The irony: while Australia blocks fruit flies, China blocks deadly viruses
How long before China bans flights from the US, UK and Australia? Count the days…
Coronavirus: China orders travellers quarantined amid outbreak
[BBC] Travellers from countries with severe coronavirus outbreaks who arrive in some parts of China will have to undergo a 14-day quarantine, state media say.
Travellers from the virus hotspots of South Korea, Japan, Iran and Italy arriving in the capital will have to be isolated, a Beijing official has said.
Shanghai and Guangdong announced similar restrictions earlier.
Authorities are worried the virus might be imported back into the country.
Although most virus deaths have been in China, Monday saw nine times more new infections outside China than in.
Shanghai said it would require new arrivals from countries with “relatively serious virus conditions” to be isolated, without naming the countries.
Chinese official statistics suggest they are getting the outbreak under control, which is hard to believe, but they are acting like they do. If most of their population is still at risk of further outbreaks, then they would care about risky incoming flights.
Meanwhile our health ministers tell us it’s too late to stop the planes.
Cost of importing viruses *might* be more than cost of closing borders x 1000
Has the Prime Minister done the right cost-benefit calculations?
Forget the tens of thousands of deaths, pretend those lives are worthless, and add up the cost of shutting down schools, factories, public transport, sports events, conferences, concerts and everything else, because that’s not the cost of closing flights, its the cost of keeping them open. Factor in $5,000 a day for intensive care beds, plus workers staying home to look after kids, plus job losses. Include the costs of putting off most elective surgery for six months. Don’t forget people who will get sick of something else this year but will have to wait longer for help, so add some cancer patient deaths to the tally.
Ponder how much cheaper it is to live in a country free of this scourge? If Australian domestic tourists knew travel in NSW was safe, and if people in Sydney weren’t afraid to eat at Chinese restaurants, then Australian citizens could enjoy those holidays and dinners and thousands of tourist-related businesses might not go bust. If we let in risky flights then we earn two more weeks of tourism cash but maybe wipe out the small mum and dad businesses who can’t survive the cash crunch.
Australian universities are paying $7,500 to fly in students from China, who don’t even need to go through proper quarantine.
We can build holiday homes or extra hospitals. Don’t close the borders, just insist on a proper 2 week quarantine.
I can’t believe I’m hoping we can do infection control as well as China does…
Golly….it appears the powers that be in the West want it to come in…
Surely not?
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This is the virus that Australia has to have !
No doubt the recession we have to have, will also come shortly.
( No apologies for stealing this from Paul Keating ! )
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Still reckon the social dislocation is going to be worse than the disease…unless of course that was the idea….
Nah…..
I could at a stretch suggest its a tried and proven formula if social engineering via a new “war”…and the beauty of “war” is that under extreme circumstances all manner of extreme things van be “justified” and carried out.
My suggestion is watch the stuff in the shadows…the main “act” could be a distraction…..
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I have a permanent cough due to lung damage after being on a respirator during a 20 day coma. I am hardly game to go outdoors at present in case I am tagged as a risk. Certainly no public or air transport in case I get locked down.
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Distraction, misdirection, black swan event, false flag, etc.. All speculative and only time will tell if any are true or not.
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Hi Jo, great post !
I watched Dr Campbell in the UK on Youtube this morning.
He noted that 8 Chinese restaurant workers in ITALY,
Returning to China ALL tested positive to Corona Virus 19.
And they were all put into quarantine by the Chinese authorities.
I’ve been thinking about this a little. ….
Chinese restaurant workers working in Italy ?
Probably in Chinese cafes & restaurants..
And maybe that is the unknown source of the Italian epidemic which is still raging..
Maybe it is safer to stay away from Chinese restaurants in Australia
As many of the Chinese students who come here to study,
Work part time in such places.
I am not racist ! But I will take precautions to not catch this virus !
Also how ironic that it was China which stopped these workers
Re-importing it to China from Italy !
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Jo, I don’t recall you being this hysterical about Ebola, which is a far more dangerous (and lethal) virus.
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Damon I don’t recall Ebola being in this country and I’m guessing you never went over to visit an Ebola hotspot at the time ?
As for hysterical read your post again !
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Can you do this calculation Damon. Use a calculator if you need to.
Givens:
Assume: 1% death rate; infection rate (say) 25% (as per the Queensland Chief Medical Officer); Australian population of 25,000,000.
Answer: ?
PS. It’s not in the back of the book.
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Except I think that the WHO’s 3.4% might be closer to the mark. So just in case it is multiply that by 3.4.
A figure of 675,000 comes to mind.
25
OOPS: 212,500 is a bit better. Can’t even claim a typo.
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🙂
Yes Ted. That’s the answer for 3.4% death rate assuming a 25% infection rate.
However, what if the infection rate is higher than that which the Queensland Chief Medical Officer suggested? What if it’s in the range 40% – 70% that Jo has referred to previously.
I hope and pray that it’s not.
I’m still waiting for Damon’s calculation at 1%/25%/25 million.
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Worst case scenarios+what ifs+moral high ground
= existential crisis + mandate for economy wrecking action
Sounds very much like the sort of things this blog normally argues against.
Common sense tells you that the % death rate based on the easily detectable cases (ie deaths, seriously ill, minor cases that have been detected by chance) is going to be far wrong.
As things stand we can detect those who currently have the virus but don’t have serious symptoms only by a laborious test which requires that people a) suspect they are infected by something other than a cold b) come forward for testing (against which there are very significant social pressures)
We currently have no systematic way to detect those who have recovered from the virus and eliminated it from their bodies, again making it difficult to get a reliable quantification of non-problematic infections.
I was listening to an epidemiologist today on the BBC who summed it up. The modelling based on current data (trying to take into account the magnitude of undetected infections) was 1% but probably lower.
Watch the actual known death rate tend towards a bad flu season over the coming months.
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And……..There are those out there who assume the Corona virus one gets infected with will be the exactly the same as the original type. So new tests will have to made for all the individual types as they arise.
There is already talk of two types…my guess, …just a guess… is that there are already 100’s of variants on the now famous original Corona virus…making it ever more difficult to diagnose and test for.
“Sounds very much like the sort of things this blog normally argues against.” That type of comment is a ‘kind of attempt’ at objectification.
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My Hong Kong based journo brother vigorously arguing the same thing to me DrNick. But the under forties are really just clueless carriers of this disease most of the time. It’s not a young man’s disease. There is a very stark age split with this one so there are huge numbers of infections that don’t really matter re mortality. It’s a bit like rounding up males in Rubella numbers?
From another post – https://www.wnd.com/2020/03/doctors-stunned-coronavirus-leaves-children-virtually-untouched/
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“Worst case scenarios+what ifs+moral high ground
= existential crisis + mandate for economy wrecking action.”
My variation on yours is…
Worst case scenarios+what ifs+moral high ground
= existential crisis + poverty and death by far exceeding the harm done by the virus.
‘Do no harm’ is a principal i definitely agree with.
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“My variation on yours is…
Worst case scenarios+what ifs+moral high ground
= existential crisis + poverty and death by far exceeding the harm done by the virus.”
You think the complete overreaction this won’t cause economic harm and therefore poverty and death.?
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Hear hear. The 3.4% death rate is a rubbish number worthy of climate science. The denominator of that number is totally unknown at this stage. The infectivity is open to question as well, I have seen figures of 60% proposed yet the number of cases identified is still in the fractions of one percent of involved populations.
I have been looking at the mortality of seasonal flu. Numbers vary but a Dutch study gives 9% mortality for hospital admissions and 38% mortality for ICU admissions. Those numbers would be terrifying except we know the context that the cases which end up in hospital and where the disease is formally identified are only a tiny proportion of the infected population
Not saying that Wuhan flu is just another seasonal flu but the numbers so far say it is a long way from armageddon.
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True, there are more cases then we know about. Are there also more Cov19 deaths then we know about?
In China it is a certainty. From the leaks of that information controlled nation, far far higher, which makes sense. China’s quarantine procedure is/ was a death sentence for all potentially exposed, but not tested who were forced into GROUP QUARANTINE, like the Princess cruise ship. Only worse, no walls, thousands of beds next to each other. Plus the Highrise apartments, everybody locked in because a few from the building tested positive. China’s quarantine practice created thousands of land cruise ships. Many leaks confirmed this.
Has China allowed anyone to tour these facilities, talk to people on in the quarantine and makeshift hospitals. The answer is no.
So why did China destroy their economy.
Lighting
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DrNick,
You’re really losing sight of the proper priorities here by elevating economics over public health. The point of a healthy economy is to provide everyone their essential living needs – CHECK!
Anything else is non-essential, and is properly prioritized LOWER than the public’s essential health and safety.
If the economy takes a big hit, SO? What of it? Economy and demand are both rapidly recoverable, and will.
3.4% mortality? Not so much.
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DrNick,
Even a death rate of 0.5% is five times worse than the seasonal flu. Since our hospitals are designed to barely adequately deal with that is it not wise to slow everything down until we get the data we all want? A five fold increase in ICU demand is a train wreck — especially in winter — but it would be in summer would it not?
The Chief Medical Officer and health minister here are offering bland platitudes and inanities.
If they are leaving the borders open I want them to be pressured to explain why. If they have good reasons, why hide them?
The media don’t even want to ask the question.
Jo
LightningCamel, very interesting statistics on flu admissions. Thank you. A useful perspective.
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I’d thought about that Sam, in fact I almost mentioned it. I think it’s likely depending on just how fastidious we are with our hygiene and separation.
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Hygiene and separation.
Yep. Agree.
However,for this disease, hygiene and separation require access to N95 masks (lots per person – one is not enough), goggles and gloves, as a minimum.
Even the medical profession says it has not got access to the PPE necessary.
There are not enough masks in Australia to provide the necessary protection for the whole population, should this virus seriously take off. It is doubtful whether there’s even enough for the medicos and their staff.
That’s why the official line is: wash your hands regularly and don’t touch each other and stay your distance. Propaganda that seeks to mask the truth.
You might as well have a “pocket full of posies” for the use they’d be.
Ring-a-ring o’ Covids
A pocket full of poseurs
A-tissue, a tissue
We all fall down
Virus in your spittle
Virus in your pee
We all breathe out
With a one, two, three.
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“… gloves, as a minimum.”
Women could start wearing those formerly common white gloves last worn by Jackie Kennedy. (?) No shortage of them, probably.
10
Being fascinated is better than fear and hysteria IMO. Lots to learn.
I have been looking at this on and off for a period since it is very interesting how pure strains lose their virulence over time or repeated transmission. It looks as though viruses compete with each another for resources within host cells via ‘Defective Interfering Viruses or DI’s.. Over time, defective virus’s get the upper hand over the original wild type. And so a virus seems to have a lot of trouble with maintaining it virulence.
From: https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/defective-virus
“Subviral Agents
“JAMES H. STRAUSS, ELLEN G. STRAUSS, in Viruses and Human Disease (Second Edition), 2008
DEFECTIVE INTERFERING VIRUSES
“Defective interfering viruses are a special class of defective viruses that arise by recombination and rearrangement of viral genomes during replication. DIs are defective because they have lost essential functions required for replication. Thus, they require the simultaneous infection of a cell by a helper virus, which is normally the parental wild-type virus from which the DI arose. They interfere with the replication of the parental virus by competition for resources within the cell. These resources include the machinery that replicates the viral nucleic acid, which is in part encoded by the helper virus, and the proteins that encapsidate the viral genome to form virions….”
https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/3-s2.0-B978012373741050012X-f09-03-9780123737410.jpg?_
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From: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1879625718300956
“The defective component of viral populations
Particles containing degenerate forms of the viral genome which interfere with virus replication and are non-replicative per se are known as defective interfering particles (DIPs). DIPs are likely to be produced upon infection by any virus in vitro and in nature. Until recently, roles of these non-viable particles as members of a multi-component viral system have been overlooked. [my bolding] In this review, we cover the most recent studies that shed light on critical roles of DIPs during the course of infection, including: the modulation of virus replication, innate immune responses, disease outcome and virus persistence, as well as the evolution of the viral population. Together, these reports allow us to conceive a more complete picture of the virion population, and highlight the fact that DIPs are not a negligible subset of this population but instead can greatly influence the fate of infection.”
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Ebola was contained by quarantine in shipping crates.
https://www.fastcompany.com/3036733/these-portable-ebola-clinics-fit-inside-shipping-containers
Perhaps that’s where we are heading.
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Ebola mutated into a harmless variety and inoculated the local populace. We got lucky. Ebola is also RNA-based like the current virus, which means relatively fast mutations.
Here’s the strains currently documented: https://nextstrain.org/ncov
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That’s pretty cool Bulldust. Brilliant work. Great site.
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Ebola is far more deadly !
But it is spread from direct contact
With an infected animal, person or dead body !
Corona 19 spreads by direct contact
AND via the air around an infected person from their breath
AND via the water droplets contaminated with the virus from urine or stool particles.
That’s a trifecta Damon !
I suggest you not bet against it.
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I don’t recall ebola arriving in Australia, do you?
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We were all lucky Ebola was so hard to catch — the highest rates of shedding were during the last few horrible days of illness just before death. By then people were tucked in hospital.
Governments (especially the UN) were late and ineffectual compared with private action, and as this story showed, the best response was well managed quarantine — which Firestone did better than the UN.
Company stops Ebola, Bureaucracy puts it on a plane
Same deal. Governments hate the idea of a temporary halt on planes.
My attitude to microbes hasn’t changed — but Ebola is different to SAR Cov-2. The latter is much less deadly but more transmissible = hugely greater threat.
As I’ve said from the first post, I hope there are many asymptomatic or low grade infections, but if there aren’t then the numbers are awful.
I agree the panic could kill more than the disease, but wouldn’t temporary closures of borders do more than anything to quell the panic? And I’m only talking of stopping holidays, sport and conferences, not trade.
To avoid people shunning restaurants and schools and locking up old folks for months, stop the holiday flights…
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Jo – your statement “add up the cost of shutting down schools, factories, public transport, sports events, conferences, concerts and everything else, because that’s not the cost of closing flights, its the cost of keeping them open” is just a brilliant summary. Watching what the governments here and around the world have been doing, I do think that the Australian federal government did act quite well early on. In particular, they were closing off entry when WHO – under direction from China – was urging everyone to take the virus in.
Since then, not so good. Or just possibly, not all that awful. In politics, it is always easier to be certain than doubtful, easier to use black and white than shades of grey.
I suspect that the government knows that they can’t keep the virus out completely, so they are trying to achieve a balance between (a) open slather, huge number of deaths and a collapsed health system, and (b) total shutdown of the economy. I think they and other governments are working on the basis that the best they can achieve is a slowing down of the rate so that the health system can cope while giving more time for vaccines, treatments and cures to be developed. If they went public with that as a policy, they would be out of government in an instant, but realistically it could well be the best policy.
A relative works for a large company in London, which has very quickly taken a number of steps including splitting all teams into two, placing the two halves in different locations.If one half gets brought to a standstill, the company can still continue.
On another angle: people compare the Wuhan virus statistics with flu, saying stop worrying about Wuhan, flu is much worse. I think that is misguided: flu is a mechanism which tends to take out people when their health gets close to its dotted line. In other words, even though it causes lots of deaths, it might not cause a lot of loss of life. Until we know more about Wuhan, we can’t be sure that its equation is similar, and therefore it’s worth treating it with full caution.
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The 1968 flu season killed over a million people. We have a long way to go if we indeed get that far. The real worry is the current virus might mutate to something a lot worse longer term.
10
Nothing like a front seat to the apocalypse, eh? Got my popcorn ready. The Four Horsemen…Pestilence, Famine, War and Death. Oh, don’t forget the other one. Riding on a jackass crying,”What about me?” Climate Change. Oh the irony. lol
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Descriptive of this!
“Delingpole: Net Zero Is the New Remain and It Will Destroy Boris’s Conservatives”
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/03/06/delingpole-net-zero-new-remain-it-will-destroy-boris-conservatives/
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It looks like there are ongoing operational/governance issues in China.
Also, as we have seen, testing for this thing and making that routine is hard. So it is hard to be too hard on the source location numbers and testing veracity when most other countries seem to have let this thing spread, mostly asymptomatically it would seem. Dumb and dumber.
Smart countries in many cases, but perhaps lacking in common sense.
Infected just walking right through the border and letting rip when they land. Everywhere. Widely spreading for a month or so. The truth of this was there, if WHO or governments had bothered to react to it. Immobilised by politics, confused priorities and risk models.
Having sat in work from home and not travelling, observing this thing since mid Jan, nothing seems to be really improving much at all on a local or global level. It is a little worrying.
Worst of all, there were multiple opportunities to avert this biological and financial disaster that appears to be unfolding from the start right up to the present across many countries.
It feels to me too like we are in the pound of cure versus ounce of prevention side of the equation. I wonder if it is 1000X.
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Probably.
10
it was unbelievably stupid not to block flights from iran and south korea once it became clear infections in those countries were out of control.
apparently ending the lives of your own citizens is preferable to being called a ‘racist’ by woko haram (look how they squealed about trump’s travel ban).
the liberals have learnt nothing from trump: If you don’t fight… you lose.
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“it was unbelievably stupid not to block flights from iran and south korea once….”
Agreed.
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Agreed.
Today it’s also unbelievable stupid not to enforce quarantine for crossing any border.
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These damn fruit flies! What you are saying is really true. I remember back in 1988 my Wife and I traveled from Sydney via Dubbo and Nyngan to Broken Hill with our Pickup Truck with a slide on camper. Then in Broken Hill we went grocery shopping and bought a lot of fruit because we had Bircher Muesli for dinner often. Then we drove towards Adelaide and in the middle of nowhere we were stopped by a barrier across the road and two friendly officers gave us the chance to either turn back, eat ten pounds of fruit on the spot or trash these fresh fruit. The reason they told us was to ensure we would not bring fruit flies to southern Australia. This was very surprising to us and we could not find any information about this in the travel guides.
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With regards to international flights, just stop them all for 30 days. That’s how you put the rest of the world in quarantine. Note that after flights resume we still have to impose quarantine on arrivals for as long as the rest of the world is incubating the virus, which will be for the rest of this year at least. Stopping flights stops the spread immediately and gives you time to set up the quarantine facilities.
The whole point of quarantine is to prevent the contagious from infecting others. Waiting for someone to show visible symptoms before you can determine they’re contagious is what you do when you have no other option like in the bad old days. But we have PCR which takes several hours per sample, and RT-PCR which is supposedly quicker, and researchers separately in China and Singapore have developed an antibody test which promises a much quicker turnaround time like 15 minutes and could be used on a much larger scale than PCR machines. If the antibody test works you can test everybody, not only the symptomatic and the risky passports.
Put everyone into mandatory quarantine on arrival. If testing capacity is limited then you start auctioning the tests to the passengers with earlier testing costing more. Samples get taken after the 3rd day so anyone who was infected during the flight will have it show up. So you get your sample taken and when two swab tests comes back negative you’re free to go early, which will be most people. A positive test and you get sent back to your home country, or if you’re already there you stay in until you’re symptomatic. Degree of severity determines what care level you go into next, which is probably to a makeshift hospital for COVID19 only.
We could even set up reciprocal quarantine agreements with other countries, where if you stay in an approved facility for 14 days before your flight you can leave the airport immediately on arrival. But the aircraft has to carry only people who’ve been through the same process, no mixing of vetted and unvetted. I suggest this requires random inspections to check that the rules are being enforced in the other country.
Doing the same to our entire country would really catch a lot of cases, it would allow us to track down most of the carriers, put a lid on it, achieve proper “containment”, and you’d only have to shut down most of the economy for 10 days. Bargain! Do I sound like a dictator? Hey, nobody blames the benevolent dictator.
I’m just waiting for Facebook, Twitter, Apple, and Google to announce they’ve all secretly worked together to identify all of the most socially active people on Instagram, FB, and texting cell locations, and have taken it upon themselves to cancel those peoples’ appointments for the next 2 weeks. You know who the superspreaders are don’t you? It’s not the basement dwellers, it’s the ones with high friend count and frequent flyer miles. Just one automated text or email sent to that set of people to remind them they are higher risk than most could have a significant effect on spreading rates.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _
FWIW…
My prediction on Monday for total cases outside China by end of Thursday on Worldometer (our Friday morning) was basically correct although it just scraped in on the low side. The projection from the best-fit exponential formula was 19812 and plus or minus 10% gave a prediction range of 17830 to 21793, and the actual was 17855.
Assuming the total cases can instead be modelled as a sigmoid, this drop below the exponential extrapolation could mean the curve has hit maximum slope already, which if it were true would mean the epidemic will be much shorter with less cases than most assumed. But I don’t think estimates could be that far off by orders of magnitude, so probably it’s just noise and we’ll see a steeper slope next week. I have another sigmoid-based model of the curve but will wait for more data before making another prediction, as that last one was just too close for comfort.
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Spot on.
The aircraft are now just as suspect as a doctor’s waiting room in Wuhan.
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Andrew, interesting. Exponential slopes are key right now… keep us informed.
40
https://www.wnd.com/2020/03/doctors-stunned-coronavirus-leaves-children-virtually-untouched/
30
Lower ACE2 receptor count. But just because they don’t become ill, doesn’t mean they can’t be carriers.
However there probably won’t be permanent male infertility problems such as may affect older persons who become seriously ill but “recover”.
50
Cheers! 🙂
10
Jo has lost her mind. Some years ago, I flew from Amsterdam to Boston with the most vile cold. I felt for the lady next to me. But I didn’t die, and I take it, neither did she. Today, I would have been denied entry to the US. The whole thing is completely ridiculous. The coronavirus is not ‘unprecedented’, and is not a global threat. Normal, healthy adults do not die, and recover rapidly and completely. Just like the previous scares.
[ Damon be careful with your descriptions of other commentors, you are right on the edge of what’s acceptable which makes me think you haven’t read “guide for commenting”.
Please read it and take more care in choosing your words ] AD
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I have never known the common cold to run rampant through a hospital putting all of its staff out of action. I have never heard of hospital staff donning hazmat suits for protection from the common cold. Either they know something that you don’t, or they are idiots.
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Have you done your sums yet Damon?
http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/even-china-bans-and-quarantines-flights-with-coronavirus-but-the-west-flys-in-deadly-virus-at-1000kmhr/#comment-2286144
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See Jo’s mortality table.
04
Um… Jo, Long time follower and sometime commenter and often linker…
But… I’m sorry but this is looking very much like another false flag event. Infections in China are on a downward curve. Deaths in most of the world are nothing like the worst case scenarios.
Can we get back to the $Trillion fiasco that is the climate scam and wait until THIS corona virus gets worse than flu?
See… I remember Avian and Swine and SARS and they were ALL world-killers and not one of them killed even 1% of normal flu.
And you have now done days of promoting this MSM scare event to people who are normally sceptical of anything the MSM promotes.
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Some are calling it a “black swan” event in the financial markets. I still maintain it’s too early to tell if this is turning into a full blown pandemic leading eventually to millions of deaths. Of course we all hope it isn’t but it’s pointless speculating how far this will go. There are too many variables, not the least of which is the mutation rate so even if we knew the exact figures right now (which we don’t) it would be a waste of time to extrapolate and come up with some conclusion as to whether we are facing an “end of the world” scenario or the spread will die out soon, or anything in between. Conspiracy theories are flooding the social media outlets, which partly explains the panic run on various items.
Just take the necessary precautions and stay calm. Wash hands, and eat and sleep well. Things we should be doing all the time anyway but not all people do. If people feel the need to isolate themselves for fear of catching the virus then by all means do it at least for peace of mind.
30
The financial markets are only concerned about their money, we all know that.
Don’t listen to them !!
The Tsunami is here and they are running scared;
And staying at home and washing your hands won’t you help much either.
If you dont get it one way, then you will surely get it another.
Best hope is that you will be amongst the 80% and get only a small dose.
Alternatively you stay clear till someone comes up with a vaccine.
GeoffW
30
I listen to the markets very intensely. It’s my bread and butter.
10
Until recently the MSM downplayed this, as did WHO and most CDCs. You have no clue what is happening in China because nobody is allowed in to find out.
What we know is that even with strong quarantine practices, thus virus will overwhelmed E.R. rooms. (See China and two cities in South Korea)
Forget the quarantines, you can count on 90 plus percent infection rate. We have that study ongoing with about 2000 from one sect of a church group. 83 percent tested positive in less then a week. So in about 3 weeks we should have both an RO and a CFR for a decent sample size.
The diamond princess will be another test we can follow to conclusion in about 3 weeks.
So that is 3700 and about 1800 people that we can finally get a decent WAG on this. China’s numbers are FUBAR.
30
I would still like to know why we shouldn’t take this very seriously, having seen all the incredible efforts made by China to deal with this illness. Anybody?
70
By the same logic, given the incredible efforts by Australia and other countries to mess up their economies because of an overreaction to the risks posed by climate change, everyone else should do the same. Just because.
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DrNick,
Nonsense. Piled higher and deeper.
Name me one person that’s died from climate change.
Name me one climate that’s changed.
With a bit of research, I could probably name you 1,704 people who have died from the Covid 19, starting with my friend James Kwan.
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Hi Sam,
True, the effects of Climate Change hyperventilation may appear to be absent but they are there.
It is very real science to say that there is No Basis for the concept that CO2 can overheat the atmosphere and yet there is constant public media output that promotes uncertainty about the future, uncertainty about the “ethics” of politicians and communities, uncertainty about what individuals must do to be a “good citizen”.
The presence of this “uncertainty” surrounding our presence on the Planet has created distress and hypervigilance in many people and is representative of the many false memes that people adopt to “fit in”.
One distressing example of those being overwhelmed by the hopelessness felt is the South American family of four who suicided in the face of the much publicised threat of global warming. Obviously the two children didn’t actually suicide but the Climate Change mess caused their deaths.
When young people are fed tales of woe that seem unsolvable they sometimes give up.
People have died from climate change.
KK
20
What an inane comparison.
I could name many more people who have been killed by other viruses this year. The world is a dangerous place.
With this novel Coronavirus and climate change it is about accurately assessing the risk and proportionally reacting to it.
The risk vs reaction of climate change has been long discussed here.
Which is why I find it astonishing that the same rationale is not applied to novel Coronavirus.
I sympathise for the loss of your friend. It is important to remember that there are personal tragedies behind each number. But on a societal level we must learn to balance risk better and step back from our inbuilt tendency to catastrophise,
68
I have not seen any accurate assessment from you as to the risk from this virus. I have seen a parrot like statement that the past has never been bad, therefore this time will not be bad. Nothing to back that up whatsoever. Jo, on the other hand, has given a good analysis of just how bad it could potentially be, based on what is thought to be true, while all the while hoping that she is wrong. You ought to try and raise yourself up to Jo’s standard.
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http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/thursday-open-thread-2/#comment-2279524
I have the greatest respect for Jo and others like Lord Christopher Monckton: both have done extraordinary things to confront the stupidity of the Climate Change thing.
KK
100
But, we are all human.
20
I fear that some may have given this comment a green tick without the info contained in the link.
The point being that we are all fallible and need to rely on others who have learning and knowledge of particular aspects of life that are outside of our own areas of expertise.
KK
KK
00
“You ought to try and raise yourself up to Jo’s standard.”
?
http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/thursday-open-thread-2/#comment-2279524
Read that thread.
30
1. This is not comparable to Climate Change in any way.
2. Mortality rate today in Italy 27.36%, S. Korea 24.16%, France 42%, Japan, 11.54%, USA 48%, Spain 62%, Switzerland 25%, UK 10%, Germany 0%, Singapore 0%, HK 5.13%, Australia 8.33%. China 5.34% however this is not trustworthy in any way.
What can you get from this ? Not one single person can say what is the actual mortality from this virus. We know so far there is no immunity. Cleared persons get infected again.
People of age seem to have a way higher mortality rate. Are they just something we should not care about ?
The average mortality may be anywhere from 1 to 10%. So assume it it’s 3.4%, (WHO today), with possible reinfections. One or two times a year. Then you actually have an existential threat. At least if there is no cure or vaccine. Yesterday in US suggestion is something is on the way maybe ! available in three month’s.
This spread with R0 possible at 7-9.
Here is case numbers in Italy :
157
231
323
468
655
888
1128
1694
2036
2036
2502
3089
3858
You plot it and get what ? You better use a log scale ! It closely follows y=x ^ 3.5 except at the start. Deaths now crossed the x2 curve ! I can also give an estimate for the coming week in Italy. Don’t look nice. Here it is start tomorrow :
5760, 7680, 9410, 11494, 13880, 16591, 19651
I hope measures taken in Italy will stop this growing at that speed. Deaths have this future : (Low estimate)
225, 256, 289, 324 and so on. Scare is this is not enough but will grow faster.
Good news, this exponential growth will slow down when draconian measures is in place or population will learn to protect them selves as governments don’t seem to have that interest so far.
If we try to read the data, we find there is cases in the beginning spreading when people are not aware and careful. We don’t see them as there is nothing reported. Now there may be a lot of cases we don’t see at all as there may be deaths we don’t see. So why try to count them in the first place. The ‘slow’ start is probably because of one major difference. Incubation time varies a lot in every person. When this starts to show, there is a large dark number to be visible in one to two weeks time. That’s when we see the real speed of this [snip]AD.
I suggest we count what we can see.
I wish I could show the graphs here ! Or how to send them to Jo ?
70
There is more than one strain circulating.
Plus a person on the mend can catch any other respiratory virus or flu that’s going around, to appear to have relapsed. But not due to COVID-19.
70
Rolf, I am all for the quarantines, but where did you get the death rates you used?
20
All numbers from official sources. I gave links on the earlier posts. Just a matter of how to count. I count mortality as Deaths / ( Deaths + Recovered) or Deaths / Closed Cases. If we use all known cases the Numbers is just not accurate. This way we Will have à better estimate much faster, until there is a cure.
20
Here
http://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
and I used to confirm with John Hopkins but now they lag or stopped publish so have to go with one source for now. However I save the numbers every day. (Guess there is a lot of us that do). I started on Feb 17th by Country. But have China/ all from January 23rd.
i will be happy to share it all.
00
Rolf,
Given the relatively recent appearance of this problem it would be good to assess just much of a complete and viable data set can be there for analysis.
Working on incomplete data should be made clear in the figures you calculate and acknowledgement made accordingly.
KK
20
If you can link to the graphs, Rolf, that would be a great help.
Thanks.
10
Climate change is not a factor ( as its unproven scientifically) , ergo its just the virus in this case…
30
Dr Nick
Do you actually have training and expertise in medicine ?
I doubt it !
certainly would NOT want to consult you re my own health.
00
I’m not asking for your sympathy.
I’m asking for you to face up to the potential downside and to cease down-playing the seriousness of this disease.
20
Annie it appears to be a beat up, we should expect flu to kill more people than this new virus.
‘In Australia, influenza on average causes 3,500 deaths, about 18,000 hospitalisations and 300,000 GP consultations.’ wiki
This is playing into Beijing’s hands, the massive economic upheaval and political instability will have a greater impact on Western democratic cultures.
43
Although too early to tell I suspect you are correct. We just need to stop the scaremongering going on here and elsewhere, calm down and be patient to see how this pans out. By all means take the necessary precautions, such as wash hands and eat and sleep well but that’s really goes without saying.
33
Yes. Of course.
Given the lack of availability of proper Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) that’s all that can be done. No masks, no googles, no gloves, leave that as the only option. Just don’t run out of soap.
Government advice is merely masking just how unprepared Australia is for any major threat. In this case it’s government propaganda dressed up as medical advice.
Had the Federal Government responded earlier, shut-down entry and extended quarantine requirements, we probably would not be facing the potential level of danger that we now are.
40
Goggles.
🙂
40
It’s all very well and good to have hindsight but the reality is governments are slow in reacting to slowly developing crises at the best of time. That comes down to a combination of a lack of knowledge and incompetence.
30
Id like to see the breakdown by age. I suspect the age most affected is 60+ in which case its just a flu derivative.
If this is an economic weapon, its been well played thus far.
But yes, lets stare it down if need be. Calm heads will prevail.
43
The common flu starts out spread all over the world. This started 9 plus weeks ago in 2 square feet of flesh.
There is virtually zero natural immunity for this.
The RO is certainly higher.
The death rate is 10 to 75 times higher.
The hospitals stays are longer and more serious.
Sans quarantine, in a study of about 2k subjects,83 percent were infected in less then a week.
Not the flu.
50
‘Not the flu.’
True. The aim is to contain this virus until we get an antidote, Beijing is looking for the host.
50
There simply is no science that proves any the modern methods of human quarantine will stop a moderate+ contagious airborne virus which is infectious during it’s incubation period and which in 80% of those infected show little or no signs of the disease. No clinical trials. Lots of conjecture, lots of rationale reasoning and lots wild speculation.
Think about how one would stop a contagion like these. We have a good history of what actually works: traveling pets and other animals. Go visit, for examples, Australia’s rules. Very strict. Isolate all except a couple of nation close like New Zealand. Isolate for periods from 10 days to 180 days along with mandatory testing. Even for slow transmission virus like rabies. And, at the importation centers, they don’t have the animals handling the animals. The reason they do it it is to stop the disease(s) from spreading throughout Australia. Internet searches show those methods do work even without clinical trials. Now how would these methods, which have weathered the test of time, be applied to humans?
A brief outline, far from complete, of what Australia would need to implement:
(A) isolate ALL travelers (except New Zealanders?) and stuff them into Quarantine holding camps. One hundred percent.
(B) Test each traveler
(C) sterilize all clothing, containers and their contents since many of these viruses can survive up to 9 days or longer on “surfaces”.
(D) anyone or anything caught up as infected should be incinerated
(E) enforcement officials (terminal side employees, border control, inspectors, quarantine facility custodians, labs, transports, etc.) need to wear hazmat gear and/or faithfully follow biohazard procedures that are 100% fullproof (hopefully that’s possible).
Don’t want to do all that? Remember, these viruses spread prior to the ability of current methods to detect them. So you’d need to add a method to track down people who were in contact with a given infected person. Search how STD’s epidemics are tracked down to understand the issues. About the only method which would track all contacts are micro-chips inserted into everyone that transmits their location 24/7 (a variation of the pet chips used for id’ing strays). Then, when a case turns up “in the wild” so to speak, the software gurus of, say Google Maps, can track down all contacts and dispatch the Viral Hazmat Crews.
Don’t like those methods? Then implement periodic National Quarantine Holidays. These are periods of two weeks (or whatever the longest incubation period of whichever virus variants selected) where everyone (except enforcement patrols) hunker down in their homes. Imposed complete isolation. No travel outside the homes period. Do this up to 12 times a year?
The point is quarantines to effect flu/cold viral control is a very difficult thing to do. Not impossible, but far from as easy as saying “Stop Wuhan flights”, isolate that infected nursing home, etc., etc. The react time, as practiced today, may, must may, slow the spread a little bit. No one really has any way of proving it’s effectiveness.
All of these class of viruses, once they emerge, simply percolate around, sometimes in predictable time lines, until mutations remove their infectious affinity for humans or everyone has been exposed.
Governments, it would seem, should
1. Announce any strain that’s circulating and issue reasonable warnings
2. Reinforcing the “clean hand”, etc., protocols.
3. Have a comprehensive response plan similar to ones created for earthquakes.
4. Focus on treatments.
5. Focus on vaccination development
6. Calm fears to prevent hysteria (actually minimize) and panics.
7. Encourage/fund technologies where a given vaccine for a given strain can be easily and quickly modified for a new mutation. Even better, the grail of universal vaccine.
Of course, regardless, this one will resolve itself around June-July. So either start or continue a healthy life style (for Aussies, visit Low Carb Downunder) and wash your hands but note that 80% of transmission is by breathing.
102
It’s way easier. STOP travelling ! NOW !
71
In Queensland yesterday there was another confirmed case of the virus that was pronounced “effectively contained” one week ago.
Would you believe the new case “recently returned from Iran” ??
https://www.health.qld.gov.au/news-events/health-alerts/novel-coronavirus#content_container_935619
Fantastic travel restrictions they have in place, where flights from Iran are forbidden but people still travel from Iran to Australia.
70
Excellent comment and advices CedarHill (above)
For goodness sake, the virus is already here and mutating along happily with or without a visa.
It’s a virus, not a fruit fly. The analogy of a virus and fruit fly control is so incredibly poor. Off the scale.
*Infection control chinese style good grief !!! Virus’s do not respect mass disinfection or travel bans. It’s here.
The web is replete with futile, Hollywood style disinfection practices in china.
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/disinfectant-control-coronavirus-triggers-mass-die-off-animals-china-2020-2?r=US&IR=T
https://www.businessinsider.com.au/see-chinese-robots-fighting-the-coronavirus-in-photos-2020-3?r=US&IR=T
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/02/17/asia/china-is-disinfecting-cash-coronavirus-intl-hnk-scli/index.html
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-51717164
Is this really the medical model we should be following??
https://www.shutterstock.com/editorial/search/Disinfection
20
A good comment on part of the problem. The other side of it is the scale. To implement a quarantine on normal travel numbers would require a permanent capacity for two million residents in individual quarantine. An enormous and costly facility. Then what about those who are infected, they will have to be cared for and there goes the health system. Overall travel will reduce but then a virus free (maybe) country with an established care system would be a powerful drawcard.
So, shut down all flights? For how long? This virus will be circulating in the world population for months if not forever, a two week shutdown is pointless and any shutdown comes with huge cost.
And no, these not choices between some economic damage and Australian wellbeing and lives. That is a simplistic analysis. The sort of economic and social dislocation and costs which would be caused by these measures would ruin lives and kill people. The damage would be harder to attribute to a cause but no less real for individuals.
40
The headline isn’t accurate when it says, “China stops flights with Coronavirus,” which suggests that it isn’t allowing them to land, much as it wouldn’t allow an infected ship to dock. (E.g., “China stops ships with Coronavirus.”) It should have said, “China quarantines arriving passengers from viral hotspots.”
60
True Roger, but a difference with no real distinction, as almost zero people from hotspots will fly to China to join their group quarantine death camps for 14 days.
30
http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/governments-say-its-safe-but-planes-are-grounded-as-people-stay-home/#comment-2285269
As mentioned previously, some additional perspective can be obtained by looking at suicides per annum in Australia.
Japan apparently also has this problem
KK
30
Comparing death rates and other statistics with past similar events or even unrelated events, such as suicide rates and car accidents is a total waste of time. For starters there are currently far too many variables, and the virus outbreak is still under the early stages of development. Little is know about the virus and how it mutates. Clearly we will have a clearer understanding of the severity if the outbreak in the months ahead. We just need to take the necessary precautions and be patient, not panic.
30
You cannot stop a Tsunami. Corvid 19 is a Tsunami.
Run for cover and get to higher ground might help and avoid initial impact.
But it’s effects will reach everyone.
GeoffW
40
All we can do is try to slow its advance.
70
The advance is greatly accelerating.
30
Alas, so is the advice….
10
Run for cover and get to higher ground? Are you serious?
10
Peter,
It will eventually reach everyone so there are two things;
Fist, slow the spread to even out the load on medical facilities,
and
second, slow the spread to give the virus a chance to mutate into a less threatening version that gives older people a better chance of survival.
? KK
70
I think it was metaphoric running to higher ground. Most people are self-isolating and preparing to sit it out. Many businesses will be impacted but there is not much that cannot be done on-line. Apple have asked all their employees based in Apple Park to telecommute. I expect many employers are doing the same.
The women’s T20 World Cup final in Melbourne has presold 75K tickets. Will be interesting to see the eventual turnout.
60
Yes of course it was metaphoric but it doesn’t alter the point it’s not a “Mad Max” situation where we need to “head for the hills”, not yet anyway. We are no where near such a possibility.
10
What else would you do PeterS . . .
GeoffW
30
Clearly be calm and collected. No need to run for the hills. No point anyway as there is no escape.
10
Just read an article by Simon Jenkins, a Guardian columnist, seems to be a conavirus skeptic.
https://uk.yahoo.com/news/why-m-taking-coronavirus-hype-131902449.html
20
Really ROFL LMAO over this. Shows you what Muppets exist in the MSM.
“So for the moment, if you see a virus story containing “might” “could” “possibly” or worst-case scenario”, stop reading. You are being fed war talk. Let them wash your hands, but not your brain.”
Just change the word “virus” with climate change and it is 100% gold.
These people have no shame.
40
Australia = 63 Cases (39 active)
As pointed out yesterday, if 50% of Australians contract this with a (globe wide) 3.4% mortality rate, then about 431,000 voters will die, and just a bit under 1 million will need an intensive care hospital bed, and its staff, which we don’t have.
If I remember correctly that was just 15 cases in Australia a week ago.
And yet our political ‘leadership’ wants to keep flirting with open air travel, to a planet where as of this morning’s data, 97 countries are now infected, and most have active cases.
Any international flight can now be importing the virus, for how else could it possibly get to 97 countries so fast? The were 7 new countries with it today and there were a similar number of new countries with it yesterday. Tomorrow there will be another 5 to 8 countries with it.
It’s mystifying how it can spread so fast, eh? It’s almost like this virus has wings and turbine engines.
90
I expect it was global at least a few weeks back but the detection and the reporting lag by quite a lot.
It is reasonable to conclude Liz Cambage was one of the first Australian to be infected back in December before the Chinese authorities were aware of the virus existence (or officially aware). Think how much travel was occurring in and out of China during December and January. Consider how many Iranians on international flights have been identified with the virus; then how many have not been identified but are carriers.
As Jo has pointed out, we all need to limit contact with others, avoid if possible, to slow the spread so the medical system is not overwhelmed.
If the Chinese reporting is accurate, then there is a good chance that the rate of spread can be controlled.
It is probably a good idea for schools and daycare in Australia to take a month off. I know that would be hard for many but probably a small cost compared with the alternative.
70
Agree Rick, we need to break the infection cycle now, not in another month.
Would anyone chose to voluntarily sit in the waiting room in a Wuhan clinic for 3 to 6 hours if they didn’t have to? But people voluntarily fly in jet cabins which we know for sure are transporting carriers. We need a break in international air travel to provide time to be sure the hardware and infrastructure itself is not acting as a ‘super-spreader’. What if it is? Do we really want to find out the hard way?
It would be interesting to know the number of people in the airline industry who have contracted it. Being young, fit and active they would be on the low side of hospital or diagnosed cases, most would be a-symptomatic carriers who never get tested. A lot of staff on the Diamond Princess contracted it and this must be occurring in the airline industry also but no one’s saying a word about it. It’s not just China which has a Cone-‘O-Silence™ filter.
70
“It’s not just China which has a Cone-’O-Silence™ filter.”
As I recall, the Cone-Of-Silence never worked that well for Maxwell Smart and The Chief.
50
Pardon? Can you speak up?
50
There is not much good news in the above posts so here is something on the bright side. From Aljazeera:
60
Thinking about this, it appears Ms Espinosa has her priorities screwed up. At worst we could expect maybe 200M deaths due to COVID-19 over the next couple of years; and predominantly old men and women. That is a drop in the bucket compared with the 7bn that will be lost over the next 11 years as climate change causes human extinction.
It makes me wonder if Ms Espinosa CAN appreciate the difference between real risks and a the fairy tale she fosters.
90
Here’s an little video on the subject of a very popular app used in China and it’s especially interesting with what’s going on there at the moment . . . . .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1153&v=LjgfE0il38M&feature=emb_logo
30
Incredible video joseph.
10
T-Shirt:
Got Bog Roll ?
40
WELL HERE WE GO !
“A doctor who recently returned from the US and since treated dozens of patients has become Victoria’s 11th confirmed coronavirus case, health authorities have said.
State Health Minister Jenny Mikakos said the GP was confirmed to have the virus last night, five days after returning from overseas.
The doctor, from the Toorak Clinic in Malvern Road, consulted about 70 patients between March 2 and yesterday, Ms Mikakos said.
He also treated two patients at a nursing home in Malvern during that time.
The nursing home residents have been isolated in their rooms and the Toorak Clinic has been closed until further notice.”
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-03-07/victoria-records-11th-person-with-coronavirus/12023438
SOOOOOOOOOO.. Did he get this is the USA ? Looks like it…At some medical conference maybe ? And he’s been treating people for 5 days since getting back from the USA….Including two aged residents in a aged care home.
70
Probably contracted it from the entertainment system on the jet, given average incubation period is 5.2 days.
50
Mean incubation period observed:
3.0 days (0 – 24 days range, study based on 1,324 cases)
5.2 days (4.1 – 7.0 days range, based on 425 cases).
Mean incubation period observed in travelers from Wuhan:
6.4 days (range from 2.1 to 11.1 days).
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-incubation-period/
40
Report in The Australian said he was unwell in the USA before travelling back. Unbelievable that he travelled back at all if that’s true. Thanks mate for speeding up the spread here.
70
More info about this infectious doctor: He is reported to be 70 years old and the lead doctor at a clinic in Toorak in Melbourne’s eastern suburbs. I spent many years in Melbourne decades ago. Toorak is one of the most well heeled areas in Australia..
So I suspect we may see some very well heeled & influential locals being tested & diagnosed with this virus.
maybe them & their families will put the steel capped boot up the bums of our leaders : SLOMO, Hunt & Murphy !
20
THE SIMPLE FACT STARING US ALL IN THE FACE
IS THAT THIS DISEASE IS BEING SPREAD BY INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL
IT’S TIME TO BITE THE BULLET AND SHUT DOWN INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL
FOR A QUARANTINE PERIOD.
AND THEN RESTART INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL AFTER THAT QUARANTINE PERIOD
ONLY TO THOSE COUNTRIES/REGIONS
WHERE THERE HAVE BEEN NO MORE OUTBREAKS OF THE DISEASE.
PAINFUL ?
YES !
BUT SIMPLE !
80
Bill, your contributions would be much easier to read if they were not in all caps and ‘blank verse’. I gave you a green thumb this time but I often skip over your comments as I find the format annoying and awkward to read. Annie.
40
Hi Annie,
I often skip over long paragraphed comments
Because I find them to time consuming.
I want to the information & opinion quickly and directly
Without lots of mental wandering about.
That works best for me in my life & on my screen.
the CAPS LOCK was simply a reflection of the urgency
of the situation.
02
That’s your choice Bill but mine is otherwise. ‘Bye for now.
50
Latest figures:
Italy critical =
Italy died = 4.25 %
40
And then …
S Korea critical = 0.65 %
S Korea died = 0.79 %
Is this an artifact of the S Koreans doing way more testing?
60
We have a problem the pollies dont like – lots of old people that have to have superannuation and pensions. Let the virus go and kill lots of them and that is lots more money in consolidated revenue and less pensions to find and less public servant super to find. Governments seem to like killing people on the whole. I dont think ours is different.
00
That thought occurred to me the other day but I wasn’t cynical enough to post it. 🙂
My version went along the lines of “Wuhan flu is the milennials solution to their baby boomer problem.”
51
Something sloppy going on in the tabulated reported numbers from https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
Total Cases – Recovered Cases is not equal to Active Cases in these countries.
Country | Active Cases | *Derived Active Cases*
China | 23,605 | 26,647
S. Korea | 6,415 | 6,458
Iran | 3,710 | 3,834
Italy | 3,916 | 4,113
Diamond Princess | 478 | 484
France | 632 | 641
Japan | 368 | 374
Spain | 389 | 397
USA | 242 | 257
Switzerland | 210 | 211
UK | 144 | 146
Netherlands | 127 | 128
Hong Kong | 55 | 57
Australia | 39 | 41
Iraq | 43 | 47
Thailand | 16 | 17
Taiwan | 29 | 30
San Marino | 22 | 23
Philippines | 2 | 3
All other country’s equal each other. Look at China’s numbers, different by 3,042! And why should the Diamond Princess numbers not be equal? And how did all remaining affected countries manage to get it to equal but Australia is out by 2, with only 63 cases? Seriously? They can’t even cope with getting the numbers to balance for 63 cases?
00
Im having a bit of trouble getting age stats.
In italy, in the news articles i could find, all seem to indicate deaths predominately 60+ age bracket.
Seems similar to normal flu…
20
Taiwan News reports Wuhan crematoriums burning people while still alive!
China has hit a shocking new low.
Will the CCP be overthrown?
I would hope so for the people’s sake.
12
I hope that is not true.
40
For this to have any credibility
There needs to be a credible source Rod.
Otherwise it must be treated as gossip
50
What can be done about stupid people?
Today I was told about a veterinary nurse who told her colleagues that she was heading to Singapore for a break, and when told that was too risky at the present time she asked why. The good news is that she cancelled her flight.
Another person told me last week that husband and wife are travelling by ship from Sydney to Capetown SA departing a couple of days ago. And they are aware of COVID-19.
As Bill in Oz has commented, stop the travellers.
50
You have to realise there are many people who refuse to listen to the news of any kind. They prefer to live out their lives in ignorance. It’s a foolish approach of course.
60
There are pros and cons Peter.
The Logical Song – Supertramp – Breakfast in America
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EXoyAjHHw-M
When I was young, it seemed that life was so wonderful
A miracle, oh, it was beautiful, magical
And all the birds in the trees, well, they’d be singing so happily
Oh, joyfully, oh, playfully watching me
But then they sent me away to teach me how to be sensible
Logical, oh, responsible, practical
And then they showed me a world where I could be so dependable
Oh, clinical, oh, intellectual, cynical
There are times when all the world’s asleep
The questions run too deep
For such a simple man
Won’t you please, please tell me what we’ve learned?
I know it sounds absurd
But please, tell me who I am
I said, now watch what you say or they’ll be calling you a radical
A liberal, oh, fanatical, criminal
Won’t you sign up your name, we’d like to feel you’re acceptable
Respectable, oh, presentable, a vegetable
Oh, take, take, take it, yeah
But at night, when all the world’s asleep
The questions run so deep
For such a simple man
Won’t you please (Won’t you tell me)
Please tell me what we’ve learned?
(Can you hear me?) I know it sounds absurd
(Can you tell me?) But please, tell me who I am
Who I am
Who I am
Who I am
Oh!
‘Cause I was feeling so illogical
D-d-d-d-d-d-digital
Yeah, one, two, three, five
Oh, oh, oh, oh
Ooh, it’s getting unbelievable
Yeah
B-b-bloody marvelous
42
I’m sure there are many people like this. Often, though not always, these are elderly people who just fear the reality of the world outside of their own horizon. We should have compassion I think. We will all get old eventually.
GeoffW
10
Article in today’s (Saturday) Australian also asks why it is the elderly, but not the young, who are most at risk. Something that struck me when I first saw the mortality figures.
30
We can only hope that puts a permanent dent into immigration and boosts local production. Let’s hope the politicians come to their senses on this opportunity.
51
The Spanish flu came from China and the masses had built up a natural immunity.
‘The Spanish flu originated somewhere in northern China in late 1917 and swiftly moved to western Europe with the 140,000 Chinese labourers the French and British governments recruited to perform manual labor to free up troops for wartime duty.’
China didn’t fire a shot in WW1 and yet they killed 50 million westerners.
41
Unsupported assertion EG
Evidence please ?
All the sources I’ve seen say it started in the USA
And was spread to Europe by US troops after the USA entered the war.
It was spread around the world by troops & others being demobilised and sent home
From France to Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, UK, India, Vietnam etc
31
Total Cases = 71
In all States:
New South Wales = 34
Queensland = 14
Victoria = 11
South Australia = 7
Western Australia = 3
Northern Territory = 1
Tasmania = 1
50
Coronavirus unlikely to become a repeat of the 1918 Spanish flu …
https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2020-03-06/why-this-coronavirus-likely-wont-be-as-bad-as-the-1918-pandemic-flu
30
Spanish flu …
https://www.history.com/topics/world-war-i/1918-flu-pandemic
20
Struggling with spelling in your headline eh Jo: Between “the West flys in” or “the West flies in” I’ll go with the latter.
10
This pandemic has another lesson for the globalisation of businesses.
The shutdown effect on China reveals the stranglehold China now has on
Western businesses and economies. Economic security of nations after
the virus burns out will no doubt have governments demanding their policies and
those of business enterprises urgently diversify and break the huge dependence
on China that has come from seeking the lowest cost of production.
30
Just like the bushfires experience at Christmas time when we hunkered down in the fiery apocalypse, the teenage progeny and I think although distinctly unpleasant, this is likely yet an experience that will make history.
The global merch slaves and risk appetite for them has been dealt a huge blow.
It is an opportunity for countries to re-invest locally in critical supply chains.
As some commentators have been saying “the cost of China was cheap, but the price was high”.
30