Melk with a Side of HCQ . . .
I’m sure most of you have seen posts from people who they’re staying at home until there’s a vaccine available. But what if it takes 5 years, or even never.
Check out this article about the problems with waiting for a WuFlu vaccine.
And of course there’s all the talk about rushing a vaccine into production by the end of the year. Well, that didn’t work out all that well back in 1976-77 with the first Swine Flu epidemic. Check out this Smithsonian magazine article from 3 years ago covering the problems that can occur when you ‘rush’ a vaccine into use.
And here’s a couple of articles about how HCQ is being used to good effect in other countries.
Here’s a nice article about how well HCQ is working in India, the largest manufacturer of HCQ in the world.
In Cameroon, chloroquine therapy hailed by French expert becomes state protocol
And here in the U.S. South Dakota will be First State with a Hydroxychloroquine Statewide Clinical Trial to Help Fight COVID-19
I’ve talked several times before about how the predicted seasonal flu has just dropped off the map. Originally forecast to be worse than normal, with 65,000 to 70,000 deaths, it’s now listed as being about 24,000 and holding.
So where did it go?
Did it just fade away, or is the WuFlu now killing what would have previously been seasonal flu victims, or are seasonal flu deaths being attributed to WuFlu because of the increased government payments?
You decide.
Less than 1% of New York City Coronavirus Fatalities (0.61%) had NO Underlying Health Conditions
Remember that over 1/3 of WuFlu deaths in the U.S. are in NYC, and half of those were in nursing homes. So stay away from NYC nursing homes and you’re pretty safe.
We’ve all seen various totals for the people who are infected with the Wuhanic Plague, but have few or no (asymptomatic) symptoms. Percentages range from 20-25% of the population, (the low end range) to the one most quoted, 80-85%.
White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator Dr. Deborah Birx told Fox News on Saturday night that the U.S. significantly underestimated the number of asymptomatic cases that existed of the coronavirus.
And in a recent series of testings at three separate federal prisons showed 95% of the inmates tested positive for WuFlu. Significant by itself, but where it really matters is when you started figuring the WuFlu’s mortality rate.
Right now we have about 1.2 million cases with 68,500 deaths, which comes out about a 6% fatality rate. Pretty high. But now what if we figure in a estimate for the few/no symptom people into the mix?
Let’s take median between the 85% and 95%, so 90%. That means the 1.2 million cases we know about really total 12,000,000 cases. So that gives you 0.0057 or a 0.6% mortality rate, a lot smaller. In fact, now you’re starting to get into seasonal flu rates.
And finishing up, here’s another article about how important good Vitamin D levels are in fighting off the WuFlu.
As I mentioned before, Jan and I take 10,000 i.u. of D3 daily.
And now for something completely different.
One Year Ago Today: We were in Melk, Austria
“Ve Know Vher . . .
Melk, Austria 5/3/2019
Our ship left Vienna last night a little before 11pm and when we went up to breakfast this morning at 7am, it was very foggy, with castle after castle appearing out of the mist.
Even this one, that I’m pretty sure must have been home to Dracula at one time. Perched high on a mountain crag, and partially obscured by the clouds, he certainly would have felt right at home.
Especially since it looks like the only way to get up there is by bat.
And of course the many churches. Many, many churches. Just church after church after church.
It’s amazing they had time to do anything else besides build churches. And FWIW these are all in the Baroque style.
We arrived in Melk about 11am, and after lunch, we were off on our excursion to the Melk Abbey, possibly the most famous Abbey in Austria. And that’s really saying a lot since there’s a heck of a lot of abbeys over here.
And it becomes more impressive the closer you get.
Amazingly this place has been an functioning Benedictine abbey for over 900 years.
Unfortunately we were not allowed to take photos inside the abbey, but obviously somebody was, or did anyway, since there are photos all over the Internet of it. So I thought I would share some of those.
It’s really hard to express how beautiful this place, almost overwhelmingly so. But two things bothered me about the visit.
First, they have added some sort of multi-media event, telling you about what you’re seeing, but mostly it seems to concentrate on the present Bishop and his background. The whole thing really clashed with the rest of the tour.
Second, adding even more to the ‘tourist attraction’ feel, is that you exit the tour . . . through the gift shop.
Getting back to the drop-off point for the 200 yard walk back to where our ship was docked, we noticed the high water marks from the Danube flooding the area.
Especially interesting was the one from August 15, 1501. Everything is OLD around here, even the floods.
And just behind this restaurant was a small RV park.
Unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to check out the pedestals to see about the hookups, but we were running late getting back to the ship. But we’ve noticed a number of small RV parks along the river as we’ve cruised.
The Skirnir cast off about 4pm heading up the Danube to our next port of call, Passau. And it didn’t bode well that within the hour it was raining fairly hard.
Dinner tonight was with our usual group, and as usual, was delicious.
We started off with a real favorite of ours, a Wedge Salad.
And when they put bacon on theirs, it’s two whole strips, not some measly crumbles.
For the entrée, Jan had the Broiled Herb Marinated Jumbo Shrimp with Baby Vegetables,
while I got the Krustenbraten, which is Crispy Pork Loin, marinated in beer, with potato pancakes and Steamed Cabbage.
Then for dessert we both got the Lime Cake, with white chocolate and raspberry sauce.
This place is dangerous to your waistline.
You would swear that the 3 other couples at our tables, and ourselves, were all RVer’s since the staff pretty much have to close down the dining room around us because we’re having so much fun. Of course the free-flowing wine may have something to do with that.
I have become so frustrated trying to use my new laptop with only built-in touchpad, that I had been trying to find a mouse for it. When I bought it in Budapest, the dealer tried to sell me one, and I should have bought it. But I had forgotten how irritating it is to use only the touchpad.
And I hadn’t had any luck locating a computer store near any of our stops to pick one up, so I ask Guest Services if they might had a spare that I could borrow, and they said they would check.
And when I went by later, Monika, the purser, a 6 ft. tall blonde, just handed me one. When I ask if I needed to sign anything, her voice dropped from her lilting Scandinavian accent into a guttural German one as she said, “Ve know vher you live’. And then she smiled.
So I’m not taking any chances. I’m definitely be returning it before we disembark.
More Tomorrow from the Blue (grayish-green) Danube.
Thought For The Day:
I prefer dangerous freedom over peaceful slavery.
~Thomas Jefferson
gh
