COVID-19 - READ THE RULES BEFORE REPLYING

[Bombastinator]

9 minutes ago, Uttamattamakin said:

I never said what he has in that quote... not even in an earlier edit never at all.    Lets unpack the rest of this. 

 

AND

You see how that is self contradicting right? 

I'd assume you're trolling but this is 2020, this is the internet, up is black, left is polkadotted, and humanity is losing a war with a virus while astronauts orbit the Earth. 

 

Please say April fools. 

Perhaps it was a misunderstanding of your statement combined with poor expression on my part.  Education isn’t useless per se.  It is not helpful for someone who has none now and needs a job today.   I was talking about time lag.  They’re not instant, and problems are too immediate atm.

[Uttamattamakin]

27 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

Perhaps it was a misunderstanding of your statement combined with poor expression on my part.  Education isn’t useless per se.  It is not helpful for someone who has none now and needs a job today.   I was talking about time lag.  They’re not instant, and problems are too immediate atm.

True  ... BUT while one is getting an education one can also get student aid.  Grants, loans, and jobs that are targeted at students.  PLUS being in college is a good way to fill a gap in the resume.  IF someone is right now 18-25 ... or even up to 35 saying  "I lost my job to Covid-19 and decided to go back to school ... will look a lot better on the Resume than just being unemployed right now. 

 

PLUS after this going to school online will look a lot more normal.  Working while listening to a lecture on your phone will be a thing even more than it already was. 

[atxcyclist]

2 minutes ago, Uttamattamakin said:

Well lets see.  At one of the colleges I teach at we are simply doing our work with Zoom  and all other collboration via our MS office 365 account.  A sub for that cost about $100 for the office 365.  SOoo  you could get that and Zoom is free or 15 a month.  Then sync your files to One Drive and share a link to that folder with your co worker.  Sit on Zoom all day chatting and working on the same files.  
 

 

I know EXACTLY what you mean.  Soo many people did not take this seriously at all.  (Might I hazard that you also watch 2/3 of this list  Peak Prosperity, China Uncensored, ADV China ? Those three channels were WAY ahead  of the wave on this. )    Callow young people are expected to be that way.  What I don't get is the politicians left, right and center who were more concerned with keeping the economy going, or using it to show the other side was bad.  Where I live until the governor of the state took action they were trying to keep colleges open.

 

My own students have been great.  I prepared the class for this.  I have always used online books, online homeworks, online test, and showed them how to use cloud collaboration to work on projects.  So this is not a HUGE problem for me. 

The darndest thing I was asked, helping other teacher,  

"how to put a scantron online".   

Unfortunately, our building modelling system doesn't work with external software like that, it has to be a live shared drive. Most of the issue is with clients and consultants not being able to work either, so work will eventually grind to a halt regardless of our preparedness. Beyond that there are all the materials providers that are shuttering or limited production, and the now closed governmental/regulatory reviewers and entities that have to be satisfied with plans before building and inspection permits can be provided. At this point it's less like an uphill battle and more like applying our faces to a brick wall.

 

I think it's especially bad when so many of the faults are so obvious to normal people:

 

Tests? Yes we need those

Enforcement of quarantine for tested individuals? We need that

PPE? Absolutely need that

 

Instead we get a bunch of cruise ships still being boarded even weeks ago when this was obvious, people hopping into other states for bars, international flights arriving, spring breakers, and no one is stopping any of this; It's pathetic.

[Bombastinator]

2 minutes ago, Uttamattamakin said:

True  ... BUT while one is getting an education one can also get student aid.  Grants, loans, and jobs that are targeted at students.  PLUS being in college is a good way to fill a gap in the resume.  IF someone is right now 18-25 ... or even up to 35 saying  "I lost my job to Covid-19 and decided to go back to school ... will look a lot better on the Resume than just being unemployed right now. 

 

PLUS after this going to school online will look a lot more normal.  Working while listening to a lecture on your phone will be a thing even more than it already was. 

Those loans are one of the reasons it’s only barely better.  I know people in their 50’s still paying off student loans.  Pay maybe higher but  net income is the same or lower sometimes.

[SpikeSpiegel]

https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/03/this-is-why-everyone-is-hoarding-toilet-paper/

 

Quote

This is why everyone is hoarding toilet paper

A consumer behavior researcher explains why toilet paper shelves are bare.

 

[Uttamattamakin]

2 hours ago, atxcyclist said:

Unfortunately, our building modelling system doesn't work with external software like that, it has to be a live shared drive. Most of the issue is with clients and consultants not being able to work either, so work will eventually grind to a halt regardless of our preparedness. Beyond that there are all the materials providers that are shuttering or limited production, and the now closed governmental/regulatory reviewers and entities that have to be satisfied with plans before building and inspection permits can be provided. At this point it's less like an uphill battle and more like applying our faces to a brick wall.

At least as far as your own business is concerned... there has to be a solution to this IT problem.  I mean a live shared drive on the the net can be made to appear like one that is on the LAN.  It is all a matter of code.  SMB over internet or NFS over internet (if on a .Nix).  I'm just spit balling but there has to be a way. 

 

2 hours ago, atxcyclist said:

Tests? Yes we need those

Enforcement of quarantine for tested individuals? We need that

PPE? Absolutely need that

 

Instead we get a bunch of cruise ships still being boarded even weeks ago when this was obvious, people hopping into other states for bars, international flights arriving, spring breakers, and no one is stopping any of this; It's pathetic.

Well lets be really REALLY frank and honest.  

 

The government knew of this in February.  Trump froze flights from china and got ROASTED as being a racist for doing so.  Multiple media outlets said the most dangerous thing about this virus was the racism it would cause.  If you showed any concern at all over this it made you racist and a fearmonger and a crackpot.   Meanwhile the CCP orchestrated brilliant propaganda to this effect.   Look four minutes into this video....

 

They have a certain bias since they have been at war with China in the past and position themselves as being what China was say 20 years ago but without being a totalitarian dictatorship. 

I love Asian people.. East Asian, South Asian, SE Asian West Asian and Eurasian.  Most of the people on Earth are Asian.  But come on  blocking travel from a country due to a breakout of communicable disease would've just been common sense.  (Now China is blocking inbound travel for that reason SMART).   
 

Another thing I HATE to say because he is so often wrong.. The president of the United States should've stuck to his guns and went further.  Banning flights not only from China but also from any country that had not banned flights from China, in addition to designating an isolated port for cruise ships to return to and an isolate airport or military base for secure quarantine of returning people.  Quarantine EVERYONE returning at a base in the middle of the desert ... just down the road from Area 51 or something for two months.  

The media would've skewered him for two months but now he'd really look like a stable genius. 

We can't totally blame him, our politicians and media tough.  Since early on it seemed like we had a lid on this.  IL had two of the first people with the virus here.  We traced and quarantined every contact and kept a lid on it.  Other states.  New York and California didn't. 

 

They also believed the government of the PRC.  The same government that has LIED so often about everything from the Great Leap Forward to the Tienanmen square massacre to the Uighur concentration camps.  Maybe because they were and are so essential to world supply chains we can't afford to shun them and they can't afford to shun us. 

[Uttamattamakin]

2 hours ago, Bombastinator said:

Those loans are one of the reasons it’s only barely better.  I know people in their 50’s still paying off student loans.  Pay maybe higher but  net income is the same or lower sometimes.

Contrary to popular belife it IS possible to cancel student loans through Bankruptcy.  IF they can show that they really have no chance of ever paying them back.  

https://www.studentloanborrowerassistance.org/bankruptcy/

https://www.npr.org/2020/01/22/797330613/myth-busted-turns-out-bankruptcy-can-wipe-out-student-loan-debt-after-all

 

Then there is the strategy of majoring in a hard core STEM discipline then either working for cheap for the government to get your loans forgiven after 5-10 years depending on the program OR working in the private sector for enough money to take care of them.    I don't know anyone who had a STEM education for whom a moderate level of student loan debt has been a life crippling issue. 

[PhantomJaguarr]

I wonder what it’s like being in the International Space Station knowing all this stuff is going down below you.

[Delicious Cake]

@atxcyclist

 

My first reply was referring to the first thread rule and not some barbed comment, but it's clear there never was any intent to engage beyond strawmanning it up in the first place. I'll humour you, nevertheless.

 

Social security and public health services, the two mechanisms which everyone is desperately relying on now have long been continuously and systematically strip mined, whether directly or indirectly, by those appointed to protect the welfare and interests of the population, for the personal financial benefit of those who rely on those essential services the least, if at all.

 

Unlike the subprime market bullshittery which was wholly of the banks' own making, this pandemic is an outside factor. Could China have done more to at least contain the outbreak better? Sure, but they have their own long list of shooting own foot. Would better funded, equipped (or even functional) public health services - especially at a local level - and social security mechanisms dometically have prevented this disease spreading? Nothing likely would have once it crossed continents, but it would lessen the impact of it for most people just from the assurance that there isn't a need to choose between the financial burden of being made unemployed by this and the burden of immediate hospital bills, especially as those with this being a binary choice are usually those barely able to afford it in the first place.

 

I don't see any claims of "moral/intellectual superiority", you jumped to that conclusion all on your own. Practically everyone is having a shit time of it all. There's nothing which makes you or your situation any special.

[mr moose]

26 minutes ago, PhantomJaguar77 said:

I wonder what it’s like being in the International Space Station knowing all this stuff is going down below you.

Probably comforted to some degree.

[PhantomJaguarr]

Born and raised here. Still hard to gauge even though I’m looking at video proof.

[Guest]

Covid-19, Train, Military Hodpital Ship and a crazy conspiracy theorist:

Quote

Engineer intentionally crashes train near hospital ship Mercy, believing in weird coronavirus conspiracy, feds say

On Tuesday afternoon, California Highway Patrol officer Dillon Eckerfield was rumbling down Harbor Avenue on his police motorcycle, in San Pedro, Calif., when he witnessed a strange sight: a freight train flying off the end of the tracks.

 

Spoiler

 

It didn’t even try to slow down. He watched it smash through the concrete and steel barriers at the track’s dead end, near the Port of Los Angeles. It crashed through a chain-link fence, careened through a parking lot and another gravel lot — barely missing three occupied vehicles — and then finally, after taking out another fence, came to a halt.

Roughly 800 feet ahead was the USNS Mercy, the Navy medical ship providing relief to hospitals overburdened with coronavirus patients — where police now believe the train’s engineer was intentionally headed.

 

Eckerfield pulled a U-turn, speeding in the direction of the spectacular train wreck, according to an FBI affidavit describing the incident. As he approached, he could see a man in a bright yellow fluorescent vest jump down from the train’s cab and start running. He was easy to follow. Eckerfield sped into the West Basin Container Terminal, an enormous ship cargo yard, and found the man in the yellow vest walking toward him. Eckerfield drew his weapon and ordered the man onto the ground.

 

Right away, as Eckerfield placed him under arrest, the suspect spilled out his story.

“You only get this chance once. The whole world is watching,” the suspect, later identified as Eduardo Moreno, told Eckerfield. “I had to. People don’t know what’s going on here. Now they will.”

Moreno, 44, was charged Wednesday in federal court with one count of train wrecking after admitting to intentionally running the train off the tracks in the direction of the Mercy hospital ship, the U.S. attorney’s office in Los Angeles said in a statement. No one was injured in the wreck, which caused a “substantial fuel leak” handled by firefighters, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors say Moreno was “suspicious of the USNS Mercy,” believing officials were lying about its true purpose. He believed “it had an alternate purpose related to covid-19 or a government takeover,” they said.

 

Moreno was held in jail overnight by local authorities before making his first appearance in federal court Tuesday on the train-wrecking charge, which carries a maximum punishment of 20 years in prison.

Moreno could not immediately be reached for comment late Wednesday, and it’s unclear if he has an attorney. A spokesman for Anacostia Rail Holdings Company — which operates Moreno’s employer, Pacific Harbor Line — said in a statement to The Washington Post that Moreno’s locomotive was pulling a single rail car when it ran off the track at a high speed.

“Thankfully there were no injuries,” said the spokesman, Stefan Friedman. “The engineer of the train has been arrested and charged, and we are fully cooperating with all authorities as they proceed with their investigation.”

In interviews with the FBI and Los Angeles Port Police, Moreno said that “everything was normal” and “no one was pushing my buttons” when he came to work on Tuesday morning. He said he hadn’t spoken to anyone about wrecking a train, and didn’t even plan it himself until the idea came to him spontaneously that afternoon, he said.

It popped into his head as he contemplated the pandemic — particularly the hospital ship.

The USNS Mercy arrived at the Port of Los Angeles on Friday to treat non-coronavirus trauma patients, thereby freeing up intensive-care at local hospitals treating covid-19 patients. The USNS Comfort arrived in New York for the same purpose.

But in a conspiratorial mind, Moreno told detectives he had been “putting the pieces together.” He no longer believed “the ship is what they say it’s for.” He believed “they are segregating us, and it needs to be put in the open,” according to the affidavit, which doesn’t explain what Moreno might have meant by that.

He was pushing his last train of the day, a cargo bound for Vietnam, when the idea hit him: He could “draw the world’s attention” to the USNS Mercy if he derailed the train, and then “people could see for themselves,” according to the affidavit. He could “wake people up,” he said.

“I don’t know. Sometimes you just get a little snap and man, it was fricking exciting,” Moreno told detectives. “I just had it and I was committed. I just went for it. I had one chance.”

It’s unclear if he intended to hit the ship directly or just crash near it.

Security cameras inside the train’s cab captured him hurtling toward the end of the tracks, the affidavit says. He made no attempt to pull back the throttle, no attempt to engage the brakes, instead putting the train in full speed.

At the last minute, Moreno lit a flare. He looked up at the camera, raising his middle finger to it. Then, just before the train smashed through the concrete barriers, he stuck the flare out the window, keeping it there all the way through impact.

He told the detectives, “I can’t wait to see the video.”

 

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/04/02/train-derails-usns-mercy-coronavirus/

 

Spoiler

 

[WkdPaul]

9 hours ago, CalintzJerevinan said:

https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/03/this-is-why-everyone-is-hoarding-toilet-paper/

 

 

 

Actually, it's all wrong !!!

 

I think the real reason was lost in the panic, it's really supposed to help us pass the time ;

https://gfycat.com/eveneminentassassinbug

[Uttamattamakin]

6 minutes ago, wkdpaul said:

 

Actually, it's all wrong !!!

 

I think the real reason was lost in the panic, it's really supposed to help us pass the time ;

https://gfycat.com/eveneminentassassinbug

Wile E Cyote would be proud.

[Taf the Ghost]

20 hours ago, straight_stewie said:

I'm skeptical to touch this issue because it brushes a little close to the political side of this issue, but experts in the field are in pretty close agreement so I feel it's safe to point out:
 

Spoiler

Quote

 

There are some extremely large problems associated with maintaining even the US current state of "lockdownedness" (for lack of a better term) for such a long time. Most of the economic models show that if we maintain our current shutdown, by mid May or early June we will be somewhere along the lines of Venezuala economically (which is not the same as socio-politically). Some of the experts have categorized this as "unrecoverable disaster", which I take to mean that it won't be a temporary economic decline, but a major one that will last for at least a generation.
 

More generally, worldwide economic experts are in agreement that the type of lockdowns we are seeing are going to hurt every country doing them in the same way. Or, in other words, if we don't change the way we are handling this pandemic economically and politically, the world will have wittingly plunged itself into a second great depression.

On the models specifically, I've somewhat suspected that to be the case all along. One need not know specifics to know how exponential graphs work: y = a+bx^c where a is a shift factor, b is a scaling factor, and c is an exponent factor. Additionally, infectious diseases spread at an exponential rate.

Given only that generalized graph equation and the knowledge that infectious diseases spread at an exponential rate, one can determine that a temporary lockdown cannot reduce the total number of infections, it can only shift the peak to happening later. That is to say, even a very strong lockdown if held for a time less than the time required to eradicate the disease, has only adjusted the shift factor, and not the scaling factor. Moreover, the weak lockdowns that we are seeing in the US will only reduce the exponent factor, at least until the lockdown is over, but it is still an exponent factor greater than 1.

My point, said succinctly, is: An exponential graph of the form described always grows to infinity, and therefore, a weak lockdown or a lockdown of any strength that is ended before the virus is eradicated or rendered inconsequential can never reduce the total number of cases over the life of the disease.

Given all of the points above, I would say that in the multivariable analysis, our tactic should be not to try too hard at lowering the scaling factor (total number of infections) over the course of the disease (although to keep working on vaccines and treatments), as what's required to do so through political means is too costly in the long game, but rather to focus on reducing the exponent factor (growth rate of infections) so as not to overwhelm hospital systems.

 

 

Note to repliers and moderators: I've already tested this kind of argument on the big blue website and the results of those tests tell me that I post this at my own peril. Given that, I will not argue, push, or defend these points, and will only respond on this branch to explore the points made in good faith.

 

 

 

The problem with all of the models tossed out, especially the early ones, is they were mostly put out by people that should probably never be allowed to use a graphing calculator. But "airborne Ebola" numbers get play in a media environment that really wants a new Plague. Which they've wanted since about 1920. ("The World is Ending" is good business for the Media. )

 

That being said, the actual value of lockdowns & limitations is a little bit "flatten the curve" (minus the fact it looks like the first strains of the virus pretty much mean Ventilator = You're Already Dead), but it's really about waiting out the mutation cycles while giving time to work out treatment regiments & potential curatives. Given the certain responses last week about chloroquine and starting to see changes already to that, good chance in about 2 weeks they'll roll out treatment regimes. The currently developed medications are likely only going to be effective at specific points in the progression of the virus for a certain amount of the population, so this issue isn't going away until an effective vaccine is developed, which will be a bit.

 

The real problem with those "the sky is falling!" graphs early is they're going to make lockdown protocols harder to maintain because the sky isn't actually falling. Compliance is eventually going to fall apart given the harsh reality that most of the population isn't terribly vulnerable to the virus. Low-effected areas will start lifting restrictions probably after about 4-5 weeks, while heavily effected areas by about week 7 to 8. Though I suspect public restrooms, concert halls and movie theaters will be closed for a while. (Food stalls and public restrooms are what you really want to avoid. The Social Distancing stuff is more about shame-based group compliance than disease transmission. It'll help a tad, but the surface-based environmental persistence is the real issue.)

 

Oh, and while I haven't done any disease modeling, I believe you'd need a decreasing function against the population set, as each new case has a smaller ability to infect a new person since someone was already infected. Realistically, you have at least two population-based equations at odds with each other: the spread-rate and the resolved-rate. This is why quarantine measures generally work, as you're attempting to eliminate as much population set as possible before the infection-rate overtakes the resolve-rate. The problem with COVID-19 has clearly been the lag-time between someone being able to spread the virus and anyone having a clue the person had it. The post-pandemic data is going to be fascinating, given how many have been asymptomatic. I wouldn't be surprised if upward of 35% of Western populations show antibodies for it by the end of 2021. Maybe higher. 

[Taf the Ghost]

@Cora_Lie crazy times brings out the crazies, though it involving a train isn't too surprising. There's been a lot of odd incidents involving trains in the last few years. Which, sadly, probably points to some train-based conspiracy theory running around the web that I'd rather not hear about.

[Guest]

A news involving Masks, France and the US:

 

France ordered some masks to China for the Grand-Est region - Grand Est is the equivalent of New York regarding the Covid-19 cases, death toll - and all. They were about to be shipped by plane (on the runway about to be loaded on the plane) when a US representative came, bought them all just right there and then for 3 times the original price, paid cash (!!!!!) and they were immediately loaded on another plane for the US.

 

Sources:

https://www.nouvelobs.com/coronavirus-de-wuhan/20200402.OBS26954/des-masques-commandes-par-la-france-rachetes-sur-le-tarmac-en-chine-par-les-americains.html

http://www.rfi.fr/en/europe/20200402-china-coronavirus-face-mask-france-stolen-us

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/02/french-officials-describe-assault-course-nations-obtain-protective/

https://www.globalvillagespace.com/after-blaming-us-bought-france-bound-face-masks-from-china/

 

I'll make 2 comments:

1. WTF US?!?!?!?!?!?
2. WTF CHINA?!?!?!?!?!?

I'm to move for France to sue both their asses off in front of WTO (OMC in french) tribunals!

 

[Bombastinator]

40 minutes ago, Cora_Lie said:

A news involving Masks, France and the US:

 

France ordered some masks to China for the Grand-Est region - Grand Est is the equivalent of New York regarding the Covid-19 cases, death toll - and all. They were about to be shipped by plane (on the runway about to be loaded on the plane) when a US representative came, bought them all just right there and then for 3 times the original price, paid cash (!!!!!) and they were immediately loaded on another plane for the US.

 

Sources:

https://www.nouvelobs.com/coronavirus-de-wuhan/20200402.OBS26954/des-masques-commandes-par-la-france-rachetes-sur-le-tarmac-en-chine-par-les-americains.html

http://www.rfi.fr/en/europe/20200402-china-coronavirus-face-mask-france-stolen-us

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/02/french-officials-describe-assault-course-nations-obtain-protective/

https://www.globalvillagespace.com/after-blaming-us-bought-france-bound-face-masks-from-china/

 

I'll make 2 comments:

1. WTF US?!?!?!?!?!?
2. WTF CHINA?!?!?!?!?!?

I'm to move for France to sue both their asses off in front of WTO (OMC in french) tribunals!

 

So China sold masks to France, the US bought them while they were still in China and brought them to the US instead?  There may be data missing here.  Is China selling masks to France but refusing to sell them to the US?  Who did the US representative pay? The Chinese manufacturer or the French receiver?

[Guest]

19 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

So China sold masks to France, the US bought them while they were still in China and brought them to the US instead?  There may be data missing here.  Is China selling masks to France but refusing to sell them to the US?  Who did the US representative pay? The Chinese manufacturer or the French receiver?

When you read the different articles, facts are quite clear.

France bought them from China. At the last moment China sold them for 3 times the price on the runway to the US who asked for them on the tarmac just before the masks were to be loaded on the plane.

 

edited to add:

China didn't "refuse" to sell to the US. France ordered them first, the US hijacked them at the very last moment.

 

[Blademaster91]

54 minutes ago, Bombastinator said:

So China sold masks to France, the US bought them while they were still in China and brought them to the US instead?  There may be data missing here.  Is China selling masks to France but refusing to sell them to the US?  Who did the US representative pay? The Chinese manufacturer or the French receiver?

I agree there is something missing, and it wouldn't be surprising if China refused to sell them to the US. I think countries need to be better prepared and rethink their supply chain on critical medical supplies such as masks.

[Taf the Ghost]

1 hour ago, Cora_Lie said:

A news involving Masks, France and the US:

 

France ordered some masks to China for the Grand-Est region - Grand Est is the equivalent of New York regarding the Covid-19 cases, death toll - and all. They were about to be shipped by plane (on the runway about to be loaded on the plane) when a US representative came, bought them all just right there and then for 3 times the original price, paid cash (!!!!!) and they were immediately loaded on another plane for the US.

 

Sources:

https://www.nouvelobs.com/coronavirus-de-wuhan/20200402.OBS26954/des-masques-commandes-par-la-france-rachetes-sur-le-tarmac-en-chine-par-les-americains.html

http://www.rfi.fr/en/europe/20200402-china-coronavirus-face-mask-france-stolen-us

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/02/french-officials-describe-assault-course-nations-obtain-protective/

https://www.globalvillagespace.com/after-blaming-us-bought-france-bound-face-masks-from-china/

 

I'll make 2 comments:

1. WTF US?!?!?!?!?!?
2. WTF CHINA?!?!?!?!?!?

I'm to move for France to sue both their asses off in front of WTO (OMC in french) tribunals!

 

Saying "the Americans" doesn't really say who actually was paying money.  Are they saying an agent for the US Government or an American business that simply out-bid someone else?

 

Though I would like to point out that China's bribe-based business operation model, so is anyone surprised? 

[RonnieOP]

1 hour ago, Cora_Lie said:

A news involving Masks, France and the US:

 

France ordered some masks to China for the Grand-Est region - Grand Est is the equivalent of New York regarding the Covid-19 cases, death toll - and all. They were about to be shipped by plane (on the runway about to be loaded on the plane) when a US representative came, bought them all just right there and then for 3 times the original price, paid cash (!!!!!) and they were immediately loaded on another plane for the US.

 

Sources:

https://www.nouvelobs.com/coronavirus-de-wuhan/20200402.OBS26954/des-masques-commandes-par-la-france-rachetes-sur-le-tarmac-en-chine-par-les-americains.html

http://www.rfi.fr/en/europe/20200402-china-coronavirus-face-mask-france-stolen-us

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/02/french-officials-describe-assault-course-nations-obtain-protective/

https://www.globalvillagespace.com/after-blaming-us-bought-france-bound-face-masks-from-china/

 

I'll make 2 comments:

1. WTF US?!?!?!?!?!?
2. WTF CHINA?!?!?!?!?!?

I'm to move for France to sue both their asses off in front of WTO (OMC in french) tribunals!

 

Seems like karma.

 

France impounded trucks headed for the UK that were full of medical supplies about a week ago.

 

[Guest]

6 hours ago, Taf the Ghost said:

Saying "the Americans" doesn't really say who actually was paying money.  Are they saying an agent for the US Government or an American business that simply out-bid someone else?

 

Though I would like to point out that China's bribe-based business operation model, so is anyone surprised? 

It wasn't an american business.

The masks have been sent directly to a US State. The french officials know who bought them. They simply don't want to make it public.

 

google translate is your friend:
https://www.liberation.fr/france/2020/04/01/une-commande-francaise-de-masques-detournee-vers-les-etats-unis-sur-un-tarmac-chinois_1783805

 

6 hours ago, RonnieOP said:

Seems like karma.

 

France impounded trucks headed for the UK that were full of medical supplies about a week ago.

 

Supplies which haven't been paid!

Before saying something you'd better first check your infos! It's not the first time you're giving partial info!

[RonnieOP]

6 minutes ago, Cora_Lie said:

Supplies which haven't been paid!

Before saying something you'd better first check your infos! It's not the first time you're giving partial info!

I didnt say anything about how they were purchased or not.

 

France detained two different trucks full of medical supplies headed to the uk. Forcing top officials to negotiate in the middle of a pandemic. 

 

Theres a big difference between what you are implying and what happened. 

 

Hijacking medical supplies and forcing a negotiation isnt an act of kindness.

 

 

[Guest]

16 minutes ago, Blademaster91 said:

I agree there is something missing, and it wouldn't be surprising if China refused to sell them to the US. I think countries need to be better prepared and rethink their supply chain on critical supplies.

No, if France would have sold them to the US there wouldn't be such an outcry!

 

France ordered them and did pay for them. The masks were 10 days late for delivery. And just as they were about to be sent, they have been highjacked by the US.

China, whether it's the company or a chinese official (truthfully I don't really care which one it is) accepted to sell them to a US official representative for 3 times the official price. Things are quite clear in that regards.