If you’d like an assessment of antibody tests from someone on the “inside,” watch Dr. Mike’s Youtube video “The truth about coronavirus antibody tests.” He does discuss the potential of tests that are not up to snuff.
Dd works as an ota in a rehab facility. She sent me a picture today in full protective gear: scrubs, face mask, and shield. She say they came in yesterday afternoon and that is how they are now treating all patients.
Made me glad to know facilities are finally starting to get their PPE.
There’s a new study from a NYC hospital that 90 percent of the patients who died had at least one of the following : uncontrolled hypertension, diabetes, obesity. The majority had 2 of these. This comports with what my daughter a nurse treating COVID patients has said…all of her patients under 70 were obese. All of any age had one of those co-morbidities.
It’s interesting to me that they aren’t facing more covid-19 patients with asthma or COPD. Maybe they’re better able to self-isolate? So much isn’t understood about this COVID-19.
Thank you for posting this. It is very interesting. I read about doctors recommending certain breathing exercises.
Do you know what level of blood oxygen on a pulse ox meter would be reason to be concerned that there is an early sing of a person having covid pneumonia? I might have missed that in the article but didn’t see it. Thanks!
I would think if it fell in the low 90s, you’d be concerned.
@MaineLonghorn I hope this is OK to say that when I was sick in early to mid March I had my pulse ox go down to 92-93 frequently. I felt like my lungs were open and was surprised by this (because it is usually 98-99). I normally feel very crummy if it is even 94. My doctor told me if it stayed in the lower 90s I would have to call 911 and/or go to the ER. I looked up breathing exercises online and found this hospital respiratory therapist’s videos and did them. They made a huge difference for me. I realized I was breathing very shallow breaths because my chest hurt so much and I was kind of hunched over. I was breathing very fast and my pulse was super high. The breathing exercises helped me take long, slow and deep breaths. My ox would come up to 96 or 97 after doing the exercises. I also don’t like being in bed when I am sick and felt much better upright than when laying down, and staying than sitting (but got tired out easily so couldn’t always do those things). I also had what look like Covid toes/feet and could smell and test very little. I do think it is quite likely I had it. I like the idea that breathing exercises could help because it feels like people can have at least a little control over things if it does help. Anyway, sorry for OT talking.
Do you mean this study?
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2765184
88% of those brought into hospitals (median age 63) in the study had 2 or more comorbidities. There was a rather large list of comorbidities, of which the most common were:
56.6% hypertension
41.7% obesity (BMI >= 30), includes 19% morbid obesity (BMI >= 35)
33.8% diabetes
11.1% coronary artery disease
9% asthma
6.9% congestive heart failure
Out of the above, it looks like obesity and diabetes are much more common among this sample of hospitalized COVID-19 patients than in the general population in their 60s (more than half of the general population in their 60s has hypertension).
@suteiki77, that’s ok. It’s a medical concern. Good for people to think about. I ordered an FDA-approved pulse oximeter today, in case my husband falls ill. Pneumonia would be very dangerous for him since he doesn’t have a spleen.
That obesity rate among COVID-19 patients looks fairly similar to the rate in the US general population, which is a 40% for ages 20-39, 45% for ages 40-59, and 43% for over 60, according to the CDC.
I’ve heard anecdotally that obesity is more of a risk factor for COVID-19 death, but can’t cite statistics.
Normal oxygen saturation at sea level is 95-100% (at altitude, like Denver at 5200 feet, “normal is 90-95%). My relative who is a MD often puts his patients on supplemental O2 when their O2 level falls to 93%. Medicare and most insurers will pay for home supplemental O2 when the patient is 88% or lower while sitting, exercising, it sleeping. Many people have their saturation rate fall about 2% when they sleep (folks breathe more shallowly).
Most folks with supplemental O2 in the US have it delivered by nasal cannula.
There are many videos online about diaphragmatic, pursed lip breathing, which can be helpful to keep oxygen saturations high and remind folks to breathe effectively.
Here’s what the NYT reported :
Dr. Leora Horwitz, an associate professor at NYU Langone Health whose recent study of Covid-19 patients found that obesity was the most significant predictor of disease severity after age, said that the new paper described similar rates of chronic disease and obesity, but that it was descriptive, so “it is hard to tell the relative importance of the various comorbidities.” She noted that the obesity rate on Long Island is 24 percent, suggesting the hospitalized patients “are disproportionately obese.”
Odd… CDC web pages seem contradictory to each other.
https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/prevalence-maps.html says that it was “adults aged 45-54 years who had the highest prevalence (36.9%).” But https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/adult.html says that obesity affected “44.8% among middle-aged adults aged 40–59, and 42.8% among older adults aged 60 and over.”
Note that the N.Y. hospital study was taking into account the much lower rate of obesity there vs general US population
I haven’t been on today but later but 
https://worldisraelnews.com/watch-israeli-scientist-awarded-us-patent-for-covid-19-vaccine-were-very-optimistic/
I read the Israelis had something already built for another virus and could use that for Covid 19 so they had a head start in making the vaccine. I already head that it’s an oral vaccine and because of that, could be out on the marker sooner than injection type vaccines.
Every single person who is developing a vaccine is publicly “very optimistic.” If they weren’t, they wouldn’t get funding lol.
UMich health system is going to start furloughing employees because they’re losing so much money. I have a feeling they’re going to open back up to some elective surgeries to bring in income. We’ll see.
ETA: FWIW, when I was in the ER about a month ago, it was when my pulse ox hit about 92% that they decided to give me a chest x-ray. This was before widescale testing and it was determined I didn’t qualify for a COVID test. (I had H1N1.)
Just an FYI. The fact that a patent is allowed on a treatment does not mean the treatment is effective as a treatment. There is no requirement at the patent offices around the world that the claimed treatment must meet stringent clinical trial requirements. Most of the time, a simple experiment in an animal or cell culture model will do to convince examiners that what is claimed is true. 
I’m not sure whether this comment refers to the study of patients at the 23 Northwell hospitals which was published in JAMA yesterday. I have read the study, and feel that it is important to note that any patient diagnosed with hypertension was counted under hypertension. It was not broken down into controlled versus uncontrolled. About 45% of American adults have high blood pressure or are on medication to keep theirs low. They all counted as having hypertension for this study.
I feel like the authors went out of their way to try to show that their patients had comorbidities, but as far as I can see, they did not show that the incidence of obesity or hypertension was higher in the patients who died than in those who did not, or the general population.
Here’s what the study says: “Comorbidities listed here are defined as medical diagnoses included in medical history by ICD-10 coding. These include, but are not limited to, those included in the table.” In other words, although they listed about 18 health issues in the table, they used an even longer list to label patients as having “comorbidities”. I do not know what was on the long list, but it could be anything that has an ICD-10 code—any physical or mental health problem.
This bothers me because the headlines about this study may make relatively healthy middle-aged people feel safe from the virus, when we do not have good data to say that they are.
DH sees about 50 Covid patients every day, mostly in three different ICU’s. He has seen patients in their 30-60’s, with no co-morbidities, die. His educated guess would be that other than age or a severe pre-existing illness, the biggest risk factor for a bad outcome is the genetics of your immune system (ie random luck).
Also, the title of the study is: Presenting Characteristics, Comorbidities, and Outcomes Among 5700 Patients Hospitalized With COVID-19 in the New York City Area. However, 3,066 of those patients were still in the hospital when the study ended. So, the outcome is only known for 2,634 people.
Here is a link to the study: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2765184
@usbalumnus, the reason for the “dueling CDC numbers” is that the site with the maps uses data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance Survey, where people self-report their height and weight. That shows a lower prevalence than the data from The National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) which actually measures height and weight in a nationally representative population. Guess which statistics are more accurate? Hence, the higher figures are more reflective of actual obesity prevalence. NHANES doesn’t have state-by-state data, though, which is why reported obesity prevalence for individual states (like New York) is based on the self-report data and will be lower than national prevalence figures…