The COVID 19 outbreak. Does it mean MORE backpacking this year?

Idster, antibodies work. Or, no one would recover.

How Long? Well, that is a valid question. They work at least till you recover from the disease…around 4-6 weeks. Are they immediately flushed out of your system? (I am guessing they have a half life similar to RBC  – red blood cells – at 120 days. They are “known” to be human in origin.) Are they still being produced in response to “triggering” infections? (Those infections that could cause the disease with no antibodies present usually trigger the production of more antibodies. However, if this cell dies, then it does not.) This is a simple biochemical feed-back loop. Can it be extracted from a doners blood?  This is the million dollar question, some proteins are too fragile for all but complicated extraction techniques. Since they have a test for this, I doubt it is too fragile, though.

Hi James, I didn’t word my post very well. I know antibodies work in people, what I meant was that we still don’t know how well antibodies from a ‘recovered’ COVID-19 person will work to help someone else.

Leading with the Unknowns in COVID-19 Models

From Scientific American. From the article:

“Others account for these dynamics, but make strong assumptions about the predictability of human behavior in the face of a crisis. Sometimes called ambiguity, non-numerical uncertainty like the unquantifiable inexactness of a model as a stand-in for reality means that our predictions could be off, by a little or by a lot depending on how flawed the model assumptions were. “All models are wrong, but some are useful,” said George Box, a statistician, reminding us of the tension between understanding models as tools for thinking versus expecting models to be oracles. Unfortunately, a careful critique of model assumptions, like other forthright presentations of uncertainty,, rarely makes it into the public-facing articles or visualizations used to present the results.”

Somebody posted a trip report on oregonhikers.org – 1 night backpack

Not at the coast or gorge that are officially closed, but a nearby national forest.

All developed sites in all national forests are closed, but dispersed sites and backpacking are not prohibited but discouraged.

There were a couple other people on the trail, easy to socially distance

A couple people posted that we should follow the governor’s  orders and stay home, or at least not post about it

It’s frustrating because hiking on a trail that has just a few or no other people doesn’t contribute to the problem.  Especially compared to allowed activities like grocery shopping.

There is a risk that if you require help because you break your leg or something, it will be difficult to rescue you, and put other people at risk.

I’m cancelling on a mid July group backpack unless some miracle vaccine or cure OR ultra reliable tests have been developed before then.

If a very reliable test has been developed I’ll ask that ALL group members be tested or I just won’t go. None of this “I’m an AMERICAN and walk test free.” B.S. for me.

Yeah, yeah, I know we’ll all sleep in separate tents, cook separate meals but there’s no way all the participants can keep 6 to 8 ft.”social distance all the time in a group backpack. Just won’t happen.