Topic: Corona Virus Panic/Discussion Thread

The future is change forever. Not only this brand new virus but more are coming as well as increase pollution, global warming, lust for power, money, hatred and much much more. Be prepare! Most human are crazy and gone berserk.The future is not good at all.

In the short term, of course we will see change. In 6 months time, we will have a completely different situation with many of us back in work. The Coronavirus will be around in some description, things will have moved so fast by that point as the whole connected world has it - we will have multiple working cures or medicine with a subsiding effect, ideas and changes to working practice in hospital. After Spanish flu people were reluctant to get close, however within half a generation this stuff is forgotten. I had hardly heard of it and I was born in 1981 with an interest in the World Wars, I was led to believe it was an inconvenience rather than a pandemic! So for anyone thinking this is going to change the world we live in 5 years time, it probably wont.

Also, and I know a ton of people are facing short term insecurity, I too am slightly concerned and I have worked in the same place for over 5 years! However we will be back to normal in the future, hugging, high fiving, kissing etc etc. Fortunately this is a wake up call for the handshake with strangers - its the most potent way to contract an unwanted virus. We should see a reduction in flu admissions later this year too.

As for airlines, Im sorry but that will most certainly will change - I personally wont be proactively searching for a holiday next year (unfortunately I have to Greece at some point for a wedding), and I believe most people will venture in their own countries for the medium term. It will be too risky, especially if airlines fail to refund customers which is something being looked at. In 6 months the worst will be over going through all of the predictions, however there will be pockets of outbreaks throughout the world. I just cant see the average person willing to take that risk of booking when they can holiday locally.

I recently watched a report in to a fantastic hospital in Naples whom have had no health workers contract covid-19. The way they were working was completely different to what I have been watching in other parts of Italy, Spain, the UK and USA. One medic was in the room, a nurse was outside to ready meds, there was a split room to pass meds and equipment through so they never physically touch with doors on either side, even after a menial task (like readying an injection) the nurse quickly took off gloves - gelled hands - new gloves, there were clearly defined markings, the rooms had a rear access, there was a decontamination suite to the rear no one bar the medics could use, a guard on the hallway pass etc etc. This is more in line with what I was seeing the military, they knew how to create a safe space. As the space was made to work it mechanically it took less time than when other hospitals showed hospital workers in the same space.

Compared to the scenes in New York with 3-4 people peering over infected individuals crammed together I was like oh my god! They haven't been able to adjust! Surely so many ill people in the same environment are feeding each other more and more covid - I dunno, something seemed really off in that hospital.

There's no way half of America is infected, but I could absolutely see the number of infections nationally numbering in the millions already. I think it's way higher than we realize. Since we're mostly testing the critically ill + people they're in contact with, I'm pretty sure the official number for Americans is only the tip of a very large iceberg.

@KratosMD That’s the main problem with how most countries are advertising lockdown, as soon as it works then people will go straight back to those bad habits. Whereas, once it’s working, the population should keep at it until the curve is beyond flattened, it’s on a downwards turn.

@KratosMD I know you are concerned, however young people should be fine so don't panic too much. Keep healthy and eat stuff to keep your immune system ship shape. I'm jealous we can't run a Swedish type system here, sounds like I have a death wish right?

Wrong, it will be over quicker. Not being able to leave the house, overreach by the police, scallies flaunting the laws anyway, mass death in care homes which is unreported, the economy crashing around us and quality of life services being effected. That is the UK right now. Once we have flattened the curve there should be regional lockdowns not countrywide lockdowns. China with the most severe lockdown has 91 new cases today, it's too contagious to stop. We missed the boat 3 months ago to stop it and the all indoors approach is massively flawed. Sweden has the right approach.

@Ralizah Half the population is a stretch, however our UK models show approximately 25% immunity towards the end of wave 1 judged to be early June. That's 125million people in America 17 million people here. This is all guesswork of course and a report from Austria states only 1% of their population has had it.

@themcnoisy In fairness, it's difficult to derive any sort of useful information out of China due to the way they censor information about the virus in their own country. If anyone here really thinks their death toll and infection numbers are below countries like Italy and Spain when their country houses almost 20% of the world's population and this thing went ignored for weeks after it got started, I have a bridge to sell you.

@Ralizah they did lie, however Rali do not go down that road. Since early January China has offered help in various guises - its their fault for sure however they did attempt to warn the world once the truth was out in early January, they locked down 8 million people. it was prior to this they lied. Is the death rate too low? Yes. But America and the UK has had ample time to prepare and we are in chaos management with politicians who are doing a worse job than we could do. I called this better than Boris Johnson who is so thick he ended up almost dead. They have neglected intellectuals and science and gone with gut, naive.

There are a number of Conspiracy theories. These are political tools to distract from the horrendous job our politicians have done. It's somewhere between illegal and insane. Our nurses don't have the PPE. Your nurses don't have PPE. Inept and unforgivable.

Viruses crop up, throughout our entire history. Our stomachs house bacteria from a bygone invasion throughout our evolution, this isn't new.

Here's quite a good read on what most of the world is starting to think of Big Don's America;

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/apr/12/us-global-rep...

@Arugula Naples in Italy. Come on bro, Neapolitan Ice Cream!

@themcnoisy Apparently all this is affecting the Huawei 5G deal since there’s a group of Tory politicians that subscribe to the conspiracy theories. Phone masts were burned down across the UK by idiots who believed that the signal was spreading the virus cause it was ‘a Chinese signal’.

@themcnoisy Go down what road? China lying about its numbers and censoring information about the virus isn't some conspiracy theory.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/02/us/politics/cia-coronaviru...

https://theconversation.com/chinas-coronavirus-cover-up-how-c...

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/12/asia/china-coronavirus-researc...

You can read the links, but I can also save you the trouble.

• You already know China's government knew about the outbreak for weeks before doing anything.
• You probably already know that China's government muzzled Chinese doctors who wanted to warn the world about this virus early on.
• China's government is censoring information within the country related to the virus.
• China's government is censoring academic publications researching the origin of the virus.
• China expelled foreign journalists.
• China's official stats related to the virus are untrustworthy.

Oh, and the real kicker? Wet markets are apparently re-opening in China.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-08/wuhan-is-r...

Oh, and not only have they not taken responsibility for allowing this virus to spread around the world, they had the audacity to try and shift blame for it to the United States.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/13/world/asia/coronavirus-chi...

None of that, of course, excuses Donald Trump almost methodically preparing the United States to be unprepared for a pandemic, or for lying to the nation and to the world about its severity for weeks, or for any of the horrible, stupid things he has done since this started (I don't need to be convinced about how unpopular he is overseas; didn't Germans vote him as the 'biggest threat to world peace' at some point? lol). But don't let the CCP erase their culpability and their continued horribleness from your mind with their propaganda.

On that note, it looks like we're sending a half-senile politician whose sole claim to fame is hanging on to Barack Obama's coattails up as Donald Trump's challenger, so don't be surprised if the world ends up having to deal with this buffoon for four more years. And, for that, I'm so, so sorry.

@Ralizah And this is the road I didn't want to see you go down.

Zhao Lijian is a Hawk like John Bolton. Does what John Bolton say summarise the feelings of an entire country. No. So how can you come to this conclusion?

'only have they not taken responsibility for allowing this virus to spread around the world, they had the audacity to try and shift blame for it to the United States.'

That's pretty harsh on all of the Chinese people and equally how Propaganda works. You now have the dog whistle to believe that China (in a Donald Trump voice) believes America started covid 19, when it was 1 person on twitter. No one believes this, not even the Chinese.

One of the CNN articles are filled with spurious claims from unknown sources. About the regimes shift to blaming America for covid 19. Now we know that CNN and Trump have a bad relationship, yet this is the very same dog whistle. There will be people in CNN benefitting from this rhetoric - it makes people read!

Some good work has come from various governers across the States and I'm with you @Ralizah do not listen to leading politicians right now unless it is a direct instruction or rule change. They will point fingers as their political futures are on a Knife edge. Depressing.

An entire country has no feelings whatsoever, because it's composed of a wide variety of people who believe different things. Of course, in a totalitarian society like the modern PRC, openly contradicting the stated position of the leadership is a good way to find yourself fearing (and probably expecting) reprisal.

Regardless, that is beside the point. These government officials represent their country, just as John Bolton used to (and Donald Trump currently) represent our country to the world. Which is probably a solid reason why America's reputation abroad is so abysmal right now.

Besides, this is hardly the only Chinese government official who has misrepresented this situation. This pandemic was a massive blow to Xi Jinping's credibility on the world stage, thus why we're seeing an unprecedented amount of gaslighting from Chinese leadership and media propaganda apparatuses.

Obviously I'm not speaking about "all Chinese people." If I say "America lied to the world after 9/11 about the existence of WMDs in Iraq to justify a senseless war of aggression" (which we did), I'm not implicating every random American man, woman, and child in the decision.

Nevertheless, it's disingenuous to pretend that this was "just one person on Twitter," or that this hasn't lined up with other propaganda efforts condoned and approved of by Chinese leadership.

And I obviously don't think THEY believe the coronavirus currently destroying the global economy started here. It's an obvious, massive lie. But it's also one they're willing to say out in the open, and one that's being repeated on China's internet, which is why it's effective as propaganda.

As to the CNN article I linked, it references an official Chinese policy. I get the whole "don't take mass media at their word immediately" thing, but insinuating that a major news agency is straight up fabricating an anonymous source (the use of which is pretty standard, especially when the person they're speaking to is in danger of being targeted by their own government) is pretty wild.

...

Anyway, this is getting WILDLY off-topic, so I'm going to end this discussion here. It's obvious we're not going to see eye-to-eye on this.

@Ralizah

I agree with most of what you're saying. But (and I've been wrong about this as well), wet markets reopening isn't a big deal. This is a video from a YouTube cooking channel I follow. And it's sometimes nice to take a step back and see everything in perspective. Worth a watch:

@LaJettatura I'm certain it's still rising in the US. But if half the population was infected, it would've been everyone by now, since the virus spreads exponentially. So I don't think half the population is infected yet (that would be a total disaster, and way worse than it is now). But yeah, as long as people keep ignoring the safety measures it will keep rising, and it will keep getting worse. It probably doesn't help that each state is allowed to put their own measures in place. And I've heard that some areas carry on like usual, pretending it doesn't even exist. But that's true for some countries as well...

OK @Ralizah I don't want to fall out with you so I will say this instead. Reporters can direct amateur sources to say what they want. The news is useful, however right now it's over blowing every little thing.

If America and China decided to work together rather than against each other. That would help almost everyone.

So why don't they give it a try? What have they got to lose? Try it.

@Octane thanks for the video Oct. The presenter was decent too.

That being said. I've always thought it was a bit weird to see things like a pigs carcass in a window of a Butchers and Full dead fish on ice in Tesco. Never been comfortable with that.

@themcnoisy I get that. But I do think there's an argument to be made. It shows that the produce is still ''fresh''. Especially with live animals you sometimes see at markets in other countries.

Problem is that when poverty is a real issue, the last think you want is people dressing up old meat or fish with chemicals to make them appear ''fresh'', and this is a thing that happens, in our countries as well; You can treat salmon to make it appear fresh for longer than it normally lasts (though it's still rotting at a normal rate). There are places where I'd rather buy a live chicken they butcher in front of me, than prepackaged chicken they could've done anything with. All the more reason to eat less meat I'd say

@Octane Just like this classic story;

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-45398254

I've just tried to do a handstand. First one ever. For absolutely no reason. I'm 33 and now have a bruised hip.

@Octane Thanks for the interesting video. The good thing, at least, is that China at least temporarily banned the consumption of wildlife there as part of its post-corona regulatory response.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/05/asia/china-coronavirus-wildlif...

Interestingly, it looks like Wuhan vendors are struggling to find customers when they re-open their stalls.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-china-w...

@themcnoisy In this case, there's more evidence that this is an official Chinese directive, and it lines up with the censorious impulses we've seen from the Chinese government elsewhere regarding the virus.

But I agree that everyone would work together, ideally. There's no benefit to be had from needless aggression between different countries, which is why so many elected Democrats opting for extreme, Cold War-esque rhetoric against Russia these last few years has been frustrating to me.

With that said, I do think you can take the leadership of a foreign country to task without agitating for war (and, unfortunately, after years of Trump, it feels like we're on the brink of a cold war with them).

@LN78 I know. I watched it live. Paula Reid did a great job.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: if we ever get the guy out of office, and if we ever seize control of our government from right-wing extremists, we need to do an actual, honest-to-goodness apology tour. I've never been so embarrassed in my life to be an American as I have these last few years.

Just feeling this should be shared: