Getting bad in El Paso....

6,646 Views | 37 Replies | Last: 3 yr ago by merc
Marcus Aurelius
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https://kvia.com/coronavirus/2020/10/26/its-apocalyptic-el-paso-cardiologist-fears-non-covid-patients-will-die-due-to-lack-of-hospital-capacity/

Some hospitals cancelling elective procedures again. Hospitalizations up 300%. Anybody live there seeing this firsthand?
AggieAuditor
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This one seems odd. Did people in El Paso just refuse to wear masks and throw big parties? Why are they getting hit so much worse than others?
aginlakeway
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AggieAuditor said:

This one seems odd. Did people in El Paso just refuse to wear masks and throw big parties? Why are they getting hit so much worse than others?

How many from Mexico?
"I'm sure that won't make a bit of difference for those of you who enjoy a baseless rage over the decisions of a few teenagers."
AggieAuditor
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No idea. I've heard that a lot, but is that really the case?
J. Walter Weatherman
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AggieAuditor said:

This one seems odd. Did people in El Paso just refuse to wear masks and throw big parties? Why are they getting hit so much worse than others?


Basically the same thing we saw in the valley right? After missing the spike in the summer this is unfortunately just their turn to go through it.
KlinkerAg11
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That's how I see it. Most of Texas had their spike this summer, looks like west Texas is getting it now.

Marcus Aurelius
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I read that 40% of El Paso hospital pts are covid and their main children's hospital is admitting adult covid.
Fitch
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Reposting my charts from Sunday on the "daily charts" thread.

Seems like west of I-35 has a similar trend. At the risk of being a, this kind of looks correlated to influence from cold weather. Just an uneducated armchair opinion.




tylercsbn9
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AggieAuditor said:

This one seems odd. Did people in El Paso just refuse to wear masks and throw big parties? Why are they getting hit so much worse than others?


Are they getting an influx from the border? That will get you downvoted to oblivion on Reddit but Houston doesn't seem to be taking off. Not sure about Dallas and Austin
cc_ag92
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"Angela Mora, the director of the El Paso Public Health Department, said contact tracing is an ongoing struggle in the city as some COVID-19 patients or others deemed high risk are refusing to cooperate. She said if a person doesn't respond to contact tracing requests after two days, a city employee and a local police officer will hand-deliver a health order and warn of a possible fine."

El Paso Coronavirus

I found a few articles that mentioned residents' resistance to contact tracing.

Those of you who are mentioning Mexico, are you thinking that residents of Mexico are in the the hospitals, spreading the illness, or something else? I'm not familiar with how that would work, but I'm interested.
Not a Bot
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Just looking at that data, it looks like the zones that had it the worst in August aren't having big rebounds. A lot of zones which had moderate but not severe spikes in August are having another wave and are close to their peaks again.

Would love to see that broken down by county/city instead of the big hospital zones but I don't think that date is available. The zones with the double spikes seem to have multiple towns that are spread out. Curious if say Midland had a big spike in August but now Odessa is having a big spike now, for example.
bigtruckguy3500
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AggieAuditor said:

This one seems odd. Did people in El Paso just refuse to wear masks and throw big parties? Why are they getting hit so much worse than others?
Probably part of the issue.

https://kvia.com/news/business-technology/2020/10/26/el-paso-event-venue-continues-to-hold-large-gatherings-contends-its-not-breaking-the-law/
ORAggieFan
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Everyone should refuse contact tracing. There is a reason the CDC was against it for pandemics until January even though this is a mild pandemic in their plan.
bigtruckguy3500
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ORAggieFan said:

Everyone should refuse contact tracing. There is a reason the CDC was against it for pandemics until January even though this is a mild pandemic in their plan.
What reason was that?

What's the definition of pandemic that classifies it as mild? Severity of illness, absolute number of infections, infection rate, etc?
Proposition Joe
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I mean, how is that any different than Billy Bobs in Fort Worth?
ORAggieFan
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bigtruckguy3500 said:

ORAggieFan said:

Everyone should refuse contact tracing. There is a reason the CDC was against it for pandemics until January even though this is a mild pandemic in their plan.
What reason was that?

What's the definition of pandemic that classifies it as mild? Severity of illness, absolute number of infections, infection rate, etc?

Percent of total deaths caused by the virus and IFR. CDC would score Covid as a 2 out of 5.

Regarding contact tracing, they said no matter the severity there was no value. I assume that's based on effort and timeliness but I don't know their reasons. This was from the plans developed after Bush increased pandemic funding which then grew under Obama. This plan also said schools should not be closed except in rare regional insatnaces, masks shouldn't be worn except by those ill who must go out, no need to close businesses, etc. Basically, the plan only Sweden followed that we funded.
EastSideAg2002
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My in laws are in El Paso. So far two have been to the ICU along with 8 others that are or have been sick in the last few weeks. My kids godmother and her family are also sick with one on the ventilator. From what I have heard they are also trying to get the VA over there to take non-COVID patients to free up space in the other hospitals.
I am not sure if there has been any idea if it is because of Mexico because Juarez got bad at the same time from what my in law say. Juarez is in much worse shape based on the population and poverty.
bigtruckguy3500
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ORAggieFan said:

bigtruckguy3500 said:

ORAggieFan said:

Everyone should refuse contact tracing. There is a reason the CDC was against it for pandemics until January even though this is a mild pandemic in their plan.
What reason was that?

What's the definition of pandemic that classifies it as mild? Severity of illness, absolute number of infections, infection rate, etc?

Percent of total deaths caused by the virus and IFR. CDC would score Covid as a 2 out of 5.

Regarding contact tracing, they said no matter the severity there was no value. I assume that's based on effort and timeliness but I don't know their reasons. This was from the plans developed after Bush increased pandemic funding which then grew under Obama. This plan also said schools should not be closed except in rare regional insatnaces, masks shouldn't be worn except by those ill who must go out, no need to close businesses, etc. Basically, the plan only Sweden followed that we funded.
Interesting. Glad they are willing to change based on evidence. I can't imagine any reason why, in the current situation, where contact tracing would be of no value. It is pretty fundamental to infection control. It worked during the ebola outbreaks in west africa a few years ago and we (in the military) have stemmed multiple outbreaks with contact tracing.

In regards to being a 2 out of 5 based on deaths and IFR, that's a pretty rigid and inflexible way of grading something. For example, what if the virus killed no one, but put everyone in the hospital and resulted in severe permanent lung damage? It would probably be a zero on the pandemic scale you reference, but would be pretty bad and worth taking pretty drastic measures to contain. Our "health protection conditions" in the military had definitions and metrics to define what needed to be done, but we found that nothing fit exactly what was going on.

South Korea took a very different approach than Sweden (much more heavy handed), and ended up with a substantially lower death rate, despite being much more densely populated in areas, fewer cases and a lower case rate. Despite having 5 times the population, they had less than a tenth the number of deaths. I don't know why Sweden is the poster boy here.
P.U.T.U
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bigtruckguy3500 said:

ORAggieFan said:

bigtruckguy3500 said:

ORAggieFan said:

Everyone should refuse contact tracing. There is a reason the CDC was against it for pandemics until January even though this is a mild pandemic in their plan.
What reason was that?

What's the definition of pandemic that classifies it as mild? Severity of illness, absolute number of infections, infection rate, etc?

Percent of total deaths caused by the virus and IFR. CDC would score Covid as a 2 out of 5.

Regarding contact tracing, they said no matter the severity there was no value. I assume that's based on effort and timeliness but I don't know their reasons. This was from the plans developed after Bush increased pandemic funding which then grew under Obama. This plan also said schools should not be closed except in rare regional insatnaces, masks shouldn't be worn except by those ill who must go out, no need to close businesses, etc. Basically, the plan only Sweden followed that we funded.

South Korea took a very different approach than Sweden (much more heavy handed), and ended up with a substantially lower death rate, despite being much more densely populated in areas, fewer cases and a lower case rate. Despite having 5 times the population, they had less than a tenth the number of deaths. I don't know why Sweden is the poster boy here.
You cannot compare South Korea to the USA in terms of response, they have almost zero immigration since you have to fly there and it is easy to trace anyone that arrives (that still has to quarantine for 14 days and has to download an app to follow your movements). They did a much better job about shutting down travel right away and allowed the use of unapproved test while they figured out what worked, did a lot more testing for everyone, and the government is tracking everyone's movements.

The big thing to me is the people of South Korea have learned from several recent pandemics what worked for them and is doing that. It seems if they can keep any new cases from coming in they can keep the cases low. The USA played politics for the first few months and with our population size along with vast area COVID was going to be something we had to deal with.

South Korea was starting to lockdown in January/February when they found out about the first cases and the USA did not until March/April. With a much more unwilling public it was too late to follow the Korean model, plus being an election year doesn't help (remember the Trump administration being called racist for talking about not allowing international travel). At the end of the day we still do not have a solid plan going forward with states allowing and doing different things. Hopefully we can come up with a better plan for future pandemics since the first few months were a nightmare.
aggiebrad94
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Quote:

South Korea took a very different approach than Sweden (much more heavy handed), and ended up with a substantially lower death rate, despite being much more densely populated in areas, fewer cases and a lower case rate. Despite having 5 times the population, they had less than a tenth the number of deaths. I don't know why Sweden is the poster boy here.
I'm still convinced that Asian countries have built in immunities from years and years of respiratory outbreaks, etc.
KlinkerAg11
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I think the same thing.

I think in time we will find cross reactivity with immunity.
RGV AG
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I haven't spent a lot of time in EP in about 15 years or so, but used to get there frequently for work. It is similar to and or like the rest of the Texas border in the sense that the number of docs and hospital beds per capita are less than most parts of the country. Also, from an eye view, it is has a large number of unhealthy people, like the rest of the Tex/Mex border. Juarez almost certainly has a limited number of accessible hospital beds as well, so the whole MSA, if they are combined, is probably well below what is typically seen in the US.

Two weeks ago, out of curiosity, I took the up to date state numbers in cases and deaths for the RGV and then did the same for the Mexican side but multiplied the Mexican side of the RGV 2.5X's for under reporting. When the Mexican side denominator was added in the RGV area had 45 cases less per 10K residents that the Houston area. But the death rate was 3 times higher. These population, just like EP and Juarez, are in communication so a magic line can't be drawn in terms of stats. Even with the border closed to most Mexicans the amount of dual citizens and working people going back and forth is still high, not to mention the thousands of Mexican trucks that cross every day.

It is a well established that in the RGV many deaths are being counted towards Covid that should not be, that may not be the case in EP, but I bet it is. Also in the RGV, starting in about July, a lot of people were hospitalized that maybe were not truly needed to. The increased death rate of the RGV compared to the Houston area tells me that something is way off. Either the treatment in the area is poor or the population is very unhealthy or a combination or the two. Or maybe deaths are being counted in a different manner.

I don't know about Juarez, but across from the RGV the Covid panic and cases has really dropped. On the Mexican side they are more worried about cases coming from the US than they are about community spread locally.
ShinerDunk93
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Alex Rodriguez on Twitter follows this. Mexico is causing an impact. Obviously not all of it. We allow people needing medical attention across the border. Hospitals don't report on nationality so it is hard to get a read on it.



It does sound like a bad situation in EP
RockOn
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Why would you assume that Chihuahua is causing an outbreak in El Paso instead of the other way around?
Beat40
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RockOn said:

Why would you assume that Chihuahua is causing an outbreak in El Paso instead of the other way around?


What mitigation steps has Mexico taken at all as compared to Texas?
bigtruckguy3500
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Beat40 said:

RockOn said:

Why would you assume that Chihuahua is causing an outbreak in El Paso instead of the other way around?


What mitigation steps has Mexico taken at all as compared to Texas?
I know when things were getting bad here in Southern California, the Mexicans started restricting travel from SoCal into Mexico. Things have largely stabilized and they've opened up considering we had pretty large case numbers before Mexico, and more international travellers come through the US than Mexico, it's possible we brought it there.
bay fan
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S
ORAggieFan said:

Everyone should refuse contact tracing. There is a reason the CDC was against it for pandemics until January even though this is a mild pandemic in their plan.
Seriously? God forbid you do your share to perhaps save someone's life. I suppose you wouldn't mind if you lost a parent by exposing them when someone you came in contact with could have made sure you knew so you could protect them.
RGV AG
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Quote:

We allow people needing medical attention across the border. Hospitals don't report on nationality so it is hard to get a read on it.
I am not sure about that, I know along the RGV they are hardly letting anyone in from Mex. I cross the border daily. Rio Grande City had a guy die on the bridge after being denied entry into the US, this was like in May. Died on the Mexican side of the bridge. They will let plasma donors in, and "essential" workers, like freight forwarders and truck drivers and such, but other than that they are being major dicks. No longer will they let Mexican ambulances in.

Lady in our plant had a mother dying in Mission, had physician documentation and hospice documentation, and they would not let her across. We were making PPE and to get a mechanic to help us inspect some equipment before importing it, I had to show the PO and entry summaries and such, it was a PIA, took about 45 min for them to OK the entry, and that was because they know me.

There are a lot of dual citizens, so in that sense you may well be right and it might be that EP has more than other areas. Juarez was pretty firm in their shutdown in March and April, and didn't truly kinda open up until the end of May and into June.

Like others on here mentioned, the shutdowns in parts of Texas were probably too early.
ORAggieFan
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bay fan said:

ORAggieFan said:

Everyone should refuse contact tracing. There is a reason the CDC was against it for pandemics until January even though this is a mild pandemic in their plan.
Seriously? God forbid you do your share to perhaps save someone's life. I suppose you wouldn't mind if you lost a parent by exposing them when someone you came in contact with could have made sure you knew so you could protect them.

You're using emotion to drive policy. There is a reason the CDC was against contact tracing and it has nothing to do with wanting parents killed.
3rd Generation Ag
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No issue with contact tracing here. I have been no where except to work because it is mandated. And I have no issue with telling someone where I have been.

El Paso, much like the valley has a high percentage of Hispanics. They are an ethnic group that tends to have the bad version of the virus, hence hospital overloads. Some think it is a vitamin D lack for people of color. Native Americans, Blacks, Hispanics. Some tie it also to higher rates of diabetes. It might be both because I am not a doctor. It is also a culture with multigenerational families. Abeula and even her mother (I don't know the Spanish word for great grandparent) live in the homes rather being relocated to senior care facilties. School child brings it home and the older famility member wind up in the hospital with the severe version. Hispanic families are wonderfully loving and respectful of the senior members. Oldest sons and daughters especially are brought up seeing their parents take grandparents into the home, and follow that model when they are adults.
Aston04
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As someone in education I can attest contact tracing is worthless. They throw hundreds and hundreds of kids out of school for two weeks... I've heard of near zero actually getting covid from that group.. But kids have lost out big time on their education - chasing something that can't be tamed anyway (at least until a good vaccine)..
Marcus Aurelius
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https://kvia.com/coronavirus/2020/10/29/el-paso-county-judge-considers-more-restrictions-possible-shutdown-due-to-virus-surge/

Back to total lockdown. Damn.
RGV AG
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I think they kept teaty bars open at 50% and the mayor cast the deciding vote. Schools closed, but topless bars remained open. Puro border.
bigtruckguy3500
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Aston04 said:

As someone in education I can attest contact tracing is worthless. They throw hundreds and hundreds of kids out of school for two weeks... I've heard of near zero actually getting covid from that group.. But kids have lost out big time on their education - chasing something that can't be tamed anyway (at least until a good vaccine)..
So maybe the contact tracing you're being exposed to is too sensitive. Doesn't make it worthless. Chances are the people doing it and making decisions are allowing for zero risk. Their bosses have told them "we have to catch every single virus and can't let anyone spread it at all."

Even the 2 week rule is a bit much. 90% will show symptoms by day 7 (if they show symptoms at all). And most without symptoms appear to be less likely to spread it. And, they're also probably expanding the 6' 15 minute rule to greater distances and times in an effort to stop everything.

Just my opinion, but contact tracing is not worthless. However it must be done correctly with the appropriate level of risk tolerance.
FlyRod
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Marcus Aurelius thank you for your continued front line coverage of this. Hang in there and don't let the trolls and whackadoodles get you down.
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