73 Comments - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:15 pm: The thing to give perspective to the state by state response and the aftermath seems… … as the focus continues to be on beating the virus… then real results appear. When the focus is not about the beating of the virus but about appeasing the loud minority… *those* results are apparently different. You can’t un-die. Your family, friends, people you might never know, it’s those lives that we ALL are fighting for… every state, Wisconsin as well. So… if it’s about money and not lives… odds are… “meh… all these numbers are gumbo, we need to open” No. These are numbers, they’re people. Wisconsin numbers are what they are, Wisconsin Supreme Court decisions too… - Montrose - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:19 pm: I was in Milwaukee last weekend and the lakefront looked like any other Memorial Day weekend. Not a mask in sight and the beaches littered with pale Midwesterners. I had a new appreciation for the rules we have in place in Chicago and elsewhere in the state. - Red Ranger - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:19 pm: But at this point according to the website, 27% of hospital beds are available and about 25% of ventilators are in use. Plus the hospitalizations for all regions look relatively flat over recent days. I dont think anyone can deny that hospitalizations and cases will go up once stay at homes are lifted. The question is can a state’s medical/hospital system handle it? If the standard is any rise in hospitalizations or cases results in going back to stay at home, this wont end for the foreseeable future, and states will have to deal with all of the consequences of that. So far it looks like WI healthcare system is handling the increases since its stay at home was lifted. - Pot calling kettle - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:20 pm: This is Rep. Bailey’s goal for Illinois. - Almost the weekend - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:21 pm: It will be fascinating to see in July if Illinois is the state that is fully operational with the lowest cases per capita. Surrounded by five states… Man glad I’m not the governor - Lt Guv - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:28 pm: I know it’s federal, but Andrew Cuomo is just knocking it out of the park at the National Press Club right now. One of his 1st points was questioning the attacks on states like NY & IL that have borne the brunt of COVID, which also happen to be the states that do the heavy lifting of being donor states to the feds while the major source of the whining are the receiving states. He bridges to “what happened to the shared, collective responsibility of the United States?” Then uses that to begin to follow Rahm’s idea of offering a national plan for recovery. I know this is very federal, and nuke this if need be, but it relates so directly to Illinois I couldn’t help but comment. - Anyone Remember - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:28 pm: Almost the weekend - With Illinois being part of the St. Louis and Quad Cities metro areas, it will see some “leakage” from MO and IA and the cases per capita will increase. - TinyDancer(FKASue) - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:36 pm: =hospitalizations rose statewide by 19.4 percent between May 13 and yesterday.= Sounds like the basis for a lawsuit. - Joe Bidenopolous - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:39 pm: ===With Illinois being part of the St. Louis and Quad Cities metro areas, it will see some “leakage” from MO and IA and the cases per capita will increase.== Not to mention suburbs near Indiana. I was talking to a friend of mine down there on Friday and he said he knew about 10 people who were heading there to have dinner in a restaurant that evening - Shemp - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:43 pm: There is such thing as a middle ground. - Greg - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:45 pm: There is only an incidence of 272/100k in WI compared to 893/100k in IL. There are 2,372 hospitalizations in WI according to JH. WI looks a lot better than IL b/c it hasn’t been hit as hard. It has nothing to do with anyone’s “policy.” - Not a Billionaire - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:48 pm: And we are near Missouri and Iowa. Casino in Davenport will be open next week. Ready to go? - Put the fun in unfunded - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:49 pm: Please actually click on that link rather than just read the headline. There are now 51 more people hospitalized for COVID in the 9-county SE Region on 5/27 than there were on 5/13. Still 60 fewer people hospitalized than the peak number on 4/14. As stated in a recent headline, “zoom out”. - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:49 pm: === It has nothing to do with anyone’s “policy.”=== … and yet Illinois is the *only* state to hit *all five* of the White House and CDC matrix… Can’t really look at that and say, “meh, it’s random”. Nope. - iggy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:53 pm: on may 23rd Wisconsin had 8 deaths that day. a stunning failure. - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:55 pm: === on may 23rd Wisconsin had 8 deaths that day. a stunning failure.=== Tell that to the families of the 8, the medical personnel also grieving at their loss.. tell that to the friends of the 8 too. I always appreciate when folks tell me exactly who they are. Thank you. - Soccermom - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:55 pm: Red Ranger — you do realize that, once you’re on a ventilator, your chance of survival is about the same as your chance of surviving Ebola. So saying “we still have some ventilators” is not really good news - Somewhat interested observer - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:57 pm: I think the states around us are much more concerned about leakage from Illinois than we should be concerned about leakage from their states. The Governor has done a decent job, I think, but the numbers don’t lie. The five states around us have a combined population two times more than us, but fewer cases and deaths. The focus should be on the virus - here in Illinois. - VerySmallRocks - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 12:58 pm: -”There is only an incidence of 272/100k in WI compared to 893/100k in IL.” They’ll catch up, in the name of freedom and liberty. - efudd - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:04 pm: “There is such a thing as middle ground” Man, you are some kind of dense. Explain “middle ground” to Covid 19 - Nick - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:07 pm: An increase in deaths usually lags increasing case numbers and, I would assume, hospitalizations I hope for their sakes that doesn’t occur - cermak_rd - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:09 pm: The middle ground is outdoor dining and mask wearing in indoor spaces. The extremes are nailing peoples’ doors shut to keep them inside and having a free for all where the virus just spreads and spreads. - Strannik - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:10 pm: Bear in mind that Milwaukee County, the City of Milwaukee, Racine County and the City of Racine implemented their own stay-at-home restrictions in the wake of the Wsiconsin Supreme Court ruling, while Kenosha County and some other Southeast Wisconsin areas haven’t. - @misterjayem - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:23 pm: “So far it looks like WI healthcare system is handling the increases since its stay at home was lifted.” And as long as everybody has a hospital bed to die in, we’re all good, rite? – MrJM - Red Ranger - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:26 pm: Soccermom, my point was WI statewide stay at home has been lifted for almost 2 weeks now and the WI healthcare system has seemingly not been overrun according to the states website. We either have to live with COVID 19 in a new normal or destroy our economies through severely restricted economic activity for the foreseeable future. Georgia, which was one of the first states to open in a limited fashion has fewer deaths per million people than us, its numbers of tests are roughly similar to ours when adjusted for population, fatality rate is also similar. There is hope that we can have a somewhat open economy, contain this virus and not overrun our healthcare system. - Donnie Elgin - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:33 pm: With Illinois having a much higher infection rate per million than WI - many of the new cases in WI will likely be contact traced back here. Typical FIB. - Decaturland - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:37 pm: Wisconsin has had 517 deaths. Eighty nine deaths per million. Illinois death rate 388 deaths per million. - Joe Bidenopolous - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:39 pm: ==many of the new cases in WI will likely be contact traced back here. == First of all, don’t be foolish and tell yourself that there isn’t community spread in WI. Second of all, most of our cases in March probably could’ve been traced back to New York and Europe. So your point is what. exactly? Should we vilify NY and Europe? Or are you just acknowledging that the virus doesn’t respect borders and that everyone is still in danger? - Rich Miller - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:39 pm: Decaturland, the point of this post is that hospitalizations are shooting up. But, continue looking for loopholes. - illinifan - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:44 pm: Red Ranger are we sure WI is accurately reporting data? States such as AZ and FL are excluding information from what they report. - Nick - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:47 pm: I don’t think the suggestion was ever that immediately after two weeks the healthcare system would be overwhelmed, Red Ranger. It’s the weeks that come after where the concern is. Because you don’t cut hospitalizations when you immediately implement a stay-at-home order either, it takes time, all the people who were already infected don’t just go away, and they’re still going to keep showing up in the numbers. I do hope for Wisconsin that these numbers start to flatten, but they’re far from the clear right now and these trend-lines aren’t encouraging. - M - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:47 pm: I really do not trust the COVID-19 data that WI and some other states have released to the public. They appear to be under-reporting. I have a friend who works in a hospital in WI. - Red Ranger - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 1:54 pm: Everyone knows only GOP Governors report inaccurate COVID numbers, so since WI has a Dem Gov we can trust trust them. Nick, did you actually look at the WI website? Newly reported cases is flat over last 20 days, same with hospitalizations. I dont know why that trend isnt encouraging? - In 630 - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 2:01 pm: ==there is such thing as middle ground== like, say, having people wear masks when around others and gradually loosening restrictions as overall public health metrics improve - efudd - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 2:06 pm: “The extremes is having people’s doors nailed shut” Because that has happened or has been proposed? We’re only where we are at due to staying the course. Other states are seeing increases. Cape county reported no new case three days in a row week before last, when they started lifting restrictions. Yesterday, 20. That’s with Missouri’s questionable testing. Again, keep thinking you can fight a pandemic with a middle ground. - Alegra - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 2:07 pm: A month or so back, Wisc was projected to peak a few weeks after Illinois, in case that makes a difference. People close to the border who grocery shop there had told me most everyone is still wearing masks. - anon - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 2:35 pm: I was in southeastern Wisconsin over the weekend at my vacation home. Mrs. Anon and myself went into a suburban Milwaukee Walmart to pick up some items. We wore masks and the Walmart employees wore masks. About 60% of the customers were masked - no distinction between classes, races, age, whatever. There was a 70-ish woman without a mask pushing an elderly man (husband?) who wore a mask. We went to meat market near Lake Geneva where we regularly shop. Online orders only last week, met us in the parking lot to give us the order. Staff wore masks and gloves as did we. They opened the store to the public today. - Pundent - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 2:39 pm: =There is hope that we can have a somewhat open economy, contain this virus and not overrun our healthcare system.= Your premise makes sense but I’m not seeing these states taking the meaningful steps to actually contain the virus. Have they increased testing capacity, put contract tracing in place, vigilantly required the use of masks? Opening things up without taking steps to contain the virus is nothing more than wishful thinking. - Cool Papa Bell - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 2:49 pm: @ Efudd =Again, keep thinking you can fight a pandemic with a middle ground.= There is always middle ground. It’s why the USA never locked down the way Wuhan or parts of Spain or Italy did. Wuhan had PRC minders in front of apartment buildings tracking when you left and took your temp when you came back. That’s the middle ground in China. In Illinois it’s far different - North Dakota has middle ground that’s no where near what Illinois has. - Woz - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 2:58 pm: I’m surprised how many people really don’t understand the reason for “shelter-in-place.” There are only two ways to stop the virus - one is a vaccine, the other is reaching ‘herd immunity’ - the point at which more people have the antibodies and the virus has no place to go. Staying home was meant to “flatten the curve,” which in reality means to reach a plateau. It is not stopping the virus, it is delaying the virus. Why? So the cases didn’t over burden the healthcare system… that is all. PERIOD. We are not saving lives by staying home. You should actually be thanking those who go about their business, as they are pushing us towards herd immunity and the end of the virus. Wisconsin numbers are up? So what. As long as beds are available, that is all that matters. - Down The Middle - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:00 pm: Amen Woz - Left Center Right - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:01 pm: Absolutely Woz. You can’t eliminate death - Down The Middle - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:02 pm: How much death will occur now due to the anxiety created by stay-at-home orders, business shutdowns, media exaggerations, and legitimate concerns about the virus? - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:03 pm: ===… they are pushing us towards herd immunity and the end of the virus.=== LOL, ask England how that went. Spoiler Alert: It failed. - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:04 pm: === How much death will occur now due to the anxiety created by stay-at-home orders, business shutdowns, media exaggerations, and legitimate concerns about the virus?=== Ok, how much? If you say you “know”… that’s a “fib” - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:08 pm: === You can’t eliminate death=== You and yours first. You can eliminate risk. Putting others at risk to sit and eat a “Chili’s” then infect maybe me or people I know… can you be more selfish with others’ lives? - Woz - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:08 pm: Oswego - or you could ask Sweden. You are completely (Purposely?) missing the point. X amount of cases and deaths were going to happen, no matter what. Shelter-in-place was meant to make sure when those cases happened, there was a hospital bed to treat them, not a way to stop deaths, cases or the virus. As a smart man once said… “I can explain it for you, but I can’t understand it for you.” - Cool Papa Bell - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:09 pm: To herd immunity - Sweden is still being challenged in their effort for it. They thought they might get it by the end May - well they have about 7 to 10 percent of the population allegedly immune and a death rate way higher than countries next door. - Down The Middle - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:10 pm: Feel free to live in your bubble while the rest of us live our lives - Down The Middle - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:11 pm: And the “so called experts” have been wrong on their predictions from the start - Cool Papa Bell - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:12 pm: @ Down If only your life wasn’t infectious mine or an elderly person or a nurse. - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:14 pm: === or you could ask Sweden.=== … far from a success story, and it could be said (it’s being said) that they are trading lives, an expense they’re willing to pay. Whew. ===You are completely (Purposely?) missing the point.=== Nope. I grasp it fine. You want a different measure you think helps your argument, which is weak… again, ask England. === As a smart man once said… “I can explain it for you, but I can’t understand it for you.”=== Nope, I got it. It’s who you are… right here… === X amount of cases and deaths were going to happen, no matter what.=== Treating life frivolously for money is not how you measure society, you measure it by its humanity. Your wise man you quote might wonder aloud if you’re cool if they were collateral damage (a death) so you can go to “TGI Friday’s” - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:16 pm: === Feel free to live in your bubble while the rest of us live our lives=== You must love it on Facebook… === And the “so called experts” have been wrong on their predictions from the start=== … or love the President’s twitter. You’re a minority in your thinking, you should go to the Facebook bubble and think on that. - Demoralized - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:19 pm: ==or you could ask Sweden== Sweden only has 10 million people and much less population density. The U.S. has 330 million people. You can’t compare Sweden to the United States. I would also note that Sweden’s death rate is something like 12%. I’m not sure that is something we should try to emmulate. - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:21 pm: To be honest… Anyone who is in a minority of a society trying to shame the majority… so some can die… so they can go eat at “Cracker Barrel”… that’s not gonna poll well or get others to readily agree… … especially when science points to this loud minority as “Covidiots” in this specific example. - Woz - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:23 pm: There is only one real question. Do you believe sheltering-in-place stops the virus? Lowers the death rate? Lowers cases? - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:25 pm: === There is only one real question. Do you believe sheltering-in-place stops the virus? Lowers the death rate? Lowers cases?=== Narrator: three questions were asked. - Woz - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:25 pm: Oswego - Do you believe shelter-in-place lowers the death and case rate? - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:27 pm: - Woz - You make your point, you shouldn’t need me to make your point. It’s an old trick when you have no point. Go for it. - Pundent - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:41 pm: =So the cases didn’t over burden the healthcare system… that is all. PERIOD. We are not saving lives by staying home.= These are two contradictory statements. If we stay at home and avoid overwhelming the healthcare system lives are being saved. Not everyone that goes to the hospital dies there. Some leave. But if they are unable to get the life saving care they need in a hospital a lot more will die. - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:45 pm: - Pundent - It’s all good, what they want is to get to a discussion where “death” is accepted, now we’re trying to agree on how many is acceptable to die. Covidiots have tried this all through stay at home. They’re sad and foolish and terribly transparent. If they have an acceptable number of deaths, and don’t like to be called on it… well… Stay safe. - Left Center Right - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:53 pm: So the deaths that will occur now due to the anxiety created by stay-at-home orders, business shutdowns,and media exaggerations, as it relates to excessive stress and how it triggers and inflames high blood pressure, digestive disorders, heart conditions, infectious diseases, and cancer is ok I guess?? - Demoralized - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:54 pm: Well that’s a red herring if I ever saw one. - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 3:56 pm: === So the deaths that will occur now due to the anxiety created by stay-at-home orders, business shutdowns,and media exaggerations, as it relates to excessive stress and how it triggers and inflames high blood pressure, digestive disorders, heart conditions, infectious diseases, and cancer is ok I guess??=== Cite numbers, please. Thanks. Also, argue like an adult. The dorm rooms have been closed since April, I am not your roommate - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 4:08 pm: - Down The Middle - Good luck to you… stay safe. The adults will take it from here. - Jibba - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 4:31 pm: ===X amount of cases and deaths were going to happen, === Tell that to New Zealand, where they have wiped the virus completely out by staying home. Or Taiwan, Hong Kong, and other places where people are not contracting the virus and dying in large numbers. So yeah, you can prevent those deaths if you act quickly and effectively. - Jocko - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 4:33 pm: ==We are not saving lives by staying home.== So I guess the 5083 had it comin’ to ‘em…one way or the other. - western chicago - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 6:20 pm: Trends are more important to look at compared to absolute numbers as some states are more “lightly” counting or testing than others. For instance, some states only count covid deaths if the person got tested and tested positive for covid 19. Some states weren’t including their nursing home deaths. But provided they don’t change their counting methodology, trend data will tell you whether things are improving or disimproving. There is a significant lag between increased infections and then increased case count and then increased hospitalizations and then increased deaths. Someone also made the good point that recovering after a ventilator is a 50/50 proposition in many hospitals and so we don’t really want to be coming close to using up all the ventilators. - Law Man - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 6:24 pm: It doesn’t matter whether there are more cases. What matters is hospital capacity and no state has a capacity problem. Remember, we were trying to make sure we didn’t overrun the hospitals. Pritzker now wants to avoid that issue and change the subject. - TinyDancer(FKASue) - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 6:44 pm: =Do you believe sheltering-in-place stops the virus? Lowers the death rate?= It’s been working for me. - @misterjayem - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 10:29 pm: “It doesn’t matter whether there are more cases.” Did you read what you’d written before you posted it? Perhaps you should start doing that. – MrJM - JS Mill - Wednesday, May 27, 20 @ 10:54 pm: = and no state has a capacity problem.= You may want to check your work there, Nebraska has a looming capacity issue. =Pritzker now wants to avoid that issue and change the Friday= My guess is that you have not read the publicly available (for some time now) recovery plan and do not realize phase 3 begins. I have read where others have said something similar to what you wrote, nonsense words at this point. I am sure that where ever you congregate the folks there agree with you when you parrot these baseless talking points. =and cancer is ok I guess= Facepalm. Staying at home causes cancer? Why haven’t the cancer researchers figured this out? So we should all be homeless and be immortal? /s - Oswego Willy - Thursday, May 28, 20 @ 7:37 am: === and no state has a capacity problem.=== Montgomery, Alabama is at full capacity for ICU beds. The state of Alabama may be hitting marks, tragic marks, that should give pause, but will they. “Meanwhile”, the signature event this POTUS has for social gathering is Alabama-LSU, 110,000 “shoulder to shoulder” as he said… I dunno if Tuscaloosa would be ready for that… because I dunno if any city is ready to handle the type of crowd, 110,000… today. Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.