Gigs Cancelled - Health and Safety

[dhergert]

Most of us can have a conversation about COVID-19, such as what we have in this thread, and not feel any increase in anxiety. However, there is a strong potential for some folks to experience heightened levels of stress with each news update or personal anecdote. For those folks, the following (with some minor edits) is from The US Department of Veteran Affairs National Center for PTSD. If you are anxious or stressed about COVID-19 (or any adverse situation for that matter), it offers some useful tips to help you manage what you are feeling. In fact, there are probably a couple of useful takeaways for all of us.


Managing Stress Associated with the COVID-19 Virus Outbreak
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This whole presentation is excellent! Thank you for posting!

[Timbofood]

Just heard my wife may be working from home for the next 60 days! Not firmed up yet but, that’s the most recent scuttlebutt from her office.

[Br1ck]

I live in Santa Clara county(Ca.) where we are on the exact trajectory as Washington State. Just a trickle here and there, but no one is counting on a break. Yesterday, the governor stated they had 7500 test kits in California. They should have 750,000. The representative in DC had come in contact with 50 people. You can see the problem. Without adequate testing we are flying blind. Think of the possibility of just one trucker coming in contact with just the people in diners along the way.

So extreme caution is in order. All large events, and schools are closed down. The economic toll is going to be great. The one social event of my week, an open mic, I’m skipping until further notice. The freeways have no traffic. Tech has gone to work from home in almost every instance. Believe the science. My life could depend on it.

[Lucas]

... Which is the reason not to over-react.

This year's novel Coronavirus has become as much a legal-liability and political issue as a medical issue. If panic continues, every financial sector will be effected and you can expect a recession as well as loss of freedoms supposedly based on fear of medical exposure.

I'm just as vulnerable as any of us here, with both age and a suppressed immune system, and being a retired healthcare professional I'm also just as sensitive if not more about loss of life. But we've seen this kind of scare often before and similar situations have not been worth the civil and cultural disruptions that they have caused.

We talked about flu earlier... Has the news media headlined how the scientists missed the right flu virus with the vaccine this year? No. There have been over 16,000 USA flu deaths in the 2019-2020 flu year so far, and that's just the USA. Normal for the USA is between 12K and 61K lives lost per year since 2010, for the world normal is between 250K and 650K lives lost per year. This is all depending on how accurate the flu vaccine has been.

"The CDC has called this coronavirus “a very serious public health threat,” but adds that its immediate health risk to the American public is low."

Let's try to keep this in perspective, and encourage those around us do the same. There's a lot at stake.

A balanced, rational approach is the best. Coronavirus symptoms are fever, cough and shortness of breath, not diarrhea, so people don't need to stockpile TP. Face masks that have been coughed on, sneezed on, or even breathed on in a non-sterile environment for more than just a few minutes are no longer effective and are more likely to incubate viruses than to block them, so using them outside of temporarily in a clean hospital environment is ineffective. Medical Centers are having trouble getting sufficient supplies of these provisions because people are hoarding them. Please try to discourage this among family and friends.

The best personal thing to do is wash your hands. Avoiding indoor crowds if possible is also a good thing to do. If you don't feel good, it could much more likely be a cold or flu, so the best thing to do is simply stay home -- if you feel you are really seriously sick, contact your healthcare provider first before going in to be seen, so they can be prepared to care for you safely.

Don: everything that you wrote is 100% spot on. The actions being taken by the authorities in the US, both State and Federal, are being driven for legal or political reasons, not medical. I'm not taking any political sides, so please don't misunderstand me.

[Hendrik Ahrend]

I like that idea, but unfortunately we are not the decision makers; in many cases the panic-makers are.

On other online forums I'm seeing that many of the most weekly-income dependent people -- including full-time musicians -- are already really suffering heavily from the quarantines and cancellations in many countries. This is going to affect the world economy pretty quickly if we don't get it under control.

Please ask the decision makers that you have contact with for a "balanced, rational approach".

(I'm sorry in advance to the admins here in the Cafe' if this is going beyond the spirit of this forum.)

Don, I fully agree. My comment was a general and sarcastic take on the matter, not at all aimed at anyone here on the forum.

[Markus]

Don: everything that you wrote is 100% spot on. The actions being taken by the authorities in the US, both State and Federal, are being driven for legal or political reasons, not medical. I'm not taking any political sides, so please don't misunderstand me.

I think it is time to close this thread as we have clearly wandered into politics.

I don't care if people pretend to be experts about mandolins here, but the people posting medical claims and now claims about political motivation as if they are experts is too much. My wife works for the government in health care, I don't see why her motivations should be questioned on a mandolin board.

You can claim to `not take any political sides', but your initial sentence makes it clear what political side you are on.

[mojocaster]

All musicians who get their gigs canceled will emerge from this significantly poorer, but with all the woodshedding at home we're gonna do, we're also gonna get so much better at our craft!

[Eric Platt]

Spoke too soon. My gig Saturday for a family dance is cancelled. And our local Irish music community cancelled the big musical event for next Tuesday. Not part of that, but many folks I know were scheduled to play.

Update - and while typing that, our big gig in Madison, WI in the middle of April is cancelled. They're just tying to play it safe. (Am grateful I don't rely on my music income to survive.)

[Mandolin Cafe]

I'm not asking, but insisting on a halt on this discussion until Ted Eschliman has a chance to review. I'm slammed with other business at the moment and just don't have the time to stop and tend to this but a cursory glance suggests violations of forum posting guidelines have been crossed.

[MikeEdgerton]

In looking at this a question was asked, a question was answered and a discussion has ensued that has little to do with this forum. Let's keep the Cafe as the place you can go without the political discussions.