outbreak! (ebola, sars, coronavirus, etc)

I'm staying home because I'm in Seattle, and the public health authorities here are desperately trying to slow down the spread of an outbreak that is threatening to overwhelm the hospitals, and social distancing is the least I can do to help. Plus it sounds like this virus is pretty horrible and I'm not guaranteed a mild case, so for my own sake as well as that of others, I'd rather not get it. Since I don't have a job right now, I can realistically stay home, which makes it safer for the people who can't. I'm still leaving the house, but mainly to do outdoor things, not to take buses or go to bars or whatever.

I suspect people in many other cities are going to wish they had done more social distancing earlier, once those cities start testing properly.

fwiw I don’t think anyone without symptoms should sequester themselves unless advised to, I was just loling at the logic of contracting the disease—>immunity—>not passing it to others—>profit because it leaves out the rather important stage of... being contagious and passing it to others

Otm. Everyone i know who is calling this overblown keeps justifying it by saying "so what, I'll get sick, I'll get better!"

Yay!!

I have a feeling my attitude may have something to do with living in a country with an actual functioning health care system

“ the problem, as has been noted repeatedly itt, is that the person sitting next to you who seems fine could have it, and easily transmit it”

Right, so I guess what I’m saying is, how could anyone ever know how much they’re at risk? Unless there’s some actual data, like, someone you work with has it? If somebody I worked with had it then I’d hunker down for sure. But until that, or something like that happens, I am gonna live my life. I think??

Whoops the “ yay” was an xpost soz

xp KM:

That comparison was by a Chinese physician dealing with critical cases, who has to deal with patients with depleted CD4+ T cell counts (also a key element of AIDS pathology). Covid19 serious cases are immunocompromised, at least for a while...

You should stay home and not go to large gatherings probably slightly before there is evidence of community transmission in your city, imo. But certainly after.

Sanpaku shut the fuck up about that asinine and misleading comparison

Nobody's saying if you leave the house you're a war criminal.

Hell nobody is saying if you get the disease that you're a monster cos it'll probably happen.

Just like follow sanitation protocols, WHO guidelines, stop rimming for a bit etc

this is not a binary choice between total sequestration or going into crowds and kissing everyone though. everyone can make the choice to do normal stuff but not get on a bus or go to the movies, which can reduce risk by a lot.

Well, yeah. Btw, how large is a large gathering?

It’s like comparing falling off a ladder to osteoporosis because they can both break your bones or something.

10 or more people according to local guidelines

How in the world did they pick that number?

The movies sent me an email reading “please still come to the movies!” and idk man

fire marshall

marshal

If you give it to 10 people, and they give it to 10 people, and so on ... I'm bad at math, but I've seen "The Thing" a bunch, and that computer model was dire.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qSbYEbtfoY

yeah, and if you give it to 11 people it gets bigger much much faster!

i'm actually going to the movies tomorrow lol. but *only* three people in my state have it. and there is only one mouse in my house.

I think I will still go to the cinema, to see unpopular films

I haven't left the house since Saturday. I've been training for this my entire life..

and wasn't there that Li Liang who died a couple of days after he was supposed to be negative and recovered? He was young.

i'm glad i decided not to go to the AIPAC conference

lmao

the complete manipulation and fumbling about this in the US, I don't know how one wouldn't make an executive decision about their own health and the health around them if they have the ability. I don't know why they are allowing Trump to keep talking about this.

i'm a little sad sanpaku isn't really worried about a dog.

I'm listening to ZZ Top right now. Is that a symptom or a cure?

Is my butt rocking, or is it rocking my butt?

Camus says that the plague is listening to the same thing over and over again, so by that metric I think we all have it.

I expect maybe 3 other people in tonight's 10:30 screening of Portrait of a Lady on Fire. It's safer than grocery shopping.

https://i.imgur.com/tRETgYe.jpg

I’m immunologically privileged

l've been thinking...

if a small particle of this thing is enough to take over an entire organism, then everyone should prepare their own meals. l suggest we only eat out of cans.

In Victoria, Australia: state chief health officer Dr. Sutton says, “there may come a point where we say no international travel at all...at the moment my recommendation is to restrict travel to New Zealand and Canada.”

This is after a doc who went into work sick after coming back from holiday. He has now tested positive. He was skiing in Colorado. He saw 70 patients since returning.

I’m currently in a hospital right now and every wall has notices about not working and contacting a doctor about any fever you get after returning from abroad and these predate the covid-19 notices next to them.

My son and i are currently eating peanut butter out of the jar with TJ pretzel slims to promote jar meals #jar4omar

I'm listening to George Clinton

That helps right?

My challah loaves are rising

Scenes from the academic labs deputized for testing at UW: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00676-3

Last Sunday I listened to the 23 year old aide who works at my daughter's group home explain that he didn't think COVID-19 was any kind of big deal because the only people who died or got deathly ill were 'old people and people who were already really medically compromised'. He said this while feeding my really medically compromised daughter and talking to two genuine old people (65 and 70). Lovely.

My ex posted the other day "those of you that say only the weak or immunocompromised will die...we can hear you"

You and her otm

Fuck me that's horrendous.

feels like half the country has underlying medical condition that could make them higher risk - obesity, automimmune issues, heart/blood pressure

Republicans will all just kill themselves as long as everyone just stays in their lane:

Here's something new: Americans who seem politically polarized by basically everything are taking dramatically different views of the new coronavirus. Democrats are twice as likely to say it's a serious threat, and more of them are washing their hands. https://t.co/OMLhFXCMJI

— Brad Heath (@bradheath) March 6, 2020

republicans are more likely to live in rural areas, too, places where the busiest place in town might be a gas station, so they're probably at lower immediate risk, on average.

however, the question also highlights the different ways that conservatives often view the world (imo). coronavirus is not an imminent threat to the country because it's not an imminent threat to THEM. “I haven’t changed a single thing,” Cindi Hogue, who lives outside Little Rock, Arkansas, told Reuters. “It’s not a reality to me yet. It hasn’t become a threat enough yet in my world.” this pattern plays out over and over, whether it's a conservative asshole being anti gay marriage until suddenly their daughter is a lesbian and they see the light, or voting against disaster aid for other US jurisdictions but then suddenly understanding the need for collective assistance as soon as a natural disaster hits their home district.

That... checks out. I bet there are a bunch of black Ford F-150s with chrome packages and number stickers saying COVID IS 4 BETAS

there's also the whole obvious globalism angle. international! pandemic! global coordination! NO NO NO!!!

“I haven’t changed a single thing,” Cindi Hogue, who lives outside Little Rock, Arkansas, told Reuters. “It’s not a reality to me yet. It hasn’t become a threat enough yet in my world.”

I'm sure you're right, broadly speaking, but this particular quote doesn't actually sound that bad to me. I've certainly encountered a lot of liberal people who consider themselves educated and informed but are ignoring this, and some of them even live in my beleaguered city. This woman is basically just saying it hasn't reached her yet, and she may well be right.

that's very true. i guess the context of the article it was in (about republicans not seeing it as an imminent threat) made me read her quote in a more universal way, rather than applying to just her own neck of the woods