South African Covid-19 News and Discussions 2

[chrisc]

It turns out that several people I know may have had covid-19 and not been aware of it. One fellow, who is an alarm service technician found he was getting short of breath and by 3.00 in the afternoon, was so tired he could not get out of a chair without falling over

Tests found that his lung capacity has reduced by 15% and although he was tested negative for co-vid (on Monday) was told that he almost certainly had a mild form in the past few weeks but this affected his lung function

His lungs ability re-oxygenate blood has been compromised. It is as if he were transported 6000 metres above sea-level

He may recover, but doctors will not give a prognosis

He is 29 years old and a non-smoker and no-one in his family smokes. A little overweight at 80kg

 

[BeerIsNotGood...]

Merit is always subjective. Objective measures are seldom of much practical use. Technocracy sounds like a good idea in theory, but it doesn't work well in practice.


But which experts? If you have them all then you just have a committee.


You can certainly manage people at Eskom without knowing anything about power generation. The only reason that goes wrong is when the manager doesn't trust the people they manage.


They're as comparable now as they were two months ago.

You missed the lite part...

 

[RedViking]

It turns out that several people I know may have had covid-19 and not been aware of it. One fellow, who is an alarm service technician found he was getting short of breath and by 3.00 in the afternoon, was so tired he could not get out of a chair without falling over

Tests found that his lung capacity has reduced by 15% and although he was tested negative for co-vid (on Monday) was told that he almost certainly had a mild form in the past few weeks but this affected his lung function

His lungs ability re-oxygenate blood has been compromised. It is as if he were transported 6000 metres above sea-level

He may recover, but doctors will not give a prognosis

He is 29 years old and a non-smoker and no-one in his family smokes. A little overweight at 80kg

I AM NOT FAT!!!

 

[pouroverguy]

Do you remember back in March the WHO said DON"T USE STEROIDS TO TREAT COVID?

There was no good evidence for it, and in many types of infections administering a steroid that can supress the immune system is not a good idea. That's why a proper study was done and there seems to be good evidence for it now. The Study still needs to be peer reviewed though, although it looks like a game Changer.

 

[pinball wizard]

There was no good evidence for it, and in many types of infections administering a steroid that can supress the immune system is not a good idea. That's why a proper study was done and there seems to be good evidence for it now. The Study still needs to be peer reviewed though, although it looks like a game Changer.

Except

Corticosteroids might reduce pulmonary inflammation in severe pneumonia, preventing respiratory failure (Mandell 2015). Several in vitro studies have demonstrated that corticosteroids decrease cytokine expression in human cells and inhibit migration of phagocytic cells (Rhen 2005)

Which would have been applied if people had of simply treated covid symptomatically instead of freaking out the way they did.

 

[pouroverguy]

Except


Which would have been applied if people had of simply treated covid symptomatically instead of freaking out the way they did.

I didn't say steroids are never used to treat infections...

 

[pinball wizard]

I didn't say steroids are never used to treat infections...

You are missing the point.

 

[sand_man]

There so many medical experts on this forum, I feel confident asking the question here... If your hypertension is diagnosed and controlled through medication are you still at high risk of developing severe complications?

 

[Grant]

You are missing the point.

what exactly is the point, this ?

Which would have been applied if people had of simply treated covid symptomatically instead of freaking out the way they did.

 

[MrR]

22,000 Edcon employees get retrenchment notices

SA's biggest non-food retailer Edcon has served 22,000 of its employees with notices of retrenchments as it blames load-shedding and the initial 45-day hard lockdown for its collapse.

www.sowetanlive.co.za

Blaming COVID on their failure is the same as attributing vehicle accident deaths to COVID.

Sure, lockdown would have had an impact on business and sure loadshedding would have caused some service disruption, but that can't be it. Their profits have been declining for years and their operating expenses and debt have been climbing. Writing has been on the wall for a long time when these things were.

With their leadership (board and ExCo) one would've thought that they would have taken more drastic measures before reaching the point that they did last year and now this.

Their lack of change and adapting to changing (and challenging) markets was the cause. COVID adapted faster than they have.

 

[Grant]

There so many medical experts on this forum, I feel confident asking the question here... If your hypertension is diagnosed and controlled through medication are you still at high risk of developing severe complications?

Take a look here, you may already be protecting your system.

 

[pinball wizard]

what exactly is the point, this ?

Steroids are a well known and well used treatment for pneumonia. Why it was halted and called into question is beyond me.
It of course does raise the larger questions of why this disease is being blown out of proportion, why we need to be bombarded with daily numbers like they are gospel truth, why the media and governments keep driving the "total number of infections" - which is a mis-truth, by the way, and so on and so forth.

I guess the answer as always will be two fold; hindsight being 20/20, and follow the money.

 

[pinball wizard]

There so many medical experts on this forum, I feel confident asking the question here... If your hypertension is diagnosed and controlled through medication are you still at high risk of developing severe complications?

Not my area of expertise. I am good with peds and some collateral.

 

[pouroverguy]

You are missing the point.

My point is the WHO (who I'm not a fan of) had no good evidence to recommend steroids back in March. That's why a proper RCT was done - to obtain the decent evidence. Too often in the last few months has poor evidence been used to recommend treatments for the virus, and it's good to see some proper science be done.

 

[pinball wizard]

My point is the WHO (who I'm not a fan of) had no good evidence to recommend steroids back in March. That's why a proper RCT was done - to obtain the decent evidence. Too often in the last few months has poor evidence been used to recommend treatments for the virus, and it's good to see some proper science be done.

Piffle.

The evidence to use them to treat pneumonia was already there.

 

[pouroverguy]

Piffle.

The evidence to use them to treat pneumonia was already there.

COVID-19 does not simply cause your run of the mill Bacterial Community Acquired Pneumonia. It attacks the body in many and vastly different ways.

 

[Grant]

Steroids are a well known and well used treatment for pneumonia. Why it was halted and called into question is beyond me.
It of course does raise the larger questions of why this disease is being blown out of proportion, why we need to be bombarded with daily numbers like they are gospel truth, why the media and governments keep driving the "total number of infections" - which is a mis-truth, by the way, and so on and so forth.

I guess the answer as always will be two fold; hindsight being 20/20, and follow the money.

steroids are also well known to have severe side effects.
you previously mentioned symptomatic treatment, and pneumonia (above).

i'll give an example you may be familiar with, louis washkansky, 1st successful heart transplant patient.
steroid based antihistamines are used to suppress the immune system in order to prevent organ rejection.
surgery was a success, but a soon thereafter post surgical complications arose.
it appeared organ rejection was taking place, so he was pumped full of antihistamines to try prevent this occurring.

he died
he died, not as a result of organ rejection, but pneumonia.
his system was suppressed by the antihistamines to the point where it was unable to fight the pneumonia.

symptomatic treatment may be ok in some instances, but only in instances where one has a firm grip on the underlying cause


**edited
earlier post said systemic treatment
was supposed to be symptomatic (thanks auto predict)

 

[Polymathic]

Take a look here, you may already be protecting your system.

Why didn't he wait for other scientific bodies to look at these findings before publishing this video. Seems irresponsible at best.

 

[pouroverguy]

steroids are also well known to have severe side effects.
you previously mentioned symptomatic treatment, and pneumonia (above).

i'll give an example you may be familiar with, louis washkansky, 1st successful heart transplant patient.
steroid based antihistamines are used to suppress the immune system in order to prevent organ rejection.
surgery was a success, but a soon thereafter post surgical complications arose.
it appeared organ rejection was taking place, so he was pumped full of antihistamines to try prevent this occurring.

he died
he died, not as a result of organ rejection, but pneumonia.
his system was suppressed by the antihistamines to the point where it was unable to fight the pneumonia.

systemic treatment may be ok in some instances, but only in instances where one has a firm grip on the underlying cause

Agreed. The decision to use steroids in any situation always has to have the pros vs the cons truly weighed up.

 

[pinball wizard]

steroids are also well known to have severe side effects.
you previously mentioned symptomatic treatment, and pneumonia (above).

i'll give an example you may be familiar with, louis washkansky, 1st successful heart transplant patient.
steroid based antihistamines are used to suppress the immune system in order to prevent organ rejection.
surgery was a success, but a soon thereafter post surgical complications arose.
it appeared organ rejection was taking place, so he was pumped full of antihistamines to try prevent this occurring.

he died
he died, not as a result of organ rejection, but pneumonia.
his system was suppressed by the antihistamines to the point where it was unable to fight the pneumonia.

symptomatic treatment may be ok in some instances, but only in instances where one has a firm grip on the underlying cause

That's not even remotely the same thing as using steroids as an anti-inflammatory in a pneumonia treatment.