A thing I've been really frustrated by with a lot of coronavirus advice posts is lack of specificity. What does "quarantine for 14 days" mean? Do I need to poop in a bucket? Can I use my private yard? Let deliveries be placed on my doorstep? If I'm recovered but my housemate is still sick, what are my obligations?

This is a thread for all of those questions. Nothing is too trivial to include, and I ask that people not downvote things they think are obvious (although still upvote the questions you find most useful). Note that even though these are questions, please submit them as answers to this question, rather than as related questions, just for simplicity.

How we plan to use this thread:

  • Maybe someone will answer your question. That would be cool.
  • It will help inform the LW COVID research agenda.
  • We've had some interest from an Official Government Agency in answering these kinds of questions in a truly exhaustive "So You Caught Coronavirus" guide. The relevant Official Government Agencies are pretty busy right now and this is the kind of project that can be dropped even when they're not, but it is a thing that might happen.

More example questions:

  • When should I seek treatment vs. toughing it out at home?
  • Do I need to avoid my pets?
  • How do I know when I'm safe to rejoin society?
  • Do I need an electrolyte solution with potassium or is table salt enough?
  • How do I get to a doctor safely when I don't have a car?
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James_Miller

240

If the hospitals get overwhelmed and a family member in my home gets critically ill, what should I do to help them? Are there good YouTube videos that will teach me the basics of caring for someone with whatever lung problems the virus can cause absent my having medical equipment?

[-]jmh80

While potentially a morbid approach, you could check with any of the area hospice providers/organizations. They deal with people in very bad health situations all the time. Based on my experience (both parents died in 2017) end of live situations seem to get to a breathing ability management stage.

They might even be a source of oxygen machines that could be used if hospital ICU space is not available. (Not sure if those systems are included in the various counts people bandy around for the hospital ability to serve COVID-19 demands).

They can probably also... (read more)

Eli Tyre

170

How bad is it to share a bathroom with someone who is infected? Are there things you can do to make that better?

The WHO guidance is that the person who is infected uses a mask as much as possible, that they use the bathroom for evening routine last (after you) and that they clean it/disinfect it after use.

Eli Tyre

110

How much does wiping down an object with disinfectant wipes reduce the risk of infection from that object?

It depends on:

  • what the object is/its surface material.
  • how effective the disinfectant used is.
  • how thorough the wiping is done. All clean, all disinfected, all good.
  • (how the now potentially infected wipe is handled).

If you're looking for specifics then try researching "fomites" (objects that could carry infections) and how to clean what can be potentially contaminated.

1 Related Questions

2Answer by james_t
Thanks for asking this question. I have come down with something -- I've been feeling increasingly bad for the last 4-5 days, since I took a train out of NYC. In retrospect, I should have done so earlier, or not done so at all, but hindsight is 20-20. I'm not certain I've got C19, but I'm trying to take actions that would help me if I do. --A lot of fluids, obviously. --I'm taking vitamin C in large quantities. There's currently a clinical trial which is testing this; I don't know if it will work out, obviously, but I might as well. (https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04264533) --Vitamin D, for much the same reason. --I'm sleeping / resting / staying in bed, pretty much continuously. --I have, of course, a oximeter -- so far, all my readings >= 94, usually 96-97, which seems fine. I might order a second in case that seems innacurate. --I'm planning to get licorice-tea, and drink it in enormous quantities. This will, in fact, raise my blood pressure, but apparently licorice contains some antiviral agents. (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4629407/) --One thing that's difficult is that I'm noticing that it's getting harder to think. I'll need to make provision for my future inability to make good decisions. If people have further ideas, I'd be interested in them. It's a frightening situation for me, although I'm reasonably healthy and in the 30-39 age bracket. I realize that some of the above actions have very small probability of substantially helping, but it's hard to dig up better ones, especially because so many of the drugs used to fight this require a prescription, and currently you cannot get a prescription until you're already basically at deaths door.
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Given that you posted this as a question rather than a post, are you looking for people to post using the "Related Questions" feature? I see one question posted as an answer already, so worth clarifying how you'd like us to use the thread in the body of your post.

I'm looking for [questions in English] to be delivered as [answers in LW]

Just as a small piece of evidence:

I've read an interview of a patient released from a swiss hospital. She isn't allowed to leave her appartment but can spend time in her garden and is allowed to recieve deliveries (there was no specification about how deliveries are done). This points towards the doctors not being very concerned about aerosolized infections.

Worth keeping in mind: The goal of public health authorities is not zero transmission events. Rather, it is keeping the R value -- the number of new infections per person -- below 1, and as low as practical. From that perspective, what they want to do is eliminate the primary routes of spread, rather than all possible routes. (And I suspect this is what they mean when they say things like "asymptomatic carriers are not a major driver" -- not that you can't get infected from them, but that their R value is comfortably below 1, so from a public health perspective they aren't critical. The pandemic can be stopped without addressing them.)