Stop complaining. Call your gatherings protests. Invite Murphy and legislators

Governor Murphy this weekend showed the New Jersey citizens how to gather closely in large groups while avoiding being ticketed for violating his Executive Order limiting public gatherings to 25 people.

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Missing Social-Distancing Data Delays Modeling for COVID-19 Hospital Surge

But health commissioner says hospitals will be able to handle coming spike in demand for critical care

By Jon Hurdle, NJ Spotlight

New Jersey hasn’t yet been able to model an anticipated surge in demand for hospital capacity for COVID-19 patients because it doesn’t have data on the effects of social distancing, but there are signs that hospitals will be able to cope, according to the state’s Commissioner of Health, Judith Persichilli.

The state’s health officials have been using CHIME, a tool for COVID-19 hospital capacity planning, which Penn Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania issued in mid-March. The tool, which has been made available to health care providers in 150 countries via open-source software, allows users to input data including the percentage of infected patients who have been hospitalized; the number of patients currently hospitalized, and the population a hospital system serves.

The resulting model also relies on the degree to which social distancing has reduced social contact, and that data wasn’t yet available, Persichilli said at Gov. Phil Murphy’s Friday briefing on the pandemic.

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I’m a nun and I’ve been social distancing for 29 years. Here are tips for staying home amid coronavirus fears.

For the past 29 years, I’ve chosen to practice social distancing.

Of course, I and the 17 other nuns I live with don’t call it that.

We are formally called cloistered sisters, meaning we never leave our walled-off monastery in Summit except for doctors’ visits or perhaps shopping for a specific item. We don’t go to parties or weddings or out to eat with friends. I often go months without leaving our 8-acre home.

The coronavirusis forcing many people in New Jersey and across the world to stay home, limit outside contact — and in a way, start living life like cloistered nuns.Of course, this virus i… Read the rest of this entry »

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