CAN WE AUDIOPHILES DO OUR PART?

We can stay home and listen to our music. 
We can support our music stores. 
We can support our local businesses. 
We can volunteer in the community. 
And much more. 

NO!! LOL I’m old I don’t want to do my part, I already done my part, my bosses part, and half the people I ever worked with’s part. I’ve done a part and a half so to speak..

I'm all PARTED out....

Time to go feed the chickens..

Regards

Preaching to the choir.

I get your perspective. I feel partly that way as well having worked for 40 years. 
But for me it feels good to contribute what I can for the sake of this fallible species. 

GIK is making and selling masks, and donating the proceeds to the Red Cross. VPI is making hand sanitizer and distributing it to local hospitals, etc.

+1 Cardas

I've made purchases from small audio shops and made a donations to my local jazz foundation to help make up some of the income loss that performing musicians are incurring right now.

Enough already move on.

My parts are worn out. 

What you mean we, kemo sabe?

After working for 50 full years, I feel that I have already done my part as well as others parts. I was a temp boss when our boss was in hospital and out off work for almost a year. I was promised extra compensation for doing 2 jobs at same time but received a big fat nothing. When I wanted to retire at the end of the school year on June15th, I was told I couldn’t get my 4 weeks vacation from the year before unless I worked until July. So for the last 2 weeks of work I showed up and did absolutely NOTHING. My reward for 35 years of service was I had to wait until the end of July To receive my 4 weeks vacation pay even though my contract said I could receive my money on July 1.


The Superintendent and Human Resources director did come by to shake my hand On my last day, then they went out to lunch. I wasn’t invited along. So as long winded as this is, I have already done all my share(s) and just want to rest. Let the millennials do something, I have nothing left to give.

"GIK is making and selling masks, and donating the proceeds to the Red Cross."

Wouldn't it be simpler to just donate masks?

@glubson, to get an answer to that question you'll have to ask Glen.

If you want to do your part, go out and protest the unconstitutional lockdown and closing of businesses. The models were beyond wrong. Hospitals are not only not overwhelmed, they are empty and laying people off. I know. I work in x-ray. In Seattle. Once ground zero. Now the only zero is our economy. But not because of the Rona. Because of the political response to the Rona. 

They closed down parks and trails. They have people wearing masks outdoors. Hello, people! You get close enough, long enough, you need a mask. Outdoors that is impossible. Never happen. So make a mask. Carry a mask. Know when its necessary and use it then - and only then! 

Do your part, but do it right. Like this Special Forces veteran.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=HXDTBl1FCWs&feature=emb_logo

Do you wear head protection when you work in x-Ray?

If you want to do your part, go out and protest the unconstitutional lockdown ...

 @Millercarbon Say it brother!!

@millercarbon,

I was wondering when you would again politicize a thread.  You did not disappoint me, thank you. Here I thought you were being a good boy after that very long thread that is still being added to.  I guess you can’t teach an old dog new tricks. 

Given the average age of audiophiles, no offence intended, doing your part is to stay safe, stay healthy, and stay out of the hospital. Don't be ashamed to ask for help if you have high infection rates in your area. Ask someone to get your groceries, etc.

The thread is about  "Covid-19 (or, as I term it, the C-Plague)" and "frankly I believe I should be socially responsible". 

"Covid-19" breaks with a hundred years tradition of naming diseases for their origin (Ebola, Nile, Lyme, etc) and indeed is only there because we stopped calling this one the China or Wuhan virus for entirely political reasons.

"Socially responsible" is political on its face. An individual can be responsible. There is no such thing as a society being responsible, and it is impossible for an individual to be socially responsible. The term has absolutely no meaning other than in a political sense. 

In other words the thread was political from the get-go. 

It's a thread about what some people are doing to help each other.It's not about politics.Political discussions are against forum rules.
My daughter works in a hospital lab and her experience has been 100% the opposite of yours miller.
Back on topic,we are staying home and donating what we can to our local food bank.

Thanks for doing the dirty work, stereo5. That is, reading that post.

Agreed.

I managed to somehow survive this deadly, once in a lifetime menace.
As I look squarely in the face of 66 years on this sphere I need to
tell you something. People in Oregon are born socialists who would
sell their kids into slavery if the gov't told them it needed doing.
Yeah!!!

Cardas is a wonderful product I hope to able to afford one day.
For now I'm still kinda a kimber guy. 
You do know why she bought masks for the factory staff don't you?
In that little town there is no pool of workers to pull from. Lose one
and you have to go shanghai another one.
That's not really the whole truth. The real reason they all wear masks
is that when people walk through the workers must hide the ear to ear grin that crosses their faces when they see another fool paying $500/foot for wire!! Oh yeah!!!

Simply looking at something from a different perspective doesn’t make it political. I’m with MC on this. I have suffered real damage from the lockdowns. I’m sure many here have. A pandemic is not political, but it sure can be used to move an agenda. Being socially responsible to me means, be smart, be prudent. Not living in fear of the sky falling.

Hey stereo5 - I hear you. Have a great retirement and enjoy life.

VPI is doing their part - very impressed. And I also love my Prime TT.

MC, Geof3,
It’s so easy to pass unproductive commentary after the event. How many have died in the US? UK? EU? China?
Would you have said the same if you and your like walked around without restrictions in place and caught Covid-19. Would you have complained that the Government did nothing? How many lived have the restrictions saved?
Your comments are pathetic.

@millercarbon is spot on. As a physician I've been following the data very closely. We got this all wrong. Regardless of what any political wonks say.

So this is a thread about what we can do. millercarbon is right. We can do whatever we can to undo the mess that our response to COVID has caused. If that requires protests then so be it. The suffering caused by the response is worse than the disease in scale and scope. It is funny that those who cry "politics" never want to acknowledge the staggering amount of suffering we have caused with unproven tactics that even as we speak are proving ineffective. If you are not seeing the economic devastation of small businesses and the healthcare sector then you aren't paying attention. When jobs are lost people lose their homes and health insurance.


millercarbon is also right about our hospitals. Ours are empty. Ghost towns. Staff laid off. And some of these hospitals may not recover. You have to see that empty hospitals DURING a pandemic are a sign that someone got something wrong.

Currently I cannot get care for my patients. My office is open and we are seeing patients. We have seen zero COVID. But many specialist offices are closed for anything but emergencies. I'm having a hard time getting tests and studies. Subsequently many of my patients are suffering and at risk. THAT is NOT how you respond to a pandemic.

But, what can we do? We paid our housekeeper (who comes once every two weeks) even though she has not been coming. Our small church elected to pay staff and pre-school teachers even though they aren't working. We get take out from our local restaurants, many of which will not survive this, and give tips that are more than the cost of the meal. My wife paid her hair guy even though her appointment got cancelled. I'm seeing my newly uninsured patients for free. We go buy growlers from the 4 new local breweries that are walking distance from my home, most of which will not survive this either.

Finally, we have to educate an American public that believes whatever they want to believe and that will give up what is precious for specious and empty promises of safety.

"In Seattle. Once ground zero."

Is there an explanation why it is not ground zero anymore?

"You have to see that empty hospitals DURING a pandemic are a sign that someone got something wrong."

One could also say that empty hospitals during a pandemic are a sign that someone got something right.

Once they fill up, you failed to prevent it.

Any tactics used is unproven. Unless you have had a few of the same situations before. It is learning as you go at this point. It is a three-month-old situation.

N80 - included hind sight. If you are you so medically smart, why did you not go to Wuhan and do something about the pandemic.
I agree that this is all effecting the world economy badly. And China’s. I can’t believe that you put money over lives.

OP. Kyron Audio are producing medical masks, the clear full face type. As there is no motor racing, one team, Erebus Motor sport put their team into building ventilators. I am way into the risk age to assist the fight against Covid-19 directly. But we have committed financially what we can.

I shall wear a GIK mask made from their material. That way I may diffuse my vast wisdom over a larger audience at one time than to the few ears here that will believe my drivel.

Btw, not to make light of bad situation, I believe many are not understanding what is really going on. Not to start a war here, as we are all in this together.i wish us all well.

We are close to the age of "high risk", so we don't want to go volunteer direct. But we're lucky to be working from home at full salaries. Here's some things we are doing:Paying our housekeeper who is sheltering at home. Cleaning our own house.
Getting take out weekly from local restaurants we like. Probably more often than we went out to before.Buying gift certificates from our local hair salon. We may never use them.
Just bought a streamer from my local stereo shop.Donating to local food distributors with each paycheck.Mostly staying home and being safe. Being nice.
Wishing others will stay safe and sane.
...this too will pass...

I’m with MC and n80 on this one.

As a sole proprietor business, most my projects/clients have been put on hold as people become fearful from the start. One was a Doctor who has suffered significantly as only 15% of his patients were classified as ‘essential’ service. I was fine with this when we didn’t know exactly what we may be dealing with, but we have a better idea now. We have done a damn good job, flattened the ‘curve’, and many parts of the country never became NYC as initially feared, and seemingly never will. As has been said, at this point some of these shut-downs and restrictions are doing more harm than good, and oddly enough, even the health sector is hurting overall, with no patients to serve and empty hospitals.

But what is more harmful is the continual fear put into the vast majority of the population, which at this point, seems largely unfounded, as smart rational protection measures can be put into place to reduce risk. And many have been and have become accepted.

I don’t get unemployment when I don’t have clients, and haven’t gotten help from any government entities in regards to my business as I have no employees, and right now, I don’t see any coming. My only hope is the return of clients who become not overly fearful to move forward and reconsider the services I provide. 3-4 months ago, this was not an issue. I’m certainly not alone.

I’m more than willing to be smart and take precautions as we move forward. But we most move forward. There is always risk to get up in the morning and go throughout our days. We are big boys and girls, we understand the risks, always have, and do what is required to reduce it. Thank goodness we seem to be slowly getting back to work, but after 3 months with little income, it would be silly to think many can do this for another 5-6 months. We will destroy many peoples lives, already have, and there is not enough government money to ‘fix it’. At that point, we will have bigger problems than we can imagine.

I can't believe I'm about to do this on an audiophile thread. I'm a sucker for punishment, it seems. Here we go. I'm an inpatient internal medicine physician in a badly hit hospital on the east coast. We had less than 20 covid positive or rule outs on the day the lock downs started I'm our area. We peaked at just shy of 200 in hospital(that is total admitted at that moment in time, not total positives. People die or get discharged. Hundreds died. Fortunately, hundreds more have been discharged)with respiratory failure with covid. The peak was about 20 days after the lockdowns started and have slowly but steadily declined after a plateau of about a week(average time to death or discharge is 16 to 18 days). This is pretty much right in line with how you would expect it to go in relation to a lock down and the timeline as it pertains to covid-19 illness. Numbers played out similarly in the surrounding hospitals. 

In hard hit areas, I'm not so sure the "cure" was worse than the disease. The hospitals here were certainly not empty. We opened up 2 extra wings. We turned the same day unit into another ICU. We were still full. We weren't laying people off. We had nurses from around the country flown in to help. Same goes for physicians. Similar stories in the surrounding hospitals.

I'm very happy that in many parts of the country...it didn't play out this way. That is, after all...the point, though. The entire point. I am amazed when I see people point at the current numbers and call out that the numbers aren't that bad. "See! It's not that bad!" Yea, it's not horrible. After taking drastic measures it's not horrible. 

I'm not going to argue that things were managed properly. I won't argue that the lockdowns don't have costs of their own(of course they do, no $#!?). I won't make a claim that I know how to handle this moving forward systemically. I will say that claiming that empty hospitals during a pandemic means mistakes were made or that we've clearly screwed up isn't really a great statement in isolation. Once again...that is the point. Stop the spread of the virus. Waiting until it gets a foothold in an area before you adjust means waiting until it's too late.

I get it. As a physician, not being able to get things done for your non covid patients in an area that isn't really affected by covid is probably a horrible feeling. It's not fair to those patients. They are paying a disproportionate cost. I don't pretend to have the answer for how we should manage that. I don't think the proper pushback against that is to claim none of this is a big deal, though.

I'm also not claiming that hospitals aren't hurting financially. They are hurting in the areas that have not been touched much by the virus. I know there are layoffs. The hospitals that are the most busy with covid are also getting crushed. Despite being completely full during April with 30 admissions held in the ED and people in the hallways...revenue was down something like 60 or 70%. All the low level but high volume stuff isn't there. I don't have the answers for how to help the hospitals, but, again, I don't think the answer is to claim that covid isn't a big deal(or that it's just a political thing). 

*This was typed in a rush on a phone, and I'm not going back to proofread. I'm sure there are plenty of typos etc. Please...forgive them. 

It all boils down to that timeless expression:
"I'm from the government and I'm here to help".

They admitted up front that many govt's seriously considered
letting the virus run its course. Let'em die was the cry. Grandma's not got many living years left anyway. I want the house!

Many countries did elect to do just that. Was that the wiser path?
We can tally that up in a few more months. Winners and losers.
The American way.

If you want get elected or re-elected bodies in the streets are not
the photo op you want. Can't have it. Better to mtg off the
kids future. 

Dems now offering $2k month to everyone. (who can vote)
What will Trump counter with? Stay tuned.

SNAFU

snarbut,

There were no typos etc. Quite an achievement, indeed.

All I know is, John Prine was infected by and died from exposure to someone already infected. Did that person not have on a mask? Should We The People be able, through our elected representatives, to require all people to wear masks while in public? Is to do so infringing on the rights of all? Does the individual’s rights and freedoms trump (no pun intended) the general population’s rights to be protected from irresponsible and potentially deadly behavior?

All perfectly rhetorical questions, and yet they have all been answered. Its just that you're not being told. Fake news isn't always lies. Its also selective reporting. 

Sweden never did lockdown or quarantine, and yet has as low or lower rates of infection and death as countries that did, including next-door neighbor Norway. So you can't say it was the climate. Ditto South Dakota, never any lockdowns at all. And you can't say its sparsely populated because the biggest cities there believe it or not have airports and their infection and mortality rates are as low or lower than equivalent US cites. 

There's a seriously grave issue here that deserves a lot more attention than its getting. Individual liberty, constitutionally protected liberty, is being trampled on a vast scale on the basis of fear stoked up by information that is heavily manipulated at best, and often flat out wrong. The problem with this is the damage being done to our public institutions, constitutional republic form of government, and the rule of law. 

Officer Anderson here has a pretty good handle on the situation. He's seen with his own eyes what can happen. Give the man a listen. Please.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=HXDTBl1FCWs&feature=emb_logo

Sweden's mortality rates are higher than its neighbors, hospital beds are empty because elective surgeries are postponed, and I urge those with a modicum of critical thinking to ignore the nonsense spewed by some around here...stay safe, ignore the faux news hate spewing lunatics as they're simply, and dangerously, wrong.

Mystery is what made a poster switch from dismay about lack of response earlier in the pandemic to dismay with care during pandemic now. Twilight zone?

Mortality rates. Fair enough. Let’s look at some of them, shall we? Sweden’s mortality rate is 12% currently. UK is 14%, France 15% and Belgium 16%. By contrast the US rate is 6%. I’ll grant you the rate in Denmark and Finland is 5%.

"Sweden’s mortality rate is 12% currently. UK is 14%, France 15% and Belgium 16%. By contrast the US rate is 6%."

That all seems awfully lot. Something is wrong with calculation. It would be 20 million for the U.S.A.

@snarbut2, Empty hospitals during a pandemic are, in fact, a sign that we got things wrong and I think it is typical of the narrow thinking that is going on that it is not a real issue. A pandemic of its own. You, of course, know that people's healthcare needs do not stop just because there is a pandemic. Downplaying the significance of delayed care is not a responsible response. That suffering, morbidity and mortality is no less real than those suffering from COVID. And, once we know the numbers may turn out to be worse.

The fact that your experience has been different is THE main issue. The response to the pandemic was general and central. THAT was the mistake. Counties in northern California with ZERO cases never needed the same measures as New York City.

@geoffkait Thanks for those mortality rates. That clears up everything. Well, at least it clears up why so many people don't seem to have a clue about this pandemic.