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Tokyo Olympics “looking at a cancellation” if coronavirus not contained

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Re: Tokyo Olympics “looking at a cancellation” if coronavirus not contained

#111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your base case scenario should be that this will be globally widespread. The tipping point was when Iran became an epicenter. This is problematic because of its porous borders with countries with weak government. The good news is the virus is not too risky for an individual, excepting those who are old and with pre-existing conditions. The bad news is that there will likely be a lot of deaths in aggregate, globally.…

I think many people here on hackernews are being stupid that they are healthy adults so they don't need to worry. Even if you don't die you will be out of the work force for 2-3 weeks either because you are sick or quarantined. You could pass the infection to your children, parents Grand parents who might not be able to fight off the infection and die. Many people get flu vaccines or over the years have built up some…

Not to mention the virus is mutating and is now killing healthy people in their twenties in Hubei (if not at least serious disease requiring mechanical ventilation and supplemental oxygen). Also there is evidence the HIV drugs are no longer working due to the virus developing resistance.

Those of you thinking "oh I'm a healthy young person I'm just gonna carry on doing what I'm doing" is gonna be in for a rude awakening.

Re: Tokyo Olympics “looking at a cancellation” if coronavirus not contained

#113
post #64
post #35

It will be cancelled. Mathematic models made by epidemiologist experts from Harvard and prediction from John Hopkins guys are giving huge numbers between 40 and 70% world adult population will be infected in one year and numbers of deaths will be between 30 and 150 million if their predictions are correct and china didn't lie with the 2% death rate Read the threads from their twitters, the situation is much much wors…

A lot of the links you provide have alarmist titles and big claims and confusing evidence. Which is strange since the twitter authors are clearly well educated virologists/epidemiologists. But the style of language makes it difficult for me to trust what they are saying. So far I am sticking to research papers and This Week In Virology [0], where there is a lot less dramatic clickbait language and a lot more skeptica…

do you use twitter much? these look like standard Twitter threads to me with standard Twitter writing style. threads from blue checkmark guys do tend towards sensational though.

Re: Tokyo Olympics “looking at a cancellation” if coronavirus not contained

#115
post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We were able to essentially starve SARS out of new people to infect. It had a 2-7 day incubation period, was not contagious before symptomatic, and spread by bodily fluid (coughing up water droplets, spread by touch to another). COVID-19 has a 21+ day incubation period, is contagious before you're symptomatic, and is possibly airborne (I haven't heard strong confirmation of that yet, but it's definitely more virulent…

And apparently it can survive on a stainless steel surface for 36 hours. [0] Also from [0] however: "Sunlight will cut the virus ability to grow in half so the half-life will be 2.5 minutes and in the dark it’s about 13m to 20m. Sunlight is really good at killing viruses. That’s why I believe that Australia and the southern hemisphere will not see any great infections rates because they have lots of sunlight and they…

This refutes several of the claims in [0]: https://docs.google.com/document/d/17mWPx-HTE1F2RKkbJlt4VkSY...

Re: Tokyo Olympics “looking at a cancellation” if coronavirus not contained

#116

I've been checking for updates on the virus several times a day since it first started being reported in Western media around Jan 20 (in part because it's been a fun distraction, in part because I have friends in Wuhan). I like to think I'm generally an optimist, but I think it's been clear for several weeks now that this is going to have a significant worldwide impact. There are just too many factors in favor of unc…

Could you tell me in what way authoritatian countries (aka China) handles this situation better?

Italy closed 50k people into quarantine, government talks about military and EU was deciding about closing borders. All of this days after confirmed cases. I am sure officials would have no trouble to isolate major city.

China has many internal problems, we just do not see them. Government refuses foreign doctors. If crisis continues long enough it may cause civil unrest. China also depends on foreign imports even for food.

I think US is best positioned to handle this well.

Re: Tokyo Olympics “looking at a cancellation” if coronavirus not contained

#117
post #96

I'm curious how other folks who work at large tech shops in the valley feel about working from home for a while. There is nearly zero reason for me to show up at work. I can do nearly everything from home, often better. At work, I'm in a large, open building surrounded by thousands of people. Am I overreacting? I know there's a good chance we're all going to get COVID-19, but if I can delay it a bit, I lessen the hit…

I personally am watching others around me do what I consider "overreacting". Once it starts spreading locally though, the response will be reasonable. The biggest gain in working from home is not protecting yourself, but the spread to all of your coworkers and then to all of the next infections beyond them leading to actual deaths.

Once you know it's spreading locally, countermeasures are a lot less effective.

Re: Tokyo Olympics “looking at a cancellation” if coronavirus not contained

#119
I know we haven't yet resolved what is happening now. But I'm curious - what happens this coming winter with this virus?

It is my understanding that SARS and MERS were extinguished - they are not circulating anymore in the general population. Given the dispersion of this virus already, I can imagine hotspots rotating around the globe until the winter.

Will it then explode in numbers once again in the colder temperatures/lower humidity of winter?

Re: Tokyo Olympics “looking at a cancellation” if coronavirus not contained

#120

I've been checking for updates on the virus several times a day since it first started being reported in Western media around Jan 20 (in part because it's been a fun distraction, in part because I have friends in Wuhan). I like to think I'm generally an optimist, but I think it's been clear for several weeks now that this is going to have a significant worldwide impact. There are just too many factors in favor of unc…

Could you tell me in what way authoritatian countries (aka China) handles this situation better? Italy closed 50k people into quarantine, government talks about military and EU was deciding about closing borders. All of this days after confirmed cases. I am sure officials would have no trouble to isolate major city. China has many internal problems, we just do not see them. Government refuses foreign doctors. If cris…

Don't count on the EU doing anything other then slow talk. They are definitely not going to close any borders. At least I would be very surprised if they did.
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