Impact of the new Coronavirus where you are?

[BrightonCorgi]

So far there are 5 dead in my town from Coronavirus. 

[Nino]

3 hours ago, ElJavi76 said:

Not to mention their bias against Taiwan for example, because maybe just maybe China don't likey Taiwan so much. W.H.O. assistant director Bruce Aylward gave an interview to Hong Kong media... The reporter asked him about the struggles in Taiwan. First he pretends he didn't hear. Then she asks again. He says I didn't hear you but let's move onto another question. (Why another question if you didn't hear what she just said.) He hangs up the Skype call. They dial him back and when she asks about Taiwan yet again he cuts the interview short, and replies we already spoke about China. 

 

Fully agree with you - it is a shame that a country like Taiwan which has successfully combatted Covid-19 and from which we could learn good lessons is not even allowed to be a member of the WHO.

That's sick IMHO.

[bpm32]

49 minutes ago, 99call said:

Everyone is lying their ass off, but maybe not to the point of secret incinerators as the billionaire featured suggested, and that the point of difference, there is zero chance that sort of stuff could be kept quiet in the UK. 

At the moment in the UK, the outward political policy is to have almost 100% lack of trust in A, China, B, Russia, and C, well!.............let's not go there. 

My point is, is everyones heads are spinning around like the nature of China's actions are a surprise......when it's very far from it.  It's almost more expected than not.

 

 

Ha, I assume C is the US. Look, the rest of the world never understands this, but we aren’t lying......we’re just delusional!

[99call]

1 minute ago, bpm32 said:

Ha, I assume C is the US. Look, the rest of the world never understands this, but we aren’t lying......we’re just delusional!

No!   how dare you!..............Switzerland!!!......they are very devious,   unregulated cheesemaking etc! 

It was naughty of me to be ambiguous, as it's banned on this forum.....lets leave it there......and not mention the place across the pond. 

[jerrybrowne]

53 minutes ago, BrightonCorgi said:

So far there are 5 dead in my town from Coronavirus. 

Aren't you in the Boston area?  There have been 154 Covid19 deaths in Massachusetts and 8,966 positives so far.  Many of these are in the metropolitan Boston area. 

[El Presidente]

My aim was at the WHO

How they screamed Xenophobia when our prime minister announced the ban of  all Chinese nationals from Australia back in early Feb. 

 

[Ken Gargett]

7 hours ago, SigmundChurchill said:

Not sure if anyone mentioned this yet, but in yesterday’s Bloomberg, there was an article saying that classified intelligence reports say that the Chinese did in fact, cover up the actual number of cases as well as the actual number of deaths.

it was also reported on the PBS newshour.

 

3 hours ago, bpm32 said:

I don’t think China is a rogue state, but I do understand the Chinese impulse to save face and lie their asses off, because I’m Chinese myself?. I’m not sure how other countries were supposed to bake in a Chinese fudge factor—their bogus numbers were probably anywhere from 1.1-100x off reality depending on the figure.

As for those other countries—I’m actually pleasantly surprised by how quickly the western countries reacted as soon as they saw how dire things were in Italy. Maybe I’m too cynical, but I expected our governments to absorb the high death counts rather than close schools, lay people off, and close borders. And I have to grudgingly admit that I’m impressed by how seriously people are taking social distancing here in central California, which I also did not expect.

my understanding, and i am happy to be corrected, is that the US had an expert working with WHO/the Chinese in China with a focus on exactly all this. however the decision was made that there was not much point and some money could be saved by removing them. this was done around a month or so before everything blew up. otherwise, the US in particular might have been able to act more quickly. whether it would have helped, who knows (that would be a small 'who', not the 'WHO'). 

[99call]

3 minutes ago, Ken Gargett said:

my understanding, and i am happy to be corrected, is that the US had an expert working with WHO/the Chinese in China with a focus on exactly all this. however the decision was made that there was not much point and some money could be saved by removing them. this was done around a month or so before everything blew up. otherwise, the US in particular might have been able to act more quickly. whether it would have helped, who knows (that would be a small 'who', not the 'WHO'). 

I think we can assume with so much evidence to suggest foreign countries knew what was coming down the line, that their response and planing was:

A, Gross negligence, and cack handedness, or 

B, An attempt to get a head start on heard immunity, and pretend to their people like it was, all a mistake i.e the delayed response. 

My money is on B

[Capt. Corona]

22 minutes ago, Ken Gargett said:

my understanding, and i am happy to be corrected, is that the US had an expert working with WHO/the Chinese in China with a focus on exactly all this. however the decision was made that there was not much point and some money could be saved by removing them. this was done around a month or so before everything blew up. otherwise, the US in particular might have been able to act more quickly. whether it would have helped, who knows (that would be a small 'who', not the 'WHO'). 

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/488593-four-senators-sold-stocks-before-coronavirus-threat-crashed-market

Oh yea....the top administration knew about it long before the house of cards came tumbling down.

[bpm32]

49 minutes ago, Ken Gargett said:

it was also reported on the PBS newshour.

 

my understanding, and i am happy to be corrected, is that the US had an expert working with WHO/the Chinese in China with a focus on exactly all this. however the decision was made that there was not much point and some money could be saved by removing them. this was done around a month or so before everything blew up. otherwise, the US in particular might have been able to act more quickly. whether it would have helped, who knows (that would be a small 'who', not the 'WHO'). 

I don’t know, but that wouldn’t surprise me. Everyone always assumes the US has people imbedded everywhere, but I think most of us would be shocked by the truth—that in a lot of critical areas we’re one subject matter expert deep, or zero SMEs deep. You are always fighting the last war and for the last 19 years the US has been hyperfocused on terrorism. After this, we’ll probably be focused on viruses and it’ll be some other damn thing that gets us. You’d think we’d be able to do more than one thing at once....

[Ken Gargett]

1 hour ago, bpm32 said:

I don’t know, but that wouldn’t surprise me. Everyone always assumes the US has people imbedded everywhere, but I think most of us would be shocked by the truth—that in a lot of critical areas we’re one subject matter expert deep, or zero SMEs deep. You are always fighting the last war and for the last 19 years the US has been hyperfocused on terrorism. After this, we’ll probably be focused on viruses and it’ll be some other damn thing that gets us. You’d think we’d be able to do more than one thing at once....

i'm pretty certain i saw it reported on PBS Newshour, which is one of the few news sources i trust. i did not focus as closely as i wish i had now. but as i recall, the states had a woman who was an expert in pandemics etc, working with the chinese authorities (no suggestion that this was covert in any way). she was there basically to assist if there were any issues and to report back home. but as nothing had happened for a while, the govt decided to save some money. a simple economic decision (not looking like a great one now). 

[helix]

 

For you folks that enjoy country music live stream Brad Paisley , Marty Stewart and Vince Gill for the COVID front line...…..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wQ6-i8hI3Gs

[BrightonCorgi]

4 hours ago, jerrybrowne said:

Aren't you in the Boston area?  There have been 154 Covid19 deaths in Massachusetts and 8,966 positives so far.  Many of these are in the metropolitan Boston area. 

Yes, Framingham. 

[Ken Gargett]

we have a contender for the stupidest person on the planet.

english novelist (never heard of her) salley vickers. 

"Fit and healthy volunteers should be deliberately infected with Covid-19 so they can help fight the pandemic after their recovery, the novelist and NHS psychotherapist Salley Vickers has proposed."

so people who are actually fit and unaffected get this infection. some might die but tough luck. but at the very last, those volunteers who are currently assisting, would be quarantined for at least 2-3 weeks and unable to assist. and no doubt many would infect others. brilliant.

if the human race had to remember to breath, we'd have been extinct centuries ago. 

[Fugu]

As abstruse as that may appear, similar - a deliberate infection of volunteers - is currently being discussed among experts (incl. ethicists) as a means to speed up the development of vaccines. Mind you - under controlled conditions.

[Ken Gargett]

29 minutes ago, Fugu said:

As abstruse as that may appear, similar - a deliberate infection of volunteers - is currently being discussed among experts (incl. ethicists) as a means to speed up the development of vaccines. Mind you - under controlled conditions.

i've seen discussions on it but i have not seen anything from anyone sane promoting it. 

[Nino]

On 3/24/2020 at 5:25 PM, Mr. Japan said:

A fact : Day 16 of lockdown, only consolation plenty food and cigars.

A fact : No light at end of the tunnel, in Italy.

A fact :   Other Countries are between 2 to 4 weeks behind  Italy in fighting this enemy.

A fact : The reason is that Italy did not believe the Chinese government ( even with late communication ) and other Countries did not believe Italy, blaming as the usual exaggerating . French on newspaper wrote CoronaPizza, British said that lockdown was a good excuse for Italians to stay off work, Austria, Germany would have been better to just close their mouth and USA ... is in the hands of a great liar.

A fact : the world is packed with idiots.

A fact : the world will survive and unfortunately the idiots will not die. So after 6 months we will be where we where six months ago.

my 0,2 cents.

FYI : Germany has taken in more than 150 ICU Covid-19 patients from Italy, France and the Netherlands into German hospitals with free ICU capacity so far.
Flying military A-310 Medevac planes to Italy to pick them up.
And Spain has received a C-130 Hercules plane load full of respirators from Germany.

I agree - the world is well packed with idiots ...

 

[LordAnubis]

I’m just here to post that I’m going out to the shops so wearing my PPE. Finally being Muslim isn’t the scariest thing out there in the world ? Stay safe folks! 

[JohnS]

3 minutes ago, LordAnubis said:

I’m just here to post that I’m going out to the shops so wearing my PPE. Finally being Muslim isn’t the scariest thing out there in the world ? Stay safe folks! 

Looking good there, Mus! ?

[Kitchen]

On 4/2/2020 at 8:02 PM, bpm32 said:

I don’t know, but that wouldn’t surprise me. Everyone always assumes the US has people imbedded everywhere, but I think most of us would be shocked by the truth—that in a lot of critical areas we’re one subject matter expert deep, or zero SMEs deep. You are always fighting the last war and for the last 19 years the US has been hyperfocused on terrorism. After this, we’ll probably be focused on viruses and it’ll be some other damn thing that gets us. You’d think we’d be able to do more than one thing at once....

There's a political commentator I listen to occasionally, Ben Shapiro, that is fond of saying people who work in government are the same kind of idiots you work with at your job, they just happen to work in government.  There are some great people, some horrible people, but for the most part, the majority are the same people you work with at the average job.  

The older I get, the more I realize this is correct and the smaller I prefer government to be.  

[scap99]

1 hour ago, LordAnubis said:

I’m just here to post that I’m going out to the shops so wearing my PPE. Finally being Muslim isn’t the scariest thing out there in the world ? Stay safe folks! 

I've got one too, and also plan to wear it when I go out.  I usually wear it while mowing, but there's nothing else as simple to wear that works with facial hair for keeping your lungs clear of dust and pollen.

  

[bpm32]

1 hour ago, Kitchen said:

There's a political commentator I listen to occasionally, Ben Shapiro, that is fond of saying people who work in government are the same kind of idiots you work with at your job, they just happen to work in government.  There are some great people, some horrible people, but for the most part, the majority are the same people you work with at the average job.  

The older I get, the more I realize this is correct and the smaller I prefer government to be.  

That’s true, but with the added caveat that there are a lot of fields that are critical, but will not yield short or even medium term profits, so government has to step in. That’s most science, even in the US. What that means then is that if a particular field or agency is underfunded for a period of time and doesn’t attract the best and brightest, 25 years later you got a bunch of meatheads running everything, which is less of a problem in (most of) the private sector. 

[Ken Gargett]

3 hours ago, LordAnubis said:

I’m just here to post that I’m going out to the shops so wearing my PPE. Finally being Muslim isn’t the scariest thing out there in the world ? Stay safe folks! 

mus, you've never looked better. 

[Ken Gargett]

1 hour ago, Kitchen said:

There's a political commentator I listen to occasionally, Ben Shapiro, that is fond of saying people who work in government are the same kind of idiots you work with at your job, they just happen to work in government.  There are some great people, some horrible people, but for the most part, the majority are the same people you work with at the average job.  

The older I get, the more I realize this is correct and the smaller I prefer government to be.  

in general, i am in agreement with this, although i would suggest govt has more than its fair share. it does seem to attract idiots at every level.

and as a rule, for me, the smaller the govt the better. but this, to me, is showing that there are times when a larger govt, more resources, more govt focus (and this is in general and not aimed at any country) can be crucial. and necessary. 

if we here had more focus in our depts earlier, we could have acted quicker. look at italy and spain et al. they seem to have been utterly unprepared. had their govts devoted more to what might happen, who knows. in the states, to have shut down certain areas of govt which dealt with this type of thing has undoubtedly cost a great many lives and caused untold tragedy. 

in saying all that, i honestly have no better idea of the ideal balance than anyone else. but it has made me realise that smaller and smaller govt is not always the answer. of course, more people probably means more idiots. 

[Zigatoh]

4 hours ago, Kitchen said:

There's a political commentator I listen to occasionally, Ben Shapiro, that is fond of saying people who work in government are the same kind of idiots you work with at your job, they just happen to work in government.  There are some great people, some horrible people, but for the most part, the majority are the same people you work with at the average job.  

The older I get, the more I realize this is correct and the smaller I prefer government to be.  

I'm assuming government probably works a bit like the local councils I've worked with, there are a lot of managers and higher ups who are simply in those jobs because they've worked there the longest as opposed to having the required skills, and plenty of older types simply clinging onto that job, which they don't want and do badly, to get the final salary based pension at the end.