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Covid 19 virus
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Nominal Animal:
Very good points from Cerebus and splin, above.

This is kinda off-topic, but this is exactly what I belive Nietsche meant when he said that God is dead.  You see, in the olden days, this kind of selfish behaviour ("keeping other people safe is too expensive for me, so I will risk their health instead of taking a financial hit") was controlled by fear of God, of divine punishment here or in the afterlife.  We don't have that, so we are finding it difficult to force people to behave in a way that minimizes the risk for the entire herd species people.  We have become self-centered and shellfish selfish, without the counterbalance an organized religion used to have.

It is also an excellent point that rather than to try and control others, we should try to instill in ourselves and our children that the best results are gained by controlling our own behaviour, rather than pushing others.  (We do not put ourselves in quarantine to protect us from those possibly infected, but to avoid spreading the infection, in case we ourselves happen to be infected.) It works in other fields of human interaction as well  :-*
james_s:
It's all hype in that it's not much different from the regular flu that goes around. I just looked it up today and in the USA the flu has killed 10,000 already this year, yet everyone is panicking that *6* people in my state have died.

We should take measures to prevent the spread of all infectious diseases, not just ignore it until the media hypes everyone into a frenzy over something like this. I think that ALL businesses should provide paid sick leave or the ability to work remotely when feasible for anyone who is sick. If someone shows up at the office visibly ill send them home! A place I used to work had no work from home policy and while we did get paid leave that was only for FTEs and we had a few hourly contractors who didn't. They would come in sick as hell, coughing and sneezing and a few days later half the office would be sick. Even FTEs would often come in sick, I guess due to a culture that views such things as indicating that one is a hard worker. It drives me nuts, the cost of paying one person to stay home and rest far outweighs the cost of paying 20 people to come in and get nothing done because they're miserable and ill.

People should also wash their hands properly, and take other sensible precautions. Instead we oscillate wildly between careless disregard and flailing around in a panicked frenzy.
splin:

--- Quote from: james_s on March 03, 2020, 01:42:20 am ---It's all hype in that it's not much different from the regular flu that goes around. I just looked it up today and in the USA the flu has killed 10,000 already this year, yet everyone is panicking that *6* people in my state have died.

--- End quote ---

Seriously??  :palm:

Not very long ago there were *only* 6 deaths from Covid 19 in China. More recently there were *only* 6 deaths in Iran, Italy etc. So no need to worry!

A doctor on the radio (here in the UK) the other day pointed out that the infection rate was around double that of regular flu, and approximately 10 times the death rate of regular flu (not to be confused with non-regular flu such as the post first world war Spanish flu). He also pointed out that his intensive care unit is typically 60% occupied by flu patients in the winter; I expect the NHS is going to be in major crisis before too long despite lots of complacent reassurances from politicians and even some senior scientists. I really hope they are right.

I rather think you're "yet everyone is panicking that *6* people in my state have died" is going to look very foolish in a few months time. Though I really hope you are right.

Given the relatively high mortatality rate in the elderly, you have to wonder how the UK's house of Lords and the US senate might look in a year's time...
Cerebus:

--- Quote from: james_s on March 03, 2020, 01:42:20 am ---It's all hype in that it's not much different from the regular flu that goes around. I just looked it up today and in the USA the flu has killed 10,000 already this year, yet everyone is panicking that *6* people in my state have died.

--- End quote ---

The salient difference is that 0.095% of people who contract 'ordinary' seasonal flu die from it (the case-mortality ratio), 2-3% of people who contract covid-19 die from it - that's a case-mortality ratio 21-31 times higher. So if that 10,000 deaths from flu in the US was deaths from covid-19 at similar infection rates you'd be looking at 210,000 to 310,000 deaths in the US. That is why infection control measures are necessary beyond those that would be taken for typical seasonal flu outbreaks. Also remember that for seasonal flu there is some existing specific immunity in the population that helps to control the spread (herd immunity), there is no existing herd immunity for a novel virus like covid-19 so the number of cases is likely to be significantly higher than for seasonal flu.

The case-mortality ratio of covid-19 is about the same as that of the 'Spanish' flu virus of 1918. That's why we need to take it seriously and thankfully we are, with infection control measures being put in place world wide. But at the same time we must not be Chicken Littles and run around panicking -  those infection control measures are working, if they weren't we'd already be knee deep in cases of covid-19 worldwide. That is no excuse however for complacency or carelessness, we need to continue with infection control measures until well after the number of new cases reported starts falling.

Just take you own reasonable precautions. The most important thing you can do is wash your hands if you've been out in public handling things that others may have and avoid hand to face contact - don't rub your eyes, pick your nose, chew your nails or smoke (an often missed cause of hand to mouth contact) with unwashed hands. I'd suggest that it might be good to avoid airports if you can, large dense gatherings of people are possibly risky, hospitals and schools are always places to avoid if you don't want to catch something that's 'going around'. Avoid the office if you have idiots around who insist on coming into work when they are ill. But nothing's stopping you going to the shops, taking a walk in the park or generally following a mostly normal routine.

And remember to boil all children, nurses and doctors before petting them.  :)
Nominal Animal:

--- Quote from: splin on March 03, 2020, 02:10:33 am ---Not very long ago there were *only* 6 deaths from Covid 19 in China. More recently there were *only* 6 deaths in Iran, Italy etc.
--- End quote ---
I read his post in a completely different vein!  Weird, eh.

That's how flu epidemics start, too.  Thing is, flu is dangerous.  A lot of people die from it.  A lot, if not most, of those deaths could be avoided by early voluntary isolation (to isolate symptom-free infected carriers, stopping the spread).  We don't, and I find that utterly stupid; similar to driving against traffic lights.

Covid-19 is very flu-like.  Like for influenza viruses, there are no known antiviral treatments.  There are vaccines for the three main influenza variants, but their efficacy varies; and sometimes the variant is a different one than actually spreads most.  Covid-19 seems to spread a little slower, but with a longer incubation period, and have a higher mortality rate (as it tends to stress kidneys more in patients who get seriously ill).  The differences are quite minor, really.

Yes, it is a different virus.  Yes, both will kill a large number of people, albeit a very small fraction of the population; nothing like the black death in the middle ages (which killed about 45% of Europe's population in five years or so), or the Spanish Flu in early 1900s (which killed about 2.4% of humans on Earth).  It has been too long since the last really bad flu epidemic, I guess, since people are freaking so bad right now.

Because of the low likelihood of death for any particular individual, infected or not, there is no need to panic.  Yes, a lot of people will die, but there is a stupendous number of humans on this planet; way too many for an ordinary human to understand or grasp in any intuitive manner.  (We can "feel" amounts up to a couple of thousand, but above that, we abstract, and instead count groups of humans.)

In particular, the overall death toll from covid-19 will almost certainly be no different than a bad flu season; at most at the level of pandemic expected to occur from one of the influenza viruses every three decades or so.  All the statistics bear the signs of that (since we can very simply compare them to old ones, except that we now have better information networks and much more data).

Also, the Chinese response to the virus is rather exemplary.  I do not know why they reacted so strongly, but it definitely was effective.  In the coming weeks, we will see that the number of deaths in Europe will be much higher, because of the ideological/political opposition to any sort of borders or restriction on movements -- that is my guess and bet.  I estimate we are only in the second week of the infected but symptomless carriers spreading the virus, so the true spike in cases will be a week to three weeks away still.  If that does happen, we know from the Chinese example that it could have been avoided.  Hopefully I'm completely wrong, though.
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