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Ask HN: How are you preparing for COVID-19 disruptions?
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Re: Ask HN: How are you preparing for COVID-19 disruptions?
#2I'm not.
There's no meaningful preparations for avoiding what is essentially a really dangerous variant of the common cold at an individual level.
Now governments and the medical field should be preparing for it. But most of that is logistical problems (e.g. number of hospital beds, preparing quarantine plans, test kits, etc).
You can order a bunch of masks if it makes you feel better, but countries with common mask usage are still seeing a large scale spread so YMMV.
Re: Ask HN: How are you preparing for COVID-19 disruptions?
#3Things are simpler for me than for many, since I am retired.
- Planning purchases for hunkering down for a few weeks: Food, water, batteries, water purifier, battery-powered radio, hand-crank power generator for radio, etc.
- Sold 50% of my stock holdings.
- Putting a large amount cash in my checking account.
- Getting a smaller amount of cash (paper) to have at home.
Re: Ask HN: How are you preparing for COVID-19 disruptions?
#4Things are simpler for me than for many, since I am retired. - Planning purchases for hunkering down for a few weeks: Food, water, batteries, water purifier, battery-powered radio, hand-crank power generator for radio, etc. - Sold 50% of my stock holdings. - Putting a large amount cash in my checking account. - Getting a smaller amount of cash (paper) to have at home.
That plan seems predicated on the assumption that COVID-19 will burn itself out and disappear in a matter of months. But there's no current evidence to suggest that will be the case, and if we look to similar diseases, they have been around for tens of years.
Even if it depresses in the summer months, it will return in full force next winter (see e.g. flu, common colds, etc).
Best case scenario a working vaccine is invented. But nobody currently has a proven working one (regardless of a few headlines to the contrary) and even if they did that would be 18 months minimum before mass manufacturing could begin.
What I am saying is "bomb shelter"-style hunkering down will likely be ineffective if there's a mass spread in your country because the disease would out-live whatever supplies you have.
Re: Ask HN: How are you preparing for COVID-19 disruptions?
#5Whether or not coronavirus turns into a stop-all-of-society-for-weeks event, China already stopped much of their society for a while. That means that things made in China are going to get scarce in a month or so. I therefore am paying attention to what things that I regularly use are made in China, and buying a few extra now, so that I can take a month or two disruption in the supply.
Re: Ask HN: How are you preparing for COVID-19 disruptions?
#6Things are simpler for me than for many, since I am retired. - Planning purchases for hunkering down for a few weeks: Food, water, batteries, water purifier, battery-powered radio, hand-crank power generator for radio, etc. - Sold 50% of my stock holdings. - Putting a large amount cash in my checking account. - Getting a smaller amount of cash (paper) to have at home.
That plan seems predicated on the assumption that COVID-19 will burn itself out and disappear in a matter of months. But there's no current evidence to suggest that will be the case, and if we look to similar diseases, they have been around for tens of years. Even if it depresses in the summer months, it will return in full force next winter (see e.g. flu, common colds, etc). Best case scenario a working vaccine is i…
I am assuming that in the next few weeks I will need to be isolated for 3-4 weeks. I am assuming that electricity is mostly on, and water to my home is mostly available, (although possibly tainted -- preparing for that).
After that, who knows. Hopefully there will be a vaccine.
Re: Ask HN: How are you preparing for COVID-19 disruptions?
#7I'm not. There's no meaningful preparations for avoiding what is essentially a really dangerous variant of the common cold at an individual level. Now governments and the medical field should be preparing for it. But most of that is logistical problems (e.g. number of hospital beds, preparing quarantine plans, test kits, etc). You can order a bunch of masks if it makes you feel better, but countries with common mask…
Question is about disruptions caused by people's reaction to the outbreak, not the virus itself.
Stuff like this: https://www.ibtimes.sg/wuhan-virus-italy-supermarkets-are-ru...
The freaking panic is already starting in my country too. People buying up food in 10x the quantities than the usual shopping visit, etc..
I've gone shopping yesterday, when the virus was found in the country next to mine, to buy enough food for a week, just to avoid the inevitable initial panic that's starting today, when the first case appeared in my country.
Re: Ask HN: How are you preparing for COVID-19 disruptions?
#8We ran a drill a couple of weeks back where everybody worked from home to ensure that if we have to close our office we are able to continue working (assuming we're not ill, of course). This was really just to shake out any issues.
Fortunately, since most of us already work remotely for at least some of the time we didn't have any significant issues.
Beyond that, nothing really.
Re: Ask HN: How are you preparing for COVID-19 disruptions?
#9Things are simpler for me than for many, since I am retired. - Planning purchases for hunkering down for a few weeks: Food, water, batteries, water purifier, battery-powered radio, hand-crank power generator for radio, etc. - Sold 50% of my stock holdings. - Putting a large amount cash in my checking account. - Getting a smaller amount of cash (paper) to have at home.
That plan seems predicated on the assumption that COVID-19 will burn itself out and disappear in a matter of months. But there's no current evidence to suggest that will be the case, and if we look to similar diseases, they have been around for tens of years. Even if it depresses in the summer months, it will return in full force next winter (see e.g. flu, common colds, etc). Best case scenario a working vaccine is i…
The mind boggles at how people can characterise preparation of a month’s worth of food, water and other essentials as “bomb shelter”-style hunkering down.
The CDC, amongst other US and foreign government agencies, recommend it. When the CDC speaks, I listen.
Re: Ask HN: How are you preparing for COVID-19 disruptions?
#10going to a tech conference!....