Mega-Thread: Coronavirus Pandemic

[Gref]

I wonder if the pictures can be verified but this is what I have seen today in our media.

https://www.sozcu.com.tr/2020/dunya/...liyor-5585410/

ignore the turkish, if pictures are truly related to the virus, its damn scary.

[shadowmouse]

@Gref Do you have a tl;dr summary? I'd rather not have to whitelist a site that I don't know, in a language I don't read, to look at pictures the Great Firewall is probably going to block anyway.

[Gref]

@shadowmouse my apologies, well tldr; there are chinese people collapsed on the roads and people in full white suits (looks like hazmat?) are looking over them. if it is because of the virus, its fucked.

one of the pictures is taken from English daily star.

[shadowmouse]

@Gref I was able to get through to several Daily Star articles but can't find anything matching what you describe. The suits appear in a number of other photographs though, and as far as I know are standard after SARS and other potential pandemic scares here. That stuff was probably already ready to go since we had a mild scare recently about plague (yes, that plague) just a short while ago. Even during an ordinary flu season, China is a witch's brew of various strains and URTIs and so they've already got lots of measures like thermal imaging equipment in place.

[Strawberry]

Is the apocalypse finally upon us?
I hope so! It's about damn time

[shadowmouse]

@Strawberry Alpacalypse? But ...

China's two most important cities have launched a Level 1 emergency response -- the highest level for a public health emergency -- to combat the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak, according to state broadcaster CGTN.

A total of 29 cases of the coronavirus were confirmed in Beijing as of noon on Friday, according to CGTN. More than 20 cases have been confirmed in Shanghai.

Hubei, the province at the center of the virus outbreak, declared a Level 1 response earlier Friday.

According to the South China Morning Post, Level 1 status centralizes the command and co-ordination of provincial-level emergency response work under the State Council in Beijing.

Source: https://edition.cnn.com/asia/live-ne...-20/index.html

FML

I was born in the Year of the Metal Rat, so although I'm not particularly into astrology, this year should have been a big deal for me just because of the culture here. I had all kinds of plans to celebrate. Somebody hand me the damned sour grapes! I'm sure they'll go well with the frozen jiaozi that are going to be dinner. Last time it was my year it was completely overshadowed by the Olympics.

[Strawberry]

@Strawberry Alpacalypse? But ...




Source: https://edition.cnn.com/asia/live-ne...-20/index.html

FML

I was born in the Year of the Metal Rat, so although I'm not particularly into astrology, this year should have been a big deal for me just because of the culture here. I had all kinds of plans to celebrate. Somebody hand me the damned sour grapes! I'm sure they'll go well with the frozen jiaozi that are going to be dinner. Last time it was my year it was completely overshadowed by the Olympics.

Haha, had to look up who you are
Why name change? Identity crisis?

P.S. I'm wood rat

[shadowmouse]

Why name change? Identity crisis?

No, it's just that as I mentioned in my revised sig, this year closes out a sixty year cycle. It seems like a time to cast an eye toward new adventures. Of course, bungee was more convenient to type and the name change may cause confusion. For simplicity, I thought "bungeebunge designation=shadowmouse" could be abbreviated, but that ends up as bdsm and might be taken wrong.

Congratulations on a good choice of birth animal!

[Yunru]

Similar to sars virus.

[shadowmouse]

@BoltBlaster And for those of us living on the other side of the Great Firewall (where it seems you linked a video that is blocked here), what's the tl;dr version?

[shadowmouse]

@BoltBlaster Probably a good watch then, for those who weren't here. I was here for SARS.

[Strangebrew]

[Veluren]

The CCP is trying heavily on their media to downplay how bad this sickness is and it's probably going to bite them until it's become a true outbreak they can't control.

In Chinese history and superstition (which the Chinese are superstitious enough to act on it) plagues precedes a Regime change, if the CCP lets the real numbers leak it has a chance of being a self-fulfilling prophecy - they get taken out by riots and angry people who see them as failing them during a horrific outbreak, which means that plague preceding a regime change has happened once again.

[Ashleyxoxo]

Is there ever a good timing for a virus?

[Gref]

Yesterday I talked with my cousin a little bit. I knew he went to China before this outbreak but I thought he was safe.
LOL apparently he is directly in the center of it. Wuhan center. I could not have much time to talk with him but he said the city is indeed in a lockdown and you can get in but you cannot go out/leave the city. He has been saving noodles, masks, cleaning stuff and told me *why the fuck would you eat a bat?*

Going to talk with him more when I can. I do not know in detail but he works at the university as a researcher (simple definition I think) and university is off until the situation calms down.

[shadowmouse]

He has been saving noodles, masks, cleaning stuff and told me *why the fuck would you eat a bat?*

Why eat a bat? Because you're a snake! The Wuhan virus, SARS and MERS all seem to have started with bats, skipped to animals and then moved on to humans. In the case of SARS and the Wuhan virus the link may have been that those animals were being eaten by humans.

Yes, Wuhan has quite a few universities. Normally they would be on winter break anyway because of Spring Festival. There will be extra confusion with this outbreak because of the timing, and obliquely because it will be seen as a test of the Party's ability to lead, but let him know that things will start to settle down soon if they follow the usual pattern. I was here for SARS and H1N1. SARS caused my quasi-adoptive daughter to coax me into moving to the outskirts of Beijing and that was a rough one, we had been on lockdown for months, but by H1N1 they had refined the screening and decontamination procedures to the point that they were much less disruptive. Wuhan is taking it in the chops right now and it doesn't help that many things would have been operating at reduced efficiency because so many businesses are closed for days to weeks during the holiday; however, it is also going to be seen as a focus for the government to get things back in order ASAP. I expect our classes to start back up in late February and at a guess the main impact will be a longer commute because there will probably be extra screenings at subway security checks and at the gates to the university (many campuses here are surrounded by walls and have controlled entry at gates).

If he has any questions about general life in China, PM me. Someone should have warned him to stock up on stuff like food before the holiday even if there had been no virus outbreak. It isn't like it used to be, when even Beijing pretty well rolled up the sidewalks for a month, but most of our smaller shops closed a week ago and will reopen in early February.

[Zan15]

Although human to human transmission seems rare and this appears less deadly than SARS, let's hope this doesn't get out of hand.

Looks like it ain't as rare and less deadly as it was originally reported.
either that or its super amped up at this point and has already mutated several times over



scary how much this seems to mirror this movie so far.... :P

I liked the movie because it was not the whole "end of world and everything totally breaks down into lawlessness in a week" movie. It also had a lot of realistic things it in and of course a whole lots of bullshit...



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contagion_(2011_film)



Returning from a Hong Kong business trip, Beth Emhoff (Gwyneth Paltrow) has a layover in Chicago to rendezvous with a former lover before returning to her family in Minneapolis. She appears to have contracted a cold during her trip. Her six-year-old son from a previous marriage, Clark, also becomes sick and is sent home from school.

Beth's condition worsens and two days later she collapses with severe seizures. Her husband, Mitch (Matt Damon), rushes her to the hospital, but she dies of an unknown cause.

At the CDC, Dr. Ally Hextall (Jennifer Ehle) determines the virus is a mix of genetic material from pig and bat viruses.


By Day 26, the death toll has reached at least 2.5 million in the U.S. and 26 million worldwide. The discovery, production and initial deliveries of vaccine take until Day 133, with vaccinations to run until nearly Day 500. The final death toll is not seen.


In a flashback, the source of the virus is revealed. A bulldozer owned by Alderson International Mining and Manufacturing (AIMM), the company Beth worked for, clears some jungle and disturbs a bat, which takes food from a banana tree. The bat flies over a pigpen, dropping a chunk of banana, which is then eaten by a piglet. A chef from the Macau casino buys the piglet. As he handles the carcass in the kitchen, he does not wash his hands when called to meet a customer – Beth Emhoff. The chef shakes hands with Beth, giving her the mix of bat and pig viruses, making her patient zero.

[Puupi]

Currently roughly 5% death rate. That's a massive amount of people if it goes wild in the public like influenza.

[Zan15]

Currently roughly 5% death rate. That's a massive amount of people if it goes wild in the public like influenza.

well 5% would be horrific but the Spanish flu was around 10-15%
and ended up killing 3-5% of the world population


So using same calculations ….yikes

[Graeham]

The issue is that there has been so many scare stories in the media that a lot of people are numb to the idea of something like this actually turning out to be a legitimate threat that will affect them personally.