patrick.net

Assholes - it's not a health org that said it, CNN decided this.

22 deaths in a nation of 350M. Most of those deaths were elderly people on a stuck on a cruise ship for days with chronic health issues.

Half of Men over 40 smoke in China COPD, Emphysema rampant there. Not to mention the multiple totally unmitigated coal plants firing 24/365

WookieMan says

mell says

The cancellation of big events will def help enormously and thus there's a good argument for it since we don't have a vaccine or treatment yet.

While you're likely more educated on the topic than I am, I still find all of this appalling. Are the AARP lobbyist that strong? You're statistically more like to die from a lightening strike or drive by shooting. I get it transmits super easy, but it's not deadly unless you're on life support anyway because of unhealthy lifestyle or immune system issues.

My wife and I are in industries this doesn't influence in any way, but this overhyped chaos is actually hurting people. The tin foil hat I put on sometimes thinks there's more to this whole thing. I don't have a guess at this point, but this is fucking nuts. I've yet to meet a person that actually cares if they get this virus and are just pissed like no coup about lost $$$.

I agree that this is quite a strong reaction and I can only assume it's because of the uncertainty and lack of treatment / vaccine. Most people here haven't changed their routine much either except for the peppers and panic buyers. We'll see.

mell says

The question is how many cases go undetected due to mild nature. If you believe that say there are 5k undetected cases in the US, and we know everyone who dies or needs hospital treatment will be tested, then you have to assume a much lower mortality rate. 20 out of confirmed 500 is close to 5%, 20 out of speculated 5000 is 0.5%.

0.5% of 100 millions is, like, 10x Vietnam.

NoCoupForYou says

Half of Men over 40 smoke in China COPD, Emphysema rampant there. Not to mention the multiple totally unmitigated coal plants firing 24/365

Facts don't sell unfortunately. Educated people see this and understand this and don't buy the hype.

As a long time ago former smoker (so not being hypocritical) these people made their own bed with their habit. To cause panic worldwide over it is just ludicrous. I'd venture to guess most dying from this have a weekly pill box that is stacked to the max just to keep them alive. They should have been dead already and are probably a negative to GDP in most countries by staying alive. People die, get over it.

*Coronavirus going to hit its peak and start falling sooner than you think*

Clearly, flu is vastly more contagious than the new coronavirus, as the WHO has noted. Consider that the first known coronavirus cases date back to early December, and since then, the virus has ­afflicted fewer people in total than flu does in a few days. Oh, and why are there no flu quarantines? Because it’s so contagious, it would be impossible.

As for death rates, as I first noted in these pages on Jan. 24, you can’t employ simple math — as everyone is doing — and look at deaths versus cases because those are ­reported cases. With both flu and assuredly with coronavirus, the great majority of those infected have symptoms so mild — if any — that they don’t seek medical attention and don’t get counted in the caseload.

Furthermore, those calculating rates ­ignore the importance of good health care. Given that the vast majority of cases have occurred in a country with poor health care, that’s going to dramatically exaggerate the death rate.

The rate also varies tremendously according to age, with a Chinese government analysis showing 0.2 percent deaths below age 40 but 14.8 percent above 80. A study published last month in the Journal of the American Medical Association found zero deaths worldwide among children 9 and under. Zero.

Like the flu, the coronavirus is afflicting high-risk groups: the elderly, those with ­underlying health conditions like diabetes or heart disease and those with compromised immune systems. Are there exceptions? Sure. But that’s the case with almost every complex biological phenomenon of the kind.

More good news. This month, the Northern Hemisphere, which includes the countries with the most cases, starts heating up. Almost all respiratory viruses hate warm and moist weather. That’s why flu dies out in America every year by May at the latest and probably why Latin America has reported only 25 coronavirus cases. The Philippines, where I live, has about a third of the US population, but it’s so damned hot and humid here, so far we have had no confirmed cases of internal transmission.
https://nypost.com/2020/03/08/coronavirus-going-to-hit-its-peak-and-start-falling-sooner-than-you-think/

Patrick says

Asians might be more susceptible to the disease:

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.01.26.919985v1.full

Another bit of anecdotal evidence: this guy is American, but obviously of Chinese origin:



from https://newyork.cbslocal.com/2020/03/09/coronavirus-update-new-jersey-patiet-speaks-out/

It would be super interesting to know the ethnic backgrounds of everyone who gets seriously ill from this. It may well affect Asians more, because race is real.

The Italians seem to have a fairly high death rate, but the Germans, not so much. Then again, Italy has an older population on average iirc.

Well, Fort Rhee is full of Asians, so he probably got it in the neighborhood.

He's only contracted it, if he dies from it I'll be shocked.

NoCoupForYou says

Well, Fort Rhee is full of Asians, so he probably got it in the neighborhood.

He's only contracted it, if he dies from it I'll be shocked.

I'm guilty of it from time to time too, but many people get sick and act like the fucking Grim Reaper is outside the door and dramatize it. Remember everyone is seeking opportunity. In a world where posting photos of yourself can make you money, don't be surprised when morons take this to an extreme to get attention.

Dems, 2017-January 31st, 2020: THE STOCK MARKET IS NOT THE ECONOMY!
Dems, February 2020 - : OMG! LOOK AT THE STOCK MARKET!

Can you guys comment objectively on a real world problem without making it a political question colored by your tribalism?

Heraclitusstudent says

Can you guys comment objectively on a real world problem without making it a political question colored by your tribalism?

It's not an important real world problem. It's simply a strain of virus, and a not very virulent or deadly one.

The whole thing is hype, heavily colored by politics since day one.

Had Biden striped down to his underwear a couple of weeks ago or something, we wouldn't be talking about this.

Let me put this another way.

About a month ago I had dengue fever. It infects millions of people a year and has exploded several fold over the past decades. The mortality rate is also less than 1 in 100.

We're just now getting out of the worst part of the year of it in South America. Dengue can easily spread person to person by mosquito bites. A plane with a few mosquitoes on board, which you can imagine isn't rare in South America, can spread it all over. Then the plane lands in Miami. It's already been in the USA with annual cases in the hundreds, but only a handful of deaths.

Did you hear about it in the Media? Did people blame OrangeManBad for either stopping or not stopping flights from Brazil and establishing a quarantine? And not testing everybody who showed up at Jackson Memorial in Miami? NOPE.

Why is this a bigger deal?

NoCoupForYou says

Why is this a bigger deal?

It all started with "zOMG, China is going into a lockdown, supply chains will be disrupted" and then all kind of self-serving cunts jumped onto the bandwagon to pursue their own agendas.

Here's a truth: The number of people infected or were infected with Coronavirus since December is probably way north of a million. Maybe millions.

The vast majority of people with it aren't even going to the hospital, they think it's just a cold or the flu and drinking tea, blowing their nose, vaporizing themselves, etc.

Not just in China, but Italy, Iran, Ireland, Irkutsk, and Indianapolis.

The tested and confirmed cases over just over 100,000. The deaths are a fraction of that, overwhelmingly concentrated among lifetime elderly smokers eating bats in heavily polluted China.

We're up to 19000 flu deaths by now, just saying ;)

mell says

We're up to 19000 flu deaths by now, just saying ;)

zOMG, need to buy MOAR toilet paper ASAP!!!!

https://www.wlav.com/2020/03/09/family-accidentally-orders-12-years-worth-of-toilet-paper/

zzyzzx says

https://www.wlav.com/2020/03/09/family-accidentally-orders-12-years-worth-of-toilet-paper/

They can make good money by reselling their stash with a draconian markup to other panicky idiots.

Called this as a potential black swan event January 23.
“ Ok here’s a possibility: a new deadly virus causes mass death and even wider panic, slowing China’s economy down and also exports and supply chains. That might hurt us a bit over time, especially if the virus comes to our shores.
Might just be another Ebola scare though. But yah a mass world health crisis could possibly do it.”

mell says

I doubt anybody on patnet will catch it as we're currently at less than 2 in 1 million. if it becomes endemic and seasonal then your chances of catching it eventually rise over the years.

I think someone on Patnet will catch it. If it’s me, I’ll report symptoms and details as well as what helps me recover (assuming I do). Everyone else wanna do the same? I guess that’s assuming we know we have it. Mild cases might seem like just the sniffles.

NoCoupForYou says

Dengue can easily spread person to person by mosquito bites.

It's not spreading exponentially in the US. Is it?
You think if it was it would not cause alarms?

NoCoupForYou says

The whole thing is hype, heavily colored by politics since day one.

You say that only because have your politics colored glasses and see everything presumably bad for Trump as a conspiracy.

mell says

We're up to 19000 flu deaths by now, just saying ;)

A simple projection implies a lot more people than that will die from COVID19 in the coming year in the US.
You can't look at absolute numbers now and ignore the trajectory.

NoCoupForYou says

overwhelmingly concentrated among lifetime elderly smokers eating bats in heavily polluted China.

Not sure why, but this is one of the few times I've actually laughed out loud instantly on a patnet comment. I'm still laughing.

Heraclitusstudent says

A simple projection implies a lot more people than that will die from COVID19 in the coming year in the US.
You can't look at absolute numbers now and ignore the trajectory.

No way. For the 2019/2020 season COVID-19 deaths will NOT outnumber flu deaths. Not even close. While anything is possible, that simple projection is very likely very wrong and unnecessarily panic inducing. Not even the US or WHO Doctors have forecasted anything close to that. You can talk about a serious illness and steps to curb it without panic inducing doomsday predictions. There are plenty of people, esp. elderly that are already isolated and lonely, this will even exacerbate their isolation. Plus the preppers encouraged by doomsday predictions are taking away medical resources needed by medical staff.

mell says

No way. For the 2019/2020 season COVID-19 deaths will NOT outnumber flu deaths. Not even close. While anything is possible, that simple projection is very likely very wrong

Why? At 0.5%, 20,000 dead is just 4 millions infected.
What will stop the spread of this before we have 4 millions infected? Especially if we take your recommendation to ignore it.
As far as I can tell, we could easily see 100k, or even 500k deaths in the US in 1 year.
Unless we take a page from the Chinese playbook - in which case the market is probably right to head south.

Heraclitusstudent says

mell says

No way. For the 2019/2020 season COVID-19 deaths will NOT outnumber flu deaths. Not even close. While anything is possible, that simple projection is very likely very wrong

Why? At 0.5%, 20,000 dead is just 4 millions infected.
What will stop the spread of this before we have 4 millions infected? Especially if we take your recommendation to ignore it.

It's not a recommendation to ignore. I'm on board with the measures taken simply because we don't now enough about it yet and there's no vaccine/treatment yet. That being said, people are totally willing to entertain 20K flu deaths per season in the US without taking any special precautions. There won't be 4 millions infected, that possibility is very unlikely esp. since the cold season is about to end, most CVs disappear for the summer except for few cases. We can talk about that possibility when there's no sign of slowing down come spring. I still say we have peaked or are peaking by April at the latest. If you look at the worldwide numbers there's only one country which has still a problem and that's Italy. I love Italians but am not surprised, they are very folksy and likely to ignore precautions and sanitary advice, which is why the whole family there gets the seasonal illnesses. I hope they can get it under control soon as they have many elderly.

Heraclitusstudent says

mell says

No way. For the 2019/2020 season COVID-19 deaths will NOT outnumber flu deaths. Not even close. While anything is possible, that simple projection is very likely very wrong

Why? At 0.5%, 20,000 dead is just 4 millions infected.
What will stop the spread of this before we have 4 millions infected? Especially if we take your recommendation to ignore it.
As far as I can tell, we could easily see 100k, or even 500k deaths in the US in 1 year.
Unless we take a page from the Chinese playbook - in which case the market is probably right to head south.

Some say that the virus is an artificial, weaponized strain and as such is too deadly to survive long-term. Meaning that it either will wind down and disappear or become less deadly with every mutation. Which makes projections based on current numbers not very useful to accurately predict the future.

The_Weeping_Ayatollah says

Heraclitusstudent says

mell says

No way. For the 2019/2020 season COVID-19 deaths will NOT outnumber flu deaths. Not even close. While anything is possible, that simple projection is very likely very wrong

Why? At 0.5%, 20,000 dead is just 4 millions infected.
What will stop the spread of this before we have 4 millions infected? Especially if we take your recommendation to ignore it.
As far as I can tell, we could easily see 100k, or even 500k deaths in the US in 1 year.
Unless we take a page from the Chinese playbook - in which case the market is probably right to head south.

Some say that the virus is an artificial, weaponized strain and as such is too deadly to survive long-term. Meaning that it either will wind down and disappear or become less deadly with every mutation. Which makes project...

I think the likelihood of this being a weaponized strain is 20%, 80% that is is natural. But either way, the longer a virus persists the less deadly they become, on order to survive and leave enough new hosts around. It already mutated once into a less aggressive strain which has been seen emerging more and more lately. This also correlates with the initial high death rate which has been slowly going down, despite being skewed to the upside since testing began as many mild cases will be missed. We don't know enough about it so we're all speculating to a certain extent, but it's not a pandemic by any means if you look at the numbers so far. More a global epidemic.

mell says

people are totally willing to entertain 20K flu deaths per season in the US without taking any special precautions

There is a vaccine. That's a big precaution.

mell says

It already mutated once into a less aggressive strain which has been seen emerging more and more lately.

Yes some miracle could happen that will save the day. Until then row projections say 20K deaths is a low estimate in the US. Mutations can also turn out more contagious or more deadly.

The_Weeping_Ayatollah says

Some say that the virus is an artificial, weaponized strain and as such is too deadly to survive long-term. Meaning that it either will wind down and disappear or become less deadly with every mutation.

Miracle thinking. God will save us. Mutations will happen to help us. It will miraculously go away because of something we have yet to see.
Motivated reasoning.

How about a simple projection from hard empirical facts?

Heraclitusstudent says

Yes some miracle could happen that will save the day. Until then row projections say 20K deaths is a low estimate in the US. Mutations can also turn out more contagious or more deadly.

Again, the new infection rate in the US has started to trend down since testing has been established. And the social gathering restrictions and closures have just started. There's no way you can deduce that many infections. And neither US doctors nor the WHO have any projections coming close to that.

Heraclitusstudent says

The_Weeping_Ayatollah says

Some say that the virus is an artificial, weaponized strain and as such is too deadly to survive long-term. Meaning that it either will wind down and disappear or become less deadly with every mutation.

Miracle thinking. God will save us. Mutations will happen to help us. It will miraculously go away because of something we have yet to see.
Motivated reasoning.

Nothing miraculous about it - simple fucking evolution: it's actualy beneficial for a virus to be less deadly, not more, so it will mutate towards being less deadly. The tendency for pathogenic viruses to become less deadly with time has been observed before on multiple occasions. The best known case is the infamous Spanish flu of 100 years ago.

The_Weeping_Ayatollah says

Nothing miraculous about it - simple fucking evolution: it's actualy beneficial for a virus to be less deadly, not more, so it will mutate towards being less deadly.

Yes and you know how it works: these deadly viruses die after they killed too many of their hosts, and can't continue to propagate.
Are you saying this is what will happen here?

mell says

Again, the new infection rate in the US has started to trend down since testing has been established.

Got a graph?

The Wikipedia graph of new infections ("Total" or "Rest of World") seems to show a flattening in the last 3 days, but that could be noise:

Heraclitusstudent says

The_Weeping_Ayatollah says

Nothing miraculous about it - simple fucking evolution: it's actualy beneficial for a virus to be less deadly, not more, so it will mutate towards being less deadly.

Yes and you know how it works: these deadly viruses die after they killed too many of their hosts, and can't continue to propagate.
Are you saying this is what will happen here?

It's not necessary for more severe strain to kill the host in order to hamper it's spread: people infected with more severe strain would more likely stay home or be put into quarantine thus hampering propagation of the virus, while people infected with a mild strain will continue with their usual activities and thus propagate their strain more. Meaing that the milder strains would have an advantage over the more severe ones.

Patrick says

mell says

Again, the new infection rate in the US has started to trend down since testing has been established.

Got a graph?

The Wikipedia graph of new infections ("Total" or "Rest of World") seems to show a flattening in the last 3 days, but that could be noise:

I look at this site:

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

and calculate new infections as percentage of total. While the active cases have gone up since the outbreak in Europe mainly, most countries are on the downslope in the last few days, percentage wise. Italy, Iran, Spain etc. are the current outliers causing the active infections to rise. I expect at least Italy to decrease soon with the drastic measures they have taken. Also if you look at Asia as an example - sure China employed drastic measures, but South Korea and Hong Kong not so much - they have already had their peak. The West is a few weeks behind. The US had new infection rates of 25% the past few days, and higher in the first days of testing, it's currently sitting at 13% for the day but there's still two hours to report since the site resets at GMT 0 hours. It's at worst stagnating and here in the bay areas we just started work from home and canceling all large events.

Or to put it differently, the vast majority of the re-spike to linear of the blue line is due to Europe and within Europe almost exclusively due to Italy. If you took Europe out you'd see the trend clearer. The total infections in the US hardly contribute - per 1 million capita they currently stand at 2.

mell says

Pay attention Dummies!

90% of all Western Cases are from Sequestered cruise ship passengers, that are effectively Political prisoner, pathogen hosts, and kept long enough to incubate a Global Crisis.
Just a month ago, the media was reporting it's not spreading, and will soon be over. Since then there has been more than 4 Cruise ships around the world that have quarantined people due to JUST ONE CASE. They kept them all there until 300 or 400 cases were documented. Then somehow saw fit to send everyone home.
None of those cases would have happened had they just sent them home. That's they way it behaves in the wild. It's not a highly contagious disease unless people are confined in close quarters.

For once Elon Musk said something smart today.

something to the affect of "The Corona hype is ridiculous. "