[HN Gopher] Paul Alexander, 'the man in the iron lung', has died
___________________________________________________________________
Paul Alexander, 'the man in the iron lung', has died
Author : palijer
Score : 253 points
Date : 2024-03-13 14:38 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.com)
| whythre wrote:
| Remarkable man! Good on him for achieving all that. The part
| where he was able to learn how to breathe and leave the iron lung
| for short periods of time is particularly interesting. I wonder
| what he did on those outings...
| drewzero1 wrote:
| I've just been reading this longer article from 2020 which has
| a lot more about his life:
| https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/may/26/last-iron-lu...
|
| It says he went out with friends, saw movies, and even flew on
| planes while "frog-breathing", as he called it. He couldn't do
| it while unconscious so he still had to sleep in the lung.
| rob74 wrote:
| > _The technique had a technical name, "glossopharyngeal
| breathing". You trap air in your mouth and throat cavity by
| flattening the tongue and opening the throat, as if you're
| saying "ahh" for the doctor. With your mouth closed, the
| throat muscle pushes the air down past the vocal cords and
| into the lungs. Paul called it "frog-breathing"._
|
| So, to state it in computing terms, this wasn't a fix for not
| being able to breathe, it was a workaround. But it seems to
| have worked really well: at 40, he was "able to spend most of
| his day outside the machine that still kept him alive".
| zingababba wrote:
| That's incredibly interesting. I'm attempting what I
| believe to be the technique described at the moment. If I'm
| doing it correctly I can see why he nicknamed it 'frog-
| breathing.'
| redkoala wrote:
| It sounds like scuba diving, having enough in the tank to go
| for dives in the outside world at a time before returning to
| sleep in the lung.
| danbruc wrote:
| _Advances in medicine made iron lungs obsolete by the 1960s,
| replaced by ventilators. But Alexander kept living in the
| cylinder because, he said, he was used to it._
|
| If this is reported correctly, it would even have been an
| deliberate choice to not leave more often or entirely.
|
| EDIT: This was seemingly not reported correctly, it seems he
| only depended on the iron lung while sleeping but could
| otherwise live without it.
| throwitaway222 wrote:
| Maybe his decision to keep using the lung was a smart one.
| After all 2020 + ventilators...
| thatwasunusual wrote:
| > I wonder what he did on those outings...
|
| Contracting Covid, unfortunately. :(
| axelfontaine wrote:
| No. Hadn't left the iron lung in 5 years.
|
| Source: https://www.sueddeutsche.de/projekte/artikel/magazin/
| eiserne...
| scop wrote:
| > Advances in medicine made iron lungs obsolete by the 1960s,
| replaced by ventilators. But Alexander kept living in the
| cylinder because, he said, he was used to it.
|
| As somebody with a medical condition since birth, this line
| really hit home. I'm not speaking for Mr. Alexander, but for
| myself "used to it" is such a great way of putting the odd
| experience of living with frequent and cumbersome medical
| intervention.
|
| On the one hand you have no choice so it is quite easy. You just
| _do_ it. On the other hand there are often periods here and there
| through your life where you wrestle with the treatment, complain
| about it, explore other options, etc. But then a new option does
| come around every so often and, well, some times you stick with
| what you know even though there are "better" options.
|
| "used to it" is such a disarmingly accurate way of putting it. It
| is simultaneously the most difficult and easy thing to do.
|
| Requiem aeternum Paul Alexander.
| dasil003 wrote:
| That line also jumped out at me. My understanding is iron lungs
| were only declared "obsolete" due to cost and mobility reasons,
| but the actual experience of an iron lung is better because it
| is less invasive and spreads the pressure more evenly over ones
| whole torso rather than forcing air into the lungs from the
| inside. In other words, an iron lung is more like actually
| breathing (and maybe that's how Mr Alexander was able to learn
| to breathe despite the prognosis).
| jxramos wrote:
| yes I believe one of the videos of him expresses the better
| comfort the negative pressure has on his body somehow over
| the positive pressure contraptions he's used.
| hinkley wrote:
| I remember a conversation in the 90's about lung damage
| from over-inflation by dialing the volume incorrectly. They
| were talking about tech that was better at avoiding it, and
| thus the lung damaged caused by it.
|
| That conversation stuck with me because I found it
| horrifying.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| The field uses the term "barotrauma" for this.
| Ventilators use high pressure alarm limit among other
| things to limit the potential for barotrauma in volume-
| controlled modes. There's also flow-terminated modes
| which try to deliver a fixed volume but will terminate
| the breath if a flow criteria is met. The high pressure
| alarm limit can also terminate a breath early to try to
| prevent barotrauma.
|
| Mechanical ventilation is very complex and has come a
| long way since the 1990's. The lung is an exceedingly
| complex organ, and breathing itself is an exceedingly
| complex bodily function that we largely take for granted
| until something goes wrong.
|
| Suction devices also have their own horrifying outcomes.
| Someone told me a story once in the context of maximum
| vacuum limits of an EMT that was suctioning debris and
| fluid from an open brain injury and had the vacuum up so
| high they were vacuuming a person's brain tissue.
| hinkley wrote:
| College roommate told of a history prof who worked for
| free. Plastic surgeon botched a lipo and caused muscle
| damage. Malpractice paid him enough to retire his board-
| flat ass.
|
| He worked for free, or next to nothing, taught the
| curriculum he wanted to (can't afford to fire him!).
| Apparently he brought high end audiophile speakers to
| school and played classical music on them when not
| lecturing. The kind that cost half a year's salary for a
| teacher.
| candiodari wrote:
| This is something people don't seem to realize. Often you hear
| people talk about how difficult it is to be born blind.
|
| Yet everyone I've ever spoken to that happened to has a simple
| answer: "not difficult at all. It isn't there". One put it like
| "I'm also not a tiger and can't jump 8 meters high. It's
| similar".
|
| Very strange how adaptable humans are sometimes.
| ska wrote:
| I think born with a condition such as that is always
| (mentally) easier than losing some capability, especially if
| you are grown.
|
| If you are born without sight, it only exists as an abstract
| concept for you.
| kypro wrote:
| My best friend as a kid was blind and being a kid his
| acceptance of this used to bug the hell out of me. I often
| found myself in conversations trying to convince him he
| doesn't want to be blind.
|
| But I remember asking him when we were teens and he me gave a
| really good answer about how he's learnt to interact with the
| world as a blind person so for him to be able to see it would
| a huge hinderance to him at this point - perhaps as much as
| me being blind.
|
| He'd would need to read and write again. He would need to
| learn how to use a computer again. He might not like how his
| girlfriend looks. He would need reorganise his life and
| activities around the fact he can now see. Would he still be
| interested in doing the same things if he could see? Might he
| want to play video games instead of piano in his spare time
| if he could?
|
| I think in a lot of cases it's not even just not knowing what
| you're missing, but it's also not worth hassle. If you're
| content as is then why change things?
| ekaryotic wrote:
| As a schizophrenia sufferer I discovered a curious statistic
| about the illness, there are no patients with schizophrenia
| who have been blind since birth. That fact is mind blowing to
| me, it seems to imply that blindness from birth creates a
| sort of immunity to mental illness.
| whelp_24 wrote:
| I think it implies that schizophrenia has something to with
| the visual system or something correlated to it.
| kelnos wrote:
| I do wonder how much of that "not difficult at all" is just
| not knowing the difference. It would be interesting to see
| the difference in attitude between people born blind, and
| those who lost their sight later in life (old enough to have
| some solid sighted experiences and memories).
|
| Just as sighted people take for granted a lot of things about
| their sight, I'm not surprised some blind people take many
| things for granted about their lack of sight -- even when
| they are negative, frustrating things.
|
| While accessibility has come a long way, it still seems like
| it would be objectively more difficult to navigate the world
| blind than sighted.
|
| > _One put it like "I'm also not a tiger and can't jump 8
| meters high. It's similar"._
|
| This makes a lot of sense, even if it's an imperfect analogy.
| Sometimes, if you have no experience with something, you
| won't mind not being able to do it, even if you know that a
| lot of other people can.
|
| But if you look at it the other way: imagine a tiger with
| mobility issues that can't jump at all. Likely their life
| will be pretty limited, compared to most tigers.
|
| I'm glad it seems there are (at least in your experience) a
| lot of people who are blind but don't consider it that big a
| hindrance. Ultimately what matters in life is that people are
| happy, and I imagine feeling like your life is constantly
| difficult due to something like blindness would reduce your
| happiness.
| tialaramex wrote:
| > "used to it" is such a disarmingly accurate way of putting
| it.
|
| This happens for medication too. If you're on a specific drug
| for your whole life, it may be disruptive to switch to a
| different medication even if it's notionally better. I take a
| pill every morning, and will for the rest of my life, would I
| prefer one I took every other day? Not really, it sounds like
| I'd just miss days sometimes. If it had fewer side effects? I
| haven't noticed any effects now, despite the list in the
| leaflet so "fewer" doesn't sound like a meaningful improvement.
|
| In the first few days maybe even weeks of taking it I'd have
| been open to any improvements, but now I've settled into a
| habit, so any change needs a serious justification.
| deadbabe wrote:
| It's also why people stay in toxic, abusive, exploitative
| relationships. They just get used to it.
| jamiek88 wrote:
| Yeah the dark side of human adaptability, we can get used to
| pretty much anything.
| graemep wrote:
| I would say (from my own experience) it is a factor, but not
| the only one.
|
| There are also enormous social pressures to stay in abusive
| relationships: people feel free to tell you you should stay
| in a relationship, that it can be fixed, etc. Very few people
| are willing to tell someone they should leave a relationship.
| So, what you hear is everyone thinks it should be fixed
| rather than ended.
|
| There are many practical difficulties in ending a
| relationship too: financial, legal.
|
| There are also many things in pop culture and media that can
| encourage it: normalisation of what are actually controlling
| behaviours, for example. The even "when you are right you are
| wrong" trope is just one common version of this.
| agumonkey wrote:
| And the brain might be very sensitive (emotionally and to an
| extent physiologically) to stay in known condition when you're
| always walking a thin line.
| bonaldi wrote:
| Curious that the story doesn't mention he died of Covid - an
| infection that, you'd expect someone with his condition to be
| extremely keen to avoid, and who should have been able to, given
| reasonable precautions from his visitors.
| zdragnar wrote:
| Many people are asymptomatic, and not only that, are exposed by
| others who are asymptomatic. Short of every single human
| interaction being preceded by a PCR test, the odds are that he
| eventually would have been exposed.
|
| It is easy to do an at-home nasal swab test when you are
| infected but before the viral load has gotten to the point of
| being highly contagious, at which point you think you are
| negative but really will soon become contagious.
|
| "Reasonable precautions" would have to be very rigorous, and I
| have to imagine it would be easy to cave and relax precautions
| as loneliness sets in.
| 0xAFFFF wrote:
| Reasonable precautions here were likely to be proper masking
| from visitors and adequate air filtering in the room. Not
| something too hard to expect from people visiting a sick
| person.
| hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
| It's not like those "reasonable precautions" are
| guaranteed. I know a couple people who were absolutely
| terrified of getting Covid, such that they always masked
| with N95s and literally only would meet with people
| outside, 6 feet apart (probably the only time they were
| inside was with others at the grocery store, and when
| stores were enforcing masking) and they still got it.
| foofie wrote:
| > (...) and they still got it.
|
| I don't see the point of your comment. You're presenting
| an anecdotal case where someone who took some precautions
| which are known for not being 100% effective against
| airborne diseases ended up contracting an airborne
| disease.
|
| It makes as much sense as ranting about wearing seatbelts
| because you can put together an anecdotal case of someone
| who got hurt in a car accident in spite of wearing one.
|
| What's the point of that sort of argument, really?
| zdragnar wrote:
| The point is that even with reasonable precautions, it is
| (and was) possible for the man in the iron lung to be
| exposed to COVID.
|
| The actual precautions necessary to protect him from any
| exposure at all would have been significantly more
| stringent than what people tend to believe are
| reasonable, as GPs anecdote demonstrates.
| mrob wrote:
| >masked with N95s
|
| I see this as an example of confusion between population-
| level and individual protection. Widespread use of N95s
| is great at keeping the hospitals from overcrowding, but
| if somebody is serious about personally avoiding COVID,
| 95% percent filtration seems rather low (and there's
| leakage around the sides too.) If they were truly serious
| about avoiding COVID, they'd use an elastomeric half-face
| respirator at the minimum (which has the bonus feature of
| being more comfortable to wear).
| TylerE wrote:
| The N95 guarantees a _minimum_ of 95% filtration at the
| _worst possible_ particle size, which airborne virus
| particles are not.
|
| The 3M 9210s I've been wearing since 2021 have been
| independelty tested as having >99.5% filtration
| efficiency at the relevant particle size, and that's with
| physical testing so stuff like ability of the make to
| seal is also being tested.
|
| Zero COVID infections here.
| t0bia_s wrote:
| _Potential Applications Include: Bagging, grinding,
| sanding, sawing, sweeping, woodworking and other dusty
| applications._ source:
| https://multimedia.3m.com/mws/media/813534O/3m-aura-
| particul...
|
| No words about viruses. Also, I recommend you to make IgG
| test for covid antibodies. Most likely you already have
| some.
| ceejayoz wrote:
| How are you managing to read "Potential Applications
| Include" as "The following is an exhaustive list of all
| possible applications"?
| TylerE wrote:
| They would never list healthcare on the general purpose
| version anyway, since there is a separate specific
| certification for that. The only difference is better
| fluid protection, which is irrelevant to the given threat
| model. They do indeed sell that.
|
| https://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/p/d/v101143973/
|
| And whatta ya know...
|
| "This healthcare N95 particulate respirator and surgical
| mask has comfortable inner materials and helps provide
| respiratory protection against certain airborne
| biological particles. The individually packaged, flat-
| fold design allows for convenient storage prior to use.
|
| Fluid-resistant surgical masks help reduce your exposure
| to blood and body fluids. Cleared for sale by the Food
| and Drug Administration (FDA)."
|
| Notice it's still "just" an N95.
| logifail wrote:
| > I recommend you to make IgG test for covid antibodies.
| Most likely you already have some
|
| I've had Covid at least twice since this nightmare
| started, most recently in November 2023.
|
| After both a chest x-ray and a CT scan in hospital
| eventually a Covid PCR test[0] came back positive and at
| that point the mood lightened and the doctors told me
| that a positive Covid test was "the good news" and to go
| home and rest.
|
| I appreciate Covid is still a threat to some elderly
| and/or sick people. To the majority of us, it isn't ...
| and wasn't ... ever [1][2]
|
| [0] Unwitting comedy moment from the (otherwise friendly
| and apparently competent) student doctor. Took my history
| very thoroughly, felt my glands, examined ears and looked
| down throat. All without her wearing any kind of mask.
| Then late on she decided to take a Covid swab, so left
| the small room that we'd been in together for 10+ minutes
| to retrieve swab and FFP mask, which she donned to swab
| my nostrils. Am afraid I giggled when I saw her go get
| the mask, had to tell a lie to avoid exposing the utter
| nonsense of fetching one at that stage :) [1] https://twi
| tter.com/d_spiegel/status/1241297511287046144?lan... [2]
| https://twitter.com/d_spiegel/status/1271696043739172864
| ParetoOptimal wrote:
| I prefer elastomeric n99s.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| P100 cartridges are also great and as an added bonus you
| never have to smell perfume, farts, body odor, or Axe
| ever again if you don't want to.
| cesarb wrote:
| > (and there's leakage around the sides too.)
|
| A properly fitted mask shouldn't leak around the sides.
| The PFF2 (my country's equivalent of N95) mask I use
| doesn't leak anywhere when properly adjusted. (Like the
| sibling comment, it's a 3M, either the 9320+BR or the
| 9360H; see https://www.3m.com.br/3M/pt_BR/p/d/v000465595/
| for its page complete with usage instructions.)
| jkubicek wrote:
| > A properly fitted mask
|
| This is exactly why masking isn't as effective as it
| should be _in aggregate_. N95s aren't foolproof to use
| even for people who are trying to use them properly, then
| you have to add in the folks who pull their mask down to
| cough or to talk.
| cogman10 wrote:
| My favorite was the chin diaper. Particularly because the
| state I live in (idaho) never really had strict masking
| requirements so it really never made any sense.
| kelnos wrote:
| I _still_ occasionally see adults out in public wearing
| the chin diaper, or with the mask partially or mostly
| covering the mouth but not the nose at all.
|
| I just don't get it. Why bother? Public outdoor masking
| rates even here (San Francisco) are anecdotally well
| under 10%. Why waste the time and effort (and in some
| places, social consequences) to do something like that
| completely ineffectively, when nearly no one else is
| bothering at all?
| hollerith wrote:
| Against COVID, you would probably get more bang for your
| buck by protecting the eyes with goggles or by choosing
| an elastomeric _full_ -face respirator. Anything that
| lands in the eye ends up in a lacrimal duct, and then in
| a nasal passage.
| gadders wrote:
| Agreed.
|
| If you stick a mask on a dummy in a lab and fire COVID at
| it, it might show pretty good protection. However, at the
| population level there is no evidence that masking
| confers any benefit in preventing the spread of COVID.
|
| The Cochrane Review demonstrated this: https://www.cochra
| nelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD...
|
| There are also numerous dis-benefits of masking,
| especially among young children.
| TylerE wrote:
| Not a study, a review.
|
| Also doesn't claim what people like you says it claims.
|
| Also, look at the history. Date of the original review is
| 2007. You know what didn't exist in 2007?
| zdragnar wrote:
| > You know what didn't exist in 2007?
|
| Airborne viruses?
| gadders wrote:
| >>Not a study, a review.
|
| It's a meta-analysis of other trials.
|
| >>Also doesn't claim what people like you says it claims.
|
| By people like me, you mean people who believe in
| science? This is what it claims:
|
| "Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or
| no difference to the outcome of influenza-like illness
| (ILI)/COVID-19 like illness compared to not wearing masks
| (risk ratio (RR) 0.95, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.84
| to 1.09; 9 trials, 276,917 participants; moderate-
| certainty evidence. Wearing masks in the community
| probably makes little or no difference to the outcome of
| laboratory-confirmed influenza/SARS-CoV-2 compared to not
| wearing masks (RR 1.01, 95% CI 0.72 to 1.42; 6 trials,
| 13,919 participants; moderate-certainty evidence)."
|
| >>Also, look at the history. Date of the original review
| is 2007. You know what didn't exist in 2007?
|
| It has been updated several times. The latest edition was
| published in January 2023. https://www.cochranelibrary.co
| m/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD...
| bsder wrote:
| > However, at the population level there is no evidence
| that masking confers any benefit in preventing the spread
| of COVID.
|
| 1) Several studies from India seem to contradict this and
| barely had enough statistical power to be useful.
|
| 2) The fact that we can't generate a masking study with
| sufficient statistical power does _NOT_ disprove the
| hypothesis-- _either_ direction.
|
| Citing your source: "The high risk of bias in the trials,
| variation in outcome measurement, and relatively low
| adherence with the interventions during the studies
| hampers drawing firm conclusions."
|
| This one _REALLY_ grinds my gears. "Well the study said
| that masks don't work". No, it fucking didn't. It said
| they couldn't _prove_ they worked given the data and
| quality of data they had. And the data was lousy as
| adherence by the general population was terrible.
|
| Things can work and _still not be provable_ --especially
| when the experiment involves human beings since morally
| we can't just create two groups and infect one.
|
| Here's your counterexample: take a look at what hospitals
| are still doing when handling Covid patients. Hospitals
| get to collect data and enforce adherence. They
| _absolutely_ do not want to transfer Covid between
| patients. And they do not want to transfer Covid to their
| staff as that throws things into disarray. Whatever they
| 're doing seems to be working. I had a stint in the
| hospital recently, and they had several Covid patients on
| my floor--they weren't isolated to a specific wing or
| anything anymore. The hospital managed to not give Covid
| to me, so _something_ they are doing is working.
|
| So, what _that_ suggests is that procedures and masks
| work just fine. What seems to be problematic is _lack of
| adherence_ to said procedures and masks.
|
| Basically, what all of these studies manage to prove is
| that the general population has enough non-compliant
| dipshits that active interventions don't work at the
| population level. Consequenctly, vaccines and other
| passive interventions that take into account the
| stupidity of the general population are required.
| gadders wrote:
| >>This one REALLY grinds my gears. "Well the study said
| that masks don't work". No, it fucking didn't. It said
| they couldn't prove they worked given the data and
| quality of data they had.
|
| So you admit people were calling for mask-wearing with no
| evidence. Sounds like we agree.
|
| >>Things can work and still not be provable--especially
| when the experiment involves human beings since morally
| we can't just create two groups and infect one.
|
| You don't have to infect one. Just see which one gets
| infected. This happens all the time with vaccine etc
| testing of have thought.
|
| >>Basically, what all of these studies manage to prove is
| that the general population has enough non-compliant
| dipshits that active interventions don't work at the
| population level
|
| It sounds like we're pretty much in agreement here as
| well. Unless you have some magical solution to ensure
| perfect adherence.
|
| Of course, you may be super-diligent as an n=1 and nobody
| ever sneezes on you without warning or anything and you
| stay free of a disease the CDC says should be treated
| like the flu.
|
| And the other name for "non-compliant dipshits" is
| "children".
| theshackleford wrote:
| > And the other name for "non-compliant dipshits" is
| "children".
|
| That's certainly what I called them only they didn't seem
| to like it.
| swed420 wrote:
| Cochrane review has many flaws
|
| https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/covid-19/commentary-wear-
| respirat...
|
| People wear N95s to protect against COVID transmission
| because they work. Yet every time the topic comes up
| online, someone is always quick to reach for the flawed
| Cochrane review.
| gadders wrote:
| Again, for an n=1 case of a medical professional doing it
| in a diligent fashion they probably do work.
|
| In gen pop with patchy adherence to usage not so much.
| lawlessone wrote:
| I know this is well known but still worth mentioning
| again I think. That the "regular" facemasks were
| primarily so asymptomatic people with covid would spread
| it less. 100% protection was never possible but anything
| to delay to spread so that not everybody was sick at the
| same time was necessary.
| zer00eyz wrote:
| Yes,
|
| I think the global "everyone put on a mask" moment
| highlighted some large cultural differences.
|
| My Asian friends understood that "not sharing germs" was
| as important as "not getting sick" mask compliance as
| much about being kind to others as to yourself. It also
| helps that lots of them were already socially accepting
| of masks due to climate, pollution and weather (or what
| ever you want to call dust out of Mongolia every year).
|
| I think that there is an interesting corollary with PPE
| culture in general, one that has changed in my life time
| (safety glasses and seat belts). I think we saw a lot of
| that same behavior bleed out to normal people (who don't
| wear PPE at a day job) in action.
|
| All in all there is a cultural aspects at play that are
| worth looking at.
| cameldrv wrote:
| You can get home tests that are similar to PCR. They are more
| expensive but the performance of the antigen tests since
| about 2022 is so bad that they're almost useless.
| jMyles wrote:
| When you say, "so bad", you mean in terms of sensitivity?
| They seem to be sufficiently selective, but under-
| sensitive. So, not great for risk aversion.
| cameldrv wrote:
| Yes sensitivity. False positives are fairly rare.
| jMyles wrote:
| Yeah, seems so.
|
| So the tests are good as confirmatory devices. But yeah,
| it was extremely unserious when they were used to
| gatekeep public events, etc. The reasonable presumption
| has always been that transmission of respiratory
| pathogens will occur at public events (which is a
| strength: humans are quite good at quickly acquiring
| community immunity - it's one of the reasons our species
| is so incredibly robust against respiratory pathogens).
| virusduck wrote:
| There is no "since 2022"--they have performed at relatively
| the same level to date. They just are not perfect and are
| unlikely to prevent the kind of non-symptomatic exposures
| people have, but in most cases, they are good to quickly
| differentiate a random sore throat from a COVID-related
| one.
| cameldrv wrote:
| No the performance is worse with newer variants. One
| factor seems to be that newer variants tend to replicate
| a lot in the throat at first and only later move to the
| nose, but there is probably more than one reason for the
| change. In 2021, the antigen tests were pretty sensitive
| if you were symptomatic, but now the false negative rate
| is 50% or greater if you're on your first day or two of
| symptoms. They perform better a few days later.
|
| The problem is that people will have symptoms consistent
| with covid and they're going to visit grandma or
| whatever, so rather than just cancel, they take a test,
| the test is negative, and they go do their thing. IMO
| going just based on symptoms is more reliable at this
| point unless you're using a molecular test.
| Teever wrote:
| It sounds like you learned nothing from the pandemic.
|
| It is practically impossible to avoid catching covid in modern
| society.
|
| 'On a long enough timeline everyone's chance of survival drops
| to zero.'
| BjoernKW wrote:
| > It is practically impossible to avoid catching covid in
| modern society.
|
| For the average human going about an ordinary and active life
| that statement is quite true.
|
| However, the person in question didn't lead an ordinary life.
| He was confined to a medical device and probably very rarely
| had in-person contact with random people. Besides, the people
| who met him personally all must have known about his
| condition.
|
| Under such circumstances avoiding COVID-19 is actually pretty
| easy: Have everyone in the room wear high-quality face masks.
|
| Even for the average person during the height of the
| pandemic, avoiding COVID-19 was still possible, but required
| significant effort (no lockdowns though, mind you):
| Basically, it meant wearing such a mask properly in public
| settings (and changing it at appropriate intervals) as well
| as frequent testing of everyone you were in touch with
| regularly.
| whelp_24 wrote:
| Masks are not 100% effective. Indeed, at it's height the
| hope was only to slow the spread to manageable levels, the
| spread was inevitable.
| asveikau wrote:
| I think for certain people with an extreme illness or
| vulnerability like this, it's reasonable to still be very
| cautious in 2024. You'd probably also be very cautious about
| cold and flu.
| _silicon wrote:
| Avoided it until Feb of this year. Frequent antibody and
| antigen testing. If you're stationary and isolated like this
| someone around you failed you.
| Teever wrote:
| It is possible for the support staff to follow all the
| rules that they were given and yet still unknowingly
| transmit COVID-19 to their vulnerable patient
| blueflow wrote:
| I know someone who is medically confirmed to never had covid:
| https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3.
| .. Here, we report on a 62-year-old male
| hypervaccinated individual from Magdeburg, Germany (HIM), who
| deliberately and for private reasons received 217
| vaccinations against SARS-CoV-2 within a period of 29 months
| (figure A; appendix 1 tab 1).
|
| [snip] Furthermore, HIM had no signs of a
| past SARS-CoV-2 infection, as indicated by repeatedly
| negative SARS-CoV-2 antigen tests, PCRs and nucleocapsid
| serology (figure A; appendix 1 tab 1).
| riffic wrote:
| > 217 vaccinations
|
| that's wild.
| t0bia_s wrote:
| This is anecdotal evidence on one individual. Data from
| 99,068,901 vaccinated individuals shows many adverse
| events.
|
| https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0264410X
| 2...
| foofie wrote:
| I think your comment reflects that you learned nothing from
| the pandemic. Lockdowns were proven to reduce the spread, as
| was practicing basic personal higiene measures such as
| washing hands, wear a mask, and respect social distancing.
| They are 100% full proof specially if you are forced to share
| public and private spaces with irresponsible people who don't
| even practice basic higiene, but that does not mean that you
| do not improve your odds of contracting and spreading the
| disease if you take responsible measures.
|
| We're in the 21st century and we are still trying to deny the
| point that Ignaz Semmelweis made two centuries ago.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis
| Teever wrote:
| > Lockdowns were proven to reduce the spread,
|
| I agree 100% that lockdowns reduced the spread of covid-19
| significantly and that they did not eliminate it.
|
| > They are 100% full proof specially
|
| I disagree strongly with this statement.
| ParetoOptimal wrote:
| I have purposely avoided getting covid by being covid
| conscious in modern society despite having been exposed by
| using n99 masks, HEPA filters that circulate air 4x per hour,
| and only eating at resturaunt patios when they aren't busy.
| PaulKeeble wrote:
| All his visitors or carers needed to do was wear an N95 or
| better respirator and he would still be alive. But people have
| weird aversions to them to such an extent they are willing to
| kill vulnerable people rather than wear one to save others
| lives.
| busterarm wrote:
| Scabies spreads the most in retirement homes and hospitals
| too.
|
| Maybe our medical professionals should be wearing PPPS[1] at
| all times, hmm?
|
| [1]:Positive Pressure Personal Suit. Aka "moon suits".
| zer00eyz wrote:
| Ummm...
|
| The positive pressure keeps airborne contaminants away from
| the wearer. The germs off of the researcher in the lab as
| it were. I'm not sure how it would prevent contamination
| from getting on people outside the suit?
| busterarm wrote:
| I was offering a farcical suggestion to a farcical
| problem.
| nerevarthelame wrote:
| Seems like a real problem to me. On average around 1,200
| people die from COVID in the US every week, including the
| guy in the article that started this conversation.
| kelnos wrote:
| It wasn't funny, then. At least make a farcical
| suggestion that would actually help, not make the problem
| (farcical or otherwise) worse.
|
| I do agree with the overall point that it's likely not
| really anyone's fault that Alexander eventually got
| COVID. Being perfect 100% of the time isn't feasible for
| anyone, even people in health-compromised situations.
| foofie wrote:
| > Maybe our medical professionals should be wearing PPPS[1]
| at all times, hmm?
|
| I'll bite your fallacy.
|
| Scabies are prevented by avoiding direct skin-on-skin
| contact. Wearing latex gloves is already effective, as is
| routinely changing clothing and bedding.
|
| Is any of this something you feel is outlandish for a
| health professional working on hospitals and retirement
| homes?
| busterarm wrote:
| > Wearing latex gloves is already effective, as is
| routinely changing clothing and bedding.
|
| Both of those things are done already and yet scabies
| still spreads in these environments like wild. You say
| that it's effective, but in actuality it isn't -- you can
| be so careful but all of the small mistakes add up.
|
| That's the point. I'm suggesting a farcical solution to a
| farcical problem...that we need to go so far above and
| beyond from what's already being done in these
| environments.
|
| The whole point is that it's useless and acting like this
| man's caregivers killed him like my comment-parent did is
| wildly misplaced blame.
| ParetoOptimal wrote:
| covid is like bumping your head: Either a minor bump or
| brain bleeding that can occur after 3 - 5 days of a lucid
| period.
|
| If long COVID didnt make getting COVID like Russian
| roulette for long term disability it would be "like the
| flu".
| jMyles wrote:
| You say this as if it is established fact, but there has been
| no RCT convincingly showing the effect you are describing -
| typically called "source control" - can be achieved from the
| use of a respirator to interdict individual transmission. In
| fact, no RCT powered for such a finding has even been
| attempted to my knowledge (though I haven't combed through
| the research in the past couple months or so - link me if I'm
| out of date!).
|
| It has also not been demonstrated that source control can be
| used to reduce community transmission (though I realize that
| your point is not about community transmission).
|
| The reasons for not funding / performing such a RCT continue
| to astound - the demagoguery of comparing masks to parachutes
| notwithstanding.
| autoexec wrote:
| You should probably read this:
| https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/masks-work-
| distor...
|
| More if you're interested:
| https://www.statnews.com/2023/05/02/do-masks-work-rcts-
| rando...
|
| https://www.acsh.org/news/2023/03/14/do-masks-prevent-
| covid-...
|
| The tl;dr is this: Randomized controlled trials are simply
| not the appropriate tool for the job and we've got a
| mountain of other evidence already.
| jMyles wrote:
| ...this link is not a new RCT. It is an article about the
| Cochrane review which we all read a long time ago.
|
| And, despite the (somewhat reasonable) chagrin expressed
| by the authors, the Cochrane review did indeed show that
| masks are largely ineffective (and cloth masks,
| completely so) at stopping viral transmission - the link
| is right there in the article to which you've linked.
|
| What we need are sober, old-school RCTs powered to assess
| both filtration and source control across individuals
| (and sure, some for community transmission as well). And
| then we need them replicated. And then we can finally
| stop this ridiculous 'debate'. Today's humans are the
| most scientifically literate society in history; there's
| no reason we need to make important social and political
| decisions with such shitty data.
| autoexec wrote:
| > the Cochrane review did indeed show that masks are
| largely ineffective (and cloth masks, completely so) at
| stopping viral transmission - the link is right there in
| the article to which you've linked.
|
| That's actually not what it showed. That bit of
| misinformation is probably best addressed in another
| article (https://www.acsh.org/news/2023/03/14/do-masks-
| prevent-covid-...)
|
| Here's the most important part:
|
| Many commentators have claimed that a recently updated
| Cochrane review shows that 'masks don't work,' which is
| an inaccurate and misleading interpretation," Karla
| Soares-Weiser, the editor in chief of the Cochrane
| Library, said in a statement.
|
| "The review examined whether interventions to promote
| mask wearing help to slow the spread of respiratory
| viruses," Soares-Weiser said, adding, "Given the
| limitations in the primary evidence, the review is not
| able to address the question of whether mask wearing
| itself reduces people's risk of contracting or spreading
| respiratory viruses."
|
| She said that "this wording was open to
| misinterpretation, for which we apologize," and that
| Cochrane would revise the summary.
|
| Soares-Weiser also said, though, that one of the lead
| authors of the review even more seriously misinterpreted
| its finding on masks by saying in an interview that it
| proved "there is just no evidence that they make any
| difference." In fact, Soares-Weiser said, "that statement
| is not an accurate representation of what the review
| found."
| gadders wrote:
| You are guilty of pushing the very misinformation that
| you claim to be against.
|
| The review itself said:
|
| 'Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or
| no difference to the outcome of influenza-like illness /
| Covid-19-like illness compared with not wearing masks...
| Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or
| no difference to the outcome of laboratory-confirmed
| influenza / SARS-CoV-2 compared with not wearing masks.'
|
| The fact that the editor-in-chief of Cochrane embarrassed
| herself due to the pressure of an opinion-piece by a non-
| expert in the NYT is irrelevant.
|
| You can read the views of one of the reports actual
| authors here: https://www.spiked-
| online.com/2023/07/19/the-junk-science-be...
| autoexec wrote:
| If you think that Cochrane revises their reviews based on
| "pressure of an opinion-piece by a non-expert in the NYT"
| I doubt any amount of research will change your mind from
| what you've decided to believe. I think it's clear that
| Tom Jefferson was embarrassed at being called out for
| misinterpreting the evidence, but he's plainly wrong that
| she never provided a reason. She was clear that it was
| due to the "limitations in the primary evidence",
| something many others pointed out as well.
| jMyles wrote:
| Please, I beg for your sensibility and brief attention
| here. This issue continues to tear fissures in what seem
| like otherwise reasonable and literate communities.
|
| The sentence in question is:
|
| "Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or
| no difference to the outcome of influenza-like illness
| (ILI)/COVID-19 like illness compared to not wearing masks
| (risk ratio (RR) 0.95, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.84
| to 1.09; 9 trials, 276,917 participants;"
|
| This is very typical wording, and a very typical
| application of limited data, for a Cochrane review.
| There's nothing here that jumps out, on first read or
| after ingestion of all of the primaries, which I'm
| guessing we've all done multiple times.
|
| I think we all agree with you (and thus, with Soares-
| Weiser) about the frustration (heck, downright
| confounding) resulting from the lack of evidence. Top
| experts from every one of the big 5 have repeatedly
| called for and proposed RCTs to solve this problem.
|
| ...but there is absolutely nothing wrong with looking at
| these data and concluding that, in each statistically-
| significant case, masking "probably makes little or no
| difference to the outcome of" ILI.
|
| Is it possible that a larger, properly-powered RCT will
| find that some form of N95 application will have some
| effect on community transmission? Sure. We'd all love to
| know about that.
|
| It it possible that a larger, properly-powered RCT will
| find a similar outcome from cloth masks? No. Not unless
| all of the current data on the matter is completely
| flawed.
|
| Is it possible that even a small, properly-powered RCT
| will find statistically significant reductions in
| individual transmission from source control measures?
| Yes! That's possible! And that's the topic of this entire
| thread - we're talking about an individual patient
| largely confined to an iron lung.
|
| Has that RCT been performed? No.
|
| Can we all agree on at least these limited, well-defined
| assessments of the available data?
| gadders wrote:
| And to be fair to Jefferson and Heneghan they have
| repeatedly called for proper RCTs to be run.
| gadders wrote:
| Cochrane didn't revise their review, neither did the
| author so I'm not sure where you imagined that. What
| happened was the the managing editor issued a statement
| in response to an NYT op-ed that criticised the review.
|
| And there was no misinterpreting the evidence. He said
| that there is no evidence that masks work. You can't then
| say "yeah but there's only no evidence because all the
| evidence is low quality" because then you are effectively
| agreeing that there is no evidence.
|
| If people are so confident masks work, do an RCT. That is
| how science is supposed to work, right? Not guessing
| something might work and doing it anyway.
| 1224530282 wrote:
| First, as the sibling comment pointed out, the Cochrane
| review article didn't show that masks were ineffective.
| "Relatively low numbers of people followed the guidance
| about wearing masks or about hand hygiene, which may have
| affected the results of the studies" [1]. Their results
| were inconclusive since the people the asks to wear
| masks, didn't.
|
| But there's still evidence that masks are effective. The
| question of whether N95 filter media can block virus-
| carrying droplets is a _physics_ question-- which has
| been replicated in experiment after experiment since the
| 90s ([2] is a recent study).
|
| I've done a lot of looking, but I've yet to find any
| explanation as to why if someone is wearing a (properly
| fitted) N95, so their air goes through a filter media,
| which has been repeatedly shown to block droplets, they
| could still inhale disease-carrying droplets.
|
| [1]: https://www.cochrane.org/news/featured-review-
| physical-inter... [2]:
| https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9947910/
| autoexec wrote:
| > I've yet to find any explanation as to why if someone
| is wearing a (properly fitted) N95, so their air goes
| through a filter media, which has been repeatedly shown
| to block droplets, they could still inhale disease-
| carrying droplets.
|
| It's worth keeping in mind that even if someone wearing
| an N95 mask does manage to inhale some percentage of the
| airborne disease-carrying droplets around them, viral
| load matters a lot. A tiny amount of virus could be
| fought off by the immune system before it has a chance to
| take hold in the body, and even if that fails and the
| virus does infect the body, larger exposures tend to
| result in worse outcomes. Even an imperfect protection
| can have a beneficial effect.
|
| It's the same for people spreading the virus. Even if a
| mask isn't perfect, that doesn't make it useless. Putting
| just about anything in front of someone's virus spewing
| face holes is going to reduce the amount of virus that
| gets into the air and limit how far it spreads. This is
| why we teach small children to "vampire cough". Not
| because the inside of our elbows provide N95 levels of
| protection, but because doing so still helps to prevent
| the spread of disease.
| gadders wrote:
| >>Their results were inconclusive since the people the
| asks to wear masks, didn't.
|
| Their review was at the macro, population level. If
| people aren't wearing masks properly through carelessness
| or ignorance, this proves their point.
|
| Shooting a virus at a masked mannequin in a lab might
| show some prevention, but in the real world people forget
| and scratch their nose, rub their eyes, get sneezed on by
| a stranger etc.
| 1224530282 wrote:
| I agree that the Cochrane review is better evidence of
| "if you don't wear/use a mask properly, it won't work,"
| rather than "masks don't work." (This is one of the
| reasons I'm against mask mandates, btw.)
|
| I'm invested in this only because, due to my health
| condition, I don't want to get covid. As far as I'm
| aware, the evidence says that so long as I properly wear
| an N95 (so I'm not taking my mask off to scratch my nose,
| have passed a fit test, etc.), I will significantly
| reduce my risk of getting covid.
| gadders wrote:
| But rather than "if you don't wear/use a mask properly,
| it won't work", I'd more restate it as "for a given
| population size, enough people would mess up that making
| everyone wear one would not slow the spread of the
| disease".
|
| I also think that if you, as an individual, are
| especially diligent it may well lower your personal
| chances of catching COVID. And given your health
| conditions, I really hope that is the case for you.
|
| But I think we are broadly in agreement.
| jMyles wrote:
| > I'd more restate it as "for a given population size,
| enough people would mess up that making everyone wear one
| would not slow the spread of the disease".
|
| ...but this is even less conservative than the review
| summary, which was inexplicably panned.
|
| The clause "enough people would mess up that making
| everyone wear one would not slow the spread of the
| disease" is part of the consideration that goes into
| "community transmission" (or the phrase "in the
| community", which is sometimes used in formal
| publications as an abstraction for real-world compliance
| levels) and is distinct from "individual transmission".
|
| The sentence in question is:
|
| "Wearing masks in the community probably makes little or
| no difference to the outcome of influenza-like illness
| (ILI)/COVID-19 like illness compared to not wearing masks
| (risk ratio (RR) 0.95, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.84
| to 1.09; 9 trials, 276,917 participants;" [0]
|
| ...it's hard to imagine how this extremely sober (and
| factually proper) extrapolation of the data has caused
| such a kerfuffle.
|
| Is it any wonder that the people who have been studying
| this topic since before it was cool are puzzled?
|
| 0: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36715243/
|
| edit: my apologies - I just read that you addressed this
| elsewhere in the thread. It seems that we are in
| agreement (and I just don't think there is a reasonable
| alternative assessment for any numerate / literate
| reading of the data.)
| toss1 wrote:
| RCT is unlikely to be a good tool to determine the
| effectiveness of masks, if for no other reason, compliance
| is marginal at best (how do you recognize &record every
| instance when someone pulls it down for a short time
| exposing their nose or both airways?).
|
| Perhaps the best evidence that even badly used masks are
| effective is that measures such a using masks for a year
| killed every instance of a strain of flu - deas, gone,
| extinct.
|
| Just by reducing the R0 value to the point where there were
| no survivors. (but not enough that more virulent COVID-19
| strains couldn't survive).
|
| Masks, particularly N95-level, work. Period. Not perfectly,
| nothing does. But they work. Regardless of any FUD you may
| want to spread.
| s1gnp0st wrote:
| Let's wear them forever then. You first.
| toss1 wrote:
| Yes, it should be strongly encouraged in crowded places,
| not discouraged.
|
| As to "You First", I still do avoid random crowds and I
| wear an N95 when I do go out in random crowds, including
| the last time I went to the grocery store. I'm not the
| only one I see doing that ('tho it is far less common
| than a year ago).
|
| But sure, you do you, because evidently your approach to
| life prioritizes your immediate gratification, and doing
| nothing that might help the general welfare, or help
| everyone (even you) in the longer term.
| s1gnp0st wrote:
| I am disgusted by the totalitarian urge which has been
| normalized by the pandemic. Your trauma is not my
| problem, and I will not permanently alter my behavior to
| satisfy your ever-escalating urge to dominate me.
| jMyles wrote:
| Well put. Though I suspect that the overwhelming majority
| of the sentiment to which you are referring is being
| carried by bots and not real humans.
|
| It's a difficult time to be empirically-driven, though
| hopefully we will come out better for it.
| toss1 wrote:
| You think that having no public health measures is data
| driven? Go read some data. Seriously. Or, just go to
| pre-1950s graveyards and gather data on how many dead
| children there were before public health measures. Or
| look at the data on how the public health measures ran
| _extinct_ a strain of flu so it is no longer being
| included in the vaccine formula.
| s1gnp0st wrote:
| That strain of flu had a lower R value than COVID-19.
|
| Again, listen to me. I'm not telling you merely that I
| disagree with you. I'm telling you that you have no power
| over me, and you never will.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| It's not totalitarian. How do you feel about having a
| sewer hookup or a septic system in your house? Because
| those things were largely mandated and not by grassroots.
| With that kind of attitude we'd all be crapping in
| outhouses and standing in our own poop within a decade.
|
| I agree with reasonable limits to public power, but I
| think data driven public health approaches are an area
| where the public should have a lot of power. We've
| eradicated things like hookworm in part because we have
| asked people to put shoes on their children and stop
| pooping in holes in the ground.
| toss1 wrote:
| Yikes, Pandemic public health measures are _NOT_
| totalitarian in any way, shape or form.
|
| Totalitarian measures are "TOTAL"; i.e., they encompass
| all aspects of govt and society.
|
| Public health measures are LIMITED to the scope of the
| public health threat.
|
| Being unwilling to take even small measures that not only
| help you but also help your fellow citizens does not make
| you some kind of 'free-thinking libertarian'.
|
| It simply shows you like to behave like a sociopath, and
| your statement that a policy idea is a result of "trauma"
| is an uncalled-for insult, as you intended it (which
| again shows your drive to prioritize feelings over
| facts). Seriously, no one is trying to "dominate" you. As
| if you were that important. Sheesh.
| jMyles wrote:
| In an unlikely turn of events, you appear to be an actual
| human and not a bot (from a cursory look at your comment
| history). So I say, gently:
|
| > because evidently your approach to life prioritizes
| your immediate gratification
|
| Do you genuinely believe that this is a fair
| characterization of the sentiment of the person (or
| position) to which you are responding, giving the benefit
| of the doubt?
|
| > Yes, it should be strongly encouraged in crowded
| places, not discouraged.
|
| It boils down to this: encouraging an intervention in
| public places needs to be based on unambiguous evidence,
| supported by genuine, authentic science and presented in
| a way that is convincing to a scientifically-literate
| society such as ours.
|
| Consider, for example, the evidence in favor of the use
| of seatbelts, condoms, traffic-calming infrastructure, or
| hard hats (the latter of which I acknowledge don't
| require RCTs to be validated).
|
| These products have produced a reliable, measurable,
| significant change in outcomes to the extent that no
| reasonable person questions their efficacy impact (though
| even with these, there is some reasonable dispute
| regarding trade-offs in each case).
|
| The intervention in question has fallen way, way short of
| this standard - so much so that it's difficult to make a
| viable comparison. Despite mandates across a literal
| majority of geographic landmass of the country, there is
| still no evidence of any benefit with regard to community
| transmission rates. And on the research side, only nine
| RCTs - and none at all regarding source control - have
| been conducted.
|
| We've watched as a huge chorus of the world's experts
| have called for RCTs, and have been told by charlatan
| bureaucrats and profiteers that such a venture is
| comparable to a parachute RCT. Do you think that's likely
| to be convincing?
|
| Meanwhile, the (typical, expected, obvious) extrapolation
| in the Cochrane review has been singled-out, and the
| waters muddied, for pointing out in sober terms what the
| RCTs actually said.
|
| It has been reduced to "well, absence of evidence isn't
| evidence of absence", creating an obvious catch-22 as the
| same data is puzzlingly used as an excuse not to perform
| further science on the matter.
|
| Believe me when I say: we care about you. I wish you good
| health and am happy to take evidence-based steps to
| ensuring that the world is a healthy, vibrant place for
| you and people like you. But you go too far when you ask
| that others to ignore their own good-faith assessment of
| the facts at hand. And the facts are unambiguous:
| respiratory pathogens emerge every so often and infect
| nearly all members of many animal species. There does not
| appear to be a viable intervention to stop this, and it's
| not even obvious is stopping it is desirable, as these
| pathogens confer immunity to those infected. It's an
| equilibrium and part of a broader ecology in which we
| live.
|
| You are loved, even by this stranger. Please don't see
| commitment to data-driven approaches to public health
| interventions as a hunger for immediate gratification;
| this is nearly the opposite of the reality of the
| situation.
| gadders wrote:
| >> RCT is unlikely to be a good tool to determine the
| effectiveness of masks, if for no other reason,
| compliance is marginal at best (how do you recognize
| &record every instance when someone pulls it down for a
| short time exposing their nose or both airways?).
|
| But this is exactly the point, surely? If people won't
| comply in an RCT, they won't comply in real life either
| and so mask wearing will have no benefit.
| throwway120385 wrote:
| It just tells us that people probably need to comply
| more, not that we shouldn't bother with certain
| interventions. Suggesting we shouldn't try mask mandates
| because not everyone complies is like suggesting you
| shouldn't have laws about piling bags of trash on your
| lawn because some people still pile trash on their lawn.
| The real problem is the people who feel that "take your
| trash to the dump" is an imposition and resent having to
| do something to help the community around them.
| gadders wrote:
| Yes, perhaps someone could develop a new kind of glue
| that will enable them to be stuck to children's faces so
| they can't be removed.
|
| I don't think that getting the levels of compliance
| required is possible, absent civil liberty abuses which
| are worse than the disease we are trying to cure.
| colechristensen wrote:
| False. Every step you take is a risk reduction, there's no
| magical solution that completely removes risk unless you want
| to live in a completely sealed environment, and even then you
| need to exchange with the outside world. A 78 year old man
| with a serious health condition died of a common infection,
| this is normal and nothing to moralize about or throw around
| blame and shame.
| ics wrote:
| The Guardian article from May 2020 which others have linked
| (https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/may/26/last-iron-
| lu...) has more information on his life than this BBC one and
| his thoughts on the present pandemic. Given that his death was
| recent, I too am curious as to whether there are any further
| details on his acquiring the illness but suspect there may be
| little to report on. If you read the Guardian article he is not
| apathetic at all but expresses a sense that it will likely be
| what finally gets him.
| riffic wrote:
| he was also 78 and mostly immobile so that may have also played
| a role.
|
| Edit: the quote below (Palahniuk, fight club I believe,) is an
| actuarial reality.
| lr4444lr wrote:
| COVID made its way to Antarctica. I have no doubt 4 years later
| that it would find its way to Paul Alexander's home.
| ParetoOptimal wrote:
| Your implication that covid is unavoidable is false. I've
| avoided getting it by being purposefully covid conscious.
| unclad5968 wrote:
| You have no way of knowing that. Some people are
| asymptomatic.
| CrazyStat wrote:
| > You have no way of knowing that.
|
| You can get a antibody (blood) test that will test
| positive for COVID antibodies even if you were
| asymptomatic.
| kube-system wrote:
| You can. But that still doesn't tell you if you've had
| COVID. Antibodies wane overtime and you can also test
| positive for antibodies after having had a vaccine. So
| even if you have been taking antibody tests every couple
| of weeks year now, you could have contracted it before
| the tests were available (it was about a year before they
| were publicly available in much of the US), or after a
| vaccination.
| whelp_24 wrote:
| Some variants didn't show up in tests well. And being
| asymptomatic was/is really common. Why would you check if
| you don't have symptoms?
| jjulius wrote:
| >I've avoided getting it...
|
| _So far_ , is the missing clarifier.
| nerevarthelame wrote:
| Just because they can't be certain that they'll never get
| it in the future doesn't mean that all attempts to
| minimize cumulative infections are pointless.
| jjulius wrote:
| You're arguing a point that I never made. By all means,
| OP should keep it up!
| bsder wrote:
| Or perhaps you have some immunity to it, for some reason
| ...
|
| Humans have high variation. It's what keeps the species
| alive when things like pandemics come rolling in.
|
| Your personal situation doesn't automatically apply to
| anybody else.
| ParetoOptimal wrote:
| Or quaranting and masking despite being inconvenient is
| very effective.
|
| That would be an inconvenient truth though.
| kelnos wrote:
| Your lack of COVID is certainly largely due to being
| purposeful and careful, but there's still a component of
| luck. The only sure-fire way to avoid it is to stay locked
| up and away from all other humans and things other humans
| have potentially breathed on. Anything less and there's
| always a decent chance you'll get it despite your
| precautions.
|
| Also, you may have gotten it, were asymptomatic, and didn't
| notice. COVID is fun like that.
| xanderlewis wrote:
| The reason might be simply that the cause of death isn't widely
| confirmed yet, and BBC News (more so than most other news
| organisations) likes to err on the side of caution.
|
| They're often late with details for this reason.
| StarterPro wrote:
| That's the irony, survived from Polio for decades only to be
| brought down by Covid, which by all points was and is being
| handled poorly.
| spacebuffer wrote:
| it is indeed iron-y...
| freitzkriesler2 wrote:
| Very sad. I hope him and his family will find peace. His story
| was interesting and the team that helped him refurbish his iron
| lung were angels in disguise.
| schiffern wrote:
| The fact is _conspicuously omitted_ from the article, but
| Alexander died after contracting COVID-19.[0] Some sources
| indicate he contracted it from a home healthcare worker, which _a
| priori_ is likely.
|
| As we know, COVID infections are almost unknown when infected
| individuals consistently wear a high-quality fitted mask. Of all
| people, I would think healthcare workers would make sure to
| properly mask around _the guy in an iron lung_. :-\
|
| We know they'd never come clean (and I'll probably be downvoted
| for even raising the possibility (and for saying that too :D)),
| but the reality of the situation is that it's quite probable some
| foolish "muh freedumbs" healthcare worker has killed the last
| iron lung guy, and they'll never be meaningfully held accountable
| for it...
|
| [0] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13192005/Iron-
| lung-...
| blueflow wrote:
| Also i'd like to know why you are getting downvotes. Is this
| factually wrong conspiracy garbage or something? I don't know
| but i would like to.
|
| Edit: valid reasons presented.
| jMyles wrote:
| My presumption is that the downvotes are related to this
| unsourced and incorrect assertion:
|
| > As we know, COVID infections are almost unknown when
| infected individuals consistently wear a high-quality fitted
| mask.
| gambiting wrote:
| I downvoted because of a completely unfounded and frankly
| offensive assumption that the worker "who killed him" must
| have been one of those "muh freedumbs" types - if you read
| about Paul's life and the people who were next to his side,
| they were most kind and most caring people you could ever
| wish for, he was so lucky to have them. To say to the people
| who literally spent decades with him and looked after him,
| frequently without any compensation, that they must be the
| "muh freedumbs" types will all related connotations - to me,
| that feels like spitting directly into their faces, like the
| armchair judgement of an internet expert to the highest
| degree. We don't know anything about the circumstances here,
| but we are so quick to pass judgement - that's why I
| downvoted OP.
| ParetoOptimal wrote:
| They were likely misinformed a surgical mask was enough or
| thought "taking my mask off for just a second wont hurt".
| anon291 wrote:
| > As we know, COVID infections are almost unknown when infected
| individuals consistently wear a high-quality fitted mask.
|
| Suppose you're visited by a home health aid everyday and in
| every instance of mask application the protective rate is
| 99.999%. That means at each instance (each day), you have a
| 0.001 risk of contracting COVID. If we extrapolate out, after
| four years, the risk of contracting COVID is 1.5%. Now suppose
| you have two or three visitors each day. Your risk is now 4.3%.
|
| Even 'unheard' of risks become quite common as you tempt fate.
| nadermx wrote:
| "That year, he published a memoir which reportedly took him eight
| years to write using a plastic stick to type on a keyboard and
| dictating to a friend."
|
| Talk about determination
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| I've read his autobiography... I highly recommend it, it is a
| mind blowing story. Amazing that someone with such a severe
| disability was able to live such a full life with romance and
| adventure that most able bodied people would be jealous of.
|
| His story and positive attitude has had a lasting impact on me in
| making me appreciate and enjoy life more- and to really work to
| make the best out of whatever is thrown at me.
| samstave wrote:
| TLDR?
|
| WOW -- I just read this:
|
| https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/may/26/last-iron-lu...
| rootusrootus wrote:
| That picture of all the children in a room full of iron lungs
| is what we should be showing every time someone tells us
| about the evil vaccines.
| johndevor wrote:
| The vaccine was introduced after polio prevalence was
| already plummeting.
| autoexec wrote:
| I would hardly call that "plummeting" considering the
| baseline
|
| https://www.eisenhowerlibrary.gov/sites/default/files/res
| ear...
| anon291 wrote:
| I'm sorry... this is ridiculous. I'm not vaccine-heavy
| (like I don't really think you _need_ a chickenpox
| vaccine or a rotavirus vaccine if you 're healthy or a
| Hep B vaccine at birth if you're low risk), but the idea
| of forgoing vaccines for illnesses like polio is just
| stupid. Too many kids died or were disabled for this.
| It's just stupid.
|
| The injectable vaccine is safe and has been used for
| decades. There should really be no objection to it. The
| oral ones are a different story and I wouldn't let my kid
| anywhere near those (too high a risk of polio)
| t0bia_s wrote:
| _Cutter incident - The mistake produced 120,000 doses of
| polio vaccine that contained live polio virus. Of
| children who received the vaccine, 40,000 developed
| abortive poliomyelitis (a form of the disease that does
| not involve the central nervous system), 56 developed
| paralytic poliomyelitis--and of these, five children died
| from polio.[2] The exposures led to an epidemic of polio
| in the families and communities of the affected children,
| resulting in a further 113 people paralyzed and 5
| deaths._
|
| source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cutter_Laboratories
| anon291 wrote:
| I already addressed this concern. I am categorically
| against live polio vaccines. Thankfully, today, only the
| oral one is live. There is no longer live injectible
| vaccine.
|
| The inactivated injectible vaccine is very safe.
|
| You reference an incident from 1955 when injectible
| vaccines were similar to oral ones today. Don't take
| these. Luckily, in 2024, you don't have to.
|
| It is irresponsible TODAY to not get vaccinated. None of
| what I wrote above applies to 1955.
|
| You're smarter than this.
| t0bia_s wrote:
| - It is irresponsible TODAY to not get vaccinated.
|
| It is irresponsible to give/take medical statements on
| internet without consulting it with your doctor that
| knows your medical records. Are you're smarter than this?
|
| Also: _In 2023, there were a total of 14 polio cases
| reported globally, with six cases in 2022._ source:
| https://polioeradication.org/this-week/
| BitwiseFool wrote:
| >"You're smarter than this."
|
| Regardless of how correct you are, or how persuasive you
| might have been up to this point, uttering this
| accomplishes nothing and is entirely counterproductive.
| samstave wrote:
| I'm not anti-vax, though but my daughter actually got
| chicken pox from the vaccine. It sucked - we had to get
| her vaccined to fly back east, so we did... flew and it
| was supposed to be a trip to chicago zoo but she got CP
| then night we got there and spent a couple days in the
| hotel bath with calamine.
|
| I got the chicken pox twice. Once at 6 months. and at
| 14y.
| moralestapia wrote:
| Some vaccines can be good, some vaccines can be bad; why is
| that so hard to understand?
| keepamovin wrote:
| What a legend. You poor man. Thank you for showing us what's
| possible. Thank you for never giving up on life. He always had a
| smile.
| speedylight wrote:
| This man demonstrated such an outstanding will to live and over
| come his disability. A part of me hopes he has moved on to a
| better life. Rest in peace, Paul.
| reddickulous wrote:
| I didn't even know he was sick.
| runjake wrote:
| Paul regularly livestreamed on TikTok -- almost daily.
|
| When I first saw him, I was rather horrified by his predicament.
| But then I saw that Paul was always upbeat and positive and
| accomplished. He seemed to live his life to his maximum. And he
| accomplished more than the average abled person.
|
| I hadn't seen him the past couple weeks (though my TikTok usage
| is more cautious morbid curiosity and at an arm's length). I
| guess this explains it.
| begueradj wrote:
| He was too brave.
| daft_pink wrote:
| They should post a link to the book. I want to read it now.
| yiiyiyiyi wrote:
| I remember reading this story a few years ago and realizing that
| the engineer who maintained it, a guy named Brady, was the same
| guy who ran my school FIRST robotics team back in 1998-2000. What
| a guy.
| anon115 wrote:
| <333333333333333333333333333333 you can rest now my sweet prince
| Uptrenda wrote:
| He managed to become a lawyer and live a productive life in that
| thing. Crazy inspiring story.
| Strom wrote:
| Paul was an inspiration for having amazing perseverance and
| determination. I especially enjoyed a 30min interview he did in
| 2022. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O5DOre3MFlw
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