Concern Over Sleep Apnea and Coronavirus Transmission

[Lifeisabeach]

Arizona doctor is building boxes to help protect health care workers.

https://www.abc15.com/news/state/valley ... -shortages

A good idea for the current emergency, but we need a more elegant long-term solution.

Imagine twenty-years from now when Covid-19 is just a horrible memory. You're hospitalized a condition, perhaps not even a respiratory condition. They won't want you to use your CPAP an mask as it's currently configured because it will be seen as not hygienic in a hospital setting.

I guarantee you healthcare will be radically changed in many ways in the aftermath of this crisis. I'm sure this and other MacGuyered solutions will be refined and become standard equipment/solutions in the future.

[Hannibal 2]

Truly, if you are positive for Covid 19 or have suspicious symptoms, you should be isolated in a single room and not share any air space with family members. It doesn't matter if you are on CPAP or not, as long as you are breathing (and certainly if you are sneezing and coughing) you are shedding virus. You should not be sharing a bathroom with anyone either as they have found virus in the GI tract and there are GI symptoms as well.

We set up the 2nd floor of our house to be a quarantine zone if it comes to that. Everyone should be looking at their homes and working out a plan to isolate a zone as much as possible. Supply the area in advance with essentials to minimize movement in and out of the area. Make it as comfortable now as you need it to be for a 2 week or longer quarantine.

I would not stop using my CPAP in that isolation. I want to wake up every morning and have a fighting chance of surviving. If my O2 sats are already in the toilet from sleep apnea all night, plus all those stress hormones, that would greatly diminish my chances against virus.

This. Exactly this.

My understanding is that by the time you start displaying symptoms of covid-19 you will already have spread it to others, if this is true (and I'm sure you'll correct me if it's not), then quarantine at this stage would be akin to closing the stable door after the horse has bolted.

[Lifeisabeach]

Truly, if you are positive for Covid 19 or have suspicious symptoms, you should be isolated in a single room and not share any air space with family members. It doesn't matter if you are on CPAP or not, as long as you are breathing (and certainly if you are sneezing and coughing) you are shedding virus. You should not be sharing a bathroom with anyone either as they have found virus in the GI tract and there are GI symptoms as well.

We set up the 2nd floor of our house to be a quarantine zone if it comes to that. Everyone should be looking at their homes and working out a plan to isolate a zone as much as possible. Supply the area in advance with essentials to minimize movement in and out of the area. Make it as comfortable now as you need it to be for a 2 week or longer quarantine.

I would not stop using my CPAP in that isolation. I want to wake up every morning and have a fighting chance of surviving. If my O2 sats are already in the toilet from sleep apnea all night, plus all those stress hormones, that would greatly diminish my chances against virus.

This. Exactly this.

My understanding is that by the time you start displaying symptoms of covid-19 you will already have spread it to others, if this is true (and I'm sure you'll correct me if it's not), then quarantine at this stage would be akin to closing the stable door after the horse has bolted.

"Potentially" have spread it to others. Likely, really, but you don't want to keep cross-contaminating each other when sick. If you are "expelling" a virus, better it not go to even someone who has it already because if it does, you just added to their existing viral load.

[Hannibal 2]

Truly, if you are positive for Covid 19 or have suspicious symptoms, you should be isolated in a single room and not share any air space with family members. It doesn't matter if you are on CPAP or not, as long as you are breathing (and certainly if you are sneezing and coughing) you are shedding virus. You should not be sharing a bathroom with anyone either as they have found virus in the GI tract and there are GI symptoms as well.

We set up the 2nd floor of our house to be a quarantine zone if it comes to that. Everyone should be looking at their homes and working out a plan to isolate a zone as much as possible. Supply the area in advance with essentials to minimize movement in and out of the area. Make it as comfortable now as you need it to be for a 2 week or longer quarantine.

I would not stop using my CPAP in that isolation. I want to wake up every morning and have a fighting chance of surviving. If my O2 sats are already in the toilet from sleep apnea all night, plus all those stress hormones, that would greatly diminish my chances against virus.

This. Exactly this.

My understanding is that by the time you start displaying symptoms of covid-19 you will already have spread it to others, if this is true (and I'm sure you'll correct me if it's not), then quarantine at this stage would be akin to closing the stable door after the horse has bolted.

"Potentially" have spread it to others. Likely, really, but you don't want to keep cross-contaminating each other when sick. If you are "expelling" a virus, better it not go to even someone who has it already because if it does, you just added to their existing viral load.

I guess right now we are going above and beyond the precautions required to avoid picking up this virus - better too much than not enough. So yes I agree, the same probably applies to this situation, it's likely that everyone else in the house already has it, but could be a slim chance that someone hasn't or just has a low viral load.

[babydinosnoreless]

Truly, if you are positive for Covid 19 or have suspicious symptoms, you should be isolated in a single room and not share any air space with family members. It doesn't matter if you are on CPAP or not, as long as you are breathing (and certainly if you are sneezing and coughing) you are shedding virus. You should not be sharing a bathroom with anyone either as they have found virus in the GI tract and there are GI symptoms as well.

We set up the 2nd floor of our house to be a quarantine zone if it comes to that. Everyone should be looking at their homes and working out a plan to isolate a zone as much as possible. Supply the area in advance with essentials to minimize movement in and out of the area. Make it as comfortable now as you need it to be for a 2 week or longer quarantine.

I would not stop using my CPAP in that isolation. I want to wake up every morning and have a fighting chance of surviving. If my O2 sats are already in the toilet from sleep apnea all night, plus all those stress hormones, that would greatly diminish my chances against virus.

This. Exactly this.

My understanding is that by the time you start displaying symptoms of covid-19 you will already have spread it to others, if this is true (and I'm sure you'll correct me if it's not), then quarantine at this stage would be akin to closing the stable door after the horse has bolted.

"Potentially" have spread it to others. Likely, really, but you don't want to keep cross-contaminating each other when sick. If you are "expelling" a virus, better it not go to even someone who has it already because if it does, you just added to their existing viral load.

Do viruses build up like that ? There is no way to isolate someone in my southwestern style house. Its a open floorplan with vaulted ceilings and family room/living room/ dining and kitchen all connected. We have one big barn door to keep dogs and cats apart but so it wouldn't mess up the air flow it has a big floor to ceiling wire mesh air vent right next to it. Well plus a/c and celling fans recirculating air constantly.

[Pugsy]

Some common sense measures folks.

Treat yourself like you have the virus....treat everyone else like they have the virus.

People who are already sick we know to avoid and they already know they need to be restricted but they contaminated their household long before they started showing symptoms. The biggest spreading factor is people who have it but aren't showing symptoms...they don't know to isolate themselves and others don't know to avoid them.

[Hannibal 2]

Do viruses build up like that ?

Some do I believe, but from what I'm reading they don't know enough about viral load with covid-19 to clarify this. Best to assume it does.

[Amishboy51]

Some common sense measures folks.

Treat yourself like you have the virus....treat everyone else like they have the virus.

People who are already sick we know to avoid and they already know they need to be restricted but they contaminated their household long before they started showing symptoms. The biggest spreading factor is people who have it but aren't showing symptoms...they don't know to isolate themselves and others don't know to avoid them.

Yes, and for the comprehension-limited folks (like me), that means, “stay in/near your home, except for limited, ’essential’ purposes.” [hopefully, we can all intelligently determine what’s essential for each of us]

Be well.

[Pugsy]

Yes, and for the comprehension-limited folks (like me), that means, “stay in/near your home, except for limited, ’essential’ purposes.” [hopefully, we can all intelligently determine what’s essential for each of us]

As do I.....it's just common sense. What's so hard about that?
Common sense and decency.... but I long ago quit expecting people to have much of either and I am usually the optimist in the family.

Case in point....
Today my hubby went to local WalMart early because between 7 and 8 is senior hour and we were hoping that he might pick up a couple of things that I am totally out of before the shelves get picked over.
There was a woman there with her 2 kids (who also each had a cart)...and she wasn't 60....she cleaned out the 5 lb rolls of hamburger meat...hubby said there was over 20....she cleaned out the eggs...there were 2 cases....and my hubby saw one of the kids over in the toilet paper section (which was totally bare) and he was muttering "she's not going to like this" and hubby asked if they were out of TP...."oh, no, we have 40 CASES already but she wants to stock up even more". The lady who checked out hubby said she checked out that same woman 4 times yesterday with her 2 kids....and 3 carts each time all loaded up like the ones today.
Our local WalMart has limits on paper products but nothing else...obviously they need to rethink that policy.
I am still out of flour....WalMart flour section bare...hubby asked one of the workers about it. He said they got a shipment Thursday and 2 women cleaned it out within an hour. 2 women and 2 pallets of flour. No one has any common sense or decency anymore.
If nothing else that low class white trash woman should leave her kids at home and not potentially expose them just to supplement her hoarding. BTW...that woman and her 2 kids could probably stand to do without a few meals if you know what I mean.
Hubby being the not so politically correct person he is...did mention that fact along with the supposedly age restriction for sales and her blatant abuse of it and what she replied I can't type....

Common sense folks...common sense and I guess I need to add decency to the equation. Pretty sad state of affairs.

Treat yourself like you have it for the protection of others....treat others like they have it for your protection.
There is no need to hoard in this magnitude....this isn't the end of the world as we know it.
There's no need to nuke your cpap equipment...if it gets contaminated guess who contaminated it???? Common sense folks...use it.
Do the best you can and that's all anyone can expect but don't hurt yourself or your neighbor in the process.

[Dog Slobber]

"Potentially" have spread it to others. Likely, really, but you don't want to keep cross-contaminating each other when sick. If you are "expelling" a virus, better it not go to even someone who has it already because if it does, you just added to their existing viral load.

This myth that when we get sick we can keep cross-contaminating each other is nonsense.

[Pugsy]

This myth that when we get sick we can keep cross-contaminating each other is nonsense.

+1.

There is no magic level of where we get exposure to X amount of germs/whatever and below that level we don't catch it and above it we do.
It doesn't work that way. Our immune system doesn't work that way. If we get exposed to something the immune system doesn't like it still immediately start to try to fight it off...even if it is one bug or 100 or 1million. The response doesn't change.
Old wives tale for sure....but it hurts nothing to take extra precautions if it makes a person feel better.

My house is a "big" 600 sq ft house...If I caught this thing or any other thing it's a physical impossibility to isolate anything.
One bedroom, one bathroom...kitchen, dining, living room is all one big room....to start with.

[Dog Slobber]

...
Our local WalMart has limits on paper products but nothing else...obviously they need to rethink that policy.
...

Absolutely.

And this is a WalMart problem, not just a hoarder problem.

The place where I most often do my shopping has put limitations on all items. The exact limits, per item aren't posted, I'm guessing they vary.

[Pugsy]

And this is a WalMart problem, not just a hoarder problem.

It's mainly a hoarder problem in my book. It's easy to get around any store limits...just go out and come back in and use a different cashier.
My husband asked how these people are paying for this stuff....answer...cash believe it or not. Where they are getting the cash is another question and we can't track cash purchases.

The stores can put all the limits in the world but people will find a way to bypass the system. Probably why WalMart hasn't bothered to try very much. They know that there's not a damn thing they can do about people buying limits and go put those products in their car and turned around and come right back in and load up again.

[Lifeisabeach]

Do viruses build up like that ?

Some do I believe, but from what I'm reading they don't know enough about viral load with covid-19 to clarify this. Best to assume it does.

Last I read, it's not even know if an immunity will be built up from having had it. There was a case from China where someone recovered; friends and family had a little party to celebrate; and he got infected again. There's an article I just found where they said any antibodies one develops don't last long in at least some people.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nat ... 804905002/

Of course this is a different virus and situation, but standing advice for HIV-infected people is to not have unprotected sex so they don't re-infect each other. Much of the reason behind that is that there are multiple strains and the virus mutates, so you risk passing a new strain between each other.
https://saaf.org/question/we-are-both-h ... e-condoms/

The reality is there's just still not a whole lot we know about COVID-19. Even if it's "a myth" that you can't add to their viral load, what you also don't want to do is expose someone who is already fighting this virus to other infectious diseases. What would happen if your body is fighting COVID-19 and you then get a flu virus thrown into the mix? Isolation is protection for everyone, including the infected person. I absolutely agree that it's highly likely that if one person is infected in a household, then everyone is. But it doesn't hurt to hope for the best.

Here's some more good reading with tips on how to self-isolate.
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-03- ... ation.html

[babydinosnoreless]

And this is a WalMart problem, not just a hoarder problem.

It's mainly a hoarder problem in my book. It's easy to get around any store limits...just go out and come back in and use a different cashier.
My husband asked how these people are paying for this stuff....answer...cash believe it or not. Where they are getting the cash is another question and we can't track cash purchases.

The stores can put all the limits in the world but people will find a way to bypass the system. Probably why WalMart hasn't bothered to try very much. They know that there's not a damn thing they can do about people buying limits and go put those products in their car and turned around and come right back in and load up again.

Walmart managers get to decide limits for their stores at least here. We have one Walmart that is limiting milk to 1 gallon. Less than 5 miles from another that has no limits. The neighborhood market (walmart grocery only) has limits on meat but not milk. Its a crap shoot. People are posting on fb when they find a store with stuff others are looking for. Some restaurants are selling packets of eggs, milk, yeast and other stuff so it doesn't go bad. Crazy times !