Coronavirus

[Kevin B.]

Who else is watching this, and how worried are you? What preparations are you making or have you made? I padded out my emergency kits and food stores last week. I still need to fill the gas cans and propane canisters. I'm not seeing a breakdown of basic services, probably, but I'm pretty sure we're going to see panic rushes on grocery stores/gas stations/pharmacies, and probably a lot of businesses putting up shutters.

The main stream media sources look to be deliberately downplaying this to avoid a panic, but CDC and others have straight out said this WILL hit pandemic status and there WILL be a serious disruption of daily life in the US. If you're relying on main stream media for updates, you're probably not getting the full picture. Here's more sources:

ArcGIS Dashboards

ArcGIS Dashboards

gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com

Coronavirus Cases: Statistics and Charts - Worldometer

Updated Statistics, graphs, and data tables showing the total number of cases, cases per day, cases by country, cases outside of Hubei in China, recoveries and discharges, newly infected, active cases, outcome of closed cases: death rate vs. recovery rate for patients infected with the COVID-19...

www.worldometers.info

Reuters | Breaking International News & Views

Find latest news from every corner of the globe at Reuters.com, your online source for breaking international news coverage.

www.reuters.com

 

[Kevin B.]

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2002387

we should be prepared for Covid-19 to gain a foothold throughout the world, including in the United States. Community spread in the United States could require a shift from containment to mitigation strategies such as social distancing in order to reduce transmission. Such strategies could include isolating ill persons (including voluntary isolation at home), school closures, and telecommuting where possible.

 

[Tonkaman]

I’ve been following along closely since the first week of February. My cousin lives in Shanghai and was posting up about it in early January. His posts started mostly to show how different eastern medicine ideas were from the west. He highlighted early on what he considered irrational panic and superstition. His posts slowly evolved to him walking COMPLETELY ALONE in what are normally crowded Shanghai streets. One day they realized that this was more serious than expected, packed a bag, and 2 hours later boarded a flight to the US. When his plane landed they were informed that their return fight was canceled and not available until atleast MAY!

The crazy part to me is that they didn’t isolate anyone on that plane! They immediately went shopping at a toy store to buy stuff for their kids that they didn’t have time to pack! He admits that If anyone on that flight was infected nobody would have known.

 

[Tonkaman]

Most of you don’t know that I’ve been extremely sick for 6 weeks now. It all started with what we thought was the flu and has gotten worse and worse as the days pass. They just can’t explain exactly why my symptoms are so sevier without any diagnosis.

During my most recent emergency room visit, I got admitted into the hospital for observation. The first night in the hospital I get a knock in my door, and a group of doctors fill my room. These doctors clearly aren’t making a normal rotation, they are dressed in formal clothing under their protective garments. I get a quick introduction but don’t catch much of it. What stands out to me is, “I’m the hospital administrator”, and “he’s with the CDC” now m listening!

“So you tested positive for CORONAVIRUS “

What the hell? My wife’s eyeballs popped out of her head! This doesn’t make any sense! Then the next sentence just topped off the panic.

“Elaina, tell us about your boss, who was recently in Singapore”. All eyes turn to my wife, as clipboards and pens are all out ready to record her every word.

For the next 30 minutes we are spelling out every detail about how we’ve felt, where we’ve been, who we’ve touched, or talked to since January 1. That’s been nearly 2 months!!


Athey finally say “oh don’t worry it’s not THAT coronavirus from the news”. Then what the hell are we talking about???! How worried should we be? I’ve had people literally babysitting me around the clock for weeks, how worried should they be????

Their response was “It’s just a virus, nothing to be too concerned about”. Then why are we getting a grilling from the top dogs in the hospital???


it’s a long long long story, but basically I have a different strain of the coronavirus that is far more common and less scary. I think the hospital workers overheard my wife talking about her executives flying all over the world and blew things way out of proportion. It was a scary day connecting the dots on hundreds of people you could possibly contaminate in a short amount of time.

 

[Noahfecks]

While it's possible that any airborn pathogen could reach pandemic levels, I think that this Covid-19 thing has been blown way out of proportion. I might be more worried if someone in our household had a compromised immune system, but otherwise it's just another flu.

 

[Hickey]

 

[Houndoc]

Mixed thoughts:

Any time we have a new disease that 1) not a lot is known about and 2) most the population has not been exposed and thus lacks immunity, we need to be cautious and recognize that a major epidemic MIGHT happen (but most likely will not, think of SARS and MERS).

At the same time, the number of deaths in the U.S. alone average over 35,000/year- which is multiple times higher the COVID-19 has killed worldwide.

It is important to keep things in perspective.

 

[Spork]

It seems like there's always something trying to kill me, I'm starting to feel numb to the latest disease of the day. A little to much boy that cried wolf and not enough people dying.

However I'm feeling like this one's different, the stories I'm hearing out of Japan and Korea indicate this is being treated differently. Some government/company/shadow leadership thinks this is going to kill us all unless steps are taken. The world is a different place, people are flying more, interacting more, cities seem to have higher density, public transportation is more utilized and at some point conditions will be right for something. I went to Smiths today to pick up groceries, some of the items weren't there that normally are, toilet paper was low, flour was low, etc.

Time will tell, while we're waiting to die, wash your hands, cover your mouth, maybe we'll survive.

 

[benjy]

The main stream media sources look to be deliberately downplaying this to avoid a panic

There’s a first for everything

 

[Tonkaman]

While it's possible that any airborn pathogen could reach pandemic levels, I think that this Covid-19 thing has been blown way out of proportion. I might be more worried if someone in our household had a compromised immune system, but otherwise it's just another flu.

I completely agree with what your saying, especially since the symptoms are very much like the flu.

I think Influenza is seriously underrated anymore though. Don’t forget it has many strains and some of them are incredibly deadly. Has it been so long that we have forgotten the 1918 Flu outbreak? It infected 33% of the world! And killed 50 million people! That was before we had commercial airlines, international travel, and such high density populations. Don’t get me wrong though, it’s just the flu...

 

[Kevin B.]

some of the items weren't there that normally are, toilet paper was low, flour was low

This is my concern. I'm not terribly worried about the virus, but I am worried about people who are. I think this one's going to get big enough to cause a panic.

 

[Kevin B.]

First death in Washington (a nursing home patient), and friends in Seattle are telling me that you can't get masks (doesn't matter, they don't help), gloves, or toilet paper in the grocery stores, and the canned food is going fast.

 

[4x4_Welder]

There has been a noticable uptick in shipping as well, maybe I can get some overtime out of this.

 

[Hickey]

First death in Washington (a nursing home patient), and friends in Seattle are telling me that you can't get masks (doesn't matter, they don't help), gloves, or toilet paper in the grocery stores, and the canned food is going fast.

That's funny, because I'm still delivering it up there. The only thing that is delaying our deliveries is the horrible traffic around Seattle that has been horrible for years. We haven't seen an uptick in demand for these items in the SeaTac area, in fact we've seen some drop.

 

[Homefryy]

First death in Washington (a nursing home patient), and friends in Seattle are telling me that you can't get masks (doesn't matter, they don't help), gloves, or toilet paper in the grocery stores, and the canned food is going fast.

I am flying to Seattle for work tomorrow morning. Anybody want me to bring back some coronavirus for them? Get it early and get treated before the hospitals fill up (unless it turns out that you can be infected a 2nd time which looks like it may be a possibility).

 

[J-mobzz]

I was in Seattle last weekend and just flew in again Friday night. I haven’t noticed anything different in stores or people.

 

[Troop92]

This is lovely.... Postal worker in Washington tested positive. All it takes is a sneeze or touch without washed hands.

Local USPS employee tests positive for coronavirus

KIRO 7 found out Saturday evening that a Seattle-area U.S. Postal Service employee tested positive for the coronavirus.

www.kiro7.com

I talked to a friend in Washington this morning, she said that stores have had a run on bottled water, toilet paper, and basically all cleaning/disinfecting products. It isn't a hurricane, I don't get it.

 

[Kiel]

Local Walmart was out of bottled water this morning except the gallons. Cleaning and cheap food pretty empty. Costco was pretty stocked, but crazy busy, pallets in the aisles etc

 

[TRD270]

My wife text me earlier said shiz is hitting the fan in SLC. Went to our local grocery and TP, flour and hand sanitizer shelves were empty. She said if she runs out of TP she's using my socks.....

Also hows @Tonkaman doing?

 

[4x4_Welder]

Great, my wife is heading to SLC Wednesday.