The Official Coronavirus Discussion

[matmosphere]

Been a crazy week so far.

Woke up Monday in Kyiv. Over the weekend we learned that they were going to close the borders for at least three weeks. No flights in or out. I'm at high risk because of my asthma and was told I should go because the health care system in Ukraine was not at all prepared for this.

Around 10am the call was made that we had to go. I started packing whatever I could. Wife got home around noon and packed as much as she could. Is and the three little ones left  for the airport at 1pm and were on literally the last flight out at 4.  Weren't sure we'd make it.

Had an overnight layover and got back to DC Tuesday night. Managed to give our little guy a somewhat normal 3rd birthday party Wednesday. Now we found a townhouse on air bnb, stocked up on food and a couple supplies and will continue to self quarantine for the rest of the two weeks.

So much is uncertain at the moment but things are calming down a bit.

All seemed a bit extreme but we heard there was less than 30 respirators in the entire city and that the estimation is that the whole healthcare system might just collapse.

Hopefully we'll go back, but we have no idea when.

Ironically there were almost no confirmed cases where we were so I almost feel like we walked into a more dangerous situation. We stayed at a hotel that first night and man that seemed like a bad idea. Seemed like a good place to spread and collect germs.

[Aentons]

https://www.livescience.com/coronavirus-not-human-made-in-lab.html

Science is great!

[Aentons]

Oh, and if you haven't seen this video already,  it lays out all the details in a very clear and visual way, plus gives you some other info that you might not have already known, it's a good watch.

[lars]

Outstanding video. Thank you for posting. I couldn't help but think of something after watching that:  I'm sure in those wet markets that properly bleeding the meat before they sell it is not practiced at all. And I know some people just eat that meat raw or live, as in the case of video clips of ones eating live baby rats. The vast majority of pandemic viruses over the last few decades have been zoonotic in nature. It comes from people eating meat that has tainted blood. So let's clarify the real problem:  it is not the meat or the types of animals. A properly-bled and prepared animal doesn't present a health risk. It's the blood left in the meat from poor preparation practices, or no preparation at all, and the subsequent flippant attitude about it. Cultures the world over will straight-up add blood to dishes, because they don't care about the consequences. Nobody has to eat raw animal meat, or blood, or live animals to survive, so it comes down simply to people choosing to be stupid.

[SirEgno]

Today is a month close in my house. I'm planning a party and you are all invited.

And, starting from today the whole Lombardy (Italy) is more in lockdown. All non-essential activities must close, nobody can leave house except for essential shopping and in case of emergency.
honestly I don't see the end. I think that we won't have summer holidays.
IMHO the government moved too late.

[EBK]

Fascinating, informative, not sensationalized, and a bit scary nonetheless:
https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavirus-the-hammer-and-the-dance-be9337092b56

[EBK]

My work has now changed from maximum telework flexibility (telework as much as you want) to mandatory telework.

[mjg]

My work and the wife's work put us on work-from-home from last week, and today the kid has finished his school term 3 weeks early.  Apparently he will have school work to do online for the next 3 weeks.  Let's see how well that goes! 

I'm managing to get out for some exercise each day...signed up for a cycling challenge before the whole virus thing dropped, so I'm trying to do about 10km per day.  Outside Exercise still allowed here as long as in isolation. 

[alanp]

NZ is now level 3 (heightened restrictions) going to level 4 in a couple days (maximum level.)

Fortunately, my slaughterhouse is apparently an essential service (people gotta eat, I guess.) The one my brother works at down the road is not essential. I'm guessing it's because the one he works at is domestic market, while the one I work at is export as well as domestic.

Edit - my brother's slaughterhouse is essential. Unreliable rumours are unreliable.

[juansolo]

I have decided to postpone looking for work until after the apocalypse...

Works for me.

[EBK]

Schools in my state are now closed for the remainder of the academic year.  I knew this would happen eventually.  I'm guessing my mandatory telework will continue during that time.

[somnif]

I have decided to postpone looking for work until after the apocalypse...

Works for me.

See, I started job hunting in January, and... well, I've only got a months rent left and I'm starting to get legitimately frightened of my living situation. My local grocery store held an open hiring fair the other day and there were at least 100 people milling about when I got there (and since we're suppose to avoid groups bigger than 6 I didn't even get out of my car  ). And not like my student loan company didn't take their pound of flesh this morning, obviously, no reason they'd defer payments right now or anything.

Bleh.

[madbean]

Woke up this morning to a small anxiety attack. I think this is really starting to hit me. I'm pretty stoic most of the time but as I started turning over future outcomes everything started to feel a bit grim. We are lucky in that we could weather a few months, maybe even a year, of loss of income (without consideration of potential continued food shortages, etc) but thinking about the possibility of my wife losing her job did make me panic a bit. It could happen and there are good reasons to think she might even if this turns around within just a few months. That would mean loss of our healthcare and even maybe more. And, the prospects of her finding another job in her field (web design/IT) could be grim as well if the economic downturn lasts for a couple of years.

Feeling better now but man, I'm expecting a lot more days like this in the near future. I'm trying to re-focus my worry on the people who are in a lot less fortunate circumstances but I guess one can't help to think about what our lives might be like in 6 months or a year.

[matmosphere]

I am not an optimist by any stretch of the imagination, but the thing we need to remember is what we're doing now is buying us some time. Time for people to find ways to treat this thing, to develop medicines that can help and to make a vaccine. None of that's gonna happen overnight, but I can't help but think that we're so much better positioned to deal with this than ever before. I mean let's be honest a hundred years ago germs spread way faster than information, these days I don't know if that's the case. 

[alanp]

NZ goes into lockdown 11:59pm Wednesday (NZT). No non-essential travel, no non-essential work, stay home.

Things are getting... somewhat saner. I visited the Four Square on the way home (suburban konbini / cornershop, whatever you call them, a step up from the Kwik-E-Mart, though ) and there were multiple brands of TP available, and all of the flour was gone (despite a 1 Per Customer note on the flour bags.)