SirBillybob

You missed the point. I am partially to blame. Event risk can be calculated using a binomial equation that incorporates rolling incidence, an accepted duration of contagion potential, and an ascertainment ratio of likely incidence over reported incidence based on what available antibody surveillance exists. This provides a probability from above absolute zero to below absolute one hundred percent for any arbitrary number of persons in the event. Risk management decisions are easier to apply with single to double digit percentage figures because the relatively small fractions of point prevalence are such that large differences (following a decimal point and zeros) appear deceptively small and do not incorporate the variable that is often known or anticipated: number of persons in the event. For many events, all that is important to know is the probability the active virus resides within it. Personally, I do not consider regional point prevalence on its own particularly useful. I had hoped to generate a more in-depth discussion since there are a lot of questions about risk, but there has been little to no discussion that incorporates clinical utilities akin to standard gamble, time trade-off, and currently the evolution of event risk probabilities that have emerged in a more sophisticated way as more is known about the mysteries and ambiguities of CoV prevalence. The trend seems to be people asking whether they should engage in a particular behaviour and respondents contributing pretty much the same input repeatedly, ranging from well-meaning cock-blocking to hedged reassurance. If that is all there is, so be it. How many punters the escort has is not totally without pertinence but the arbitrary selection of 25 was not intended to shut down a discussion that may hold interest to a few message board readers.

I calculated event risk probabilities with the applicable algorithm as the OP privately shared the location. We likely have individualized margins of risk tolerance/aversion. If the escort tricks with 25 clients over the course of a week, assuming he has first-exposure strain immunity, what percentage likelihood of a minimum of one actively contagious client among the 25 would you accept? Please chime in. I am late 60’s and healthy. I would tolerate a 5% chance that at least one of 25 clients prior to me exposed the escort to this week’s flavour of CoV.

My story a bit long about Montreal. I am not shocked. My background in Ontario was healthcare and my reputation meant something. Providers would bear with my input as a respected researcher. One problem is that good luck and connections did not transfer across the border. Now I am the average Joe and I empathize with the masses in terms of quality. I pay for some components of care because physicians in QC can now delist and the higher caliber ones tend to go that route. I am jaded about the quality of public-payer providers and have yet to intersect with the professional interpersonal finesse I had grown accustomed to. Yes, there is an evolving have-have-not divide here.

Every reason to not be dismissive. My father died quite old of metastasized prostate cancer but was a lifetime smoker, an independent risk factor. There are options evolving other than radical prostatectomy, such as imagery-guided focal laser ablation. Quebec has poor health coverage compared to my time in Ontario ... apples, oranges. I will not have my prostate removed if I can avoid it and will pony up a great deal of cash for other viable and reasonably proven options if needed. Quebec is no model for advanced standards of care. It is not uncommon for one’s pelvic nerve plexus to be traumatized and yield irreversible genital dysfunction. The impediment to access to out of province-or country services of greatest concern to me now is the pandemic.

I cannot see any evidence that the presiding Justice used the term “rape”, because the poorly conceived and seemingly hyped media reports do not reference the transcripts or the specific criminal code. It may be that no better term legally exists for negation of consent based on deception. She said sexual episodes were unpaid and the crime was neither sophisticated nor uncommon for commercial sex workers. The media translates this as the loser having “raped“ a few dudes. I don’t think the judge would use rape as a verb in this case, and maybe not even literally as a noun, depending on the code, but it is not her role to disabuse the press of their choice of wording in reductively spinning the terms of a situation more nuanced than forcible sexual assault as it is conventionally understood. Rape is his silly games but on a much more pronounced figurative steroid cycle than actually transpired. The dudes could not pay their bills and will be anxious about a common occupational hazard. Will they psychologically dissociate with revivified trauma when engaging in future sex? Commercial sex workers are prone to dissociate anyway as an artefact of sexualizing with punters out of sync with subjective attraction. The media is doing a big favour for commercial sex workers including the escorts in this case. It is financially lucrative to conceptualize and portray sexual exchange that is consensual (at the basic level outside of the parameters of deception, etc) but is taboo enough to exaggerate its differential worth relative to nonsexual services. Male sex workers in Brazil would be rolling on the floor, splitting their sides, incredulous at the notion that there is a transactional hierarchy in which they could be considered assault victims. You would get your lights punched out if it was insinuated that compensation manipulation was tantamount to rape and you had better hope they have no friends in your prison wing. lol

At this point a rape, explicit or implicitly by any other name or politicized context, is looking pretty appealing. Just sayin’. Profuse apologies all round for the abject insensitivity. I do, however, need a few days notice for on-demand PrEP, so staged is best though flexible about setting. Naturally I realize I digress.

Good point from 7829V about test reliability. It is a shit show. I had a very sore throat this past Wed and got PCR tested on symptom Day 2 (Thurs) with a 75%-100% probability of false negative. The result was negative. For good measure I just completed a do-over today (Day 5), about the lowest anticipated false negative potential, 20%. And this is an easy exercise compared to random testing without any symptoms. I suspect it is still negative but cannot understand why I felt like crap a few days back since I am considerably confined. The nurse today barely grazed the back of my throat (frustrating!) but at least seemed to take a deep adequate nasal swab. More failsafe is sexual partners that are not cohabiting to self-quarantine for a few weeks prior to hook-up, not practical for escorts and perhaps the same inconvenience level for many clients.

Usually, generally, provisionally a lesser risk but not zero risk. Many variables are involved. Personally, I would want to see evidence of a previous positive test result, or positive for antibodies. The prevalence in his (your) jurisdiction is a relevant factor independent of exposure status and immunity status FWIW. I can show you how to calculate probability in your geographic area, if in the USA simply tell me the county, if you are comfortable, or DM me privately, or outside of USA state the country. Jury is still deliberating on reinfection phenomena and whether these ‘second helpings‘ may be a different strain for the host that he can manage with preexisting defences, yet a newbie might not do well with initial exposure to the strain. Animal models suggest it is possible to transiently host and shed the same virus even if immune, as the pathogen spends a bit of time attempting to get a foothold thru subsequent exposure, while the host’s antibodies and other immune system components kick into action. Such research is not done with humans. However, this is relevant from my point of view given the higher reexposure potential of escorts from clients.

My urologist is hyper vigilant about my elevated PSA readings and intermittent BPH. I recently had my 2nd MRI of prostate and bladder in 3 years, both negative at 90% accuracy, and will do something called 4K serology, very expensive, that triangulates 4 blood tests for 4 biological separate markers along with age as an apparent predictor of cancer. I know he essentially wants to get in there to do the dreaded biopsy. The tally is now into the $thousands out of pocket. Universal free health care in Canada is a rumour. One is more likely to get coverage for medical problems that occur due to poor lifestyle choices around diet and substance consumption. My prostate and PrEP are my only needs. I pay hundreds of dollars for about one month’s worth of PreP annually.

Death kept pace with incidence in March because mainly only symptomatic cases were diagnosed. There were barely a few days spread between incidence peaking and mortality peaking. There was very recently a 5-fold uptick in mortality from the summer lows, relative to a 15-fold uptick in new infections. Sometimes the death rate is deceptively low in absolute terms or seems proportionally lower yet subsequently latently spikes, as we saw a similar disconnect in the USA (I rolled my eyes a few months ago as Pence and the Texas governor highlighted the appearance of less lethality at that time), and then mortality rates caught up again. I wonder if the newer trend of lower age central tendency simply means, in part, that those that eventually die take longer for severity and death to occur, although death obviously selectively favours the longer in tooth to take to its bosom. Fingers crossed that new upcoming waves are less devastating. For a little updated perspective, CoV deaths to date in Spain are approximately equivalent to 8 years of influenza/pneumonia mortality there. Yet the tally falls short of the annualized influenza mortality rate for about 60 poorer nations, and many nations maintain higher related mortality even if the CoV death toll in Spain multiplies by 3 times the current toll over the next six months! I think hypothetically that to prevent one-eighth of CoV deaths in Spain more people would queue up for vaccination than typically do so for influenza vaccine. Flu prevention is rather a shit show if you consider that in an ideal world we may beat CoV yet in another 8 years just as many Spaniards will have died due to influenza unless vaccine uptake is ramped up extensively.

Oh, I am not at all surprised about reports on the ground there. I am not being at all contrarian. Like in many places people are laying low though they can elect to circulate more out and about. That is a good sign. The risks are high. Attendees at the saunas have real or perceived immunity or risk tolerance for prolonged morbidity or 1:83 odds of death there (though we have yet to see mortality climb with this second wave). They cannot easily replicate their set points of sexual interaction through TicToc and such, and the venues are a tiny unique microcosm of general social interaction.

I calculated event risk based on current Catalunyan rolling incidence per capita with a 5.35-fold ascertainment correction based on antibody prevalence in Spain divided by molecular PCR reported prevalence in Catalunya. The ascertainment bias (underreport) is likely more pronounced there relative to national average, but that error is offset by the national increase in exposures since the antibody surveillance was conducted (I did not bother to assess raw cumulative totals of infection at the time of the antibody research). My algorithm result is sobering. For any random number of 53 attendees without immunity offsetting transmission, the probability of at least one CoV contagious person is 50%. As exposure rates increase, the risk algorithm should eventually adjust for proportions (ie, single-figure percentages) unlikely to pose contagion risk. The true previous exposure nationally is 5-10% the population, but because the first peak has recently been nearly repeated and briefly sustained it is conceivable that immunity (for what it is worth clinically) is now more in the 10-15% range, as antibody cohorts were assessed following the first wave abatement. It may be higher for male trade. There is statistically a minimum of one infected passenger for every commercial flight out of El Prat, or Girona for that matter.

Oh, online only, not word of mouth, but why would very recent IG posts by the venues misrepresent the operational aspect, leading to inconvenience for customers? Anyway, I read the major points of the current Catalonian-specific decree. There is ample latitude for a bathhouse to operate, as restaurants and bars, and fitness centres, also presumably spas, can also function with mitigation measures. There is also ample opportunity for ‘minor’ infringements in a place such as Thermas, but I doubt all the regulations are easily monitored and enforced. I wonder if the payment for various durations combined with lie-flat sleeping accommodations in enclosed rooms is a quasi-lodgings workaround solution for hours of operation. There seems to be a defined threshold of collectives larger than 15 persons in a relatively confined shared space, below which concern is of a reduced level. Larger groups smooshed together with sustained sharing of breathing space appears to be the larger focus. The saunas are small clusters of people, much traffic flow as opposed to prolonged periods of close proximity shared space, and pairing offs.

My sense is that a new topic recently emerged. Not sure the OP is angling for textual selfies. lol

Right, so it is interesting that the umbrella org Sauna Pases has all venues open in Barcelona, Sevilla, and Valencia. Also seemingly expanded to 24/7, though that in itself makes sense to spread out the traffic.

You would have a dancer welcomingly approach you up close without a mask, unsolicited, as in the past, but I expect you can legitimately signal the desire for not interacting. If you pass him a polite note that you just want to drink and look, I think the other dancers will catch on. They have all the time in the world to communicate among themselves whether you are a punter worth pursuing, notwithstanding that some of them hold borderline Q-Anon-grade views. In Brazil in early March, the answer to CoV among the brothel studs was that they took fitness supplements as a matter of course.

Small gatherings of 2 or more (up to 10) are permitted with the provision of 1.5 metres between members of same household and 2 metres if not cohabiting, with no more than 3 households represented. However, you will see in restaurants and bars full tables of 4-6, etc, and it is impossible for authorities to screen the associations, monitor and enforce, etc. The strip club seating is actually more compliant because there tends not to be the occasional larger groups of friends at one table or huddled side by each at a counter that occurs in normal times. The current paltry patronage more than meets the regulations of reduced capacity by floor space. Lap dance cubicles already have the partition aspect that you will often now see, for example, between pay-per-use gaming stations. Quebec province is on paper restricting intimacy between people that do not reside together, even if they are in a primary attachment relationship. Obviously, while clinically not outrageous, this is an impossible and unenforceable prohibition in either private homes or venues where snuggling and snogging is want to happen. I suppose it is hoped that common sense precautions will prevail, the most seemingly important goal to prevent community spread to the elderly. Technically, outside of commercial sex illegality in Canada, lap dances are no more or less a deviation from the provincial transmission mitigation regulations compared to boyfriends from different households getting it on. It is appropriate for authorities to outline risks and prevention but paradoxically they undermine credibility with ridiculous wording that implies sex is permissible among those residing in the same household. But the trend here is for politicians to screw up applied clinical considerations and spur community reactivity. One or more of the individuals in a common domicile may be more prone to occupational exposure. Within the same walls means little ... bubbles can be otherwise created and maintained using common sense discretion.

I cannot think of a reason for prostate enlargement (hyperplasia) suddenly precipitated by pandemic adjustment, but it is customary in one’s fifties to have a GP or urology check up including digital rectal exam and blood test for prostate specific antigen level. Prostate changes are often implicated in changes in urination if fluid intake has been otherwise consistent. Even if PSA is in the normal range at least you have on record your own specific baseline reading for future reference. I am not picking up a genuine vibe of objectively compulsive hypersexuality. We may see an uptick in procreation evidence in the pandemic context. Orgasm frequency is an arbitrary marker of sexual pursuit that I do not put total stock in, and is but one component of the sexual response cycle, but about how many orgasms are occurring on a weekly basis? 15 on average is an outlier but not indicative of ‘pathology’; there is no objective threshold of compulsivity in this regard. Once per day on average is within two standard deviations around the statistical mean for young male adults, but a lot of research does not differentiate between intercourse and other ways of achieving sexual orgasm. I am pushing age 70 and am a once per day ejaculator, non-normative for my age group but a lifetime frequency pattern. I am not going to second guess the appropriateness of something I value and enjoy. I also reject much of the substance addiction theoretical model as some attempt its application to human sexuality. On a positive note, no sign of testosterone deficiency that tends to downregulate desire. Frequency of ejaculation is not associated either direction with risk of prostate cancer. I know of no physical or medical liability resulting from frequent orgasm or total aggregate duration of erection. Desire may interfere practically with other activities but otherwise is not inherently medically damaging.

Interestingly, it remains open although CoV prevalence in Spain has just quickly recouped that nation’s first wave’s peak of March 31st, and has now surpassed USA rolling incidence per capita. At that time, prevalence plummeted with the application of mitigation measures. I wonder if Barcelona will ‘freestyle’ it this time. Without lockdown I expect the curve will outperform the Spring pattern in terms of infection rates.

Our government’s employee wage subsidy program for businesses that can verify previous and ongoing substantial loss of revenue is extended to the end of November. This likely assists payment of servers, MCs, DJs, security personnel, etc, for the time being. Campus has deferred its puny weekend entrance cover charge. Stock still charges its modest admission fee. Meanwhile, those out of work due to the pandemic will transition from the emergency wage loss program (distinct from the wage subsidy component) to the regular employment insurance program. The latter has a time limit, followed by the more permanent regular social assistance option that does not nearly provide a living.

Ratched with Sarah Paulson, Netflix Sept 18th. Looks like great fun. For some reason I thought Louise Fletcher was older in OFOTCN but she looks rather young. Paulson is 44 starring in prequel but she can pull off looking younger.

I think Trevor Noah recently did it more succinctly on The Daily Social Distancing Show. Addendum: yes, August 24th episode.

Hahahah ... don’t matter, seeing as many of us seem to be progressively ahead of our time and I don’t give a crap about the legacy I leave in this regard. I refuse to politicize a basic desire that others get psycho about. Onlyfans, etc, holds about as much interest to me as paying to read the first-class menus of the Titanic or Lusitania would. I will read them for free out of historic interest. “Please pony up more to peruse the full dessert course offerings ... look as much as I will allow based on your donations but never touch, yet do succumb to paying for mystery-box clips”. My validation that you are interesting enough to watch should be enough payment. If you are hot enough to clear the bar for me in terms of what is basically appealing I can happily beat off to your tamer corresponding Instagram photos. I don’t think the substandard porn offerings one would expect with expanding digital media trends is any more likely to legitimize in-person commercial sex.

Perhaps you could switch it up and put that bladder urgency to more creative service?

Aren’t we due for a new more widespread emergence of a cray-cray fallacious belief system to complement the big two: religions and the insistence that extraterrestrial aliens live amongst us? The setting is ripe for grasping systematic desperate measures cold-comfort to try to psychologically adapt in desperate times. There is a lot of insidious confirmation bias built in to Q-Anon rhetoric, without needing buy-in to all of the more outrageous components. This pandemic seems to spawn a novel eugenics state of affairs, where the fittest that survive are both disinclined to naïveté and able to skirt the physical boundaries of the willfully contagious (ignorance default) and those innocents within their reach.