need a 2/3 majority in both Senate and House to pass such an amendement, and that simply won't happen. It didn't happen in WW2 either, not in 1940 and not in 1944.

So yeah, I'm more inclined to think it's the Blofeld side of thought with that thing.

But yeah, you can see which lengths some people would go to discredit state/federal things in favor of private ones with this...

In addition to Moderna, Germany company Pfizer has also announced the launch of Phase III clinical trials, bringing the total to 6 vaccine candidates in this final stage: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html

Yeah, I've spent the last two months in a flat by myself with no human contact at all, and the seclusion is really affecting me too.

Still, I'd rather this than getting sick and potentially dying. While it is taking its toll, at least I can feel somewhat safe.

I try to mentally reframe it from "I am stuck at home" to "I am safe at home".

I live with my grandfather, so not really as alone as you. Mom came here too, once or twice a week to help with household chores. I'm still missing my old routine though, even the small things such as taking a bus, look the sea in the road or having lunch with my coworkers. I understand the severity of the virus, my grandma's brother died from covid back in April, I know I can't risk taking the virus and infecting my old man

In a positive note, things here are really getting better. Overall Brazilian government is next level incompetent, but my state management proved to be pragmatic and responsible. It's one of the few that never truly had a waiting list for intensive care, part because they actually spent money increasing hospital capacity, part because we spent whole May in a very severe lockdown. We come from the 3rd worst state in the country to one of the 3 that is effectively decreasing the deathroll 

Some details came out about back to school in September, basically all options suck.

What they're proposing is cohorts of 15 kids, stick to the same group, smaller classes, sounds reasonable.

However, many kids have siblings, thus doubling the cohorts by siblings being in different cohorts.
To achieve this it will be 2 days / 3 days school per week alternating, while the other days many kids will go to day care meeting other kids (from different schools as well), cohorts multiply.
The teacher will of course teach all week going in between cohorts, doubling the cohort size again.
Shared bathroom use, exposure to different cohorts.
Kids from different cohorts travel together on the bus from and to school, mixing the cohorts again.
And you have the after school activities mixing cohorts likely also between different schools.

So it's just a bunch of security theater bullshit not achieving anything.


As for measures in school, mask use and kids need to clean their own desk etc.
First of all, elementary kids cleaning things properly, good luck with that.
Second, lunch breaks, take of mask, eat together...

More security theater, not effective when you're in the same room for hours while eating without a mask.


And nothing about air filters thus micro droplets build up and get free roam around the school anyway.



Alternative, home schooling through Brightspace.
First of all, it's a nightmare to use Brightsuck.
Second, trying to keep both your kids engaged with that 3 blocks a day, 100 and twice another 80 minutes, I don't see it happening.


Kids need that school interaction, but this security theater penny pinching won't do anything to stop the spread. Heck they're proposing for the school buses to make several loops (to have fewer on the bus) but not stagger the classes so some will be late or waiting to go home after. It's a logistical nightmare and we simply don't have the teachers and class rooms available to solve this problem properly. Can't spend money on actual safety but have to lull the parents into believing its safer so they can go back to work.

Saw this on resetera....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsSwzVomWhU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBdgAUA0VvA

John Campbell is basically also saying that the US is manipulateing data.
About 1:25 into the video.


There were people that speculated that the reason it was being moved from CDC, to HHS, was because CDC was transparent and open to public.
So you could get insight into data if you wanted, while the same isnt true for the HHS under Trump.
Basically why it was moved from CDC-> HHS was to manipute the data (cook the books).

Thoughts?

I'm happy about the move. Not too long ago people argued that the data wasn't doctored and I had to say that it's being manipulated on an individual local level, which was definitely the case, be incompetence or malice.

But now that they streamlined the process I can just point my finger and say: "Yep, they're manipulating the data on a national level." Can't wait to see where the Republican cult members will point their fingers next, now that the evil CDC can't manipulate all of the numbers for that hoax.