SARS CoV-2 coronavirus / Covid-19 (No tin foil hat silliness please)

Sarni said:
Impossible to buy them here anymore.
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Oh well...

TMDaines said:
That Singapore lecture I posted earlier was very interesting, because they were explicit with their public that they DID NOT WANT them to wear masks everyday and waste them. They wanted them saved for when they would be most useful: both to protect others when you were contagious and for when you had to interact with people showing symptoms. Everyone wearing masks all the time in public is an awful waste for little benefit.
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Unfortunately the fact is a Wuhan Coronavirus carrier can be contagious and infect plenty of other people before showing any signs of symptoms.

Singapore has a smaller population than Hong Kong and over 70% more cases despite being much further away from China.
Rado_N said:
People who don’t have it shouldn’t be wearing a mask.
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And how do you know if one has it? Wearing a mask is about protecting yourself AS WELL AS OTHERS.
mu4c_20le said:
Does CDC recommend the use of facemask to prevent COVID-19?

CDC does not recommend that people who are well wear a facemask to protect themselves from respiratory illnesses, including COVID-19. You should only wear a mask if a healthcare professional recommends it. A facemask should be used by people who have COVID-19 and are showing symptoms. This is to protect others from the risk of getting infected. The use of facemasks also is crucial for health workers and other people who are taking care of someone infected with COVID-19 in close settings (at home or in a health care facility).

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/faq.html
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Now I can understand this kind of advice IF there is a shortage of masks available, you should prioritize the healthcare professionals. However, if availability isn't an issue, I don't see why one would not want to wear one.
Stookie said:
It’s not really to do with masks. They might help a little but it’s really only fitted filtered face masks that really help. One reason Hong Kong is relatively well is because they are so well prepared after SARS. Hand sanitizers everywhere. Government instruction videos about cleanliness in your house, battalions of cleaners cleaning everything that’s frequently touched. They are just prepared for it. They kept all this up even though sars was a few years ago. I only know this because my sis lives there. Compare that to here.
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Government? I live here, and honestly the main reason it's relatively contained in Hong Kong is because the vast majority do NOT trust the government, at all. The Chief Executive of Hong Kong currently has about a 20% approval rating.
The CE actually tried to tell people not to wear masks early in the outbreak - even told government staff not to wear them. (https://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong...onavirus-carrie-lam-warns-hong-kong-officials). The city just ignored her and bought up a lot of masks from all over the world.

So in a way we did contribute to the mask shortage around the world (sorry...), but it works, especially if you live in a metropolitan area.
 
Hindsight and all that, but we should have just quarantined all international arrivals for 14 days when the virus first hit Wuhan. Sometimes panic is good.
 
ThatsGreat said:
Hindsight and all that, but we should have just quarantined all international arrivals for 14 days when the virus first hit Wuhan. Sometimes panic is good.
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China tried to hide it from the public and by the time the story broke, it was already everywhere.
 
Igor Drefljak said:
:lol:
I sort of had to laugh at your response as I knew what he was getting at, but at the same time, totally feel for you, as you and a lot of people are going to be under a massive amount of stress right now, and that's even without the virus
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Dante said:
I feel for you, mate.

I know it's going to be difficult for many to swallow their pride on this, but I'd imagine that food banks are going to be popping soon.
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Haha feel like a right tit responding like that now but I had no idea FFS, I've had a mare there.

I work in a warehouse do that's extra pressure as we're currently getting absolutely battered and can barely cope with the orders. I've had a message through today saying from tomorrow before we can enter the warehouse we will have to be tested with a handheld temperature scanner. They're currently ignoring government advice too, HR of the company has basically said it's up to the worker to decide if they should self isolate. From the sounds of things that's now changed since yesterday with these temperature measures being introduced. Which makes little sense considering it doesn't prove whether anybody does or doesn't have the virus. It's bizarre.
 
Cal? said:
China tried to hide it from the public and by the time the story broke, it was already everywhere.
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Was it though? The first precautions that I heard being taken in India is temperature screening, which allowed the asymtomatic infected persons to slip in. If compulsory quarantine was enacted right from the beginning there would've been close to 0 cases. I mean is compulsory quarantine being done even now? This should be standard procedure for a pandemic like disease from now onwards.
 
TheReligion said:
Dependents leave is paid in my profession. I assumed it was everywhere? You can take unpaid leave but that's different.
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Its not per the government unfortunately for a lot of parents. Id imagine most will have to use stat holidays or unpaid leave
 
Suedesi said:
And Western leaders don't? Their response to the virus has been incredibly bad. Repeated the same mistakes over and over again.

Other countries (FSU) did things efficiently and started early, resulting in much lower numbers.
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Of course you should hold any and all countries' leaders accountable.
But, as China was the first country to face the crisis, their response and reports were the most crucial in the first days of the pandemic. The minimum you could ask for, was more transparency. This would have allowed other countries to better prepare themselves.
Instead, there was misinformation, doctors were threatened from sharing real-time data, local journalist/s disappeared and international journalists expelled.
So, yes, China has a special liability, not just because it allowed the outbreak in the first place (either the wet markets or its biological research facility), but because of the way they handled it since.
 
Pogue Mahone said:
But why would all suppliers be simultaneously fecked/transit compromised? Sick employees? Seems heartless to say this but one thing we won’t be lacking in the coming months is people looking for work.

If anything, transit should run a little smoother than usual, seeing as the EU announced they will be passing legislation to prioritise food and medicine transit at all border crossings.
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The fact that the EU had to pass that legislation tells you that it's under risk.

It wouldn't need all suppliers to be fecked. Just enough to lead to shortages in one or two countries. That would then have knock on effects everywhere because there'd be less to go around. And because we're dealing with Supermarkets that don't hoard (ironically) short-term perishables, any delays could have significant ripple effects.

Hopefully after these measures, it won't now. But as with anything happening in the world at the moment, I wouldn't bet on it. It gets said every two minutes, but we really are in unprecedented times.
 
Nou_Camp99 said:
Agreed. Even if they are teaching 1 on 1 to every student who can't be at home. That's still better than doing nothing at home. No public servant should be sitting at home on full pay when the country is in a major crisis. Its just not going to wash with me that.

I know a few teachers and they aren't like that. They will be rallying around for sure doing their bit.
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Perhaps we should pay them enough if we want a dedication like that?
 
Ever since I read you could say 'Covid-19' to the tune of 'Come on Eileen'...it doesn't seem as scary.
 
Im of work following an acl op but apparently we've been told to finish out March then the office will be shut for April and we are to use all our leave to keep full pay. Anything further will need to be ssp
 
Camy89 said:
Ever since I read you could say 'Covid-19' to the tune of 'Come on Eileen'...it doesn't seem as scary.
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Imagine that ringing around every premier league ground in the country whenever Liverpool come to visit :drool:
 
Full scale military lockdown in the uk before the weekend anyone?
 
One Night Only said:
Debate over the strategy yeah, but it's feckwits saying "Boris is shit" "haha Boris is clueless" as if he hasn't got loads of advisors around him and medical professionals, not a bunch of people behind a computer screen eating wotsits in their underpants.
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Well you can pin it on his experts or on him, but either way it was immediately obvious that their initial strategy was incredibly risky, and it later emerged that they completely cocked up all their modelling. Is that because we're unlucky with our experts or because they've picked the ones most likely to say what they want to hear?

And the economic response has been the classic Tory half-arsed, give money to the people with assets & capital and ignore the ones without to as great an extent as you can get away with. The fact that they've not been anywhere near as heartless with it as Cameron and May would have been is certainly to their credit but it still isn't good enough. The government is supposed to govern for the benefit of the people who vote for them, not just the ones who donate.
 
Revan said:
China now starting human trials for a vaccine. Lead by their top military biowarfare researcher. https://nypost.com/2020/03/18/chinas-first-coronavirus-vaccine-approved-for-clinical-trials/

I thought this was just another conspiracy theory, but at this stage, I wouldn't exclude the possibility that there was some leakage of an engineered virus.
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Bullshit. The live animal markets caused SARS, they've caused this one too, it's clear as day. Shut the feckers down and the whole world will be a lot safer.
 
MTF said:
@VorZakone I don't mean to be callous, but just because the numbers are so large and look scary, I just want to offer for perspective that about 1% of the population dies every year in developed nations. So almost 3 million Americans die each year, a majority due to illness/old age. When you compare the virus to WWII deaths it looks several times worse, but even during the war it's likely that more people died from non-war causes rather than the war (in the US, don't mean European countries).

I have parents in their 70s at home, I obviously want us to be safe as a society and am in favor of the current measures being taken in the US and elsewhere, and most of all wish that we'd get a better grip of the testing situation globally.
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Which post of mine are you replying to?
 
Dante said:
It wouldn't need all suppliers to be fecked. Just enough to lead to shortages in one or two countries. That would then have knock on effects everywhere because there'd be less to go around. And because we're dealing with Supermarkets that don't hoard (ironically) short-term perishables, any delays could have significant ripple effects.
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The issue we're seeing at the moment is a demand issue, not a supply issue. The current demand is some x10 of normality for this time of year, driven mainly by panic buying. Reduce the panic buying (which is happening) and demand returns to nominal levels, then supply picks up in line with it. Most supply chains will carry buffers to manage the slight increases in demand and have strong contingency planning for scenarios like what we're seeing now. Most supermarkets ask to see this if you're ever signed up as a supplier.

The only issue that will affect most FMCG supply chains in the next few months is the access to raw materials.
 
Is there any information of what "lockdown" has actually meant in countries that have implemented one?
 
Revan said:
China now starting human trials for a vaccine. Lead by their top military biowarfare researcher. https://nypost.com/2020/03/18/chinas-first-coronavirus-vaccine-approved-for-clinical-trials/

I thought this was just another conspiracy theory, but at this stage, I wouldn't exclude the possibility that there was some leakage of an engineered virus.
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I read a journal this week that had a study saying that the virus is not engineered, apparently there are markers to indicate if a virus has been altered through engineering or natural mutations.
 
Dante said:
It was for things that I eat every single day as a part of my diet, but that I knew were likely going to run out (like nuts, raisins, salt-your-own crisps, peanut butter, etc).

I've been avoiding panic buying of random shit precisely for the reasons you've spelled out. I didn't go near any of the stuff most people are hoarding (not that there's any left even if I wanted some pasta or rice).

I'm still hoping/expecting to go out every few days for skimmed milk, eggs, cottage cheese and bread.

Although I am still young and healthy, the issue I have is that I live alone and have no family still alive. If I were to become ill, I'd have to rely on myself for food and drink. if I were unable to physically get out of bed, I'd pretty much be fecked. And if I were too unwell to go out shopping, I'd be equally in trouble.

So I may not be vulnerable from an age point-of-view, but I am vulnerable from a support network point-of-view. Having a few packets of nuts, raisins or crisps by my bedside is about protecting myself rather than trying to get one over everybody else.

For what it's worth, I've also timed it so that I've been eating loads of takeaways the last couple of weeks. Now I'm going to start dieting for the next couple of weeks (eating minimal amounts of food). Then I'll go back to normal. Hopefully that'll be enough to get me through.
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Good luck fella. Make sure to keep plenty of liquids to hand and your phone just in case.
 
TwoSheds said:
Bullshit. The live animal markets caused SARS, they've caused this one too, it's clear as day. Shut the feckers down and the whole world will be a lot safer.
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It did not caused SARS, coronaviruses are natural. The only thing that a market can be is a hub.
 
Dante said:
The fact that the EU had to pass that legislation tells you that it's under risk.

It wouldn't need all suppliers to be fecked. Just enough to lead to shortages in one or two countries. That would then have knock on effects everywhere because there'd be less to go around. And because we're dealing with Supermarkets that don't hoard (ironically) short-term perishables, any delays could have significant ripple effects.

Hopefully after these measures, it won't now. But as with anything happening in the world at the moment, I wouldn't bet on it. It gets said every two minutes, but we really are in unprecedented times.
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We produce 59% of food internally in the UK, we also export enough to get that up to about 80% if we stopped exporting I think. Surely we can manage the food supply to sustain us?
 
ThatsGreat said:
Was it though? The first precautions that I heard being taken in India is temperature screening, which allowed the asymtomatic infected persons to slip in. If compulsory quarantine was enacted right from the beginning there would've been close to 0 cases. I mean is compulsory quarantine being done even now? This should be standard procedure for a pandemic like disease from now onwards.
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They knew about it back in December, in fact a Doctor in China voiced his concerns (in private chat groups) about it on Dec 30 and was locked up for his efforts (he's now dead).

First overseas case discovered on Jan 13 in Thailand, followed by Jan 16 in Japan, first case outside Asia was Jan 21 in US
 
RedTiger said:
I read a journal this week that had a study saying that the virus is not engineered, apparently there are markers to indicate if a virus has been altered through engineering or natural mutations.
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Not sure how detecting that would be possible. Maybe some of the experts here can elaborate ?
 
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