Coronavirus, a threat or media hype?

[alxtw]

China and South Korea are encouraging. The question is whether we will be willing and able to implement the same steps. In China they check your temperature any time you enter any public building. In South Korea they are testing 10,000 people per day; in the US we have tested 11,000 people total.

In China, they check everyones temperature entering any place, even your apartment complex. You're also required to spray hand sanitizer.

[alxtw]

Except for in China and Korea.

We don't really know the true extent in China and each country used Draconian measures that are not allowed in the US under our laws. We're at the point of asking people to "self-apply" these measures so that it doesn't spread the way it potentially could. We know enough to be rightly scared into doing these things (and should have known better at least a week or two ago).

Korea is using hi-tech tracking and surveillance that puts the NSA to shame. Korea also has virtually universal health insurance and people there go to the Doctor on a whim and they have the medical infrastructure to accommodate that. They have a younger population to boot.

In China the Hubei province (where Wuhan is) basically under house arrest with soldiers patrolling the streets and food being delivered by the government. You also cant believe the government data coming out of China. We have a quasi-family member in Hubie where we get daily, carefully worded, updates though there is little new news as they are basically locked up.

It does no good to try to compare the results in Korea or China to what will happen here as we don't have the capacity or will to duplicate their approaches.

I can shed a little light on the situation in China for those of you that are curious. I work in China and made it out of there in late-jan, sensing that this thing would get alot bigger.

The extreme measures that they implemented on the cities have worked. The new cases there have dropped significantly and people are back to work. Many shops, restaurants, and indoor entertainment venues are still closed. The ones that are open now still take temperatures of everyone entering, make you spray hand sanitizer, and everyone wears masks.

My friends in wuhan are still in a locked down city, but people can go out and walk. Xi even visited wuhan, which means the situation is really improving.

I agree that it does no good to say the US should do what China has done because there are so many differences and factors on all levels between the two countries.

On another thought, oregon sports has the worst of luck. It sucks that we wont be able to see Sabrina and the WBB win a title and MBB do well in the tournament. It would have been great if they could push march madness back a month or two but that would not be feasible on many levels.

[StevensTechU]

This has been really startling to see how little people care about your life when you're over 60.

[OregonFan4Life]

This has been really startling to see how little people care about your life when you're over 60.

You're just now realizing that people only care about themselves and their close ones?

[Tray Dub]

This has been really startling to see how little people care about your life when you're over 60.

You're just now realizing that people only care about themselves and their close ones?

That's not my experience. Some people are that selfish, lots of people aren't.

[duckfan22]

This has been really startling to see how little people care about your life when you're over 60.

My 13 year old granddaughter last night asked me to sit with her on the couch.
She was watching news on the virus. She asked me to stay home from work because
i fit the group of at risk diabetic, respiratory issues from pneumonia. her exact words
"i dont want you to die" putting sports before lives is crazy

[StevensTechU]

That's incredibly sad.

One other thing that stands out is the "we all die, so what's the big deal" attitude. Contrast that with the attitudes toward illegal immigrants killing something like less than 10 people per year, and the concern that begets from people, it's also startling. People -- as a populace -- have absolutely zero consistency about their emotions.

[OregonFan4Life]

This has been really startling to see how little people care about your life when you're over 60.

You're just now realizing that people only care about themselves and their close ones?

That's not my experience. Some people are that selfish, lots of people aren't.

I'm glad you've had that experience! I truly am, and I certainly have too sometimes. I guess being involved in Church and other places I've seen it where 20% care and 80% don't. It is sad how both extremes don't care, young panicking people are buying all of the stuff from the grocery stores and the elderly are left with nothing, but then there's the other side where people don't care and spread it carelessly. It definitely feels like we need to be calm and in the middle.

In addition, as I think about it more, cancelling so many things was extreme. I get we want to keep it from spreading, slow it down, keep the health care system from overloading, those are all good things. But with such extreme reactions it seems to have spread too much panic which can do its own damage. I think decisions were made too quickly, when they could've postponed events and taken time to think about it. I do feel spreading panic has certainly done damage and that also could've been avoided if a more thought out and careful approach was taken. But at the same time, the federal government and others should've taken this seriously weeks ago instead of waiting as long as they did. It's a tough situation for sure.

[StevensTechU]

This has been really startling to see how little people care about your life when you're over 60.

You're just now realizing that people only care about themselves and their close ones?

That's not my experience. Some people are that selfish, lots of people aren't.

I'm glad you've had that experience! I truly am, and I certainly have too sometimes. I guess being involved in Church and other places I've seen it where 20% care and 80% don't. It is sad how both extremes don't care, young panicking people are buying all of the stuff from the grocery stores and the elderly are left with nothing, but then there's the other side where people don't care and spread it carelessly. It definitely feels like we need to be calm and in the middle.

In addition, as I think about it more, cancelling so many things was extreme. I get we want to keep it from spreading, slow it down, keep the health care system from overloading, those are all good things. But with such extreme reactions it seems to have spread too much panic which can do its own damage. I think decisions were made too quickly, when they could've postponed events and taken time to think about it. I do feel spreading panic has certainly done damage and that also could've been avoided if a more thought out and careful approach was taken. But at the same time, the federal government and others should've taken this seriously weeks ago instead of waiting as long as they did. It's a tough situation for sure.

It's not those actions that are spreading panic, but the fact that there's no counter commentary that is educating people. I really hate that this sounds political, but the lack of leadership and clear guidance from the powers that be is really making this into a s*** show. What should be happening is that a leader within the federal government calmly explains why things are occurring, what the intent is, and update on the state of affairs. Instead there's yo-yoing between "it's contained" and "we're shutting down Europe." It's exacerbating the issues you bring up.

[alxtw]

This has been really startling to see how little people care about your life when you're over 60.

You're just now realizing that people only care about themselves and their close ones?

That's not my experience. Some people are that selfish, lots of people aren't.

I'm glad you've had that experience! I truly am, and I certainly have too sometimes. I guess being involved in Church and other places I've seen it where 20% care and 80% don't. It is sad how both extremes don't care, young panicking people are buying all of the stuff from the grocery stores and the elderly are left with nothing, but then there's the other side where people don't care and spread it carelessly. It definitely feels like we need to be calm and in the middle.

In addition, as I think about it more, cancelling so many things was extreme. I get we want to keep it from spreading, slow it down, keep the health care system from overloading, those are all good things. But with such extreme reactions it seems to have spread too much panic which can do its own damage. I think decisions were made too quickly, when they could've postponed events and taken time to think about it. I do feel spreading panic has certainly done damage and that also could've been avoided if a more thought out and careful approach was taken. But at the same time, the federal government and others should've taken this seriously weeks ago instead of waiting as long as they did. It's a tough situation for sure.

I also feel they should have postponed events. Because if it doesn't get better in a month or two, you can then cancel the event. But if you cancel the event immediately, and the situation improves drastically next month, then can you still hold the event again?

[GrandpaDuck]

There is a misconception about age. People see the average age of death at around 81 and think this only effects the very old. But lets forget about the over 70 group completely for now and take a second to look at the latest death rates among the middle aged. According to the latest I could find from the Wall Street Journal among those diagnosed:

Age 40-49 1 in 250 die
Age 50-59 1 in 77 die
Age 60-69 1 in 27 die

Figures from Italy are even worse. But this is so much more deadly than the flu for these age brackets that the comparison is ridiculous.

One last thing I can tell younger people is that the 60s and 70s can be one of the best periods of ones life. A reward for a lifetime of grinding, it's something you don't want to lose out on.

Lastly, as one who has cared for 3 different very elderly parents in the last decade I have a bit of experience with hospitals and ICUs. They seem to always run at or over 50% capacity in the best of times. A good Flu season swamps them. Even low projections for COVID-19 will overwhelm them. Only lately have I heard talk about setting up field and alternate ICUs which is what we should be working on like crazy in the time being bought by these social distancing delay tactics. It does no good to buy time if you do nothing with it. It seems like too many government officials and groups of regular people are putting all their hopes in the development of a vaccine, but it might not happen in time for ??????? number of people, and possibly not at all.

We talked about South Korea and how because of their Universal Health Insurance people there go to the doctor for everything and they have the capacity to handle it. I recently saw the USA has 2.8 beds per 1000 people, Italy Italy’s 3.2 beds per 1,000, China 4.3 and South Korea 12.3. These other countries had a head start and if we had actual data on Iran I think would see a strong correlation across the board with bed capacity and survival rates when hitting peak levels and achieving containment.

[greenyellow]

The bed capacity figure is actually quite misleading. It doesn't really take into consideration the actual number of ICU and ER patients they can treat. Italy has a higher bed capacity rate but their figure is skewed by the fact most are for non-emergency visits. The US, on the other hand, actually has an ER and ICU capacity that is higher than most of those countries you listed.

[karlhungis]

China and South Korea are encouraging. The question is whether we will be willing and able to implement the same steps. In China they check your temperature any time you enter any public building. In South Korea they are testing 10,000 people per day; in the US we have tested 11,000 people total.

In China, they check everyones temperature entering any place, even your apartment complex. You're also required to spray hand sanitizer.

LOL, sure they do....

[OregonFan4Life]

All Washington schools are now closed until April 24th. This seems extreme to me. I do feel that a lot of this country was under-prepared for this. This to me is why all business should have the abilities to work from home (the company I work for doesn't so I'll still be coming into work 6 days a week for a while, the joys of being a tax accountant) and all schools should be prepared to teach remotely immediately. Hopefully schools can still keep kids educated during this time and people can make income.

[pezsez1]

Average age of death in Italy is 81. Most people are fine...

This is far more deadly than flu at every age bracket. Also, what do you have against old people?

I'm glad to see the conversation here beginning to focus on the fact that this isn't some kind of "hoax" or media hype.

COVID-19 is real and it's here in far bigger numbers than we've tested for. The death count is just beginning. I really hope everyone is taking social distancing seriously.

Also, since this is a Duck football forum, everyone here should be bracing for the upcoming football season to be canceled or played in front of an empty stadium.