FYI- NY City has extended its ban on all large activities until July 1 along with its shelter in place and wear face masks in public until 1 July. Mayor said that unless the feds " provide substantial help with testing" they will not be able to even start working back towards " normal".

Sadly the Trump administration continues to gaslight the whole testing issue despite clear strong evidence showing we as a nation are way behind the 8 ball on this vital subject.

Plan for the worst....pray for the best.

Ross Rowland

More politics?

Exprail

If trying to stop the effects of a pandemic is purely political now, and not one of wholy human concern for all, then so be it. We have now lost more people to this in a month than we have in three years of the Korean War. We have lost more people now to this than the 2018-19 Flu season, and it's only been less than a month since we passed 1,000 deaths.


The continued shutdown of New York will cause a cascade of effects through the responses of numerous local, state, and federal agencies. Responses that directly affect us in preservation, and in life itself. We need to realize this is a war just as any person versus person fight was. Unless we can unite and totally subject our efforts towards eradication of this virus much as we did in the second World War, the virus will dominate this country for the foreseeable future.

We didn't let 3,000 deaths go unanswered two decades ago. Why let 40,000+ go with indifference now?

I have word from someone highly placed in 'official' government COVID-19 response that a practical vaccine is now 'over 2 years' out. From yesterday's date.

It is no longer possible, in my opinion, to tolerate the present slipshod, piecemeal and often feel-good set of responses currently in place to this situation. While we may not have passed a singularity in economic recovery quite yet, continuing current Whitmer-style global mandated shelter-in-place, together with the current type of default yet not wholly effective distancing procedures, is guaranteed to bring about probably catastrophic economic changes well shy of the 'reasonably safe and acquirable immunity without continued shedding' that is the accepted end to the pandemic scare. Like it or not, we're going to have to solve return-to-work (and the restarting of the concerted economic processes that create an 'economy' out of the sum of individual back-to-working) long before there is either a concerted accurate testing methodology or effective treatment for those at risk who will have progressed to 'viral pneumonia' or ARDS symptomatology.

I encourage anyone here who is in a position to assess or develop solutions to pieces of this situation to accelerate their efforts, and to increase the degree of discussion and consensus-reaching to combine efforts into first a set of solutions, and then into a 'lessons-learned' framework for better response to pandemic issues that arise in future.

I apologize in advance for posting this kind of material on a railroad-preservation board, but it is at least within a tolerated topic.

South Korea and the USA recorded their first cases on the same day.

One country treated it as a public health problem and sprang into united action with preparations that they learned during previous outbreaks.

The other country treated it as a political problem with preparations that had been been scrapped for political reasons.

Guess which country's government is blaming everything under the sun for their failure?

Brian

IMHO we will not begin to solve the return to work issue until we can do rapid ( results in under 15 minutes) testing in the multi millions and the contact tracing attached to those who test positive.

If you listen to the knowledgeable health pros we are at least 4-6 months away from that capability today, despite the non fact based happy talk nonsense delivered daily by the Trump administration.

The American people are a lot smarter than they're given credit for ( especially in DC ) and they're not about to risk their families health playing Russian roulette with this disease.

My WAG is that it will be mid to late 2021 before we're well on our way back to our new " normal".

Plan for the worst.....pray for the best.

Ross Rowland

Agreed, Ross.

Exprail

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Only have seen news that the Mayor sees that it may stretch to July or August. But the Governor set May 15th as a tentative date.

I can not see NYC locked down until July. People and businesses can not wait that long to earn income. Nor does the city or state have the funds to continue to pay businesses to stay closed or unemployment funding and other safety net systems into August.

Many businesses are gone already.

PC

My full time paid job is exec director of a regional theatre in coastal Delaware. Thankfully we have (had?) a solid base of attendance and financial support from the local community in addition to summer tourist ticket sales.

I am already starting to hear concerns from our audience about social distancing once the bar is raised to allow gatherings of 50 people. If our theatre and the arts in general must deal with that new reality I am unsure how the museum and heritage railway will do the same.

In another RyPN thread there are suggestions of spaced seating, non-contact ticketing, cleaning equipment after each trip and the like. Perhaps it is time for the Heritage Rail Alliance to begin work on a new set of recommended practices focused on operations in this new reality?

Just a thought.

Wesley

Maybe in Pottstown they are....... here in the South, we have a relatively strong and strident subculture claiming and acting as their refusal to abide by any rules which limit their access to anything or ability to gather as a patriotic and moral imperative. Our President seems supportive of their sentiments and actions through a lack of condemnation. Leadership means providing the people with what they need in times of stress whether they like it or not, and there's nothing patriotic about behaving in ways which enhance the exposure of danger to your fellow citizens. I'm fortunate in having no chronic conditions despite my advanced age and ever present clumsiness, but I'm a caregiver for someone who does - and I can't keep her safe without first protecting myself since I provide all the food, services, et al.

A pox on all their houses, and may they be their only victims themselves.

Except for a portion of the millennials, most people around here are abiding by the rules. The wife and I are pretty much on self-imposed house arrest to reduce exposure as much as possible. Both of my parents are 95 years old and in fairly good health and we don't want to jeopardize that. I figure this is going to carry on until there is a vaccine. Do I like it? Hell no. But at least a lot of projects around the house are getting done.

Here in Mahoning County Ohio where I live, 0.26% of the population has Covid-19. Of that, 0.02% of residents have died. I am sure that when the latest unemployment numbers are released we will be at 20% (most likely higher), meaning that approx. 80 times more people will be affected by the economic effects than by the virus itself. Countrywide only 0.24% of the population has been diagnosed with Covid-19.

Just some perspective of the scale of the problem.

As I see it, those numbers are meaningless because of how terrible our testing rate is.

In addition it appears that a large number of folks have the virus, do not have symptoms, but are able to infect others nonetheless.

How can you be sure that you are not Kobe Bryant's helicopter pilot?

Brian