Corvid-19 and its impact (name edit)

Saint of M

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https://v1.escapistmagazine.com/forums/post/707

Reading one article dated January 21 2020, China has confirmed 26 dead and 800 sick with it. Another a friend has sent states there are at least 9 in the Alameda County of California's San Francisco Bay Area.

We know the virus is is part of the Coronavirus family which is fairly common, the main cause of the common cold in fact. THey can effect a wide range of animals like birds and mammals. In cattle they have been known to give them diarrhea, but its mostly known for its upper respiratory problems. Most of the time, these viruses are not particularly dangerous because after all the biggest difference between a Flu and a Cold is a Flu can kill you, a Cold makes you wish it would already.


This said, they can be deadly as was shown with the SARS outbreak back in 2003, where it's mayhem lasted 6 months and had almost 8,089 cases with 774 deaths in 17 countries (so about a less then 10% chance of dying from it). It was believed to have been transferred from an animal to a human, as is the case with most of the viruses in this catagory.

This is also believed to be the case with the Wuhan variant, so named because it was discovered in the City of Wuhan in central China. Most of the infected so far are those that were in the city or passed through it or other parts of Central China.



So what do we know about the Wuhan virus?


Its been not very old, or at least it official reports are not very old. New York Times covered its discovery on the 9th of this month, and from there has killed 26 people and infected 800 that have been confirmed. Like with SARS, the deaths are mostly with people with preexisting issues like older men with high blood pressure and diabetes, much like SARS. THe youngest death was a 48 year old woman and the oldest was an 89 year old man.

Its suspected to come from the live animal markets where people go to get their food. The animals are alive at the time of selling usually because fresh is best. Nothing is confirmed, but one market where a large number of the early known infected people worked at was shut down and heavily sanitized.

We know its mostly kept to China, but a handful of cases have cropped up in Korea, Taiwan, Japan, and the US, with Mexico and Sadi Arabia investigating potential risks.

We're not sure how exactly is spread, but potential person to person, so maybe like how a cold or flu gets spread around.


We also don't know how dangeorus it is. It might be something minor, mostly being a threat to those that are the very young and old, or it could be more tramatic.

The flue kills about 35000 a year, and infects 200,000. Every once in a while you get something like the Spanish Flu which killed more people in World War 1 than the actual war, or the 2009 Swine Flu Epidemic which had a high toll mostly from how far and wide it spread.

At this point its too early to tell.
I say wash your hands, stay home if you're sick
Don't let your kids go out if they are sick.
Face Masks can be more fashionable than being sick.

Any of you have thoughts on this, especially anyone with more than my shot glass worth of info on it?
 

Thaluikhain

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saint of m said:
Every once in a while you get something like the Spanish Flu which killed more people in World War 1 than the actual war
Just after the 3rd worst war in human history, though, it had a leg up.

saint of m said:
At this point its too early to tell.
I say wash your hands, stay home if you're sick
Don't let your kids go out if they are sick.
Face Masks can be more fashionable than being sick.
I'm going to predict this not being that big a deal, however those aren't bad ideas. Like you say, the flu kills lots of people every year. If people took more attention of basic hygiene, preventing needless deaths due to boring old diseases instead of exciting new ones is still good.
 

Neurotic Void Melody

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Well at least we can rest easy in the knowledge there's no way in hell this is going to get overblown by the usual suspects of sensationalist press. Not. At. All.
 

CaitSeith

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Although person to person contagion has been confirmed, it doesn't seem that it will be worse than the H1N1.

saint of m said:
Flu can kill you, a Cold makes you wish it would already.
Pretty much my Christmas and New Year this time. It sucks specially to be sick in Holiday Season (once you feel well enough to enjoy them, they are already over).
 

Agema

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The good news is that China learnt from the SARS outbreak and told everyone about the issue promptly rather than trying to suppress it for months whilst it merrily spread. I suspect it will be considerably less problematic than SARS.

saint of m said:
Every once in a while you get something like the Spanish Flu which killed more people in World War 1 than the actual war,
True, but medicine was pretty primitive back then. Outside young children, elderly and infirm, 'flu should polish off minimal people in a developed country these days.
 

warmachine

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The Chinese government have shut down transport in thirteen cities. Right in the middle of family reunion holiday. Perhaps the CCP are overreacting but I wouldn't trust the reporting of their public health managers either.
 

Marik2

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This is going to flare up a lot of xenophobia and racism against China. It might get treated like the ebola outbreak.
 

Silentpony_v1legacy

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Don't believe the media! Its a zombie outbreak! Gather the prep bags and bottled water. I think these are even running type zombies.
 

CM156_v1legacy

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I remember when Ebola was going to kill us all.
I remember when H1N1 was going to kill us all.
I remember when bird flu was going to kill us all.
Hell, I even (vaguely) remember when SARS was going to kill us all.

I will be just as disappointed this time around that society remains stubbornly intact.

Remember to drink your orange juice and wear a face mask, people.
 

Agema

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warmachine said:
The Chinese government have shut down transport in thirteen cities. Right in the middle of family reunion holiday. Perhaps the CCP are overreacting but I wouldn't trust the reporting of their public health managers either.
Again, SARS really hurt China's reputation and it would be intensely embarrassing to repeat that. Particularly because China has also expanded greatly into the global stage since then, including that it encourages other countries to let in Chinese workers to operate for Chinese companies' foreign operations. It can't afford a reputation as a country which incubates dangerous diseases that it can't control.
 

Marik2

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I keep thinking of the Mexican beer Corona when the virus is always mentioned.
 

Marik2

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If China wants to be taken seriously as a global trading partner, it would have to put strict regulations on what food gets sold in their markets.
 

CaitSeith

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So the official name has been given. The illness is now called Covid-19, and the virus SARS-CoV-2




To put it perspective, the 2002-2003 SARS epidemic had 8,098 cases with a death toll of 774 people worldwide.
 

CaitSeith

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Marik2 said:
Is this going to come up with future trade deals with China?
Seeing that senior officials got fired for mishandling the outbreak, possibly.
 

Saint of M

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Its been getting bigger. I didn't want to be the one to bring this back up, but as you folks did, might as well add.

There have been a few news stories going around about a doctor and early whistle blower that seems to have disapeared, and China seems to be doing things like haveing thousands of pet dogs killed to stem it when its already crsed over to humans

Ho accurate or not those stories are, it seems China is trying to use a bandaid to cover up a festering wound.

@ CaitSeith: Using a calculator, it seems the death rate is about 2%. If we keep it at this rate, it might go well enough. However, even though its been about a month since this started getting covered, is this a normal rate for cold and flue cases for the number of people to have contracted it? Or is it slower/faster than the typical bugs we get?



@ Marik2: I have to wonder what the futre is for them. This is the second big virus that has come from them in our lifetime. If nothing else, this could be what gets companies moving their production of cheap plasitic goods to other nations if this gets worse.

If nothing else, it might be just the excuse Hong Kong needs to keep out of China's direct control for a few more years.
 

Agema

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saint of m said:
Its been getting bigger. I didn't want to be the one to bring this back up, but as you folks did, might as well add.

There have been a few news stories going around about a doctor and early whistle blower that seems to have disapeared, and China seems to be doing things like haveing thousands of pet dogs killed to stem it when its already crsed over to humans

Ho accurate or not those stories are, it seems China is trying to use a bandaid to cover up a festering wound.
To be fair to China, it has improved processes a great deal since SARS.

As I understand it, the problem is that although the top wants a rapid response, more local representatives still find considerable motivation to conceal local difficulties from their superiors which has casued a critical delay. After that, once something's gone wrong, the whole system tries to suppress commenting on its errors like crazy.