Masks
Here is the thing about masks, although they will slow the spread of the Wuhan Coronavirus, they will not actually stop anyone from getting the virus over the long run.
Hospitals have the ability to care for patients and the Military can provide surge hospital capacity if necessary. Currently, there are many people in this hospital who have the virus but are in the hospital because they have delayed seeking care for other health issues.
Back to my original point, if the virus spreads more quickly, the US will reach herd immunity more quickly, and the virus will no longer be a problem. If there are sharply lower numbers of cases 2-3 months before the election, the political cover to have widespread mail-in voting will be removed. Widespread mail-in voting will result in widespread voter fraud (look at what happened in NJ recently where ~20% of mailed ballots were fraudulent), and it is not possible to have a free and fair election with widespread mail-in voting.
I am not sure if we can get herd immunity in ~2 months. We probably have about 6% of the US population infected as of today, and we need somewhere between 40 and 70% of the population to be immune (via having recovered or receiving a vaccine) to outright stop the spread. Currently, mostly young people are getting the virus, who are dying at much lower rates than when NY governor Cuomo was sending infected people into nursing homes to maximize the number of vulnerable people getting infected, and are having hospital stays at around half as older people.
lets correct a few things
imagine a californian area of 10mill people. knowing there are 2000 hospital beds
knowing the r0 of 2.6 withotu lockdown
knowing 9% of people who get it need hospital treatment (30% mild needing home bedrest)
so lets just take some weekly numbers of February and March
ill also abbreviate things
NH=badly sick need hospital.
OK. for assymptomatic/bedrest at home people
lets begin with saying just 55 people got off a repatriation flight who got the virus but 50 not really that sick. but 5 were sick to need treatment.
Fwk1:50(OK),5(NH) Fwk2:130(OK),13(NH) Fwk3:338(OK),34(NH) Fwk4:879(OK),88(NH)
Mwk1:2284(OK),228(NH) Mwk2:5940(OK),594(NH) Mwk3:15445(OK),1545(NH)
as you can see even basic math shows that at march 14 where there are 594 needing a bed. and being in bed for a fortnight. and adding to that the 1545 the following week. causes all the beds to be full
and they cant let it get even bigger numbers the following week
again this is only talking about 1500 sick in a whole week amungst 10mill
.. the reason its bad. is because there are only 2000 beds
get it yet?
so
imagine no lockdown. no restriction.
and just counting the NH numbers
MWk4: in hospital already 1545 + 4016new 37 previously died/ 331 discharged
=5561 patients but 2000 beds = 3561 discharged untreated=potential deaths(mainly at home)
AWk1: in hospital already 2000 + 10441new 3598 previously died
=5561 patients but 2000 beds = 10000 discharged untreated=potential deaths(mainly at home)
its now getting to a point just a few weeks later that anyone wanting treatment wont get any.
this is why the lockdown was done in the 2nd week of march to curb the spread before it got t the march week 4 predicted numbers.
....
if you do the math of the 50+130+338+878+and so on Ok people
in mid march would be 9621 people out of 10mill that had it but not harshly
which is 0.9% total pre lockdown
a couple weeks of that
which at the flatten of the curve would be ~0.5% a week which would have been 0.9+6%= ~7% combined spread
without lockdown it would have been 0.9+2.5+6.5+16.9+43.96= ~70% spread in 4 weeks..
but with 7% that really need hospital treatment but not getting it (so ~22mill died at home with no treatment)
however
if society could maintain a healthy 1% spread each week to allow the sick the 0.1% sick to have 2 weeks of treatments(0.2% bed occupency) at any time. and have its predictable and controllable it wasnt a problem
the at 1% spread a week would take another ~93 weeks to get 100% herd immunity
or 63 weeks to get 70% her immune
...
any faster then that will over run the hospitals
have a nice day and enjoy the 0.5% curbed spread due to lockdown while it lasts.
yes at full lockdown it would take a few hundred weeks to get her spread.
but now it seems that number is rising now lockdown is relaxed. so expect nurses and doctors to get overworked soon and another lockdown to be put in place. because they cant just let it go uncontrolled
an r0 of 1.1
JulWk1:0.5%: JulWk2: 0.55% JullWk3: 0.6% JulWk4:0.66%
AugWk1: 0.73% AugWk2:0.8% AugWk3: 0.88% AugWk4:0.97%
so even at just the smallest of rises of 1.1 expect 2 months before something will need to be tightened/restricted again.
or.
stay at a distance. dont get sick and lower the numbers.. and then restrictions dont have to happen in a few months
one thing is for sure.
you wont acheive herd immunity and not have restrictions to protect the healthcare