I'm really surprised there's 300 comments (with lots of panic) and nobody mentioned the official WHO guidelines https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2... especially the part about "How to cope with stress during 2019-nCoV outbreak"
What you linked to is a single article that has not been peer reviewed, on a month old virus strand.
No one said panic, but worried. Being prepared is the wise choice, as opposed to “turn off the news”.
Let me take a wild guess: if I go to the trouble of searching for old comments from you on HN from early 2020, will I find similar baseless dismissive content?
The point of my post was precisely what I said in the first line of that post:
"Good article! Answer: not very scared!"
To elaborate: people are panicking unduly and they need to quit being scared, they need to calm down, they need to relax and go about their day w/o being on edge every minute. I'm not saying that people should not take precautions: I'm saying that, once you take precautions, there isn't much else one can do that will make one safer than to relax and enjoy the ride as best one can. So, for example, I read, exercise, eat right and live a somewhat normal life.
The point of my last statement was emphasis: I was emphasizing how uncommon Covid-19 is and, in particular, how rare Covid-19 deaths are.
The topic or thought of death is what seems to trigger panic in most people about Covid-19. Mention of the reality of Covid-19 is like waving a magic amulet: all I need do is utter "A Covid-19 death..." in a meeting and half the participants appear to void their bowels and the other half begin to make attempts to exit the room. Everybody needs to calm down and focus.
Mainly I wanted to balance out the comments on this thread a bit as there were many which seemed overly cautious/mildly alarmist and there were too many comparisons to covid which is not particularly similar except for being a virus and causing one of these declarations.
Because 10 days ago the estimated # of cases was, while probably fudged lower by China, about 300. Now it's, as of this comment, about 17,000. If that number is underreported to the same magnitude, it's even more of a huge issue. Then consider that the symptoms mimic, at least for a time, cold/flu symptoms, and it's not hard to see how it could go undetected in an even larger group of people. Or not, but it's absolutely possible, hence the enormous scale of the reaction and precautions being taken. It's not panic, it's prudence. well, maybe it's also some level of panic, but I wouldn't say it's an over reaction. This is the sort of thing where I way more effort than actually required is a significant virtue as compared to even slightly less than required.
God, I was so annoyed reading WHO statements and people quoting them as an authority when this first started to blow up in China.
The numbers quickly went from dozens to hundreds, and they still tried saying there was no chance of human-to-human transmission (pretty unlikely that they all ate the same food and that a virus with the main symptom being coughing isn't transmitted by coughing) and that it'd all be contained and there was no need to worry.
In this crisis, the WHO has been bending over so far backwards that it's spinning donuts to serve as a political mouthpiece for certain governments. There was panic over people being under-supplied and under-prepared, and one of the main supplies in short supply was masks. Masks aren't perfect, but even if they're reducing transmission by 10% and keeping people from touching their mouth, that's a decent effect.
Just trying to keep up with the developments via Twitter and Youtube over the past few days has been detrimental to my mental health.
People are supposedly falling over on the streets in pools of blood; dead people are lying in hospitals unattended; cremation facilities are operating in overdrive and cremation fires can be seen from space - all of it backed up by footage that, at first glance, seems legit but is mostly taken out of context.
I'm a mild hypochondriac and every time one of these posts pops up, I can feel my cortisol spiking. I'm sure I'm not the only one in this regard, and I wonder whether the health costs associated with the spread of misinformation (panic attacks, anxiety, and long term effects) will not outweigh the actual costs of the virus in many countries other than China.
I really don't get why people get so worried about this. Especially on a science oriented forum like HN.
At this moment, even if we assume that there are 100 times more unreported cases than reported cases, the odds are so low that there is simply no reason to be worried, even if attending an international conference. It's true that people do get sick, and die, and it can happen to anyone. But people also get into all types of unlikely accidents, and we don't let this affect our daily life. Besides, symptoms are mild for most people. We're not talking about Ebola here.
I'm blaming the media. They make a "good" job at reporting each new individual case, making you feel that "this could be you" but IMHO this is noise. What I want to know is, how are countries prepared, what steps will be followed if this gets out of control, what is currently the probability of catching the virus, what do we know about the virus, how could the situation evolve in one week, one month and so on....
There are effective ways to mitigate the virus propagation other than canceling all events and stopping our economy, with all the adverse consequences we can imagine. For instance, starting by following the recommendations from health organisations. Such as stay home when showing symptoms, washing hands and so on. This is not followed by most people in Europe (and I suspect the US too). I see people coughing all the time in public transportation (compared with Asia where people wear masks).
EDIT: I'm not saying that we shouldn't be concerned or prepared, but I wouldn't go beyond the recommendations from the CDC, and I think that catching the virus now is extremely unlikely.
I don't think the Corona Virus is as benign as a flu virus. Sure the mortality rate is 1% but that is what we know today. No one knows what this Virus is capable of, in terms of mutation etc, and it is because of these unknowns organisations and public officials are on alert and taking quarantining steps - rightly so.
It is foolhardy to undermine WHO's cause for concern.
I am sorry you are stuck on a ship and I do hope you get to disembark in Singapore.
Also, the other article you posted from bedford.io seems to confirm this won't be a big deal. But even if it is, what do you suggest I do about it to improve the situation? I mean that question seriously.
Further more, I'm not saying that one slide doesn't exist. But maybe it isn't the end all, be all of authority? Maybe the other link you yourself posted also has some validity?
Unrelated - is there a term for exhaustion of opinions?
I swear you could go into any HN comment thread related to this outbreak and it breaks down to; Person A saying X is going to happen and then Person B saying Y is going to happen and then Person C saying that No! Z is going to happen!
How did everyone get so opinionated about something so unpredictable and unprecedented? In any case I think we should all calm down regardless of how dangerous this situation is. Stay sane, everyone!
Fair, although I think we need to remember in difficult times like this that:
- The plague killed 50-100% of people who got it depending on which kind of plague you got (bubonic, pneumonic or septicemic) whereas while nCoV rates are still TBD we're probably looking at an upper bound closer to half a percent, or 3-4 order of magnitude lower.
- The average age of folks who've died of nCoV so far in Italy is 80 and in China the mid-high 70s.
- The plague took everyone whereas the young and healthy are effectively going to get a (sometimes very, very) bad cold out of nCoV. The younger they are, the less affected. I think out of the hundreds of thousands of cases we know about so far only a single child has died -- and they had serious medical conditions going in. Currently the CFR in Korea and in the USA for people under 30 is less than 0.1%.
Perspective matters. It's easy to get swept up in the panic going on right now. Don't panic. Do listen to authorities and generally keep away from other folks. This will all be over in a few months. We'll mostly all get it, we'll overwhelmingly recover, and become immune. Chances are this is going to become one of the endemic viruses that shows up every year from now on.
As panic sets in, if you've got some cash to invest in the markets and a long time horizon to draw on it, this may be the money making opportunity of a generation.
How is no one is worried about viruses in moving water vs a puddle? (I've learned a lot about survival over decades, you can't tell me this is new information)
Just like the panic around COVID-19. China, who has more infections and more deaths than anywhere else combined, is already calming down. Yet the rest of the world is just starting in full panic mode.
Some people (medical leaders and scientists, not nut cases) are 100% convinced we should panic. This is not rational.
We have _scientific_ proof that COVID-19 is not a big deal. Yet here we are.
This is a somewhat different argument than the parent comment. The parent comment, as I read it, says that news of the virus is sensationalized. This says it's below your current threshold to act.
When you should take actions to mitigate risks depends on where you are and what resources you have available and what else you are dealing with. Where I am, we have had one case of the virus and I expect we have an above average amount of people recently in China.
I find it quite comforting to read about the virus so I can understand it and take steps to mitigate what I think are the likely risks. Reading the advice of medical experts has helped me take what I hope are sensible precautions and develop a good strategy for what to do if something bad happens with my family.
I have gathered enough food for my household to eat for a month, some water, stocked our medicine cabinet with things that are useful for dealing with the symptoms of the virus, a couple boxes of N95 surgical masks, and, maybe a bit more out there - I've got a pulse oximeter and a stethoscope and I've practiced listening to normal lung sounds and made sure I can use the oximeter.
If the virus sets in where I am, my household will shelter in place and stay inside. If we get sick we will stay home, since I know hospitals can't do more than treat the symptoms and going to hospitals will expose you to other pathogens including pneumonia which seems to kill many people with the virus. I will use the oximeter to detect a drop in blood oxygen of any sick person which is an indicator of pneumonia as a signal that home care is insufficient and then we'll strap on our masks and safety goggles and go to the hospital.
If the viruses doesn't materialize then we'll eat the food in the stockpile and I'll have spent only a small sum on things that aren't likely to be useful.
People are irrationally terrified by COVID. There is of course a rational level of respect we should have for it, but people are TERRIFIED. That's why you are getting downvoted (and I will too probably).
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