COVID COVID-19 Coronavirus Containment Efforts

[Dr. Courtney]

Yes. Its one of those reasons I am now wary of reading too much into what the scientists say.

I once articulated Courtney's law which says, "The quality of the science is inversely proportional to the public policy impact." Though that was somewhat tongue-in-cheek, the point is I've observed that finding the clear path from the public policy push back to the sound scientific conclusions back to the careful experiments and hard data to support those conclusions is often harder when there are important public policy implications, especially when the whole process is squeezed by time and political pressure.

In the current Coronavirus event, I am reminded that in science, sound inferences are based on careful experiments and hard reliable data. Repeatable experiments are the only gold standard in science for reliable data. Public pronouncements from government agencies and from scientists themselves do not constitute "facts" or "data" in the scientific method, as these amount to arguments by authority rather than data-driven science. There may be windows of time (hopefully short) where these public pronouncements provide the best available information for making medical decisions.

But as a scientist and a teacher and mentor of other scientists, my mantra for confidence is the verifiability of the scientific method that comes from "Show me the data!" Until there is a clear path from public policy and pronouncements back to quality conclusions and quality data of the sort suitable for publication in peer-reviewed journals, a scientist should retain a healthy dose of skepticism. And no, I don't trust that scientists in some government lab have the data to back up their policy positions until I see the data and can read all the experimental procedures that produced it.

 

[TeethWhitener]

I have to mention (and it's possibly irrelevant to the above) the Australian vaccine uses what they call molecular clamp technology which I think may be different - but this is hardly my area of expertise:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molecular_clamp

Thanks
Bill

A molecular clamp basically just keeps the antigen from falling apart. Wiki does a pretty good job: essentially, the immune system needs to recognize an antigen (in this case, probably a surface protein on SARS-CoV-2), but that antigen takes a different shape depending on whether it's incorporated into the viral structure or free in solution. Since you want the immune system to recognize the viral-incorporated protein specifically, but you're using the protein free in solution, you need to add a "molecular clamp," a molecule that coaxes the free protein into the correct shape for the immune system to respond properly.

 

[TeethWhitener]

(Possibly off topic) Why does extracellular RNAse not just immediately chew up an RNA vaccine? What's the advantage of RNA over DNA vaccines?

Answering my own question:
http://sitn.hms.harvard.edu/flash/2015/rna-vaccines-a-novel-technology-to-prevent-and-treat-disease/
The advantage seems to be that RNA vaccines can be produced much more quickly than DNA vaccines. Also, RNA has less chance of genome alteration and easier uptake into cells than DNA. This is countered by the fact that RNA, as I mentioned, gets chewed up in a hurry (this is a good thing normally: it prevents overexpression of proteins). The claim is that the delivery mechanism (using either lipofection or a cell-penetrating peptide) can encapsulate the RNA enough to protect it from RNAse. Here's a recent review:
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2019.00594/full

 

[cosmik debris]

Yes. Its one of those reasons I am now wary of reading too much into what the scientists say.

Yes, you can't trust scientists...hang on a minute :-)

Cheers

 

[bhobba]

Yes, you can't trust scientists...hang on a minute :-)

Yes it is amusing

Seriously though let's be clear in what is being said here. When scientists use terms, what it means to those like some posting in this thread who are experts in testing vaccines (having been actually involved in doing it) and simply a person with a general scientific knowledge of the area are two different things. An example was the conclusion I drew that testing has begun because animal testing has begun. Sounded reasonable to me, but those that have done this stuff say that's really part of pre-testing. As a politician out here in Aus used to say - the devil is in the detail. Because I am not familiar with that detail I will not be offering commentary any more on information I spot such as the briefing by the CSIRO - I will let those with more expertise comment.

What can be said regarding the vaccine is we now have quite a few - UQ took just 3 weeks to create one and others in similar time frames, although I think UQ may have actually been the first. But it seems this is not the main time consuming part - it's testing the thing, and many say that could take a year to 18 months. Others say sooner - but that does not seem the consensus. We will need to wait and see.

Thanks
Bill

 

[Dr. Courtney]

Yes, you can't trust scientists...hang on a minute :-)

Cheers

No, you can't trust scientists when they are making predictions and projections outside of things that are already well-verified by the scientific method. For example:



"There are going to be millions of people dying, and I don't think there's any way to get around that."

 

[chemisttree]

I live in Contra Costa. Did anyone go to the conference? I missed it. Chemisttree did you go?

Nope. It was over a thousand miles away from me. Unknown contact history can only mean one thing though. There’s a cluster of cases there and you should prepare for what will come.

 

[TeethWhitener]

"There are going to be millions of people dying, and I don't think there's any way to get around that."

I didn't watch the video, but responding to this quote: just for some perspective, if 1% of the world's population contracts COVID-19, and if the case fatality rate in the end is 2%, then that's 1.5 million people dead. It's not totally unrealistic, especially if (as has been reported) 80% of the cases present as a mild cold, and if the virus can be passed asymptomatically. For comparison, the flu and malaria each kill about half a million people per year.

 

[mfb]

No, you can't trust scientists when they are making predictions and projections outside of things that are already well-verified by the scientific method. For example:

[MEDIA=youtube]iDelUkpFm60[/MEDIA]

"There are going to be millions of people dying, and I don't think there's any way to get around that."

Don't quote people out of context in such a misleading way please. The relevant part is 1:20 and what he says is this:

If it really does spread as widely as that projection says [40-60% of the adult population infected], and that's what I think is likely to happen, then there are going to be millions of people dying, and I don't think there's any way to get around that."

If so many people get infected then yes, we will see so many deaths, this is well-verified. He doesn't say it will spread so far, he just thinks it is likely.

----

South Korea keeps testing more and more people but the rate of new cases they find goes down (graph). There is some hope that they can contain it. Testing works.

 

[Mary Conrads Sanburn]

Nope. It was over a thousand miles away from me. Unknown contact history can only mean one thing though. There’s a cluster of cases there and you should prepare for what will come.

You would be welcomed at my home any time I was rather upset that the polls at the Civic Center right across the street where I live had so many people voting! My husband dragged me over there. ~

I read that "A novel (new) Coronavirus is causing an outbreak of pneumonia illness". What do you think of that? I could give you a link to it if you would like.

 

[OmCheeto]

No, you can't trust scientists when they are making predictions and projections outside of things that are already well-verified by the scientific method. For example:



"There are going to be millions of people dying, and I don't think there's any way to get around that."

According to my research, tens of millions of people die every year, anyways.
Even if everyone gets the bug, and 1% die, that's not even twice the annual global death rate.

ps. I'm an orphan, so I'm not too worried about my parents dying from this.
pps. I'm kinda old, so I'm somewhat worried about the age mortality rates.
ppps. I don't have any kids, and have lived a VERY full life, so I'm not afraid to die.

 

[kyphysics]

What's the probability this does NOT become a U.S. pandemic.

California first...now NY:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/05/nyregion/coronavirus-new-york-cases.html

2700+ in quarantine in NY.

Both are heavily and densely populated states with lots of traffic flow and international communities.

 

[kyphysics]

In 10 days, will the whole U.S. be engulfed?

 

[mathwonk]

Those of us in the Seattle area are a bit closer to this than most. I have connections to more than one resident of the affected nursing home where several have died in the past few days, including one known personally to me, not all of whom have even been tested to attribute the cause of death. Moreover all stores are out of sanitizer, most are out of alcohol, and many are out of soap, towels, toilet paper and kleenex. Still, let's be realistic; if someone is concerned about of dying of a possibly preventable disease, I suggest he/she is advised to immediately get a flu shot and stop smoking.

Update: In my area, even flu shots are not readily available, i.e. both my son and grandson were told there were none available for them at the two places they sought them, both of which had prominent advertising of " flu shots here".

 

[chirhone]

Looks like 14-20 days prior from her arrival in Ausie shores she's been infecting everyone. What kind of PCR tests Philippine-DOH does?

https://cnnphilippines.com/news/2020/3/5/Woman-who-traveled-to-Philippines-tests-positive-coronavirus-Australia-.html?fbclid=IwAR33MjuIZ7AFLkeXVYUjvF9-F4RKZq1wYf4L-W1wcwirfdFRhPOx2lgGKR0#.XmDKEvrJFis.facebook

I read there are two kinds of strains:
https://fortune.com/2020/03/04/coronavirus-mutating-second-strain-covid-19-wuhan-china/amp/

It is not within the realm of impossibility that the Philippines may have the S-strain which caused weaker infection which prevented hospital admissions.

For other countries with the L-strain. Do all victims or patients require hospitalization enabling their identification or can some hide in the midst infecting more?

My concern is the latter. The former is more hopeful. That means we can have thousands who carry the L-strain and it doesn't cause deeper symptoms than the common cold. But if a elderly get it. Would the symptoms be weak too?

Also is the term "Persons Under Investgations" (PUI) under use too in other countries? Could there be foreigners with the L-strain who somehow escape being part of the PUI?

 

[Ygggdrasil]

I read there are two kinds of strains:
https://fortune.com/2020/03/04/coronavirus-mutating-second-strain-covid-19-wuhan-china/amp/

The Fortune article is based on a recently published paper in the journal National Science Review (which is not a journal I had heard of before looking up that paper, though it does appear to focus on publishing work from China). This paper has recently been criticized by other researchers in the field:

An analysis of genetic data from the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak was recently published in the journal National Science Review by Tang et al. (2020) 84. Two of the key claims made by this paper appear to have been reached by misunderstanding and over-interpretation of the SARS-CoV-2 data, with an additional analysis suffering from methodological limitations. [...] Given these flaws, we believe that Tang et al. should retract their paper, as the claims made in it are clearly unfounded and risk spreading dangerous misinformation at a crucial time in the outbreak.

http://virological.org/t/response-to-on-the-origin-and-continuing-evolution-of-sars-cov-2/418

I have not had time to read the paper or the critique in detail, but for now, you may want to take the claims about two strains of the virus with a grain of salt.

 

[bhobba]

There are only 50 people in the the whole of Australia that have it, but boy has it had an impact psychologically:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-51731422

I saw a couple of interviews with psychologists/psychiatrists and even they were somewhat perplexed. Every commentator I have listened to has basically said - they give up - people are mad.

People likely have seen it but just in case here is a post about the starting of human trials with the Moderna vaccine:
https://www.livescience.com/us-coronavirus-vaccine-trial-recruiting.html

I will let those more experienced in vaccine tests comment on exactly what it means.

Thanks
Bill

 

[kadiot]

1. An Australian woman tested positive for COVID-19 and she had a travel history from the Philippines. We have no idea what the timelines are, if she stayed in the PH for a long time or just transited, or if she came from somewhere else.

2. A Taiwan man who tested positive also came from the Philippines. We have a little bit more detail about him from official sources, but we need some more data on whether he traveled elsewhere and if he was sick before that.

They got to trace their flight itineraries to find out which areas in the Philippines they roamed. Otherwise, PH-DOH should do a shotgun testing like what South Korea is doing if epidemiologic tracing will not work.

 

[kadiot]

Also is the term "Persons Under Investgations" (PUI) under use too in other countries? Could there be foreigners with the L-strain who somehow escape being part of the PUI?

Next set of query from the chart, they should remove the query Yes or No for history since either go for PUI and PUM.. Confusing.

 

[chemisttree]

There are only 50 people in the the whole of Australia that have it, but boy has it had an impact psychologically:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-51731422

I saw a couple of interviews with psychologists/psychiatrists and even they were somewhat perplexed. Every commentator I have listened to has basically said - they give up - people are mad.

Yeah. I live through that whenever a hurricane comes close. You should do something to prepare, though. The supply chain HAS been interrupted. Fallout from that is just around the corner.
India has just halted export of a couple of dozen of (pharmaceutical) APIs. Wuhan is (was?) an important source of pharmaceutical ingredients that supplied India. Paracetamol (acetaminophen) is on https://dgft.gov.in/sites/default/files/Noti%2050_0.pdf

 

[chirhone]

Next set of query from the chart, they should remove the query Yes or No for history since either go for PUI and PUM.. Confusing.

https://news.abs-cbn.com/news/03/06/20/philippines-2-new-coronavirus-cases

We just have confirmed 4th and 5th cases. We are not immuned after all. Now we have a problem and it is just starting.

Where can anyone buy an NCOVID-19 test kit? I have a cough and tired recently. I want to be able to test myself and other relatives/friends without going to the hospital and risk getting real infections.

 

[chemisttree]

https://news.abs-cbn.com/news/03/06/20/philippines-2-new-coronavirus-cases

We just have confirmed 4th and 5th cases. We are not immuned after all. Now we have a problem and it is just starting.

Where can anyone buy an NCOVID-19 test kit? I have a cough and tired recently. I want to be able to test myself and other relatives/friends without going to the hospital and risk getting real infections.

This quote from the story, “The absence of travel is a clear indication that this is a local case. But it is still premature to say that there is local transmission, we need to be evidence-based.”

I wonder what evidence they’re waiting for? Astonishing!

 

[russ_watters]

Where can anyone buy an NCOVID-19 test kit? I have a cough and tired recently. I want to be able to test myself and other relatives/friends without going to the hospital and risk getting real infections.

No such thing exists or likely ever will.

 

[kadiot]

This quote from the story, “The absence of travel is a clear indication that this is a local case. But it is still premature to say that there is local transmission, we need to be evidence-based.”

I wonder what evidence they’re waiting for? Astonishing!

That's a very convenient EXCUSE by DOH. They don't even have test kits and monitoring, so where do they base their statements?

Edit to add: Maybe the news writer is just fond of using the term evidence based without really understanding the seriousness of the situation. I heard the multi-agency task force led by DOH in a congressional hearing weeks ago and I thought they were funny.

 

[chemisttree]

Local case (no travel) is not the equivalent of local transmission?

How do they explain how this man got the virus? By opening an email attachment perhaps?

 

[Mary Conrads Sanburn]

Is there a cure for the new coronavirus?

By Stephanie Pappas - Live Science Contributor 2 days ago

When would you know you have the virus?

COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the new coronavirus, has spread to every continent except Antarctica. Not too long after the virus was first discovered at the end of December, labs turned their sights toward treatment.

Currently, however, there is no cure for this coronavirus, and treatments are based on the kind of care given for influenza (seasonal flu) and other severe respiratory illnesses, known as "supportive care," according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). These treatments essentially treat the symptoms, which often in the case of COVID-19 involve fever, cough and shortness of breath. In mild cases, this might simply mean rest and fever-reducing medications such as acetaminophen (Tylenol) for comfort.

In hospitals, doctors and nurses are sometimes treating COVID-19 patients with the antiviral drug oseltamivir, or Tamiflu, which seems to suppress the virus' reproduction in at least some cases. This is somewhat surprising, Michigan Tech virologist Ebenezer Tumban told Live Science, as Tamiflu was designed to target an enzyme on the influenza virus, not on coronaviruses. The National Institutes of Health has begun a clinical trial at the University of Nebraska Medical Center to test the antiviral remdesivir for COVID-19, the agency announced Feb. 25. In China, doctors are also testing an array of other antivirals originally designed to treat Ebola and HIV, Nature Biotechnology reported.

In cases in which pneumonia inhibits breathing, treatment involves ventilation with oxygen. Ventilators blow air into the lungs through a mask or a tube inserted directly into the windpipe. A New England Journal of Medicine study of 1,099 hospitalized patients with the Coronavirus in China found that 41.3% needed supplemental oxygen and 2.3% needed invasive mechanical ventilation. Glucocorticoids were given to 18.6% of patients, a treatment often used to reduce inflammation and help open airways during respiratory disease.

There is no vaccine for the Coronavirus that causes COVID-19. Scientists are working to develop one, Hilary Marston, a medical officer and policy advisor at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), said in a Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health webcast on Monday (March 2). However, there will not be a vaccine for the virus in the near term.

"If everything moves as quickly as possible, the soonest that it could possibly be is about one-and-a-half to two years. That still might be very optimistic," Marston said.

[ . . . ]

https://www.livescience.com/can-coronavirus-be-cured.html

 

[kadiot]

"There was extensive environmental contamination by 1 SARS-CoV-2 patient with mild upper respiratory tract involvement. Toilet bowl and sink samples were positive, suggesting that viral shedding in stool5 could be a potential route of transmission. Postcleaning samples were negative, suggesting that current decontamination measures are sufficient."

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/ja...a9SlRnMb2TaWCyJJ3CImYi-JdNUlzRz5P8-fOkL8CDpjQ

 

[kadiot]

https://news.abs-cbn.com/news/03/06/20/philippines-2-new-coronavirus-cases

We just have confirmed 4th and 5th cases. We are not immuned after all. Now we have a problem and it is just starting.

Where can anyone buy an NCOVID-19 test kit? I have a cough and tired recently. I want to be able to test myself and other relatives/friends without going to the hospital and risk getting real infections.

No such thing exists or likely ever will.

I was told that the testing for Covid-19 in Philippines is being done in Research Institute for Tropical Medicine (RITM). There are currently several formats for testing. A validated RT-PCR (a process that amplifies DNA if it is present using primers) is the most common method but there are others. The RT-PCR machine can use either a commercial KIT (includes primers and reagents in a package) or an in-house method that uses primers and reagents that are bought separately. That is what I meant by PH-DOH doesn't have kits, because they use the in-house method which is cheaper but is good enough as long as it is done properly. RITM uses an in-house method with primers supplied from Japan. One primer set is good for 1,500 tests. They currently have enough primers to run 3,000 in house tests. The kit that Philippine Genome Center and UP NIH is developing still needs to be validated but runs on the same principle. TMI? Bottomline is RITM can do the Covid19 test confirmation without kits and they have enough materials to do 3,000 tests.

 

[kadiot]

Official press release from PH-DOH. It explains the 2 new COVID19 cases in detail AND the 3 cases (Japan, Australia, Taiwan) that traveled to the Philippines.

https://www.doh.gov.ph/doh-press-re...qpNyeEZP5n3IoEPbqOWD49VqygruEkHTg_PJHyLcTZ06I

 

[Bandersnatch]

There are only 50 people in the the whole of Australia that have it, but boy has it had an impact psychologically:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-51731422

Police were even called to a dispute on Wednesday, with reports saying a knife was pulled out in an argument over toilet roll between panic buying shoppers.

Ah, the Land Down Under. When I first saw the Mad Max films, I thought them neat apocalyptic fiction. Over the years it's been dawning on me they are actually allegorical documentaries about Aussie psyche, and y'all but one toilet roll away from the Thunderdome.

 

[chirhone]

Are these also the terms used in other countries, the difference between "local transmission" vs "community transmission"?

http://inqm.news/iuug

"Local transmission is defined as the transfer of the virus that causes the disease in a local geographical setting.

Dr. Rabindra Abeyasinghe, WHO's representative in the Philippines, however, clarified that the case will not be a widespread contamination for now, as long as contact tracing is still being conducted.

"Even the fifth case is a local transmission, but getting another case in a local contact does not mean widespread contamination. We already know that this disease is transmitted upon close contacts," he told reporters when asked if the fifth patient's relatives also tested positive for COVID-19 later on.

When there is already a "widespread transmission beyond the geographical area," Abeyasinghe said this is already considered a community transmission."

So we don't have community transmission although we have local transmission? Maybe we are still hoping against hope we are more immune than others like the South Koreans?

 

[Ygggdrasil]

You can have local transmission without community transmission. For example, consider the case where someone who has traveled from an infected area (e. g. China, Italy, Iran, or South Korea), shows symptoms and tests positive. This travel related case counts as neither local nor community transmission because the disease was not acquired locally.

Now consider the case that this individual infects a family member who did not travel. This counts as local transmission because the virus was acquired locally, but not community transmission because we can trace the source of the infection. This situation is not bad because public health officials can still use contact tracing to isolate individuals to stop the spread of the disease.

Community transmission occurs when people start being diagnosed with the disease who have no history of travel or contact with known cases. This situation suggests that there are undiagnosed individuals in the community spreading the disease, so contact tracing will not likely be sufficient to contain the disease.

 

[kadiot]

One may have come in contact with a foreigner with disease. Sustained local transmission in the community is defined as transmission from one local to another. If its from a foreigner to a local, you can prevent subsequent sustained transmission by meticulous quarantine.

 

[jbriggs444]

One may have come in contact with a foreigner with disease. Sustained local transmission in the community is defined as transmission from one local to another.

If we are to trust @Ygggdrasil, sustained local transmission in the community amounts to transmission from an unidentified local. The ability to usefully trace individual contacts has been lost and the entire community is considered suspect.

If its from a foreigner to a local, you can prevent subsequent sustained transmission by meticulous quarantine.

If it is from a local to a local you can still prevent subsequent sustained transmission by meticulous quarantine. As long as you can trace the local's prior contacts, you can increase the scope of the quarantine to include those. In principle, this is no different from a foreigner. It's just that with a recently arrived foreigner it is easier to trace prior contacts.

 

[kadiot]

If we are to trust @Ygggdrasil, sustained local transmission in the community amounts to transmission from an unidentified local. The ability to usefully trace individual contacts has been lost and the entire community is considered suspect.If it is from a local to a local you can still prevent subsequent sustained transmission by meticulous quarantine. As long as you can trace the local's prior contacts, you can increase the scope of the quarantine to include those. In principle, this is no different from a foreigner. It's just that with a recently arrived foreigner it is easier to trace prior contacts.

I agree. Yes once it has spread from local to (unidentified) local, its much harder to trace.

 

[kadiot]

"The virus is not believed to be transmissable by people who do not have symptoms. Dr Bloomfield said people who were in that area were casual contacts - and not close contacts"

Taken from
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national...-s-fourth-covid-19-case-attended-tool-concert

Do you agree with that statement? It was rockin' roll. Headbang until he is so sweaty and breathless. Boom!

It is the duty of every government to ban large gatherings. Do not sacrifice people's health and possibly lives for the sake of money.

To a Covid19 carrier. Don't pass the virus to others. It's no different from murder. Be responsible with your action.

 

[chemisttree]

Shaking hands - bad

elbow bumps and head banging - good

 

[WWGD]

Yes, tell the Beatles: "I _don't_ want to hold your hand" ( because I don't want to get Wuhan(ed))

 

[Vanadium 50]

Don't pass the virus to others. It's no different from murder.

Of course it's different.

 

[chemisttree]

What happens when the Mayor declares a COVID-19 state of emergency...

This is where the bleach would be. It will soon be restocked. Strangely, the chlorine pool “bleach” (10% sodium hypochlorite) hasn’t been touched. Sorry, no pictures of that section.

This is where the surface cleaners and sanitary wipes would go. It will soon be restocked. There is no shortage of this stuff.

People are also buying WATER! Why?

 

[Vanadium 50]

People are also buying WATER! Why?

Because that's what you do in an emergency that will completely wipe out civilization.

 

[chemisttree]

Because that's what you do in an emergency that will completely wipe out civilization.

Well, they’re doing it wrong! At the P^3*meeting they tell us to buy above ground pools and fill ‘em up. They come with recirculating pumps and filters. C’mon Uh-murica! Panic Properly!

*People Panicking Properly (P³)

 

[russ_watters]

Because that's what you do in an emergency that will completely wipe out civilization.

...such as the first 2" snowstorm of the year. You buy a month's worth of milk that will go bad in a week, and a years' supply of toilet paper.

The downside of not paying attention to the apocalypse is if you accidentally go to the grocery store the day before a snowstorm you may get beaten to death over a roll of toilet paper, and if you go the day after, there isn't any left!

 

[anorlunda]

eople are also buying WATER! Why?

Because the authorities made public statements telling the public to have 2 weeks food and water on supply at home. I think they should have left the word water out of that.

I fear being unable to buy food in the stores more than I fear catching the virus.

 

[WWGD]

Because that's what you do in an emergency that will completely wipe out civilization.

Open your tap and fill up plastic bottles?

 

[russ_watters]

Because the authorities made public statements telling the public to have 2 weeks food and water on supply at home. I think they should have left the word water out of that.

I fear being unable to buy food in the stores more than I fear catching the virus.

Wait, did anyone actually suggest that for this apocalypse or is that just the general apocalypse preparedness advice?

 

[chemisttree]

The downside of not paying attention to the apocalypse is if you accidentally go to the grocery store the day before a snowstorm you may get beaten to death over a roll of toilet paper, and if you go the day after, there isn't any left!

That’s why I’m heavily invested in smooth rocks!

 

[anorlunda]

Wait, did anyone actually suggest that for this apocalypse or is that just the general apocalypse preparedness advice?

Yes, I heard it on TV from the local head of public health department. It may be stupid, but she is the authorized spokesperson.

The rationale is related to people being ordered to work from home and to avoid crowds. Not all people are white collar workers. Some are retail store cashiers and some are truck drivers. If those people don't come to work, the stores must close.

 

[mathwonk]

@chirhone : we are told here (Seattle area) that if we think we may have the virus and want to be tested we should call our doctor and discuss the situation. The doctor will make a determination as to whether the test is warranted and make an appointment with you to come in under appropriate conditions for a test. You should not go to an emergency room , nor come unannounced to the doctor's office, for exactly the reasons you gave.

 

[jedishrfu]

Fellow posters let's keep in mind that this is a serious issue facing the world today and people are dying because of this illness. There is much fear going around and in an era of intolerance for others, this can lead to people taking what we know here to be humorous as factual with dire consequences.

Personally, I know a few friends who have been questioned by strangers as to where they came from and if they've traveled to China recently. I can see this escalating further if we don't stop and consider that our words can sow so much more fear.

VOX has presented some excellent videos on the why and how of the Coronavirus and I have posted one such video below:



Bottom line, no more jokes (that includes you @jedishrfu ).

Jedi