Living in the SARS-CoV-2 era (distancing, wash hands, wear mask to protect others, but OK to go outside)

NorthReport wrote:

Bingo!!!

Reality check: The flu is a much bigger threat than coronavirus, for now

Seasonal influenza has infected as many as 26 million people in the United States in just four months, killing up to 25,000 so far, according to the CDC.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/time-for-a-reality-check-america-the-flu-is-a-much-bigger-threat-than-coronavirus-for-now/2020/01/31/46a15166-4444-11ea-b5fc-eefa848cde99_story.html?itid=hp_hp-top-table-main_virusflu-10a%3Ahomepage%2Fstory-ans

This is for Americans. The story is similar for Canadians. Both with a big "for now" and both speaking about North America. Where the disease is present in numbers it is a greter threat than influenze. Let's not look at this from just a here-and-now American viewpoint shall we?

for now we are lucky enough that the flu remains the greatest threat in the present for us but that is not the global reality and our country has to look ahead and prepare if this may change.

NorthReport wrote:

Latest stats from John Hopkins U

17,491 confirmed cases

362 deaths or 2.07% 

536 no longer ill

This no-longer ill number is very low. It really shows that you cannot compare the death rate with the infection rate as you cannot know the final result of those infected and still sick.

I cannot provide links as I read these earlier on my phone but people can google if they do not believe me: There is much speculation on how virulant this is. Some reports say that it could have a death rate of up to ten percent (Lancet) others speculate that large numbers may have had it and recovered without knowing they had it meaning it could have a very low death rate and that we only hear of the most seriously ill. There are also ranges in terms of presumptions of how infectious it is -- in part for this reason as people may be carrying it and not know or be ill. 

As people reading this probably know, it is the combination of infection and death rate that makes the difference. The Spanish flu had a low death rate and a high infection rate and therefore killed a vast number of people. Some have speculated that this could be the case: a fairly low eventual death rate but higher transmission (particularly becuase it can be asymptomatic) so a high death number.

As well there are conflicting reports from experts on how long a cure may take with some saying that this could take a year and the  outbreak could be over or that something could be rushed through quickly. This explains efforts to slow transmission.

It seems to me that the best evidence being combinations of evidence suggests that we really do not know how infectious it is, what the death rate is, or how long it will take to get a vaccine. This means that we do not know how serious this is and that those who say it is almost over or those who say that this will certainly lead to a serious global pandemic ought to be met with generous doses of skepticism. Both extremes are most newsworthy and liable to attract attention from people who want answers that may not yet be available. It sucks not to know but that is wher ethe world probably is.

To make matters worse the truth and the public interest may not be perfectly aligned. Public policy strategies to contain economic damage and prevent panic -- or to increase prevention and cooperation with efforts to control it -- could lead to presumed justification for large scale deceptions. If you have public agencies in different countries adopt different strategies it is possible that you could see deception from national communications in addition to deception through misinformation just dsigned to get attention. these national agencies may or may not have public health as their chief concern. Econmics and politics are competitors for that.

NorthReport wrote:

The number of deaths continues to hover just over 2% 

Latest and rapidly growing confirmed stats are

Confirmed 20,001

Deaths 426 or 2.13%

Recovered 623 or 3.11%

death rate meaningless when recovered rate is this low as I said above

NorthReport wrote:

If the truth be known - better not short the stock market tomorrow, eh! 

New coronavirus may be no more dangerous than the flu, despite worldwide alarm: experts

The apparently high initial mortality rates have shrunk as the number of infections grows, and many of the infected appear to have mild or no symptoms

https://vancouversun.com/health/new-coronavirus-may-be-no-more-dangerous-than-the-flu-despite-worldwide-alarm-experts/wcm/60f48752-e0dc-4960-9112-1431f00d4204

 

Uhuh: "may be"

bekayne wrote:

NorthReport wrote:

The number of deaths continues to hover just over 2% 

3.1% in Hubei province. In China outside of Hubei province, 0.2%

Entirely explainable by the fact that outside is more recent so some who may die have not yet. Really there is nothing here that is useful in terms of predictions.

NorthReport wrote:

Why doesn't Hong Kong close the border with mainland China?

I am not aware of their rationale or of the nature of their preparations or precautions. It is possible that they are checking the poeple as they go in -- I do not know.

kropotkin1951 wrote:

Hong Kong is part of China is the simple answer and so far the whole country is not being quarantined. They have quarantined the part of China where the outbreak has occurred, why would they close an internal border thousands of kilometers away.

While true, this does not mean that the authorities in Hong Kong could not close the border if they felt that it would help contain the virus. This is why I said I do not know the rationale since many locations in the country are restricting travel. The approach being taken in China is clearly severe travel restrictions where considered helpful to slow the disease. While outside China other countries have criticized this apporach, most have adopted it with far less of a reason than Hong Kong.

BTW Hong Kong is not as far from Wuhan as that. It is only slightly further than Shanghai. I think less than 1000 km. Wuhan is very central -- smack in the middle of the country. The distances to Yunnan in the West, Shanghai in the East and Hong Kong in the South are all not much different -- even Beijing in the North East is not all that much further.

At issue is not actually the distance, certainly not the political status of the regions, but more likely flow of people and local preparations. I am sure a medical risk was evaluated and determined to not warrant the move.

kropotkin1951 wrote:

You are right I should not have pluralized thousand. It is just over a thousand kilometers away, about the same distance as Vancouver to Calgary or Moncton to Ottawa.

The Hong Kong government has no authority in its relationship to China or the outside world, it is a subordinate level of government to the central state of China. It does not have the power to close the border anymore than BC can close its border to Alberta oil or citizens.  Even if it did have some power under emergency health regulations it is still not going to go against the coordinated efforts of the central government.

This is not what we have been told. They said they had the authority and decided aghainst it. I suspect that other local levels in China also have the authority to do this. I would imagine considerable cooperation between levels of government and that the central government can over rule but I doubt a local authority that wanted to could not. Why do you think they do not have this authority? I also think that in a health emergency it could be done here.

kropotkin1951 wrote:

Why do you think a centrally controlled country would allow a national emergency to be handled independently by 33 provincial type governments or 334 prefectures the next tier down in their administrative system? That sounds like a recipe for confusion. Strange how the Western media narrative about almost all other issues is that Xi Jinping controls everything personally. I think that China has a very effective administration with large room for autonomous decisions in the lower levels of government but I also believe anything that affects China as a whole is not dealt with by the lower levels of administration.

I merely stating my believe  about how I think the Chinese a system works on the ground.  I do not live under it so I am just making guesses, others are free to believe what they want.

You partly answered yourself in saying they have centrally controlled system with some autonomous authority if you just ask why.

The local authorities can act faster and often have access to more up-to-date information and can focus on local needs over a national average. I have spent a lot of time in conversation with visiting people from China and a number were professors who also worked with the government. China has a reputation for central authority but has a lot of autonomy in regions to respond to things based on local needs and speed. (For many years, I had a steady stream of Chinese visiting professors stay in my house while they worked with the University of Ottawa.)

I think a local health authority speaking to a local authority would be able to measure the infomration regarding travel restrictions at a local level very much more efficiently. They would of course be in conversation with national authorities and share a lot of best practices. There is every indication that China is using travel restrictions to slow the virus. I am sure that the local mayors, regional admistrative regions would have a lot of say. I think the Chinese government wants to effectively control the spread of the virus doing as little long term and short term harm to the daily lives and economy. I am sure local government contributes to these decisions. As well, the Communist party in China itself has top down control to be sure but it also has bottom up people on the ground in the regions and infomration is filtered back up. China is much more centralised than it used to be in some respects but I think the idea that it is all run from Beijing is somewhat mythical. Their local authorities are not that much different than ours. This outbreak has the country mobilized. I hardly think that the cities and regions are shut out of all decisions like this. I do not know exactly how the decision was made not to close the border but I would not guess that there was no local input. My guess is that when a decision affect only a local region that this region is very much involved. In the case of Hong Kong they ave a lot of local structures to gather information.

kropotkin1951 wrote:

"I hardly think that the cities and regions are shut out of all decisions like this."

I don't think they are either. Please I don't have the time to respond to all the things you read into my posts that I do not intend to convey. I am sorry my writing style is not good enough for you so please don't bother answering anything I say and I will try not to directly speak to your posts either.

okay

NorthReport wrote:

Has Canada stopped all flights to and from China now?

Yes