Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member Latest Breaking News General Discussion The DU Lounge All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

CaliforniaPeggy

CaliforniaPeggy's Journal
CaliforniaPeggy's Journal
March 27, 2020

Plasmapheresis transfers for critically ill patients from recovered patients.

https://inside.mountsinai.org/blog/mount-sinai-to-begin-the-transfer-of-covid-19-antibodies-into-critically-ill-patients/?fbclid=IwAR3K24ihhZpYA-2ZFmTbgs0A7ZRfQ0u5JZ0SXz5O8hPs6bQ5gjkR3k3Yklw#.XnzxikC6Mos.facebook

The Mount Sinai Health System this week plans to initiate a procedure known as plasmapheresis, where the antibodies from patients who have recovered from COVID-19 will be transferred into critically ill patients with the disease, with the expectation that the antibodies will neutralize it.

The process of using antibody-rich plasma from COVID-19 patients to help others was used successfully in China, according to a state-owned organization, which reported that some patients improved within 24 hours, with reduced inflammation and viral loads, and better oxygen levels in the blood.

Mount Sinai is collaborating with the New York Blood Center and the New York State Department of Health’s Wadsworth Center laboratory in Albany, with guidance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and expects to begin implementing the treatment later this week.

“We are hoping to identify patients who can provide the antibodies,” says Dennis S. Charney, MD, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Dean of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and President for Academic Affairs, Mount Sinai Health System. “We are at the front lines in fighting this pandemic and making discoveries that will help our patients.”

March 26, 2020

How Many Dead For The Dow?

Posted by a friend of mine on Facebook and thought you all might enjoy it...

&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR0N4-ai_r9qbaStAry7MKivRFOezoceLgWfDbpD7aOAqr17rdOnLRRK3-Q
March 24, 2020

How Many Dead for the Dow? By Eric Hensal, who was a close friend of WCGreen. Copied w/permission.

Acceptable death continuum

For Trump to say the public health cure is worse than the COVID-19 pandemic, he presents a calculus of acceptable dead versus economic damage. This is opposed to Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s “If it saves one life, I’m happy.” Here is the acceptable death continuum.

So how many people dying is worth a faster economic recovery ?

Trump horrified progressives weighing the economy against people. But Cuomo’s statement of solidarity, while poetic and caring, is an absurd hypothetical. Considering public health intervention’s social cost is not, in itself, irrational. Progressives must walk through the impulse and implication of Trump’s “cure” to persuade an American majority to support difficult public heath measures.

"Trump uses imagery of letting grandma pass without suffering to sell a different policy.”

Our economy does not face death

When is a cure thought worse than a disease? A difficult chemotherapy with little hope to prolong life. An end-of-life resuscitation with vents and feeding tubes with no chance to recover. Trump supporters likely carry these experiences in mind while listening to him, hence the power of his statement. He uses imagery of letting grandma pass without suffering to sell a different policy.

But our economy faces no such death challenge. There is no asteroid impact, no crop-destroying blight, no Yellowstone super-volcano shattering our world catastrophically. We will have access to the same natural resources, food production and labor as we did before COVID-19. Once people can work, the economy will recover over time.

Trump’s concern is the timing of a recovery, rather than its inevitability.

Dying for the Dow

What is Trump’s measure of a strong economy? His lodestar has always been the stock market. He will point to jobs, but always comes home to the Dow. The markets, disturbed by Trump’s March 11 incompetence which expressed starting at March 12 crash, need reassuring. Trump believes simply declaring victory will end the downward spiral. Put the Dow Index on one side of the policy balance scale.

Assume Trump could end social distancing. Specifics can be argued, but this would increase COVID-19 spread and raise deaths this year. Put this death count on the other side of the scale.

My progressive response to Trump’s cure: No sacrifices to a Wall Street Golden Calf. No death for the Dow.

So Trump believes a Dow Index recovering on his timetable is worth a fixed number of additional deaths. He may present it as disbelief in expert opinion or a gut optimism, but this is what he is saying. Evidence is clear that social distancing reduces COVID-19 impact. But Trump’s distrust of all things foreign plus his abiding concern over the stock market recovery drives him to accept more death.

Who benefits ending the cure? Trump benefits. Shareholders benefit. Billionaires benefit. Who does not? The elderly. Recovering cancer patients with compromised immunity. Soon-to-be-sickened returning workers. The Federal Government should help workers shelter in place, keeping food on the table, the lights on, bills paid. Our real economy will recover in time. But Trump would allow fellow Americans to get sick and die for an illusion of the pandemic’s end to boost the stock market now and speed his return to the golf course.




March 19, 2020

A Flowering Tree







I did mess up the exposure, but they're still interesting, I think! Hope you enjoy.
March 16, 2020

Garden photos from this afternoon:









With my iPhone

Profile Information

Name: Peggy
Gender: Female
Hometown: Manhattan Beach, CA
Home country: USA
Current location: At home
Member since: Thu Feb 3, 2005, 02:41 PM
Number of posts: 149,560
Latest Discussions»CaliforniaPeggy's Journal