The Coronavirus Thread

[JimC]

Another 270 new cases here in Victoria (almost all in Melbourne) and a dozen or so in NSW. Second spike still going...

[DRSB]

...and a snake if we're using Chinese astrology.

Snake and monkey are a love pair in the Chinese astrology, likewise the rat (the current year) and the ox (next year). I wear a cow amulet to appease the rat this year, and what a year it has been being! Rat and monkey are in a friendly triad as well, together with the dragon, the water triad. Yeah, I have officially gone bonkers! But, honestly, the Chinese are doing well, aren't they, even now, virus and all! In Singapore and Hong Kong they practice Feng Shui at state level. Mao forbid it in China and all the masters fled to these countries. They say that no construction plan is approved in Singapore and Hong Kong without a Feng Shui master.

[rainbow]

They say that no construction plan is approved in Singapore and Hong Kong without a Feng Shui master.

Nearly as bad as LA, then?

[DRSB]

They say that no construction plan is approved in Singapore and Hong Kong without a Feng Shui master.

Nearly as bad as LA, then?

Yeah, they claim it was Trump has great Feng shui masters, this is how he became president, he had many trucks loaded with sand around his house to build the element of earth, etc. Trump Tower was designed by a Feng shui master, go figure! https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... er-pun-yin

[laklak]

I knew it. The Donald is a fucking Chinese agent.

[Svartalf]

Chinese? I thought he worked for putin.

[laklak]

Vlad is probably a closet Chinee.

[JimC]

We all need to practice with those chopsticks...

[L'Emmerdeur]

Ed Yong, bringing the hilarity. Not going to put this in the Trumpdemic thread, even though the title is US-centric. The roll of the dice that he's talking about isn't only of concern to the US.

'America Should Prepare for a Double Pandemic'

Seven years ago, the White House was bracing itself for not one pandemic, but two. In the spring of 2013, several people in China fell sick with a new and lethal strain of H7N9 bird flu, while an outbreak of MERS—a disease caused by a coronavirus—had spread from Saudi Arabia to several other countries. “We were dealing with the potential for both of those things to become a pandemic,” says Beth Cameron, who was on the National Security Council at the time.

Neither did, thankfully, but we shouldn’t mistake historical luck for future security. Viruses aren’t sporting. They will not refrain from kicking you just because another virus has already knocked you to the floor. And pandemics are capricious. Despite a lot of research, “we haven’t found a way to predict when a new one will arrive,” says Nídia Trovão, a virologist at the National Institutes of Health. As new diseases emerge at a quickening pace, the only certainty is that pandemics are inevitable. So it is only a matter of time before two emerge at once.

“We have to prepare for a pandemic to happen at any time, and ‘any time’ can be when we’re already dealing with one pandemic,” Cameron told me.

I first worried about the possibility of a double pandemic in March. Four months ago, it felt needlessly alarmist to fret about two rare events happening simultaneously. But since then, federal fecklessness and rushed reopenings have wasted the benefits of months of social distancing. About 60,000 new cases of COVID-19 are being confirmed every day, and death rates are rising. My worry from March feels less far-fetched. If America could underperform so badly against one rapidly spreading virus, how would it fare against two?

[JimC]

And they're competitive little buggers, too...

"You call that a death rate, Covid-19? You ain't seen nothing, snowflake..."

[pErvinalia]

Seems a bit fear-mongering.

[Sean Hayden]

It's certainly frightening.

[JimC]

Shit. 317 new cases in Victoria yesterday, the biggest daily number we've had. Hope that's the peak...

[Brian Peacock]

Seems a bit fear-mongering.

Does that mean the idea disturbed you or that it's just a bit of overblown hyperbole?

[JimC]

It is certainly possible, given that the more humans disturb ecosystems and bring wild animals into wet markets, the more likely zoonotic outbreaks are possible. Covid-19 will be an issue for years, so the chances of another one appearing while we are still dealing with it seem quite high to me...