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| Covid 19 virus |
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| Cerebus:
--- Quote from: not1xor1 on March 22, 2020, 10:43:00 pm --- --- Quote from: imo on March 22, 2020, 07:44:44 pm ---No special antibiotics to cope with secondary infections at that time. --- End quote --- I'd rather say little problem with antibiotic resistant bacteria --- End quote --- As is often the way with these things those in know were making quite a lot of fuss about it back then. MRSA had been identified as a problem in the sixties and by around 1980 knowledge of increasing multi-drug resistance in bacteria was a commonplace among the scientific and medical community. One of the identified causes was use of antibiotics as 'growth promoters' in animal feed. It is only now that this practice is being finally banned, 40 years after anyone with a brain knew that it was a fundamentally stupid practice that was guaranteed to breed multi-drug resistant pathogens. Ditto the feminising effects of pollutants - one biochemistry lecturer I knew had been researching this on trout for several years back then. And the list goes on. The gap between what the scientific community has clearly identified needs action and the taking of action in political policy circles is huge and it takes along time for anything to happen. No doubt somewhere there are dozens of academics who were treated as Cassandras about their warnings about future viral pandemics and attempts to get governments to develop solid preparations for when it finally happened. They have earned the right to feel smug, but I suspect they don't; I suspect they wish that they had had some way to force action before it was too late. |
| iMo:
--- Quote from: SiliconWizard on March 22, 2020, 09:54:52 pm --- --- Quote from: imo on March 22, 2020, 06:24:09 pm --- --- Quote from: nctnico on March 22, 2020, 05:49:54 pm --- --- Quote from: SiliconWizard on March 22, 2020, 05:06:41 pm ---If anything, this should teach us how fragile our whole society has become. Seeing how one small virus can wreak havoc, imagine anything worse than this (which is not at all unlikely)? --- End quote --- Actually I think society is better equiped than ever. Imagine the Corona outbreak happened 20 years ago with the internet still in it's infancy? It is our modern communication systems which keep things going right now. All the data to stop the outbreak is shared quickly without risk of actually spreading the infection. And the Corona virus isn't the first outbreak ever. --- End quote --- If this happened 40y back you would hardly notice it as a pandemic of this scale. A bit stronger seasonal flu. More fatalities would be "averaged" in the yearly flu statistics.. --- End quote --- Yeah. We may be better equipped these days, but the worldwide movement of people has literally exploded, and I'm not going to teach you that virus spreading is by nature exponential. Current technology certainly helps mitigate things in the current context, but I'd venture it doesn't make up for the (unreasonable) movement of people we have now. --- End quote --- My original post has been ripped apart by few and then commented out by experts like by Dr. Cerebus who is using all today's technologies in all his hospitals around the World since 1980.. :P When you would read my post in context you will get - it is about how you would "notice" current pandemic provided it happened 40y back (1980). There are 3 examples related to the "Geopolitical situation in 1980" - ie. whether you would had been even able to get the real information about the pandemic in 1980, and how the pandemics could have been "medialized" in 1980 on both sides of the Iron Curtain. My post did not elaborate the severity of such a pandemic in 1980 or in 2020. Sure, in 1980 the covid would have been much more deadly as it is today (except you would be treated in the hospitals of Dr. Cerebus). |
| SiliconWizard:
--- Quote from: imo on March 23, 2020, 12:45:56 am ---Sure, in 1980 the covid would have been much more deadly as it is today (except you would be treated in the hospitals of Dr. Cerebus). --- End quote --- Certainly more deadly, but it would have spread slower IMO and to fewer countries, and currently the most concerning issue is how much it's spreading. Just as an illustration, wherever we live (in the western world), many people know at least one person that has traveled to China in the past months. You're more fortunate if this is not a close relative. That's something that was extremely rare in the early 80's. |
| Cerebus:
--- Quote from: imo on March 23, 2020, 12:45:56 am ---My original post has been ripped apart by few and then commented out by experts like by Dr. Cerebus who is using all today's technologies in all his hospitals around the World since 1980.. :P --- End quote --- Gibe all you like, but facts still beat uniformed opinions hands down every time. And please don't call me Doctor, you have to earn one of those by doing a PhD, and I never did. You can call me professor if you like, as that's merely a courtesy title that's often given to, in my experience, scumbags; I'd probably wear it well. |
| Mr.B:
New Zealand to enter full lockdown within 48 hours. https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/coronavirus/120495548/live-pm-jacinda-ardern-to-give-update-on-coronavirus-alert-level Many NZers have been pleading with the government to move hard and fast. Fortunately they have listened. We can live through the economic impact, we do not want a high death toll to go with it. |
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