Corona Virus - are we doomed ?

[Outlaw Yogi]

Run for the hills ... oh no wait a minute, I'm in the hills ... so run somewhere else ... or I'll have to take you out with my fully automatic sling shot and depleted uranium tipped boomerang.

[Juliar]

If you catch it the worst that can happen is you will die.

Can you survive if you are quarantined for a fortnight ? Toilet rolls, tinned food, water, soap, etc ?

[Valkie]

If you catch it the worst that can happen is you will die.

Can you survive if you are quarantined for a fortnight ? Toilet rolls, tinned food, water, soap, etc ?

Im happy to hole up for a couple of weeks or even a month.
Food would get a bit scarce toward the end, but we would be OK.

We have a pretty full freezer, plenty of other foods and quite a bit of canned stuff.
All comes from when I first went on monthly wages 35 years ago.
So now we live month to month with our major shopping and hold a months worth in hand.

[sprintcyclist]

If you catch it the worst that can happen is you will die.

Can you survive if you are quarantined for a fortnight ? Toilet rolls, tinned food, water, soap, etc ?

I can get stuff delivered from the local woolies. Other places would do it too.
Have netflix on ..............

[Juliar]

But no place will go anywhere near you if you are in quarantine. Maybe they might leave it on the road outside your front gate.

[Outlaw Yogi]

Fortunately I have heaps of news paper for lighting fires ... just as well too, there's no bog roll at Gin Gin IGA.

The hand sanitiser bit I get, but what's with the run on dunny roll? .... It's not like it'll prevent being infected.

EDIT ADDITION; Latest speculation suggests Wuhan flu/COVID19 may be air bourn .. like SARS.

[Juliar]

How much more will the Corona Virus panic escalate ? Are toilet rolls being used as currency ?

If you are elderly and weak you are DOOMED TO DIE if you get it!!!!!


Stock up on toilet paper and run for your lives!!!!!



Coronavirus: it’s fatalities that count, not the numbers infected

When the Japanese bombed Darwin­ in World War II, killing more than 240 people, the Curtin government kept the news quiet for as long as it could. How would panic in Sydney and Melbourne help the war effort?

Truth, they say, is the first casual­ty of war.

In the social-media age every new case of coronavirus, no matter how mild, is pored over with lurid fascination.

As the health and economic ­crisis precipitated by COVID-19 deepens, authorities need to tread a fine line between urging calm, remainin­g publicly optimistic and ensuring people comply with measures to contain the virus.

It might seem like it, but this isn’t the world’s first flu pandemic. In 2009 H1N1 — known as “swine flu” — infected 61 million people and killed about 590,000 globally, 80 per cent of whom were younger than 65.

In 1968, the H3N2 flu killed one million people, including 100,000 in the US, according to the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

About a decade before that, the H2N2 flu pandemic killed 1.1 million people.

None of the previous pandemics caused a recession, let alone a near 30 per cent drop in global stock prices.

This is, however, the first flu ­epidemic where everyone has a digital megaphone.

There’s no reason why this corona­virus should be far more deadly than those previous flu pandemics, provided the death rate ends up lower than feared.

On Friday, there were more than 47,000 people who had contracted COVID-19 outside China, including 128 in Australia.

If the number of infections grows at 15 per cent a day, more than 3.4 million people, including more than 9300 in Australia, will have the virus by Easter. If it grows at 20 per cent, about the average so far, it’ll be 12.6 million and 34,800, respectively. That’s still far fewer than caught swine flu in 2009.

It’s the apparent death rate, espec­ially in Italy, which has struck fear in the community.

The World Health Organisation’s official death rate of just less than 4 per cent for COVID-19 has naturally drawn comparisons with the devastating Spanish flu pandemic of 1918-19, which killed between­ 50 million and 100 million people globally.

But 3.6 per cent must be an overestimate. Logic dictates many thousands more people have been infected with COVID-19 than the 125,000 official cases. The disease is highly contagious. International travel has only very recently been curtailed.

Most of all, the incentive for someone to volunteer him or herself for testing is very weak. Even in victims, such as Melbourne doctor­ Chris Higgins, in his 70s, who controversially kept working, symptoms can be very mild.

While it might not be in the interest­s of public health for an individu­al with cold or flu-like symptoms, discreet recuperation in ignorance seems a better option than seeking a test.

Quite aside from the hassle and costs of getting a test, a positive finding would cause significant disruption, including potentially forced quarantine or even loss of job.

Telling friends you have a cold, rather than coronavirus, goes down much better at social events.

The number of deaths from COVID-19, more than 4700 glob­ally as of Friday, is therefore a far more reliable and relevant statistic than the number of infections. And this death toll, while sure to surge, is a long way from the millions killed by virulent flu outbursts in the 1950s and 60s, when the economy was booming.

Finally, populations today are far healthier and more resilient than in the aftermath of World War I, before antibiotics existed to cauterise the secondary infections that flu can induce.

“Extrapolating from the mortality­ rates reported for the Spanish flu to 2004, 96 per cent of the projected 50 million to 80 million fatalities worldwide might occur in developing countries,” writes Walter Scheidel in his 2017 economic history of war and disease­, The Great Leveller.

Researchers are much more likely to find a vaccine quickly in 2020 than 1920 too. But what if develop­ed countries can’t control the virus, as China, where infection rates have tapered off, appears to have done?

Health experts have criticised the US and Australia for doing too little too late, failing to cancel large gatherings, close schools, and compel workers to stay at home. “The US response has just been appalling,” says economist Saul Eslake.

“If we can believe the Chinese data, at some point people will draw sharp contrasts between China’s response and how the US has dealt with it, in ways that won’t be helpful to those who believe in the superiority of US-style ­democracy.”

Democracies can’t so easily compel their citizens to quarantine; governments with an eye to re-election want to upset as few voters as possible.

Indeed, large private companies, perhaps fearful of potential lawsuits, have been far stricter in their quarantine and precautionary policies than state and federal governments.

German Chancellor Angel Merkel reckons up to 70 per cent of her country will contract the virus.

Even if the mooted death rate proves an overestimate, widespread contraction of the COVID-19 will cause major economic and social disruption.

How much is impossible to predict­. Economic forecasts, includin­g the effectiveness of the so-called stimulus, are based on what’s happened in the past.

We don’t know household and business spending and investment patterns in the grip of a deadly viral pandemic.

As toilet-paper hoarding illustrates, herd mentality can erupt in unexpected ways.

It remains to be seen whether house prices, which have a much bigger effect on household confid­ence than shares, slump in sympathy with shares.

Central banks, with official rates already practically zero everywhere, are rapidly running out of ammunition to keep proppin­g up asset prices.

The US government, heavily indebted and already borrowing about $US1 trillion ($1.56 trillion) a year, has little scope to introduce a major stimulus package.

If 70 per cent of the over-80s contracted the coronavirus, even with a 2 per cent death rate, almost 14,000 would perish in Australia alone — an extraordinary tragedy. Health workers, hospitals and aged-care homes would come under severe strain.

Severe pandemics, argues Scheidel, for all their horror, have tended to improve income inequalit­y by creating a shortage of workers, increasing wages, while reducing the value of assets, which mainly hurts the rich.

Whatever its ultimate spread, COVID-19, which attacks largely the elderly, appears poised to ­deliver all of the horror and loss of wealth, with no increase in wages.

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/

[Juliar]

Anyone who is old and frail can look forward to dying from the virus.



Australia prepares for 50,000 to 150,000 corona virus deaths
By Dana McCauley, Eryk Bagshaw and Rob Harris March 16, 2020 — 7.44pm

Up to 150,000 Australians could die from the corona virus under the Morrison government's worst-case scenario, as it considers advice on restricting visits to pubs, cinemas and aged care homes.

Deputy Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly said on Monday that the number of infections would be "somewhere in the range" of 20 per cent to 60 per cent of the population, urging the public to comply with social distancing measures such as avoiding large gatherings of 500 or more people.

"This is an infectious disease," Professor Kelly said in Canberra. "The more we can do to separate people and stop the disease spreading, the better. The death rate is around 1 per cent. You can do the maths."


Commonwealth deputy chief medical officer Paul Kelly. CREDIT:ALEX ELLINGHAUSEN

Under the best case scenario of a 20 per cent infection rate, about 50,000 people out of 5 million infected with COVID-19 would die. A moderate scenario of 10 million infections – 40 per cent of the population – would mean 100,000 dead.

In a worst case scenario, 15 million people would get the coronavirus and 150,000 would die.

Professor Kelly said authorities hoped to slow the rise in cases to keep the death rate lower than in other countries.

"Rather than concentrating on numbers, we are focused on preventing a large and rapid rise in cases in the coming weeks and months through thorough and proportionate public health measures," he said.

A six-hour meeting of all Australia's chief medical officers in Canberra on Monday night will also consider whether to reduce the 500-person limit set on Friday for all non-essential mass gatherings for enclosed spaces.

Professor Kelly said federal and state chief health officers would debate whether there should be different restrictions on a "football stadium versus a pub".

“We have been asked to give frank and fearless medical advice from the beginning and that's what we will continue to do," he said.

VIDEO: Coronavirus lockdown leaves major European cities deserted:- https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/ ... 092f78ca0b

Major cities across Europe have been silenced by lockdown measures brought in to tackle the spread of the coronavirus.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison and all state and territory leaders are expected to make a decision on the recommendations on Tuesday.

Mr Morrison said the corona virus was a "one in 100-year event" and slowing the spread of the virus would save lives.

The potential new measures could mean pubs, restaurants and cinemas being either forced to shut or scale down their operations. Popular Sydney pub the Vic on the Park in Marrickville has a capacity of up to 1000. In Melbourne, the Exchange Hotel in the CBD holds more than 900. Hoyts and Event cinemas in Sydney and Melbourne can hold more than 200 people in a session.

The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday recommended a stop to mass gatherings of 50 people or more including weddings, parades and concerts for the next two months. Ireland shut down pubs and New York ordered all restaurants to become take-away only.

The Australian government expects the number of local cases to rise to 1000 by the end of the week after a dramatic increase in confirmed cases in NSW, with an additional 37 positive tests bringing the state's tally to 171 on Monday afternoon.

Six of NSW's cases attended a wedding in Stanwell Tops, between Sydney and Wollongong, on March 6. Another 14 people have been diagnosed with coronavirus in Victoria, taking the number of infected people in the state to 71.

The government is not expected to consider nationwide school closures at this stage as health officials weigh up extending the Easter school holidays in three weeks' time.

All options remain on the table if the infection rate escalates sharply. The government is wary of taking healthcare workers out of the workforce to care for their children or potentially infectious children being sent to stay with more vulnerable grandparents.

"That situation may change in the future," Mr Morrison said on Monday. "When it does, that's when we'll act."

Professor Kelly said elderly people, Australians with a disability and those living in remote communities were at increased risk.

"We need to do what we can to limit the opportunity for the infection to come into aged care," he said.

Aged Care Minister Richard Colbeck on Monday announced that providers would be asked to limit visits to residential facilities.

"Given the risks to older Australians from COVID-19, particularly those with chronic disease and other frailties, we now recommend that residential aged care providers restrict visitor access," Senator Colbeck said.

Energy Minister Angus Taylor said the Council of Australian Governments meeting would prioritise preparing the energy system for the spread of the disease.

"Our priority must be to ensure Australia is well-placed to respond to energy supply disruptions, including electricity, gas and liquid fuels," he said.

https://www.theage.com.au/politics/fede ... 54amn.html

[Texan]

Here is what I'm seeing in America. All large entertainment venues have shut down. That's NBA, XFL Football, Major League Baseball soon, concerts, political rallies, etc..... Restaurants are rapidly becoming take out or drive through only. Bars and most retail stores are closing. I feel for people who are losing their incomes during this chaos. The stock market is tanking. I think crime over food and necessities will happen soon. Especially in larger cities where most residents are dependent on government programs to live. If this ends soon, I think all will bounce back and we will learn from this, but if it goes long term, all bets are off.

[billy the kid]

Anarchy within three days if the supermarket shelves run out....googling seems to suggest this....
Am I being an alarmist...not really...I knew this years ago....(2008)