Apple Reclosing Some Stores in Texas Amid Spiking Coronavirus Cases

[Baymowe335]

If folks wear masks, keep up social distancing, keep up testing, and we do quarantining and contact tracing of sick people, we can do way better. Take a look at Europe.

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The virus didn’t magically disappear from Europe. They reopen more, it will spread again...this time likely with a far lower death rate.
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The number of positive cases certainly may be affected by more testing, but the number of hospitalized has jumped dramatically as well. While hospital systems in general have claimed to be hurting financially, patient’s need to meet admission criteria to be admitted to a hospital. Which means at least some sort of symptoms that cannot safely be managed as an outpatient.

So there’s more to it than the death rate Or the number of positive cases. It’s more likely that more people are getting infected because more of the general population has the virus - whether they are symptomatic themselves or not. And unfortunately some of those with symptoms are to the point they are being hospitalized, which inevitably would lead to more deaths (though I hope this can be avoided)

Then we should quarantine for the flu too. It’s serious and kills tens of thousands every year, with a vaccine.

 

[KPOM]

The Texas government is guilty of gross negligence.

Still way fewer deaths than New York.

Staying inside might not be the answer, either, since HVAC systems might spread the virus.

 

[yaxomoxay]

People don’t get it, if you don’t have to go to a store for Something that can be remedied by purchasing online, shipping your product for repairs, etc., then don’t. The Problem I see, is people don’t want to be the example of what to do as advised From all the professional health advice we have available to us with resources, And yet, it’s more important for people to put their ‘wants‘ first in terms of grouping where it’s unnecessary.

Let me add one thing that almost everyone forgets. If you shop online, and people don't work, and stores close, municipalities will lose almost all their revenue which is almost entirely coming from sales taxes and some other "usage" fee (public transportation, hotel fees, etc). Tourism oriented cities will lose even more. This means that municipalities (and counties) will need to layoff thousands of people, they will become unable to pay for basic services, to pay for street repair, utility repair, safety, fire safety etc., let alone stuff like libraries. The first people that will be impacted the most are going to be homeless individuals, then the poorest of the poorest. then everybody else.
How do I know? I see it in real time, and you have no idea how much in my line of work we're feeling this. We expect that it will take between 5 to 10 years before things will stabilize budget wise, and this from a minor lockdown that lasted about a month.

 

[furqan8421]

If they are doing this based on what the media reports, they are merely costing themselves income.. Most of the media with rare exceptions is ginning this up. As they test more, they get more results, most people are asymptomatic, and hospitalizations and ventilations and fatalities are way way down.. States with the least barriers are doing far better than states that went overboard on the lockdowns, Course hardly anyone is counting the other human costs created by this..

As someone else noted, some how the bar got moved, it changed from flatten the curve to stop it at all costs, which of course is ridiculous.. The more we get out, the more people may become infected, and since 99% or so recover or have no symptoms, they become immune..

Where are you getting that hospitalizations are way down - at least in Texas

Many hospitals in the major cities are claiming to be at or near capacity. The proportion of those with covid positive tests relative to those needing hospitalization may be different -> but at the same time people are needing to be hospitalized
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Yes, very dramatic. I’m so scared now...more testing after a quarantine lift is causing more cases. I’m shocked.

As was stated the number of patients being hospitalized is also increasing. Your bravado borders on stupidity

 

[Professor Rucy]

Since 90% of the hospitalizations here are related to either meat-packing plants in rural West Texas (where Apple stores aren’t) and/or within the incarcerated prison populations (where Apple stores aren’t either), yeah, closing Apple stores makes a hell of a lot of sense. If Apple had a contact-tracing app of some sort (or read their own Apple News COVID-19 section) they would be aware of this. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

At least the Simply Mac stores remain open here in East Texas.

 

[newyorksole]

Godzilla is scheduled for July, reptilian invasion is scheduled for August, and the AI Skynet revolution is scheduled for October. September is free for now.

Good because my birthday is in September. 🙌🏾

 

[yaxomoxay]

As was stated the number of patients being hospitalized is also increasing.

What's the acceptable threshold to reopen the economy? Without a precise answer to this it's impossible to have a conversation.

 

[furqan8421]

What's the acceptable threshold to reopen the economy? Without a precise answer to this it's impossible to have a conversation.

Quite frankly, and respectfully, the economy doesn’t require a magic key to unlock and reopen which is why there is no answer

Things will take time to get back to normal. Right now lots of people are out of work, and people with jobs are unlikely to spend a lot of their income as they may be next to lose their jobs.

You can’t “reopen the economy” because it is multifaceted. You can say that people are safe to return to work if they do so safely, but that doesn’t mean that money will be flowing as it was prior to the pandemic.

 

[citysnaps]

I think we’re all just a tad quick to feel like this is over. We’re not even out of the first wave yet.

No doubt some here continue to believe it's just a flu.

 

[macduke]

We shut down to flatten the curve and learn more about it. We learned that transmission is significantly reduced if you wear a face mask and social distance. So what do we do? Open back up, and people have been threatening to murder various county and state health officials who have mandated masks, and have murdered employees who have stopped them from entering a store because they're not wearing a mask. They've packed into crowded restaurants and other venues. Even where I live, in a college town where about 75% of adults have a college degree and 25% have a masters or higher, only 1/3 of people are wearing masks. A lot of people are not following social distancing and having big neighborhood parties. This US is nearly lawless and out of control right now, run by mob rule.

I always see people point to the projections from groups like the IHME that the Coronavirus Task Force frequently relied upon, primarily because they would always forecast the lowest projections. But why are the projections always off and miss reality? They assume people following guidelines of social distancing and wearing masks. So people look at those numbers and think "Well, this is over! The numbers are going to trail off." and they do the exact opposite and seem surprised when the numbers go up. Those numbers only work if you as an individual put in the effort to follow guidelines! I feel like all of this is a communications issue. It needs to be stated clearly from the top. Good luck with that. All of these other countries have figured it out and we're still flailing about like some third world country. Although honestly there are a lot of third world countries that are better off than the US right now, lol. It's insanity.

 

[yaxomoxay]

Quite frankly, and respectfully, the economy doesn’t require a magic key to unlock and reopen which is why there is no answer

Things will take time to get back to normal. Right now lots of people are out of work, and people with jobs are unlikely to spend a lot of their income as they may be next to lose their jobs.

You can’t “reopen the economy” because it is multifaceted. You can say that people are safe to return to work if they do so safely, but that doesn’t mean that money will be flowing as it was prior to the pandemic.

Agreed, it doesn't require a magic key, but policies affect the economy to a huge degree. A total mandated lockdown for example will mean that people will not work, or spend enough to keep the various local economies up (blue collar workers will be hit first). So by reopening the economy it is meant to put in place few regulations to decrease the risks (I am ok with mandated masks at grocery stores for example), but that are not enough to disrupt the economy to a high degree.

 

[unchecked]

I think we’re all just a tad quick to feel like this is over. We’re not even out of the first wave yet.

There’s no second wave is the first wave didn’t end. heh.

If they are doing this based on what the media reports, they are merely costing themselves income.. Most of the media with rare exceptions is ginning this up. As they test more, they get more results, most people are asymptomatic, and hospitalizations and ventilations and fatalities are way way down.. States with the least barriers are doing far better than states that went overboard on the lockdowns, Course hardly anyone is counting the other human costs created by this..

As someone else noted, some how the bar got moved, it changed from flatten the curve to stop it at all costs, which of course is ridiculous.. The more we get out, the more people may become infected, and since 99% or so recover or have no symptoms, they become immune..

Should have acted and locked down earlier. But that’s water under the bridge now.

The thing with this disease is it’s a lottery. We don’t know if we’re going to get severely affected or get away with mild or no symptoms, much like HIV.

We don’t know if we’re infected. We don’t know if we get immunity and even if we do we don’t know how long it will last. We can get affected multiple times by diseases like dengue if we get hit by another strain of the virus. Or we may never build immunity, again, much like HIV.

There’s so much we don’t know and so many variables. Vaccines are going to take time to get it right and chances are it’s going to be something we may have to regularly get much like the flu vaccine.

So until one appears, the best course of action is do our best to not get infected and not infect other people when we’re outside. That means washing our hands, wearing masks, not touching our faces.

 

[triangletechie]

If folks wear masks, keep up social distancing, keep up testing, and we do quarantining and contact tracing of sick people, we can do way better. Take a look at Europe. They’re doing the right things, it’s not magic.

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I don't think they have many people who own a red hat.

 

[ghostface147]

Houston is a troubled place right now, case wise. Hospitalization rates are going up, available beds is going down, but deaths are not rising massively though. Texas should go back to Phase 1.

 

[AustinIllini]

I have no issue with them closing these stores

What I question is why they don’t also close stores in Austin and San Antonio which have also had dramatic spikes in positive cases recently

I don't think the Austin store at the Domain has been open...they were boarded up like two weeks ago
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Houston is a troubled place right now, case wise. Hospitalization rates are going up, available beds is going down, but deaths are not rising massively though. Texas should go back to Phase 1.

Yes, we should. The reopening charade is over.

 

[BornAgainMac]

I miss the old days when people complained about the keyboard, touchbar, spinning disks on the entry level iMac, or disappointing keynotes.

 

[yaxomoxay]

Yes, we should. The reopening charade is over.

If you want all municipalities to go bankrupt, feel free. We're already scrambling for money due to loss of revenue like there's no tomorrow. I am all for enforcing masks and such, but we need to stay open if we want even the most basic services to work.

 

[cocky jeremy]

I think we’re all just a tad quick to feel like this is over. We’re not even out of the first wave yet.

There's nothing to be over. Just media hype and pointless panic over nothing.

 

[ThaGoochiestMane]

Godzilla is scheduled for July, reptilian invasion is scheduled for August, and the AI Skynet revolution is scheduled for October. September is free for now.

Perfect, that leaves September for the big 3 companies to slide in some keynotes! I'd really like to know what device I'm going to be using that new Skynet on.

 

[genovelle]

Pretty much everywhere will see increased cases compared to the days when everyone was huddling in their homes. History may show that closing businesses only prolonged the inevitable

The problem is opening fully without robust testing and tracing in place makes it impossible to identify and isolate those who have been infected and exposed.

 

[sofila]

Godzilla is scheduled for July, reptilian invasion is scheduled for August, and the AI Skynet revolution is scheduled for October. September is free for now.

And all of this is going to happen strictly on US territory, like 30 years of catastrophic movies teached us.

 

[QCassidy352]

What's the acceptable threshold to reopen the economy? Without a precise answer to this it's impossible to have a conversation.

Well, it depends in large part on how willing (or not) people are to engage in behaviors that limit the spread. We could have a lot more open with relative safety if people were Ok with masks, mass testing, social distancing, etc.

The problem is that a lot of the people who are yelling the loudest for things to be "reopened" are also the least willing to accept these relatively minor concessions that would make it much more possible. If you want the economy as re-opened as possible, you should be first in line for a mask, a bluetooth contract tracing API on your phone, etc. And yet it seems to be the reverse.

 

[CarlJ]

If folks wear masks, keep up social distancing, keep up testing, and we do quarantining and contact tracing of sick people, we can do way better. Take a look at Europe. They’re doing the right things, it’s not magic.

“But muh freedums!!1!”

 

[normang]

Europe is down now simply because they did a full lockdown, something that almost no one in the US did. The virus didn't magically disappear from Europe, and now that they are reopening, seeing protests, and public events etc, they will also see a spike (see Germany). The roles have simply reversed, Europe used to be 15/30-ish days ahead the US, now it's the US that is ahead.

I guess you never saw any of the reports that show that the lockdowns probably did not really do much of anything, it was more of the social distancing to some degree.. The big problem has always been the elderly or those with underlying conditions that are made worse or fatal when Covid strikes..

 

[Fatboy71]

I think we’re all just a tad quick to feel like this is over. We’re not even out of the first wave yet.

I couldn't agree more, especially as other places around the world are getting spikes of new cases. Places and businesses are too keen to reopen (which I can fully understand their keenness) but its all about money/the economy first, and peoples lives are coming second in my opinion.

I also feel that people are getting lacks and flouting lockdown restrictions more and more.