Officiating Post COVID-19 ???
 

I answered an online survey yesterday (I believe it was from NASO) about safety concerns in officiating next season. Some questions dealt with wearing masks while officiating. So I was thinking how that's fine for officials that don't use whistles (baseball, softball, gymnastics, etc.) but how is that relevant to me officiating basketball?

Today I got an email advertisement from the company that provides our IAABO uniforms:

https://tse1.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.b...=0&w=300&h=300

Fox 40 Electronic Whistle

Should I purchase one now to avoid another "toilet paper situation"?

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Getting Back To Officiating Sensibly ...
 

If I need a mask and an electronic whistle, I'm not officiating. No, thanks all the same.

Surprised in number 10 he does not know the purpose of a mask.

Heh...does jumping to take the first vaccination that becomes available satisfy NASO's common sense?

There's talk of rushing this vaccine out. Not a good idea with any drug, let alone a biological, and especially as a prophylactic!

Inherent Risk ...
 

I believe that he does. The "inherent risk" is that he may infect others, including some others that may be in a high risk category (like me).

I realize that while it isn't the main purpose of wearing a mask (it's to prevent infecting others), when I venture out of my isolated bomb shelter to hunt and gather food while wearing a mask, I feel that the mask prevents me from touching my face (mouth, nose), so there may be some selfish, small, personal health benefit to me wearing a mask before I head back down to hide in my bomb shelter for another week.

Interesting how all the virus/social distancing virtue-signaling from the media has ceased in the wake of these protests. It’s almost as though it was, at minimum, overblown from the start. I see no reason why we can’t go back to normal including having basketball this winter. If someone chooses not to officiate, that is their prerogative I fully support.

(And before someone gets mad, I support the peaceful protests. Just think the irony is funny.)

We need you refs to work games; not waste away
 

I look fwd to officiating this summer for youth tournaments and during the regular season for local high schools.
I have seen/heard the electronic handheld whistle during a game last season wherein one of my partners could not blow a regular whistle because of dental jaw bone degradations and irritations he told me. So, he used the ewhistle (see picture in previous post to this thread); however, the sound quality of that ewhistle was poor. It sounded like a faintly elevating "chirrrpp chirrpp". I recall that I had to step in and also blow my normal whistle when the players kept on playing instead of stopping play at the whistle.
Alas, I'm certain we will "figure-it-out" as the situation demands tho.

If Anybody Gets Within Six Feet Of You Start A Five Second Count ...
 

What's the more important and urgent story right now? The pandemic, which may have plateaued leading many states to consider careful reopenings (we can finally get haircuts starting today in Connecticut), or to the civil rights protests (and/or riots) which are the worst I've seen since the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968?

While the "original sin" of the 400 year old plight of African Americans is a really big story (and should continue to be, even as the protests and/or riots calm down), so are the 100,000 American deaths caused by an infectious disease, a disease that we were ill prepared to deal with, and where we may have made some mistakes in dealing with it in its early stages.

What's the bigger story? Police precinct stations going up in flames and Target stores being looted, or hundreds of people not wearing masks and not social distancing while relaxing in a swimming pool drinking adult beverages while the commander-in-chief, and many others, enjoy a couple of rounds of golf with no flagsticks, no sand trap rakes, no nineteenth hole appletinis, and pool noodles in the holes?

Also, compare the "reopen" protesters to the civil rights protesters. Not many peaceful, long gun carrying "reopen" protesters wore face masks, while many civil rights protesters (and/or rioters) are wearing face masks, as are most of the media covering the protests.

This pandemic is not over, and may not be over until there is a vaccine. We still have to be aware and be careful, or it may come back, and if it comes back during the next influenza season, especially if it's a particularly bad flu season, we're really going to be in for a really big problem. Hopefully, we may be better prepared deal with a combined "second wave"/bad flu season, we already have our masks, and our hand sanitizer.

Watch the civil rights protests (and/or riots) on television, or participate in the protests (hopefully peacefully), if you want, but keep washing your hands, wear your face mask (to protect others, especially others at high risk, like me), and if anybody gets within six feet of you start a five second count.

Well, my wife is a medical field worker, nothing has changed in that situation and she works in a major city (where there were mass protests all over the city and suburbs) that I think we will still see influences from this virus based on what is done or not done by youth and pro leagues in the coming weeks. I just had two camps completely canceled that were postponed a few months ago in the last 48 hours. One was originally scheduled for the end of June, the other was from April but looking for a date in July. The school and the shoe company were scrapping their events for I am sure safety reasons and probably a complete lack of commitment from the participants. If schools are still out and kids are not having any school activity now, then it is probably not going to be advantageous for teams to travel to a place that was near the hotbed of a virus outbreak. Also, are travel teams going to take the risk as well?

As a football official, that is what seems to be driving what happens with schools. Right now there is no activity in high school with any sports as there would be basically starting today. So if schools are still in jeopardy of starting, that will influence the fall seasons and then might run into the winter season. So I am not so sure that everything will be back to normal if schools all over the country are not finding a good path to come back in the same form they normally do.

The media covering protests and riots across the country has not changed those facts of what the threat might be. I guess we will see if pro sports even can come back because that is really what started this entire situation in the first place.

Peace

I've seen plenty of mention of how the protests and Covid-19 safety protocols do not mix well and we may well be seeing new outbreaks because of this. I guess we're watching and listening to different media sources.

I plan on visiting my father's for Father's Day, so I'll be getting tested and self-quarantining the week before I go b/c I can't afford to be asymptomatic and give my diabetic and cancer surviving father the virus.

My local assignor sent out a feeler about working at the local AAU venue starting in July. I told him I don't trust that they will keep the facility sanitized to Covid-19 safety standards. Said if I were to work, I would be arriving dressed 10 or 15 minutes before game time, working two straight games, then immediately leaving.

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Fall Foliage And The Crack Of The Bat ...
 

Here in Connecticut we're starting to think about fall interscholastic sports. While some fall sports may be easy to socially distance (cross country), others like football, with twenty-two players within several yards of each other at the line of scrimmage, may be more difficult to socially distance. One serious suggestion we've heard here in Connecticut is to switch baseball and football seasons. Have baseball, an easy sport for social distancing, this coming fall, and have football in the spring of 2021 when we may have a vaccine.

Football goes with tulips and daffodils? Right?

https://tse2.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.M...=0&w=216&h=163

Not many of the "reopen" protesters were setting fire to their cities and destroying businesses and their owners' (who had nothing to do with the incident) lives, either.

See, I can cherrypick, too.

Also, if you do your research you can clearly see how the importance of masks (especially porous cloth ones) is overstated and in many cases simply used as a political statement. I went to the doctor this morning and wore a mask because I assumed that was the expectation - not a single soul in the office had a mask on. Touching your mask and putting it back on all day long would seem to defeat the purpose according to common sense.

We must be, because all the doomsdayers I heard lecture us with the "if it saves even one life" nonsense don't seem to care anymore about social distancing.

You are free to choose how to live your life, and I respect you for considering your father. Not going to hear me tell you otherwise.

Basketball probably isn't the sport officiate in if you're have a more than average worry about getting sick. We just came off the worst flu season probably since I was in highschool sophomore year and that was 20 years ago. Every other school was being closed because of student absences to flu, won't be surprised if some of those get relabeled covid cases of they get antibody tested.

I'll be out there this winter. Might not be as many grandparents in the stands or calling games though.

As will I.

Can't legislate germs out of sports. Unfortunately some people are hellbent on controlling everyone else's lives.

I agree that the protests haven't changed coronavirus facts, it's just interesting that all of a sudden the same media that lectured everyone doesn't seem to be too concerned anymore.

Washington Post, New York Times, National Review, NBC News, Boston.com, CNN, and Fox News have addressed it so far. Those appear to be media organizations on both sides of the aisle.

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I am like Raymond, I have heard and read and seen things about the virus and the protests and sometimes the stories combined about how we might have a second wave. So we will see what happens. My point is that other things are not changing because of the protests. When we cannot play even summer stuff still because of concerns by organizations and schools, we still are living with the reality of the pandemic. I agree the protests have taken over most of the coverage, but still see people talking about the virus and the affects of things opening. Also many states have opened and many business have opened with conditions. So it is still a wait and see position.

Peace

Peaceful ...
 

I don't believe that any of them were, which is specifically why I referred to them as "peaceful" and never even considered the possibility that some of them could be considered "rioters". Here in Connecticut, the worst they did was to slow down response times of some fire trucks and ambulances by blocking traffic.

Surgical face masks will never stop the inhaling of the virus, especially any fine airborne aerosolized particles, but it will definitely stop the larger droplets from being sprayed several feet when the wearer is talking, singing (Connecticut Catholics are going back to church next week, but no singing), breathing deeply, coughing, or sneezing.

I wear my mask to protect others, especially others that may be at a greater risk than most of the population. I also know how to put my mask on and take my mask off properly (only touching the straps), and to only wear my mask for one day before laundering. I also believe that my mask has the added benefit that it reminds me not to, and makes it more difficult for me to, touch my face (mouth or nose).

I've named my mask Charleen (reference to Full Metal Jacket).

https://tse2.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP._...=0&w=385&h=217

Tell Him That BillyMac Said So ...
 

You're a good son, and your Dad should be proud to have raised a son like you.

Who's Scared ???
 

Who Was That Masked Black Man ???
 

Thanks... He's also showing some signs of dementia so he probably won't even remember it a month afterwards (no joke).

Back to the subject at hand, I know this upcoming high School season things are going have to be done differently as far as pre-game expectations for venues that don't have proper locker rooms for us. There are way too many unsanitary, cramped, and poorly ventilated changing rooms we are expected to utilize. I know I'll be advocating for 30 minutes prior showtime for varsity games, already dressed except for sneakers, and not going back to a cramp space breathing on each other at halftime.

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Thoughtful ...
 

Sounds reasonable.

I'm a big advocate of showing a "professional look" for interscholastic games, especially for games at the high school level, but under these corona virus circumstances, I'm 100% all in for get in, get out, and get paid.

Also, no pregame coaches captains meetings.

It sure would be nice if we had a vaccine by then.

Who's On First Eating A Turkey Drumstick ...
 

We can start a new tradition, Thanksgiving baseball. Big-time rival high schools playing a game of rounders in front of alumni, students, cheerleaders, mascots, teachers, family, and friends, followed by traditional Thanksgiving turkey dinners.

Pass me the gravy and the dressing. Can I have seconds on the mashed potatoes and the turnips? Can't wait for the pumpkin pie for dessert. How about that exciting bases loaded walk in the bottom of the seventh? The home crowd went wild.

Might be the best thing to come out of this.

Not Just Part Of The Way Around ...
 

What? How can we play the game without shaking hands with both head coaches and all eight quad-captains, telling coaches to be sure that their players know how to tuck their jerseys in, and without asking who the speaking captains are, what their numbers are, and if they're starting? And I almost forgot, how will they know that it's the black line all the way around? Dr. Naismith will be rolling over in his grave.

Wearing a mask is pretty much useless. The coronavirus has a diameter somewhere between 60-140 nanometers. The pores in the material of the masks people are using are much bigger, meaning the virus can pass right through. In fact, the pore size on the N95 medical mask can filter 99% of particles between 0.1 - 0.3 microns. Sounds impressive, except that converts to 100 - 300 nanometers, again meaning much of the virus can get through the filter.

Useless ???
 

Surgical masks are not stopping the tiny corona virus particles, they're stopping the larger diameter respiratory droplets (that contain tremendous numbers of the much smaller diameter corona virus) from being exhaled or spit out by those that have COVID-19, especially from those that are asymptomatic for COVID-19 and who don't know that they're sick (and may not be socially distancing, or can't socially distance, like at work).

A mask, be it a surgical mask, or an N-95 mask, doesn't have to be 100% effective to be better than no mask at all.

I'm sure that many of us have seen slow motion video of respiratory droplets been coughed or sneezed out of one's nose or mouth and how far they can travel.

How are surgical masks useless?

Gesundheit ...
 

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And it doesn't have to be sneezing, it can be talking (especially loud talking), singing, whistling, laughing, or breathing deeply (especially through one's mouth).

Of course the droplets won't go as far as with a cough or sneeze, but they could still end up on a faucet, elevator button, keyboard, phone, light switch, countertop, dinner plates, drinking glasses, cutlery, gym equipment, scissors, church pew, etc., someone (maybe an at risk person), touches that object, and then touches his nose, mouth, or eyes, and they get sick, maybe really sick (enough to be on a ventilator), or even die.

All because somebody else refused to wear a surgical mask (not to wear a mask is our God given right as Americans, we are free and have the freedom to do as we chose, like it says in the Declaration of Independence, or the Gettysburg Address, or the Magna Carta, that's why we defeated the Germans at Pearl Harbor).

How can I be sure that I don't have COVID-19 right now this second? Maybe I have it and I'm asymptomatic? And testing is nothing more than a snapshot in time. I've named my mask Charleen, and she helps me to keep my loved ones, and strangers, safe, maybe not 100% safe, but safer than if I didn't wear her.

Asians, especially Chinese and Japanese, have been wearing surgical masks for years, in some cases for particulate pollutants from burning coal, but in many cases to prevent the spread of infection. It's accepted there. We may have to learn to accept it here, especially before we come up with a vaccine.


https://tse4.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIF.V...=0&w=239&h=176

What if there's never a vaccine? They've never come up one for any of the other human coronaviruses(common cold, SARS-1, MERS, etc). Even the flu today is a remnant from the Spanish Flu and that vaccine still is maybe 50% on a good year

Then we have choices to make don't we? And I think at the end of the day we do not need a vaccine. We need something that will prevent people from dying. Even a treatment is just as good as a vaccine. And even if there is one, I am like others probably not taking it anyway, at least at first. I never take a flu shot for some of the same concerns.

Peace

Sneezing in your hand does as good as a mask does and then you can wash said hand almost immediately. Sneeze into a mask you'll need a new one unless you like smelling your snot all day. We aren't doing surgery.

If it weren't for local health department busy bodies, nobody would be wearing masks that arent already immunocompromised. You definitely won't see one in the medical facilities I work at outside of the ORs. Even the WHO is saying no healthy people should be wearing masks.

Well I'm sure those lovely ladies sitting in trailers outside of hospitals would gladly shove that cue tip through your nose and into the back of your throat if you want the really fun test. They tell those ladies that you should see the fear in your eyes to know if they went far enough. Or you could get the antibody test which is a bit less invasive. I'm glad I wasn't near the labs the day they started doing the tests in house as they grab every employee they can grab hold of to do calibration tests.

My biggest concern would not be not with the facility and how well it has been sanitized. My biggest concern would be handling my whistle a countless number of times throughout the game intermingled with handling the ball countless numbers of times throughout the game....a ball which will be handled by countless numbers of others (players, partners, coaches, etc.), some of which will also be handling their whistles or mouthguards. That, to me, seems like a far more likely of an avenue of transmission than a doorknob that isn't properly sanitized.

There are ways to avoid all of that, but I'm not sure it would be practical on a large scale, but it is worth considering. We could change our protocols to simply not handle the ball, ever. In reality, there is only one moment in a game where it is really necessary for us to actually handle the ball....the opening toss. We could change the rule to just give it to the visitors. At all other times, the only reason we handle the ball is to control the action. But, that can actually be done, if we want, with the whistle and/or verbally.

Soccer more or less already does this. This wouldn't necessarily eliminate all opportunities for transmission but it would remove what is, in my opinion, one of the biggest opportunities within the game.

The other potential issue is the actual blowing of the whistle. Surely, blasting air through the whistle, which often has a fair amount of saliva, is bound to aerosolize some of that saliva, creating the equivalent of a small sneeze. The only way to eliminate that is to move away from a whistle. An electronic, hand triggered, whistle may be the future. I've never heard one, but someone above mentioned they were not a very good proxy for a real one, but they could certainly be made better if the demand is there.


I've actually done a game, many years ago, when I had pink eye, which, while not fatal, is very contagious through contact. It was a fairly informal volunteer church youth league and I was to work solo. I was ready to cancel but they didn't have someone else to do it. The league director and I came up with the idea that I could do the game without making ANY contact with anything. All the players, coaches, and several parents that were present were presented with the situation and agreed to proceed. The players were directed to never throw/hand me the ball and if they did, I'd dodge it. I'd blow the whistle when needed and I'd direct them what to do with the ball. As an extra precaution, even though I wasn't touching anything aside from my own whistle, I washed my hands on every timeout/intermission. I think one of the coaches did the opening toss.

Or, we just realize that life is meant to be lived and not in fear of something like a virus and the fact that all people die eventually. We can take reasonable precautions, even some aggressive precautions, but we don't necessarily have to stop everything. It could be just another step in the evolutionary cycle and that, while not pleasant, may just run its course in time, taking a fair number of people with it, and fading away, even if we do nothing.

It sounds like people are trying to make this political statement. I said we have a choice now don't we? That means that some people will risk their health to do things that others will not. It is not about stopping everything. You can continue while others will not. And when the right people die in your life and we still have no "fix" then again it might influence your choices. We all have choices. We act like we are mandated to do things.

Peace

Those involved with training have dedicated a good amount of effort teaching officials techniques to avoid hasty, impulsive whistles. Without having one of those electronic, push-button whistle devices to experiment with personally, I'm wondering if such would impact favored whistle discipline. Would their use initiate a habit of impulsive whistle use that would need to be moderated? Or would the "patient whistle" be something more natural with these new-fangled finger operated gizmos? Time will tell, if they ever do become commonplace.

Good questions. I suppose it could be either.

Gesundheit ...
 

Many people certainly stifle their sneezes and coughs, but how many stifle their talking loudly, singing, whistling, laughing, or breathing deeply?

My Health Care Hero ...
 

That's my daughter. When Connecticut first started COVID testing she stepped up and VOLUNTEERED to do the testing, more dangerous back then due to a shortage of personal protective equipment for nurses (she used the same N-95 mask for her entire first week, keeping it in a labelled brown paper bag overnight). Last week, as Connecticut hospitals decided do elective surgeries, she went back to her regular job as a post-operative nurse, however, she continues to VOLUNTEER to do COVID testing on weekends because trained nurses are needed, especially nurses like my daughter who specialize in safety and personal protective equipment education and supervision.

When she's not working, she's self isolating (because of her job, she's at high risk to get COVID) and hasn't had any contact with me, her two siblings, or her nephews, to protect us. She's my health care hero.

https://tse2.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.q...=0&w=313&h=177

Also, while rapid tests still require the swab to be inserted high up into one's nasal passage, most testing today only involves the simple painless swabbing of the inside both nostrils.

Well unless your making out with them while they're doing that, your pretty safe from that dangerous laughing.

Laugh Out Loud ...
 

Sneezing, coughing, talking (especially talking loudly), singing, whistling, laughing, or breathing (especially breathing deeply) all may spread respiratory droplets that may contain large numbers of COVID virus particles. Some activities may spread respiratory droplets farther than others, and a surgical mask may stop, or slow, the spread of many of these larger respiratory droplets.

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...0px-Sneeze.JPG

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surgical_mask

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Respiratory_droplet

Hero ...
 

She does this, despite putting her own health at risk, and isolating herself from her family and friends, because she feels like she's making a difference, she's preventing the spread of this virus, and she's saving lives.

Florence Nightingale Pledge: With loyalty will I aid the physician in his work, and as a missioner of health, I will dedicate myself to devoted service for human welfare.

That'd be an old tradition. Thanksgiving day was the traditional end of the baseball season a century and a half ago. Football was any time they felt like it.

I'm hoping the demonstrations and riots lead to the end of all this people distancing, once everyone realizes they didn't lead to any increase in sickness -- except for the diseases of getting a brick in your head or getting shot by the cops.

The killing in Minneapolis was just the trigger. It's the go-out-of-business-now edicts, and the resulting unemployment and lack of social interaction that people were upset about. Imagine not even being allowed to date for months.

And I'm sure wearing a mask in public isn't an incentive toward illegal acts, right?

H1N1 Coming Soon To A Theater Near You ...
 

Not sure what that means. There is not a single "flu today". H1N1 caused the Spanish flu in 1918, and Swine Flu in 2009, but there are about a dozen different types of viruses that cause human influenza and a variety of these viruses appear every year. H1N1 was here in 1918, caused a lot of influenza epidemics and pandemics in many other years, and it will be back again.

H1N1 may have been here before 1918, but we've only known about human viruses since the late 19th/early 20th century, and proof that influenza was caused by viruses was not obtained until 1933.

https://tse3.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.n...=0&w=317&h=186

Who Was That Masked Man ???
 

Tell me about it. I haven't been on a date since 1975. Married for thirty years, divorced for fifteen.

I recently had to visit my bank in person to deal with a credit card issue. It felt really strange entering the bank wearing a mask.

As far as I know I can possibly be practically bathing in covid as I handle medical waste, covid specimens and more all day.With less protection than any poor nurse. I've handled crap that will literally melt surgical gloves in seconds that wasn't always securely closed. Been in the labs when they've had live AIDS spilled on the floor. Outside work I'm constantly exposed to giardia, distemper, rabies, tularemia, hantavirus, tetanus and who knows what else that laugh at covid.

It's just another problem filled with problems. Some of the measures taken when this first reared it's ugly head and we had next to nothing for information. Now we got more information than we know what to deal with. Most of it has shown that if your not in a nursing home ran by a new york politician, your odds of dieing is shockingly low

Typhood Mary ...
 

While 100,000 deaths is pretty bad, the worse part of COVID-19 is that one can walk around with the virus for several days, maybe a week, while being completely asymptomatic and unaware that your'e sick and can infect others. That's not the case with many other infectious diseases, including influenza, (you get the influenza virus, don't know that your'e sick and spread the disease for only a few days, get sick, stay home from work or school, and stay in bed). Not so with COVID-19, with this disease one can infect dozens, maybe hundreds, before one even begins to feel sick.

Because of this, with no vaccine (maybe never, best chance is a very modern MRNA vaccine), our only defense as a society will be social distancing and masks because this virus can spread very quickly, killing the old and elderly, the sick (diabetes, asthma, emphysema, high blood pressure, heart disease, immunodeficiency disorders, etc.), cancer patients (chemotherapy), even some of the young and healthy, and maybe a few children.

Of course we can all wait for active immunity (due to surviving the disease) as the disease travels all over the world, killing millions, but that may take a very long time (luckily viruses have evolved to limit their carnage, if they didn't they would kill all their hosts and viruses die with no hosts).

COVID-19 isn't influenza, it's not a cold. It may not be the worst infectious disease, or have the worst symptoms, or the deadliest, or the most widespread, or the easiest to spread, or the easiest to catch, but it's still pretty bad.

I have a feeling that, like our Chinese, Korean, and Japanese friends, we'll (at least those that care about our family, friends, neighbors, coworkers, and complete strangers) be wearing our masks for a very long time, it might even become the new normal.

Asymptomatic spread has been shown to be a myth .

I'm off to play golf with 30 fellow hospital employees, none will be wearing masks.

Asymptomatic Spread ...
 

Citation please.

The British Medical Journal Thorax (British Thoracic Society), and Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), both say otherwise.

Actually that's been the case with viral pneumonias, which have been among the leading killers of old people (especially in nursing homes) since forever. How could it possibly be getting into nursing homes, other than by being spread from the general population?

Pneumonia isn't caused by a single agent, but we don't know how many it is caused by. It can be caused by a bacterial infection, by influenza, or by other viral diseases. In most cases of pneumonia, even the fatal ones, the causative agent isn't even explored. Other than influenza and tuberculosis, nobody tries to control the spread of pneumonia agents in the general population, and usually the infection isn't even traced. We just know pneumonia agents circulate in the general population, and sometimes cause pneumonias there, but manifest as life-threatening ones in the debilitated. Influenza at least makes most people sick, and we do try to control the spread of tuberculosis -- which tends to infect some people for a long time, and has a lot of carriers who are asymptomatic or have only occasional symptoms -- but for the most part we try only to protect debilitated persons and health care personnel from these agents.

Covid-19 to me is just another viral pneumonia agent, no different from what we presume to be many others that are always circulating and cause most people little harm. It seems the only reasons efforts are being made to control its spread in the general population are: that it was discovered close to its apparent origin of human transmission, and there was a brief chance to prevent its breakout; and that it was associated with a far more severe version of SARS. But the time its breakout could've been stopped has long passed, and it's now known to be much less of a threat than SARS was. I think efforts to control it in the general population are futile, and that control efforts should have been aimed at isolating nursing homes, not the general population.

Of course nursing homes have always been bad on average at keeping pneumonia from going around; some have viewed such pneumonias as a merciful end where euthanasia was not practiced. But as we know, in various places around the world perverse policies were followed that seemed to deliberately increase the chance Covid-19 would go around such facilities, snipping off lives faster than the usual run of pneumonias would have.

We could all have been trying to live like this for the past century for all the medical justification there was, given what we know about pneumonia, trying to keep these respiratory agents from going around because in a few cases they will kill old, debilitated people. But we would thereby have crippled all of society to try to save those few.

Viral Pneumonia ...
 

I've just about finished reading The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History by John M. Barry, about the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic. Most deaths were caused by pneumonia, but at the time they thought it was bacterial pneumonia. Of course back then they didn't know much about human viruses, the viral cause of influenza wasn't determined until 1933.

From what I understand, X-Rays of pneumonia in the lungs of COVID-19 patients are quite nasty compared to other types of pneumonia.

Blood Vessel Disease ...
 

And now there's a new study that indicates that COVID-19 is a disease of the blood vessels.

https://news.yahoo.com/evidence-sugg...195153450.html

1) That citation you provided was very good reading

2) Good for you. Do you want a medal? Does that make you brave or something? I played golf outside without a mask over a month ago. Not sure what your point is. I rarely wear a mask outside.

Some people just need attention I guess. Now we know who announcers are talking about when they say "that official is making it all about himself".

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Not Molly Malone ...
 

Not COVID-19, but typhoid fever (a bacterial infection).

In New York's fair city,
Where the girls are so pretty,
I first set my eyes on sweet Mary Mallon,
As she wheeled her laundry barrow,
Through streets broad and narrow,
Crying,"Why are all my employers dying?"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Mallon

Nero fiddled while Rome burned, or was he golfing?

https://tse2.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.8...=0&w=328&h=160

The widespread use of masks in these countries seriously predates the appearance of Covid-19, or sundry other infectious agents.

Primary motivator for mask wearing is the near constant smog, most of which originates in China and wafts eastward.

Just pointing out that most of the medical community outside the quacks and media grifters that haven't seen a patient in years consider the.masks and the lockdowns are a joke. Our hospital system would be back to no masks if it weren't for liability lawsuit fears.

King Coal ...
 

Agree, but as you stated "primary", it's not the only reason.

China loves its coal burning plants, spewing out lots of particulate pollutants, that can be sucessfully filtered by surgical masks.

Surgical masks wouldn't do a very good job filtering out the gaseous components of photochemical smog (nitrogen oxides, sulphur oxides, ground-level ozone, and volatile organic compounds like hydrocarbons), but could do a pretty good job filtering out smoke particulates in photochemical smog

https://tse3.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.t...=0&w=300&h=300

Old King Coal was a filthy old soul and a filthy old soul was he.
He called for his asthma, and he called for his emphysema, and he called for his fiddlers with lung cancer.

Just pointing out that most of the medical community outside the quacks and media grifters that haven't seen a patient in years consider the.masks and the lockdowns are a joke. Our hospital system would be back to no masks if it weren't for liability lawsuit fears.

I don't see anything from the former in the news that points to anything to the contrary other than the cruise ship issue. The AMA shows nothing in the news and they aren't especially trustworthy on anything that is a political issue. CDC as of three weeks ago doesn't point to anything definite.

This thread has gotten so off topic from officiating it should be locked. Take your political and medical opinions elsewhere.

Unfortunately, this has been politicized by the people at the top that want to complain because of who is making some of the decisions. The reality is that this is going to be bigger than a governor making a decision. There will be local authorities that will decide what their school districts are going to do and if they participate in events based on their local health concerns. We are not going to talk about even "masks" if there are not games in several districts by the time the school year starts because there are schools not even open. But people like in Illinois have tried to make this about the governor and his positions politically, while in Indiana they did the very same thing and schools were shut down for the rest of the year before Illinois made such a decision. And we have a leader that wants to make wearing a mask a bad thing, but has not figured out how to get this under control. So politics is all around this issue and clearly coming out in this conversation. ;)

Peace

Wash Your Hands ...
 

Agree. However, JRutledge recently posted some great comments bringing us back to the topic of officiating.

For my part, I was just trying to debunk some health myths with the intent of keeping us all safe, and hopefully moving us closer back to normal, even if it's a new normal.

Good news. Next week (for the first time since mid-March) I'm going to church and I'm going to get a haircut.

I'm starting to look like a Beatle, the good looking Beatle.

https://tse2.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.c...=0&w=300&h=300

The Myth Is A Myth ...
 

Agreed. Sorry for falling asleep at the switch.