BBC: China pneumonia outbreak: COVID-19 Global Pandemic

[visionary]

 

Kind of gross to watch, to be honest....

Edited March 2, 2020 by visionary

[bcl05]

He's just so, so stupid.  I can't imagine Tony Fauci's patience.  He must be pulling his hair out and screaming into his pillow at night.  

[Skintime]

19 minutes ago, visionary said:

 

Kind of gross to watch, to be honest....

He is the most disgusting individual ever

[visionary]

 

[CousinsCowgirl84]

dun dun dun....

 

 

 

should increase the people infected nicely.

[visionary]

 

 

 

 

[zCommander]

Looking at the biology of the virus... I bet you the 1st person from that seafood market in China was bit by a bat. 

 

"The epidemic, which started from 12 December 2019. Full-length genome sequences were obtained from five patients at the early stage of the outbreak. They are almost identical to each other and share 79.5% sequence identify to SARS-CoV. Furthermore, it was found that 2019-nCoV is 96% identical at the whole-genome level to a bat coronavirus. The pairwise protein sequence analysis of seven conserved non-structural proteins show that this virus belongs to the species of SARSr-CoV. The 2019-nCoV virus was then isolated from the bronchoalveolar lavage fluid of a critically ill patient, which can be neutralized by sera from several patients. Importantly, we have confirmed that this novel CoV uses the same cell entry receptor, ACE2, as SARS-CoV."

[TheGoodBits]

^the origin was almost certainly bats, but transmission was likely not direct to humans. I heard an expert on npr about a month back talking about how bats can transmit to a host animal, which would then infect humans.
 

Example: bat lands in tree to eat fruit, poops while eating, a pig in the field eats fallen fruit with bat poo on it and is infected. That piggy goes to market and is butchered, suddenly the 20 people who buy the pig meat are all infected.

 

Mystery illness and most symptoms are mild, so no major cause for concern. Weeks go by and this thing is spreading like crazy. Once people start dying in big enough numbers for doctors to figure out this is something serious, 5k people already have it. 

 

[visionary]

 

 

 

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Edited March 3, 2020 by visionary

[Bacon]

Life update: 

 

Went to Costco with the wife yesterday and bought $270 in unperishables. It was like Black Friday. There isn't a bottle of sanitizer on the shelves in LA county, but my apartment still has a little, plus 5 containers of clorox wipes, 2 cans of sanitizing spray and 2 80 oz bottles of hand soap. The rations we bought should last at least 6 weeks. 

 

Despite the absolute trainwreck that has become of Iran and our tangerine dip**** leader trying to kill us all, I am encouraged by:

 

1. The news of 1,000,000 test kits coming to the US

2. Andrew Cuomo waiving health care costs in NYC for coronavirus testing

3. Positive trends in recovered vs deadly cases that we've been seeing; today was especially encouraging 

4. Clinical trial results for treatments coming in the next week or two

5. Today was the first day to see a drop in new cases outside of China since February 25

 

I know things seem hopeless, and this next month is going to be bleak, we're going to lose a lot of people, but there are reasons to be optimistic. Besides a vaccine, the best thing we can hope for out of this is to become an overall more health-conscious and self-sufficient nation.

 

Alright, I'm backing out of this thread again. Stay well! 

Edited March 3, 2020 by Bacon

[visionary]

 

[CousinsCowgirl84]

24 minutes ago, Bacon said:I know things seem hopeless, and this next month is going to be bleak, we're going to lose a lot of people, but there are reasons to be optimistic. Besides a vaccine, the best thing we can hope for out of this is to become an overall more health-conscious and self-sufficient nation.

 

Alright, I'm backing out of this thread again. Stay well! 

 

 

So you think this will kill more people than the flu this year or less? Half as many? A quarter? An eighth?  What is a lot of people? “Seems hopeless” is a bit much.

[Cooked Crack]

 

[Bacon]

28 minutes ago, CousinsCowgirl84 said:

 

 

So you think this will kill more people than the flu this year or less? Half as many? A quarter? An eighth?  What is a lot of people? “Seems hopeless” is a bit much.

 

It depends on who you believe or want to believe. Look at this ****:

 

https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/public-global-health/485602-virus-expert-as-much-as-70-percent-of-worlds

 

If 40 percent of the population catches this and the virus has a CFR of 1%, we're talking about 28 million deaths. That's a hell of a lot more than the flu, if it all took place within a year. 

 

But I think the wording and time frame matters. I actually do believe that 2.8 billion of the people on earth today could catch COVID-19 or some form of it. But will all of those happen this year? Probably not. But if we don't get rid of COVID-19, 2.8 billion could catch it in their lifetime. 

 

Let's do the math. Worldometer begins its charts on January 22, so let's use that date. In 62 days of tracking, there have been 3125 deaths, an average of 50 deaths per day within the tracking period. If that number were to remain constant (and it won't), we would be looking at 18,300 deaths over 366 days (because it's a leap year), which is a far lower figure than the 300,000-600,000 or so we can expect to die worldwide from the flu each year. 

 

Here's the problem and why everyone is so freaked out: if we don't develop a vaccine for this virus, and soon, this first wave will look like a warning shot compared to what's coming. The Spanish Flu only got really nasty during its second wave. We know what to do to quell the flu. We have no vaccine for COVID-19 and no approved treatments beyond support in the United States (though that may change soon). I am legitimately concerned about next year's flu season. 

 

All I can say is that I wish our virologists Godspeed and hope we learned something from this mess. 

Edited March 3, 2020 by Bacon

[Renegade7]

3 hours ago, visionary said:

 

 

Next headline should be a million confirmed cases because we took so long.

 

Maybe that's a good thing that it's probably already everywhere and we arent all dead yet or in total collapse.

 

Perception is reality, right?

[China]

8 minutes ago, Bacon said:

 

Let's do the math. Worldometer begins its charts on January 22, so let's use that date. In 62 days of tracking, there have been 3125 deaths, an average of 50 deaths per day within the tracking period. If that number were to remain constant (and it won't), we would be looking at 18,300 deaths over 366 days (because it's a leap year), which is a far lower figure than the 300,000 or so we can expect to die worldwide from the flu each year. 

 

 

 

Hmmm... those numbers seem off.  If the CFR is 2% and 2.8 billion people become infected, then 56 million people should die.  If only 18,300 people die, I think that would be considered minor in terms of global population.  56 million people on the other hand would be huge.

[PeterMP]

23 minutes ago, Bacon said:

Here's the problem and why everyone is so freaked out: if we don't develop a vaccine for this virus, and soon, this first wave will look like a warning shot compared to what's coming. The Spanish Flu only got really nasty during its second wave. We know what to do to quell the flu. We have no vaccine for COVID-19 and no approved treatments beyond support in the United States (though that may change soon). I am legitimately concerned about next year's flu season. 

 

Unless there's a more general break down in society that results in people behaving differently than when they are sick normally, a repeat of the Spanish flu is unlikely.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu#Spread

 

"This increased severity has been attributed to the circumstances of the First World War.^[90] In civilian life, natural selection favors a mild strain. Those who get very ill stay home, and those mildly ill continue with their lives, preferentially spreading the mild strain. In the trenches, natural selection was reversed. Soldiers with a mild strain stayed where they were, while the severely ill were sent on crowded trains to crowded field hospitals, spreading the deadlier virus. The second wave began, and the flu quickly spread around the world again. Consequently, during modern pandemics, health officials pay attention when the virus reaches places with social upheaval (looking for deadlier strains of the virus)."

 

That the 2nd wave will be worse than the first or that there will even be a 2nd wave in the next few months is pretty unlikely.

 

The Spanish flu happened mostly because of WW1.

Edited March 3, 2020 by PeterMP

[Bacon]

22 minutes ago, China said:

 

Hmmm... those numbers seem off.  If the CFR is 2% and 2.8 billion people become infected, then 56 million people should die.  If only 18,300 people die, I think that would be considered minor in terms of global population.  56 million people on the other hand would be huge.

 

First of all, I believe if 40% of the population becomes infected, the mortality rate will not remain a constant 2%. The mortality rate is currently 2.5% or thereabouts at a very early stage of testing and treatment, but as it becomes more widespread, we've already seen countries like South Korea whittle that rate down to as low as 0.5% with aggressive testing that brings mild cases to the surface. Including asymptomatic cases, the CFR is likely much lower than we'll ever know. I chose 1% to take those variables into account. 

 

Secondly, I didn't take the statement to mean that 40% of the human population will catch the virus this year. 40-70% of the human population will likely catch the virus at some point because it's very possible that COVID-19 is here to stay. It could become a mainstay of cold and flu season and millions would die over the course of time, in that eventuality. 

13 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

Unless there's a more general break down in society that results in people behaving differently than when they are sick normally, a repeat of the Spanish flu is unlikely.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu#Spread

 

"This increased severity has been attributed to the circumstances of the First World War.^[90] In civilian life, natural selection favors a mild strain. Those who get very ill stay home, and those mildly ill continue with their lives, preferentially spreading the mild strain. In the trenches, natural selection was reversed. Soldiers with a mild strain stayed where they were, while the severely ill were sent on crowded trains to crowded field hospitals, spreading the deadlier virus. The second wave began, and the flu quickly spread around the world again. Consequently, during modern pandemics, health officials pay attention when the virus reaches places with social upheaval (looking for deadlier strains of the virus)."

 

That the 2nd wave will be worse than the first or that there will even be a 2nd wave in the next few months is pretty unlikely.

 

The Spanish flu happened mostly because of WW1.

 

It's difficult to make a realistic comparison to the Spanish Flu because virology and health care has advanced to such a degree that we should expect treatments and vaccines to quell spread. 

 

On the other hand, as we've seen recently, it's also easier to travel internationally than ever before. Transmission is now very simple and possible for anyone, not just active military. 

 

I can't and don't guarantee a second wave of COVID-19 in October, but I guarantee you it's at the forefront of the minds of many scientists. They're working to prevent exactly that. 

Edited March 3, 2020 by Bacon

[Renegade7]

Solid article about social media giants , like facebook, taking stand on coronavirus misinformation.

 

Which begs the question, why doesnt facebook take this stand on other dangerous forms of misinformation?  Posting BS about global pandemics isnt free speech, Zuckerberg?

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2020/02/28/facebook-twitter-amazon-misinformation-coronavirus/

 

[PeterMP]

27 minutes ago, Bacon said:

I can't and don't guarantee a second wave of COVID-19 in October, but I guarantee you it's at the forefront of the minds of many scientists. They're working to prevent exactly that. 

 

Even if there is a 2nd wave, it almost certainly won't be more deadly than the first wave, unless you have some sort of mechanism where the more deadly strain of the virus has the ability to reproduce and spread more easily than the less deadly one.

 

What happened during WW1 is that due to conditions at the time, a more deadly variant of the virus was allowed to evolve or at least spread instead of dying out.

 

Even international travel doesn't change that.  The more sick people are going to be the less likely people to travel or be allowed to travel, which means the more lethal version will be less likely to spread.

 

In most cases, over small periods of times viruses (or any pathogen) don't generally become more lethal.

 

(Which means people will be more likely to catch the less lethal version first and gain some immunity from that.)

Edited March 3, 2020 by PeterMP

[visionary]

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 3, 2020 by visionary

[visionary]

 

[visionary]

 

 

 

 

 

[Cooked Crack]

 

Trump might **** around and catch COVID19.