Montreal City Weblog

Kate 12:06 on 2020-09-14 Permalink Reply  

• Ian 12:28 on 2020-09-14 Permalink

  via Steve Faguy on twitter –

  On a per capita basis, the number of new cases in Montreal over the past 8 days is spread out pretty evenly.
  Lowest: Dorval-Lachine-LaSalle (19 per 100k)
  Highest: Plateau etc. (44 per 100k)

  considering that 20 per million was enough to make Legault consider reintroducing certain lockdown measures, 44 per 100k is horrifying.

• Tee Owe 12:57 on 2020-09-14 Permalink

  Reposting an older comment – should we be more consistent with use of the word ‘case’. A case of the flu is usually diagnosed as symptoms and maybe a doctor’s OK that that’s probably what it is. AFAIK we don’t routinely test for flu eg by throat swabs, PCR or antibody tests. However, a case of Covid is a positive PCR from a throat or nasal swab, regardless whether there are symptoms. I worry that this can be misleading when discussing eg relative numbers of cases of flu vs Covid, no?

  Anybody know more about this?

• Kevin 14:13 on 2020-09-14 Permalink

  There are multiple diseases that are tracked regardless of symptoms, such as HIV and tuberculosis.

  Debating Covid in terms of the flu is kind of a red herring anyway: it’s a new disease and unlike influenza, there is no inherent immunity in the population.

• Michael Black 15:05 on 2020-09-14 Permalink

  I think “new cases” becomes a valid figure because after a while we get a feel, so it’s an easy way to see a trend. I’m not sure the running total is useful, except if getting it means immunity (in which case yiu want that number to be high)

  But it’s complicated because authorities are mostly worried about the serious cases, but the more people who carry it the more it will spread. It’s not linear. So who knows.

  I was reading yesterday that autoimmune diseases are almost an epidemic, topping cancer. But it’s spread over a bunch of diseases, some “common” and some rare. The most serious of the Covid-19 cases sound similar to autoimmune diseases, without really reading deep it’s hard to follow where one ends and the other begins.

  Things sre returning to normal. It looks like I really will have an appointment at the hospital on the 30th, it having been postponed twice.

• Ian 20:34 on 2020-09-14 Permalink

  Best wishes, hope your visit goes well.

  From my perspective I’m mostly watching the ICU numbers but I also realize hat some people have really bad secondary effects. I know a few people that have had covid and it’s pretty rough – for some it’s not much worse than having pneumonia, but I know a couple of people that are still experiencing heart and breathing issues. Still, they aren’t dead, that’s the big thing.

• Kate 21:15 on 2020-09-14 Permalink

  I’ve saved links to a few items about lingering Covid, not from paranoia, but to counter anyone saying it’s “just a flu” (nobody here, but I’ve seen a few on Twitter and Facebook). Maybe they’ll interest you guys:

  https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/13/i-was-infected-with-coronavirus-in-march-six-months-on-im-still-unwell

  https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/months-after-infection-covid-19-patients-report-breathing-difficulty-excessive-fatigue-1.5102886

  https://www.bbc.com/news/stories-53948028

  https://www.tvanouvelles.ca/2020/09/05/toujours-des-symptomes-de-la-covid-six-mois-plus-tard

• Chris 21:38 on 2020-09-14 Permalink

  “just a flu” is kinda a weird comment anyway, since influenza kills many people. Maybe they mean “just a cold”? Having lingering covid symptoms 6 months later is better than being dead from influenza.