BBC: China pneumonia outbreak: COVID-19 Global Pandemic

[NoCalMike]

[@DCGoldPants]

This century is going to have a lot more of these outbreaks. Overpopulated areas like SE Asia are going to be in bad shape. Oh, and viruses frozen for thousands of years in areas where it's melting. That's going to be fun for the ole immune system.

 

 

[kfrankie]

Here's one of my favorite far side cartoons.  I'm not saying its anywhere near time to panic over this, but if there's like a 1/1000 chance this breaks out into a real plague hindsight will be 20/20:

 

[China]

Chinese cities cancel New Year celebrations, travel ban widens in effort to stop coronavirus outbreak

 

BEIJING - Major Chinese cities, including the capital of Beijing and virus-hit Wuhan, banned all large gatherings over the coming Lunar New Year festival, the most important holiday on the Chinese calendar, in an expanding effort contain the rapidly spreading outbreak.The announcement Thursday came as authorities expanded travel restrictions imposed on Wuhan to surrounding municipalities, shutting down travel networks and attempting to quarantine some 25 million people - more than the population of Florida.

 

The extreme measures were accompanied by other indications that Communist Party authorities were struggling to control the outbreak, notably the aggressive censorship of any criticism or skepticism on social media.But some outspoken doctors warned that the controls would not be enough to stop the spread of the pneumonia-like virus, which has now killed 17 people in Wuhan and surrounding Hubei province.

 

"A bigger outbreak is certain," said Guan Yi, a virologist who helped identify severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) in 2003. He estimated - "conservatively," he said - that this outbreak could be 10 times bigger than the SARS epidemic because that virus was transmitted by only a few "super spreaders" in a more defined part of the country."We have passed through the 'golden period' for prevention and control," he told Caixin magazine from self-imposed quarantine after visiting Wuhan. "What's more, we've got the holiday traffic rush and a dereliction of duty from certain officials."

 

The Lunar New Year holiday, a week-long period when millions of Chinese travel to their hometowns - the biggest human migration on the planet - officially begins on Friday.

Ahead of the holiday, authorities initially said that the virus, which began in a Wuhan food market selling exotic animals for consumption, was mild and could not be transmitted between humans. But that changed this week when the number of people infected by the virus, which has an incubation period as long as 14 days, began to rise rapidly.

 

Even one of the government's top experts, who had played down the prospects for widespread infection, contracted the virus.

 

The number of people infected in China stood at 638 on Thursday evening.

 

Now, cases have been detected around the country, from Harbin in the north to Shenzhen in the south. Vietnam and Singapore joined the list of other countries that have detected the virus, with both confirming two cases had been found and were being treated.

 

Airports around the world, from London to Dubai to Atlanta, have put special screening measures in place to detect passengers arriving from China with fevers.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[China]

Somebody's scared of this virus:

 

After being diagnosed with Wuhan coronavirus, Seattle man now in isolation

 

The Seattle area man who is now the first confirmed U.S. patient to be diagnosed with the mysterious Wuhan coronavirus remains in isolation, and based on an interview with medical staffers his hospital stay can be described as challenging and harrowing.

 

Diaz spoke to ABC News on Wednesday about the patient and what his daily life and routine is like now that he has become the country's first patient with the mysterious virus.

According to Diaz:

• -Hospital staffers use a robot with a stethoscope to care for the man, an attempt to limit physical contact with him.
• -The patient resides in bio-containment room that is about 20x20, and it has security guards and four specially trained nurses who are assigned to his case.
• -Only 10-12 credentialed healthcare workers have access to room, and only a very few of them have have actually been inside his quarters.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[BigDaddyShoo]

Things that make you go hmmmmmm.......

 

 

"Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, is also home to one of the most advanced epidemic disease research laboratories in the world."

 

https://twitter.com/ShanghaiEye/status/1093160842638446592 

[kfrankie]

1 hour ago, China said:

• -Hospital staffers use a robot with a stethoscope to care for the man, an attempt to limit physical contact with him.
• -The patient resides in bio-containment room that is about 20x20, and it has security guards and four specially trained nurses who are assigned to his case.
• -Only 10-12 credentialed healthcare workers have access to room, and only a very few of them have have actually been inside his quarters.

 

Click on the link for the full article

 

Sounds a little bit like Ebola schmiola.  What the death vs. survival rate on this thing?

Edited January 23, 2020 by kfrankie

[SkinInsite]

SARS was 8-10% depending on who you ask. It was a lot more serious for people over 60.

 

 

 

The key is if this thing is as deadly as SARS and easy to spread like regular flu that number can get vary large very quickly.

 

 

[nonniey]

49 minutes ago, kfrankie said:

 

Sounds a little bit like Ebola schmiola.  What the death vs. survival rate on this thing?

So far about 2% of reported cases. Don't conflate this with infection rates though, which a lot of people sensationalizing this are already doing ( the OMG 2% of US population = 6 million dead!!!! reports/tweets/posts).

 

 

[kfrankie]

3 hours ago, BigDaddyShoo said:

Things that make you go hmmmmmm.......

 

 

"Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak, is also home to one of the most advanced epidemic disease research laboratories in the world."

 

https://twitter.com/ShanghaiEye/status/1093160842638446592 

 

 hmmm.....  Looks like they're in precisely the right place to fight it then!!  Too bad they don't know anything about it yet though.  I mean, if they had synthesized it or something that would be different, but since they had nothing to do with this strange disease popping up out of nowhere, I guess they'll just have to get down to brass tacks right away!!  Or maybe some guy will show up with a mysterious IV bag and try to nip it all in the bud like Morgan Freeman.

[visionary]

 

[visionary]

 

[visionary]

 

 

 

 

Edited January 24, 2020 by visionary

[Cooked Crack]

 

[visionary]

 

[Cooked Crack]

 

 

 

[China]

https://www.addictinggames.com/strategy/pandemic-2

[TradeTheBeal!]

[visionary]

 

[visionary]

 

[abdcskins]

This is bad. I have a feeling this is going to spread on a global scale. This may be the beginning of the end.

 

Probably not...but you never know.

[TheGreatBuzz]

49 minutes ago, abdcskins said:

This is bad. I have a feeling this is going to spread on a global scale. This may be the beginning of the end.

 

Probably not...but you never know.

Meh.  From what I’ve been reading, it doesn’t seem like it is actually all that bad especially for healthy people.  Even if it spreads across the better part of the globe, while it wouldn’t be good I definitely don’t see it as being the “beginning of the end.”

[TradeTheBeal!]

I’ve got a buddy on a guitar forum who is a rather celebrated virologist - lives in Switzerland, owns multiple Ferraris, very good player - and his specialty is corona viruses.

 

In his considered opinion, this outbreak is essentially no different that SARS or MERS.  Lethality around 5%...Which indicates elderly/compromised patients and a contagion factor roughly the same as influenza.  He’s not worried.

 

But...he added that things can change.

[China]

China coronavirus: Wuhan residents describe ‘doomsday’ scenes as patients overwhelm hospitals

 

-One woman said her husband had been feverish and coughing blood but was turned away by several hospitals that said they had no room

 

Hundreds of patients in Wuhan who have yet to be confirmed as carrying the new strain of coronavirus are becoming increasingly desperate as the city struggles to cope with the numbers reporting pneumonia symptoms.

One 36-year-old, speaking by phone outside a major hospital in the city, said she had spent the past week taking her sick husband from hospital to hospital in a vain attempt to get him tested for the virus, which has already killed 41 people and infected hundreds more.

“I have nothing. No protective clothing, only a raincoat, and I am standing outside the hospital in the rain,” said the woman, who gave her name as Xiaoxi.

“I am desperate, I have lost count of time and days. I don’t know if we will both live to see the new year.”

 

She said that Lunar New Year’s eve felt like “doomsday” as there was nowhere for her and her sick husband to go in the locked-down city.

A video shared by Xiaoxi appeared to show the hallway to the fever ward of the hospital packed with anxious patients seeking attention from medical staff.

 

The footage also showed medical staff in protective clothing and what Xiaoxi said were the bodies of patients who had died in the hospital and been left in the corridor wrapped in linen.

 

Click on the link for the full article

[twa]

20 minutes ago, TryTheBeal! said:

 

In his considered opinion, this outbreak is essentially no different that SARS or MERS.  Lethality around 5%...Which indicates elderly/compromised patients and a contagion factor roughly the same as influenza.  He’s not worried.

 

But...he added that things can change.

 

 

possibility of mutation keeps things interesting