Spill the tea! Some see it as an trick to get the French to take the epidemic seriously.
In a televised speech, Mr. Macron promised to ease the lockdown when the number of new cases fell below 5,000/day. The French government broke it on Tuesday and suffered the consequences on Thursday.
Macron is young enough to fight the virus. It is expected that he can give weight to COVID-19, rather than continue with the gimmicks.
It is the First Lady who is more worrying. France, after all, has just had two state funerals and can no longer afford hat tricks.
Under French law, if the President’s life is in danger, the speaker of the Senate shall act on his behalf. As is known to all, Macron is an EM supporter, while the Senate is mostly composed of LR supporters (including the speaker Gerard Larcher). In the event of the President’s death, there would be great unrest in the country.
It’s not unusual. In the Fifth Republic, there have been 8 presidents, including two (Pompidou and Mitterrand) who died while in office and one (Charles de Gaulle) who quit voluntarily, so the French presidency is perilous.
By the way, the president shall hold a concurrent post of Copríncep d’Andorra.
Incidence in early July after the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic
Unit: 100,000 people/week
Incidence in early October after 1.5 months after the second wave
Incidence at the end of October after lockdown, 4 times higher within one month
Lifted lockdown at the end of November by ① expanding the range of activity; ② moving to night-time curfew on the number of new cases falling to around 5,000 a day. Incidence on that day
Today’s incidence. The pandemic was not under full control compared to one month before due to premature lockdown lifting. However, this step was willfully pursued by the French government.
Pandemic trend. Half of the cities were locked down and prematurely lifted in the second wave, thus interrupting the downtrend.
Premature beats are a common kind of heart arrhythmia, which are initiated by ectopic pacemakers.
It can be divided into premature atrial contractions (PACs), premature ventricular contractions (PVCs) and premature node contractions according to its origin.
The occurrence frequency of PACs, PVCs and premature node contractions decreases in turn.
It happens to ordinary people or patients with OHD, CHD, RHD, HHD, cardiomyopathy, etc.
Poisoning of quinidine, procainamide, digitalis or antimonials; hypokalemia; or mechanical stimulation of the heart by cardiac surgery or cardiac catheterization can be a trigger.
Generally speaking,
The heart beats in a regular and rhythmic manner.
Normal heartbeat is “lub-dub, stop, lub-dub, stop, lub-dub, stop…”
While premature beat breaks the rhythm, becoming “lub-dub lub-dub, stop, stop, lub-lub, dub-dub…”.
It is a case in which two (or even more) beats occur in advance in a normal heartbeat.
The rhythm of the heart varies with different ectopic pacemakers as illustrated below:
Fig. 1 (12-lead ECG under normal conditions)
Fig. 2 (2-lead ECG under normal conditions, determining whether premature beat occurs)
Fig. 3 premature beat (the red part manifests an earlier beat which disrupts the original rhythm and lengthens the subsequent interval)
Premature beat can be medically interpreted as a cardiac impulse initiated by ectopic pacemakers, or popularly understood as an early beat that disrupts the regular heartbeat rhythm.
PS: In spite of the aforesaid simple types, you can search “arrythmia or internal medicine or diagnostics” documents for more detailed ones.
Symptoms
There may be no symptoms of the heart or may be palpitations or cardiac arrests.
Frequent premature beats will decrease cardiac output, or cause fatigue, dizziness and chest distress due to the lack of blood flow to the brain, or aggravate angina or heart failure.
It occurs occasionally or frequently, embodied in unstable, premature or missed pulses.
In short, the heart rate is unstable (it may be ignored under normal circumstances).
Solutions
Premature beats often happen to healthy people. Occasional occurrence to the youth without special conditions, family history of heart disease or history of congenital heart disease can be ignored.
But others need to pay attention and seek medical advice in time.
PS: an ECG test costs RMB 40-50 in most hospitals, which is very cheap. You can access it in community hospitals.
You’d better do an ECG test in a nearby hospital if premature beats last for 2-3 consecutive days without exceptional circumstances (e.g. all-nighter, excessive drinking & smoking, fatigue, emotional excitement, or excessive stress, workout and medication). It’s up to you for further clinical treatment.
An HIV-positive mother can give birth to a HIV-negative baby.
Study reveals that HIV is transmitted through blood contamination, sexual contact, mother-infant. Photos of AIDS children infected through mother-to-child transmission in underdeveloped areas are really striking.
How can an infected woman make a healthy infant?
Attention:
The chance of mother-to-child transmission ranges from 15% to 45% without intervention, but it can be lowered down to less than 5% or even 1% in certain cases if interventions are taken timely before and during pregnancy.
Here, doctors usually take two precautions in case of an HIV positive mother.
How? This starts with mother-to-child transmission mechanism.
It is also called vertical transmission, which mainly refers to the HIV transmission from a mother to her baby during pregnancy, childbirth and breastfeeding.
If infected women do not receive treatment, virus can proliferate in their blood and vaginas.
Maternal and fetal blood won’t be blended directly in general because of [placental barrier], which ensures the safety of fetal growth.
Any damaging factor can encourage blood to mingle, thus leading to infection.
The real danger starts during the delivery, where uterine contraction will harm placenta. Therefore, mother’s HIV-positive blood may travel into the fetus through placenta and umbilical cord.
That’s why the most possible chance for mother-to-child transmission is during the delivery.
Other factors include: bacterial/viral infection, placental abruption, placenta previa, abdominal injury, physiological deformities, tobacco and wine, etc.
If nothing is done, newborns are vulnerable to infection.
Pregnant women in underdeveloped areas fail to intervene due to poor medical care, so infected babies are born.
Solutions:
Simply put, to reduce such probability, [Prevention of mother-to-child transmission (PMTCT)] shall be in place, including reasonable drug treatment, delivery and breastfeeding modes.
Measures:
Adhere to antiviral drugs to control the amount of virus and improve immunity;
Avoid [mother-to-child blood transfusion] by cesarean delivery;
Take comprehensive interventions such as post-exposure prophylaxis for newborns.
A PMTCT program was carried out from 2005 to 2009 among the people living with HIV in rural areas of Yunnan province. In the end, only two out of 193 newborns tested positive (rate of 1% or so).
The outcome is getting infinitely closer to what the developed world has achieved.
To sum up, HIV-positive mothers can be certain to make normal infants.
Someone might choose not to have a baby because of the 1% chance of infection.
Be aware that a pregnant woman is at risk for infection throughout her pregnancy.
Most people who haven’t read this article may believe that the mother-to-child transmission rate is 100%, but it could actually go down to 1%.
Outsiders mentioned [not having a baby] as the solution.
While doctors insist on saving lives and patients strive to survive.
