It doesn't make sense from a medical point of view. China, and specifically Hubei Province and its capital Wuhan, suffer an epidemic that they are trying to control with titanic efforts. 99% of cases of coronavirus (COVID-19) infection, today more than 40,000 with a thousand deaths, have been registered in China. Of them, almost 70% in Hubei. Only 1% of cases have been registered outside China, in 24 countries (inclu…
It seems completely unsurprising to me that we aren't seeing more cases in other countries so far - almost every country with the exception of Singapore are only testing people who have been in Hubei (or China, if symptoms are serious). Meanwhile Singapore, which actually has been testing more people, has been finding more and more locally transmitted cases, despite huge efforts tracking down and isolating contacts of previous cases.
>Serious cases and mortality (2%) will be adjusted downwards safely in the coming weeks, as the detection of mild cases increases.
Or it could adjust upward, as it seems to often take 3+ weeks to kill. In Singapore 8/50 cases are in critical condition in the ICU (And Singapore has detected many mild cases, even asymptomatic ones). For the flu in the U.S. it seems about 0.1% of cases end up in the ICU, so that's some compelling evidence that this is 10-100x as dangerous as the flu. And what happens to the fatality rate when we run out of ICU beds, as already happens during particularly bad flu seasons?
I'm not saying this will be globally devastating, but I think the chance is high enough that I'm disappointed more extreme actions aren't being taken worldwide.
edit: I also assume the case numbers in China outside of Hubei have been looking better recently because they also can no longer rely on the fact that a sick person has recently been to Hubei to know who to test.