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Medicine United States News

SXSW Canceled Due To Coronavirus After Austin Declares 'Local Disaster' (cnbc.com) 95

Posted by msmash from the breaking-news dept.
South by Southwest, the annual tech, film and music conference held in Austin, Texas, has been canceled due to concerns surrounding the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak. From a report: Local government officials announced the update at a press conference Friday afternoon discussing the status of the outbreak and events in the city. Austin's Mayor Steve Adler said he had declared a local disaster in the city and issued an order canceling the conference. In a statement on its website, SXSW said it would "faithfully follow the City's directions." "We are devastated to share this news with you," organizers wrote in a statement on the SXSW website. The show must go on is in our DNA, and this is the first time in 34 years that the March event will not take place. We are now working through the ramifications of this unprecedented situation." Austin officials said there are no confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Travis County, where Austin is located. But confirmed cases around the world passed 100,000 Friday.
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SXSW Canceled Due To Coronavirus After Austin Declares 'Local Disaster' More

SXSW Canceled Due To Coronavirus After Austin Declares 'Local Disaster'

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  • Why not broadcast it? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by WillAffleckUW ( 858324 ) on Friday March 06, 2020 @06:53PM (#59804918) Homepage Journal

    No, I'm serious.

    Virtual sessions, broadcast channels, use the same tech they used for interactive booths to allow the audience to post questions with a delay filter.

    I mean, if universities can decide to broadcast all their courses, seminars, and conferences online, why can't the tech-capable SXSW crowd do it?

    Now, excuse me, I have a chemistry class to interact with online for seminar ...

  • Nah (Score:4, Interesting)

    by sexconker ( 1179573 ) on Friday March 06, 2020 @07:02PM (#59804946)

    annual tech, film and music conference

    Nah, it's an advertising conference. Just like Comic(and video games and anime and movies and Verizon and...)Con.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by leonbev ( 111395 )

      Yeah, if SXSW was really just a music and movie festival, there isn't much reason why it couldn't just be streamed online.

      Now, if it's real reason to exist is just a giant viral marketing ploy and an excuse to jack up hotel prices for a few weeks... Well, that's (thankfully) harder to replicate using live streaming.

  • Follow the money (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mjsmith1568 ( 870220 ) on Friday March 06, 2020 @07:28PM (#59805010)
    South by Southwest cancels conference then they need to pay back attendees. South by Southwest gets government to declare natural disaster then they don't need to pay anyone back.

    • "Austin Mayor Steve Adler said he had declared a local disaster in the city and issued an order canceling the conference. "

      How does that fit your narrative?

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dj245 ( 732906 )

        "Austin Mayor Steve Adler said he had declared a local disaster in the city and issued an order canceling the conference. "

        How does that fit your narrative?

        Most contracts have a Force majeure [wikipedia.org] clause which means that they aren't responsible if certain disasters are declared by government entities.

        I don't know where to look to find this particular conference's T&C's but it probably has such a clause.

        • There's no force majeure for a conference which can be held at any time. If SXSW ever hooks a conference again they can be forced to accept the previously paid admissions. Force majeure are for one off or time sensitive contacts.

  • Put some zinc lozenges in your medicine cabinet. When you get that first tickle in your throat or slightly stuffy nose, you have the beginning of either the flu or covid19, and you should start the zinc lozenges as directed on the package. The virus has a real hard time moving down your zinc covered throat into your lungs, which would ordinarily be its next stop, to make you start coughing it all over the place. Taken early, the zinc lozenges abbreviate these illnesses.

    • Re:pro tip: zinc lozenges to arrest infection (Score:5, Funny)

      by Brett Buck ( 811747 ) on Friday March 06, 2020 @07:39PM (#59805032)

      I also heard you can swing a dead cat at midnight to ward off evil spirits

      • How should I do that? Over-head? Clockwise or counter-clockwise? Don't just tease us with all that. This is important. We need specific instructions. Also, we're going to have to be careful because in many places you can't swing a dead cat without hitting various things, and some of those things are not good to hit.

      • I also heard you can swing a dead cat at midnight to ward off evil spirits

        First time I've ever had to type LOL on Slashdot!

      • Yeah but what timezone?

      • I also heard you can swing a dead cat at midnight to ward off evil spirits

        He'd BETTER be dead, otherwise you're about to lose an arm or a hand once you stop swinging.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by anwyn ( 266338 )
        It works if the cat is not even dead. But the live ones do tend to make a lot of annoying noise.

    • Clinical study proof (Score:4, Informative)

      by doug141 ( 863552 ) on Friday March 06, 2020 @08:06PM (#59805096)

      https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p... [nih.gov]

      "Results

      The mean common cold duration was 33% (95% CI 21% to 45%) shorter for the zinc groups of the seven included trials. Three trials that used lozenges composed of zinc acetate found that colds were shortened by 40% and four trials that used zinc gluconate by 28%. The difference between the two salts was not significant: 12 percentage points (95% CI: 12 to+36). Five trials used zinc doses of 80–92mg/day, common cold duration was reduced by 33%, and two trials used zinc doses of 192–207mg/day and found an effect of 35%. The difference between the high-dose and low-dose zinc trials was not significant: 2 percentage points (95% CI: 29 to+32)."

      • I'd try it but unknown with this new virus what would happen

        • I'd try it but unknown with this new virus what would happen

          All the shelves would be empty, and people would be selling them for $500 a packet on Amazon / eBay.

          • most people don't know it's good for reducing cold severity (proved by peer reviewed stury) and there are piles of the stuff at walgreens and similar chain stores. that said, could be utterly useless against this new virus.

      • How is an article talking about Rhinovirus proof of anything about Influenza or Coronavirus other than proof of your complete ignorance on medical matters?

        • How is an article talking about Rhinovirus proof of anything about Influenza or Coronavirus other than proof of your complete ignorance on medical matters?

          How does you not even knowing what a cold is prove anything other than your ignorance on medical matters?

          The only time rhinovirus was even mentioned was in a reference to something else.

          Perhaps you need to find out what a cold [wikipedia.org] is.
          The study never mentioned the cause of the colds other than to say they were 'naturally acquired'. They never bothered to check the cause. You are just assuming it was a rhinovirus. Influenza viruses and coronavirus can both also cause colds.

          (Not that i would put much faith in

    • You're only half right. Does stop the sore throat within hours and lessens cold dramatically but is useless for influenza. I'd try it for other caronavirus but might not work

  • But, what about influenza?

    It is killing several magnitudes more.

    • SARS-CoV-2, at least the form spreading outside of China, is actually not much more unhealthy than the viruses that cause the common cold and influenza. This is just ridiculous over-reaction, to say the least.

      • Re:But, what about influenza? (Score:4, Informative)

        by WaffleMonster ( 969671 ) on Saturday March 07, 2020 @07:03AM (#59805826)

        SARS-CoV-2, at least the form spreading outside of China, is actually not much more unhealthy than the viruses that cause the common cold and influenza. This is just ridiculous over-reaction, to say the least.

        What's ridiculous is failure to learn from recent history. Look at what just happened to the death rates in Wuhan as a result of hospitals being overrun.

        When double digit percent of people infected require hospitalization and there are no beds available come back here and tell us all about how much this is just another flu and just how low the true honest CFR is once you count everyone who doesn't know they even have it.

        --
        I would rather because I like the numbers where they are.
        I don't need to have the numbers double because of one ship.

        • Next, they'll say "It's just a cold, what do you need a hospital for? Buck up."

          The virus hit China first, but it's like it was made just for us. Some Americans consider it a greater threat to their ego than their health. They're more threatened by the people trying to help than the virus.

        • Ah, I think you're forgetting that in China, you have two huge issues that have compromised pulmonary systems there:

          1. Decades to uncontrolled burning of coal for electric power plants in urban and industrial areas. All those oxides of nitrogen and sulfur, particulates and heavy metals aren't good for your longs.

          2. The Chinese are notorious heavy smokers. Indeed, 48% of all men are habitual smokers of cigarettes, no thanks to the China Tobacco monopoly.

          This is why when SARS-CoV-2 first appeared, it spread i

          • Ah, I think you're forgetting that in China, you have two huge issues that have compromised pulmonary systems there:

            1. Decades to uncontrolled burning of coal for electric power plants in urban and industrial areas. All those oxides of nitrogen and sulfur, particulates and heavy metals aren't good for your longs.

            2. The Chinese are notorious heavy smokers. Indeed, 48% of all men are habitual smokers of cigarettes, no thanks to the China Tobacco monopoly.

            Not clear to me why this would be relevant to the issue at hand.

            There area areas of China where CFR is under 1%.. areas of high density infection where healthcare facilities were overwhelmed CFRs were many times higher.

            Is the assertion China is an outlier and double digit percentage of those who get the infection won't require hospital admission in other countries? This has not been the case in Italy.... perhaps Italy is an outlier because it is full of "old people" ?

            It didn't ring true in Iran either with

    • There is a wave of influenza going in parallel with it. Several Eastern European countries put all schools offline this week because of it (not because of Covid19).
  • The event is a grim shadow of what it used to be
  • Until we get a meaningful denominator, then canceling "value add but not required" events seems to make sense. That said, I'm at a very large east coast university this weekend, and NONE of the kids are wearing masks. They're playing 5x5 bball, weight lifting, etc, without a care. Youthful ignorance? Perhaps. Intuition that this is overblown? Seems like it. This is the age of adults we chose to send ashore in battle. But there's ZERO indication of any sort of change, let alone panic, besides the on campus

    • Masks are for sick people to hold their virus in, not healthy people to keep the virus out. CDC guidance is that you are more likely to carry the virus around on the mask infecting other people (and yourself when you remove the mask) than to prevent infections.

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