Is It a Pandemic Yet? • Hacker News Board

Re: Is It a Pandemic Yet?

#41

Post by TomMarius » Mon, Feb 24, 2020, 2:54 PM UTC

JulianMorrison wrote: post #29

James_Henry wrote: post #20

> And what should each of us do, beyond staying informed and washing our hands frequently? Keep calm and rational. It might be worth stocking some reserve of critical medications, for example — but not too much, because hoarding could create shortages. > We, as individuals, can also try to plan for basic contingencies. Companies can cross-train key staff members so that one person’s absence won’t derail the business.…

You don't need to stock up if you can get food delivered. They can leave the delivery on the doorstep.

They won't once the quarantine is in effect

Re: Is It a Pandemic Yet?

#42

Post by chc4 » Mon, Feb 24, 2020, 2:55 PM UTC

aww_dang wrote: post #24

Last week google had a promoted 'fact check' snippet for searches about covid-19 being released from a lab. Predictably, it was an article debunking the story as a crack-pot conspiracy theory. Today stories about covid-19 being released from a lab are front page at news.google.com.

Those new articles have basically the same exact conspiracy theory reasoning behind them as the ZeroHedge and friends ones from last week, so this isn't as much of a slam dunk as you make it sound like.

Re: Is It a Pandemic Yet?

#43

Post by toomuchtodo » Mon, Feb 24, 2020, 2:55 PM UTC

JulianMorrison wrote: post #29

James_Henry wrote: post #20

> And what should each of us do, beyond staying informed and washing our hands frequently? Keep calm and rational. It might be worth stocking some reserve of critical medications, for example — but not too much, because hoarding could create shortages. > We, as individuals, can also try to plan for basic contingencies. Companies can cross-train key staff members so that one person’s absence won’t derail the business.…

You don't need to stock up if you can get food delivered. They can leave the delivery on the doorstep.

Do not count on this. Buy food stuffs that are non-perishable, which you can eat anyway if it turns out to not be needed.

I speak from experience preparing for hurricanes. If you wait until the last minute, you're going to be woefully unprepared.

Re: Is It a Pandemic Yet?

#44

Post by Udik » Mon, Feb 24, 2020, 2:55 PM UTC

rimliu wrote: post #28

est31 wrote: post #9

> Some 152 cases (and at least three deaths) were confirmed in Italy on Sunday, up from three cases on Thursday. The number of infected people in South Korea jumped to 763 (and six deaths) in just days. To add an important point: In both countries, they have detected covid-19 only well after it has spread inside the country. E.g. in Italy it started with one severely ill patient who went to the hospital and got teste…

Our media is referring to "patient zero" in Italy as a 38 years-old man. So either he is known or our media is full of your-know-that. Which would not be surprising. Edit: a commenter below correctly pointed out that that 38yo man is being referred to as "patient one" not "patient zero". My bad.

I think they're referring to him as "patient one". Patient zero (i.e. someone who is or was ill and has recently come back from China) hasn't been found yet.

Re: Is It a Pandemic Yet?

#45

Post by JulianMorrison » Mon, Feb 24, 2020, 2:55 PM UTC

i_am_nomad wrote: post #35

JulianMorrison wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't need to stock up if you can get food delivered. They can leave the delivery on the doorstep.

That might be what the other 1.5 million people in my city are counting on. Which means, I’m not going to count on that.

If your city's supermarkets can feed people with in-person shopping, they can feed people with deliveries as easily, it's the same number of people buying food.

Re: Is It a Pandemic Yet?

#46

Post by mytailorisrich » Mon, Feb 24, 2020, 2:56 PM UTC

wonderwonder wrote: post #39

danmaz74 wrote: post #8

I read a lot about this virus lately, and it looks like the mortality rate depends a lot on the availability of intensive care. If that's the case, slowing down the diffusion of the infection could be really important in keeping down the total number of deaths.

I noticed the same thing. As numbers continue to grow, we run the real risk of even top of the line health care systems being overwhelmed and people passing from lack of access to care. Couple numbers that jump out for me are China with ~3% mortality rate but also rumors of these numbers being vastly unreported. Iran with a 19% mortality rate (on a small scale)! Also the mortality rate appears to be 3.2% where for a…

In Iran I suspect that either the actual number of cases is much higher than currently reported/known or that the people infected were mostly elderly, or both.

Re: Is It a Pandemic Yet?

#47

Post by nickjj » Mon, Feb 24, 2020, 2:57 PM UTC

James_Henry wrote: post #20

> And what should each of us do, beyond staying informed and washing our hands frequently? Keep calm and rational. It might be worth stocking some reserve of critical medications, for example — but not too much, because hoarding could create shortages. > We, as individuals, can also try to plan for basic contingencies. Companies can cross-train key staff members so that one person’s absence won’t derail the business.…

> if needed, quarantine yourself and take care of yourself and your family/relations well

How would that work in practice? The last I heard you can catch this virus pretty easily just by having air touch your eye.

A lot of people live in either a city or a suburban area and most apartments and houses aren't air tight. Wouldn't your breath get circulated out of your apartment, mixed in with the outside air and drift over to your neighbor -- or is the virus not that susceptible to spreading?

Re: Is It a Pandemic Yet?

#48

Post by thrower123 » Mon, Feb 24, 2020, 2:57 PM UTC

aww_dang wrote: post #24

Last week google had a promoted 'fact check' snippet for searches about covid-19 being released from a lab. Predictably, it was an article debunking the story as a crack-pot conspiracy theory. Today stories about covid-19 being released from a lab are front page at news.google.com.

The hit rate on conspiracy theories is getting to be better than the official narrative these days.

Re: Is It a Pandemic Yet?

#49

Post by JulianMorrison » Mon, Feb 24, 2020, 2:58 PM UTC

TomMarius wrote: post #41

JulianMorrison wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't need to stock up if you can get food delivered. They can leave the delivery on the doorstep.

They won't once the quarantine is in effect

A quarantine that tries to prevent people getting food is a quick way to get riots. No government would be stupid like that.

Re: Is It a Pandemic Yet?

#50

Post by SiempreViernes » Mon, Feb 24, 2020, 2:58 PM UTC

rimliu wrote: post #28

est31 wrote: post #9

> Some 152 cases (and at least three deaths) were confirmed in Italy on Sunday, up from three cases on Thursday. The number of infected people in South Korea jumped to 763 (and six deaths) in just days. To add an important point: In both countries, they have detected covid-19 only well after it has spread inside the country. E.g. in Italy it started with one severely ill patient who went to the hospital and got teste…

Our media is referring to "patient zero" in Italy as a 38 years-old man. So either he is known or our media is full of your-know-that. Which would not be surprising. Edit: a commenter below correctly pointed out that that 38yo man is being referred to as "patient one" not "patient zero". My bad.

Things are developing very fast, expect that distortions from the chinese wispers games that is modern media to be worse than ever.

I've seen report that the first case was in contact with a person that had been in China but showed not symptoms and even might have tested negative at some point. If they get re-tested and show positive now, or some of their possessions do, that solves the mystery.