This is ALL political, media-hype, kabuki theater, hysterical sensationalism...yet again.

quote:

Originally posted by erj_pilot:
This is ALL political, media-hype, kabuki theater, hysterical sensationalism...yet again.

Of course it is.

And for some damn reason, Tucker Carlson is leading the charge on the hysteria.

quote:

And for some damn reason, Tucker Carlson is leading the charge on the hysteria.

Mister "group think hater" still needs ratings, no?

look up a guy named Dr. Campbell on youtube.
Uk doctor who has trained many nurses and students . He breaks down the virus using science and medicine almost daily now.
https://youtu.be/dnE9O-vV-ws

quote:

Originally posted by erj_pilot:
This is ALL political, media-hype, kabuki theater, hysterical sensationalism...yet again.

Yes, the dominant "news" media and others are undoubtedly hyping this, but it is not all "political, media-hype, kabuki theater, hysterical sensationalism." Please read my prior post and Doc H's response, here: https://sigforum.com/eve/forums...240059664#2240059664

Doc H has been one of the voices of moderation in this thread. Even he is now saying:

quote:

Originally posted by Doc H.:
... The virus already meets the technical definition of a pandemic. Underestimating the effect is not something they want to do right now, and because of the (very apparent) ease of transmission, it's prudent to plow the road ...

You're welcome to ignore the evidence clearly in front of you. I won't be doing that.

quote:

Originally posted by 46and2:
Yay for drive-through pharmacies, order-ahead groceries, and take-out food.

Take-out food... So you're going to eat prepared food handled by others during a viral pandemic?

That does not seem... wise?

Wait until this virus hits the homeless camps in San Francisco/Loa Angles or Austin.

quote:

Originally posted by erj_pilot:
This is ALL political, media-hype, kabuki theater, hysterical sensationalism...yet again.

Dems Politicize Coronavirus Outbreak By Proposing $8.5 Billion Rescue Package:

Dems are officially doubling-down on their push to politicize the coronavirus outbreak and use it as a cudgel against President Trump by proposing a plan calling for even more money to be spent.

According to Fox's Chad Pergram, Chuck Schumer is planning a $8.5 billion package that he plans to hand over to the appropriations committee later on Wednesday.

President Trump is holding a press conference later today to discuss the outbreak. Yesterday, he said he would be handing off his administration's $2.5 billion rescue package to Congress. President Trump has repeatedly insisted that the outbreak is under control, so we suspect that he fears a large number might spur panic.

Of course, in a situation like this, money can only go so far. As the CDC has demonstrated, containing an outbreak is more about decision-making and hard choices.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geop...rrives-south-america

quote:

Originally posted by Johnny 3eagles:
Wait until this virus hits the homeless camps in San Francisco/Loa Angles or Austin.

Or the inner cities. It won’t be pretty.

Whether it’s media hype or not, I’d rather be safe than sorry, especially with a baby and a pregnant wife. Everyone should have a month or so of food on hand just as a rule.

If this turns out to be nothing, oh well, I have 3 months of non perishables now. Better to have it and not need it and so on.

Also, better to get it now before everyone freaks out and goes shopping at once.

quote:

Originally posted by BansheeOne:
And there we have it. 47-year-old man with pre-existing condition in North Rhine-Westphalia in critical condition and on ventilation with symptoms of severe pneumonia tested positive along with his wife. Unlike in the separate case of a 25-year-old tourist just returned from Italy, no likely source of infection has been established so far. I'm reminded to stock up on a supply of my regular meds.

Textbook case. He had visited the hospital twice on regular appointments during the incubation period, and over 40 staff and patients are being watched, with one nurse showing symptoms. His wife now also has developed pneumonia - and she is a kindergardener, so the facility was shut down. Both also went to a carnival session while already showing symptoms, and one contact there is a Luftwaffe officer based at Cologne, where the government transport squadron is housed.

As a result quarantine measures went into effect at the base, and while the officer is being tested it's also being investigated whether he was in contact with crew members of current government flights, including with President Frank-Walter Steinmeier. And of course the original couple has mingled with an indeterminate number of people in the last two weeks, at which point isolation measures become pretty pointless.

quote:

Originally posted by RAMIUS:

quote:

Originally posted by Johnny 3eagles:
Wait until this virus hits the homeless camps in San Francisco/Loa Angles or Austin.

Or the inner cities. It won’t be pretty.

Whether it’s media hype or not, I’d rather be safe than sorry, especially with a baby and a pregnant wife. Everyone should have a month or so of food on hand just as a rule.

If this turns out to be nothing, oh well, I have 3 months of non perishables now. Better to have it and not need it and so on.

Also, better to get it now before everyone freaks out and goes shopping at once.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't concerned. I'm making preparations as well.

Part of my concern is that my family and I will be doing a ton of traveling the next few months and through the end of the year. That includes internationally to France. But honestly, I'm more concerned about disruptions rather than actually getting sick.

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:

quote:

Originally posted by erj_pilot:
This is ALL political, media-hype, kabuki theater, hysterical sensationalism...yet again.

Yes, the dominant "news" media and others are undoubtedly hyping this, but it is not all "political, media-hype, kabuki theater, hysterical sensationalism." Please read my prior post and Doc H's response, here: https://sigforum.com/eve/forums...240059664#2240059664

Doc H has been one of the voices of moderation in this thread. Even he is now saying:

quote:

Originally posted by Doc H.:
... The virus already meets the technical definition of a pandemic. Underestimating the effect is not something they want to do right now, and because of the (very apparent) ease of transmission, it's prudent to plow the road ...

You're welcome to ignore the evidence clearly in front of you. I won't be doing that.

quote:

Originally posted by 46and2:
Yay for drive-through pharmacies, order-ahead groceries, and take-out food.

Take-out food... So you're going to eat prepared food handled by others during a viral pandemic?

That does not seem... wise?

To be clear, I'm still the voice of moderation . But just like during flu season when we say "get your shots," it's prudent to take precautions to maximize your chances of not having a severe illness, or mitigating it if you do. And I agree with the CDC (not always!) - people should right now become aware that this will likely filter through the US and cause widespread illness - but hopefully, probably, not widespread fatalities. Take the same precautions you would take during a severe seasonal influenza outbreak.

This is a newly emerging disease, that 1) visibly has no "herd" immunity, and 2) currently has no reliably established Case Fatality Rate. And it's a fast-mutating RNA virus. That's nervous-making to epidemiologists, virologists, and worn-out infectious disease hacks like me. I'm glad it makes the CDC nervous as well. But - and a big "but" (sorry about that) - not hair-on-fire, jump off a cliff nervous. We - I use the royal "we" - are working on a protocol to stop this son-of-a-bitch, or mitigate it considerably. We have the tools and the talent, and we are close. And protect the herd from the disease in the future - not so close. Like influenza, it will not go away. Ever. It's part of the ecology now. So we may now see, "Get vaccinated, influenza/COVID-19 Season is almost here!" Another cog in the wheel of the forever human-tiny predator, co-survivor, shaky truce stalemate. Sleep tight.

quote:

Originally posted by chellim1:


Dems Politicize Coronavirus Outbreak By Proposing $8.5 Billion Rescue Package:

And about 1 million will go to actual pandemic purposes while the other 8 billion 499 million dollars will be marked for all sorts of Democrat BS, you watch. Climate change, Green New Deal, they will try to sneak all that in there and when Trump objects they will scream "Trump is trying to kill Americans and oppose efforts to stop this pandemic".

Coronavirus far more likely than Sars to bond to human cells due to HIV-like mutation, scientists say

https://www.scmp.com/news/chin...cells-scientists-say

Research by team from Nankai University shows new virus has mutated gene similar to those found in HIV and Ebola

The new coronavirus has an HIV-like mutation that means its ability to bind with human cells could be up to 1,000 times as strong as the Sars virus, according to new research by scientists in China and Europe.The discovery could help to explain not only how the infection has spread but also where it came from and how best to fight it.

Scientists showed that Sars (severe acute respiratory syndrome) entered the human body by binding with a receptor protein called ACE2 on a cell membrane. And some early studies suggested that the new coronavirus, which shares about 80 per cent of the genetic structure of Sars, might follow a similar path.

But the fact that the ACE2 protein does not exist in large quantities in healthy people, partly helped to limit the scale of the Sars outbreak of 2002-03, which infected about 8,000 people around the world.

Other highly contagious viruses, including HIV and Ebola, target an enzyme called furin, which works as a protein activator in the human body. Many proteins are inactive or dormant when they are produced and have to be “cut” at specific points to activate their various functions.

When looking at the genome sequence of the new coronavirus, Professor Ruan Jishou and his team at Nankai University in Tianjin found a section of mutated genes that did not exist in Sars, but were similar to those found in HIV and Ebola.
“This finding suggests that 2019-nCoV [the new coronavirus] may be significantly different from the Sars coronavirus in the infection pathway,” the scientists said in a paper published this month on Chinaxiv.org, a platform used by the Chinese Academy of Sciences to release scientific research papers before they have been peer-reviewed.This virus may use the packing mechanisms of other viruses such as HIV.”

According to the study, the mutation can generate a structure known as a cleavage site in the new coronavirus’ spike protein.The virus uses the outreaching spike protein to hook on to the host cell, but normally this protein is inactive. The cleavage site structure’s job is to cheat the human furin protein, so it will cut and activate the spike protein and cause a “direct fusion” of the viral and cellular membranes.Compared to the Sars’ way of entry, this binding method is “100 to 1,000 times” as efficient, according to the study.Just two weeks after its release, the paper is already the most viewed ever on Chinarxiv.

In a follow-up study, a research team led by Professor Li Hua from Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, Hubei province, confirmed Ruan’s findings.The mutation could not be found in Sars, Mers or Bat-CoVRaTG13, a bat coronavirus that was considered the original source of the new coronavirus with 96 per cent similarity in genes, it said.This could be “the reason why SARS-CoV-2 is more infectious than other coronaviruses”, Li wrote in a paper released on Chinarxiv on Sunday.

Meanwhile, a study by French scientist Etienne Decroly at Aix-Marseille University, which was published in the scientific journal Antiviral Research on February 10, also found a “furin-like cleavage site” that is absent in similar coronaviruses.A researcher with the Beijing Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, said the studies were all based on genetic sequencing.

$425M in World Bank catastrophe bonds set to default if coronavirus declared a pandemic by June

https://www.washingtonexaminer...d-a-pandemic-by-june

Investors betting big against catastrophic diseases are watching the World Health Organization closely as insurance bonds tied to whether the organization labels COVID-19 a pandemic are set to mature in June.

In 2017, the World Bank designed a new way to raise money: Pandemic Emergency Financing bonds. Over $425 million worth of such bonds, which bet against a global outbreak of infectious diseases and will default if WHO declares the coronavirus a pandemic, were sold by the World Bank in its first-ever issuance of catastrophe bonds. In the event of no pandemic, investors would be paid a healthy annualized return. Meanwhile, the World Bank could use the bonds to insure itself against the risk of a global outbreak.

“As an investor, we do not want to lose money,” said Chin Liu, a portfolio manager at Amundi Pioneer, a Boston-based firm that purchased the bonds as a way to diversify the company's $1 billion catastrophe fund. “But then, we also understand if it’s unfortunately triggered, it benefits every single person, including ourselves, to keep the virus controlled.”

For large-scale investors looking for above-average returns in a bloated market, the bonds were the next logical place to hedge against disaster. At the time of issuance, then-World Bank President Jim Yong-Kim heralded the bonds as an opportunity to leverage "capital market expertise to serve the world’s poorest people."

The bonds were administered in two tranches, with Class A bond investors receiving a return of 6.9% annually. Class B bond investors received 11.5% annually. The World Bank raised $225 million in Class A bonds and $95 million in Class B bonds.

The investors, mainly endowments and pension funds, have long bet against natural disasters such as hurricanes, but the 2017 issuance of the bonds marked a shift in the market. Before, investors were betting on the wind speed of hurricanes, but now, they were betting on the likelihood of an infectious disease that could tear through nations across the globe.

"This marks the first time that World Bank bonds are being used to finance efforts against infectious diseases, and the first time that pandemic risk in low-income countries is being transferred to the financial markets," read a statement from the World Bank at the time of issuance.

The conditions under which the payout on bonds will default are staggered based on how rapidly the disease spreads, the number of deaths associated with the illness, and whether the virus crosses international borders.

As of Wednesday, the coronavirus has claimed the lives of more than 2,500 people and infected more than 80,000, with most cases contained to mainland China. This week, the illness has begun to spread outside of China — with more than 100 cases reported in Iran and a run on stores in Italy after the number of infected patients increased 45% on Tuesday alone.

The Hopkins site for tracking cases/deaths:

https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis...40299423467b48e9ecf6

Just a clarification, though. The virus itself is called SARS CoV-2, and the disease it causes is called COVID-19.

I'm estimating that the efforts to isolate and quarantine known cases will slow down the progression, but since it is both droplet and airborn spread by otherwise asymptomatic carriers, they can probably delay it for only a few weeks longer.

The effects may sounds scary, but we're talking about severe disease mainly in those older than 80, as seen on this table: https://www.worldometers.info/...ge-sex-demographics/

No fatalities up to age 9. Only 0.2% mortality rate up to age 39 (regular flu is around 0.1%), climbing all the way up to almost 15% if you're 80. Most of the cases are in an overwhelmed area of China, so perhaps the mortality will drop elsewhere.

If you're into the pharmacology of it, there's an interesting link at Innophore about how they modeled the protease to find an inhibitor. https://innophore.com/2019-ncov/

Early trials should conclude at the end of April. There is also a vaccine in Phase I testing too (look up MRNA stock).

^^^^ Look at the death rate in China alone. Their healthcare system is a joke and is making the worldwide average rate worse than it should be.

You’re not going to see a death rate anywhere near that in the US.

But hey, don’t let facts get in the way of the panic.

quote:

Originally posted by PowerSurge:
You’re not going to see a death rate anywhere near that in the US.

But hey, don’t let facts get in the way of the panic.

I really wish some of y'all would stop raising this straw man. It's getting old.

The big concern, echo'd even in the hype-it-beyond-all-reason "news" media, isn't the mortality rate, but the infectiousness and the potential hit on services and the distribution network.

A friend of mine is a nurse here in Atlanta. Her hospital has its first confirmed case.

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:

quote:

Originally posted by PowerSurge:
You’re not going to see a death rate anywhere near that in the US.

But hey, don’t let facts get in the way of the panic.

I really wish some of y'all would stop raising this straw man. It's getting old.

The big concern, echo'd even in the hype-it-beyond-all-reason "news" media, isn't the mortality rate, but the infectiousness and the potential hit on services and the distribution network.

As others have stated, It’s not the disease itself that’s the biggest issue. It’s the social disruption and interrupted supply lines and services that’s gonna be the problem if everyone gets sick and quarantined. I.e. truck drivers, medical professionals, cops, supermarket workers etc...the glue that holds civilization together. Americans are not used to being uncomfortable and there’s always the possibility people will freak out and turn violent.

As stated previously, I work for one of the worlds largest medical distribution companies. Most of the medical supplies they distribute to American hospitals comes from China. From gowns and gloves to lifesaving medications and equipment. We should probably see some shortages in the next few weeks.

quote:

Originally posted by Johnny 3eagles:
Wait until this virus hits the homeless camps in San Francisco/Loa Angles or Austin.

https://thehill.com/policy/hea...ncy-over-coronavirus
San Francisco declares state of emergency over coronavirus

https://www.latimes.com/califo...inst-housing-the-ill
Ugly battles erupt as residents fight housing coronavirus patients in their cities