Mar 11, 2020, 10:13 am
Last edit by: Ocn Vw 1K
In order to reduce noise in the Coronavirus / Covid-19 : general fact-based reporting thread, and to create a central place to invite any member to ask a basic question about the impact of COVID-19 on travel, your moderators have decided to open this separate "lounge" thread for related discussion that isn't strictly fact-based reporting.
Any member who can provide a constructive, helpful answer to a question; or post constructively in reply to a member's point-of-view, is welcome to post.
All FT rules apply, including avoiding personalized, snarky, political, other off-topic, commercial, and repeatedly disruptive content.
Discussion of general economic impacts of Covid-19 belongs in the OMNI forum, not here.
Discussion and critique of political/government actions to aid the economy or which is far more political than related to COVID-19 is for the OMNI/PR forum, not here.
This is a protocol for posting adopted by the forum Moderator team:Please follow this protocol, based on FlyerTalk Rules and long-standing FlyerTalk best practices. Doing so will help keep the thread open, and allow our moderator team to aid members, rather than having to resort to discipline.
Constructive, respectful posts, views, opinions, questions, and replies, related to the topic are welcome. Avoid commenting on members personally, or posting off-topic or political messages.
While respectful disagreement of a posted view is allowed, dont call-out posters to prove their points. FlyerTalk has never required discussion standards at the level of a Ph.D. dissertation defense, or a trial court witness cross-examination.
After a reasonable exchange of views on a point, please yield the floor so that others may bring up different topics, questions or points.
Especially important in this time of pandemic, when normal life and travel have been upended: please take regular breaks from the thread.
Please stay healthy,
your FT Coronavirus and Travel Moderator Team.
Any member who can provide a constructive, helpful answer to a question; or post constructively in reply to a member's point-of-view, is welcome to post.
All FT rules apply, including avoiding personalized, snarky, political, other off-topic, commercial, and repeatedly disruptive content.
Discussion of general economic impacts of Covid-19 belongs in the OMNI forum, not here.
Discussion and critique of political/government actions to aid the economy or which is far more political than related to COVID-19 is for the OMNI/PR forum, not here.
This is a protocol for posting adopted by the forum Moderator team:Please follow this protocol, based on FlyerTalk Rules and long-standing FlyerTalk best practices. Doing so will help keep the thread open, and allow our moderator team to aid members, rather than having to resort to discipline.
Constructive, respectful posts, views, opinions, questions, and replies, related to the topic are welcome. Avoid commenting on members personally, or posting off-topic or political messages.
While respectful disagreement of a posted view is allowed, dont call-out posters to prove their points. FlyerTalk has never required discussion standards at the level of a Ph.D. dissertation defense, or a trial court witness cross-examination.
After a reasonable exchange of views on a point, please yield the floor so that others may bring up different topics, questions or points.
Especially important in this time of pandemic, when normal life and travel have been upended: please take regular breaks from the thread.
Please stay healthy,
your FT Coronavirus and Travel Moderator Team.
COVID-19: Lounge thread for thoughts, concerns and questions
Mar 7, 2020 | 8:51 pm
#181
Join Date: Oct 2007
Posts: 637
Got a link to the article or video with Fauci saying that? I'd believe it if Fauci said it, but I'd ask him to explain what happened at Life Care Center in Kirkland. 0.1% would be similar to the flu, but you don't hear about the flu going through a senior living facility and killing 8 people in a matter of 1-2 weeks.
Mar 8, 2020 | 12:16 am
#182
Join Date: Apr 2013
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There are undoubtedly plenty of people in HK who have the virus (or previously had it) and were never counted, not because of any lack of transparency but simply because they never became a case by seeking medical assistance.
With some estimates of minor/asymptomatic infection up around 80% of infected people it should be quite easy to understand how the case count can have little to do with the number of infected people, with the ratio between those numbers varying between countries not based on transparency but simply based on how much testing theyre doing, making comparing case counts between countries rather a pointless exercise.
With some estimates of minor/asymptomatic infection up around 80% of infected people it should be quite easy to understand how the case count can have little to do with the number of infected people, with the ratio between those numbers varying between countries not based on transparency but simply based on how much testing theyre doing, making comparing case counts between countries rather a pointless exercise.
If everyone has a cold at work no one is panicked over it because the death percentage is low. If this ends up with the same death rate, it won't matter if the whole planet is infected since this won't be the extinction level event it is currently being made out to be.
The Daily Mail is reporting that the Xinjia Hotel in Quanzhou city, being used as a quarantine facility, has collapsed:
Daily Mail - Rescuers race to save 30 people still trapped in collapsed five-star hotel in China being used to quarantine coronavirus victims (Updated: 12:11 EST, 7 March 2020)
Daily Mail - Rescuers race to save 30 people still trapped in collapsed five-star hotel in China being used to quarantine coronavirus victims (Updated: 12:11 EST, 7 March 2020)
Last edited by NewbieRunner; Mar 11, 2020 at 1:30 pm Reason: Merge consecutive posts by same member
Mar 8, 2020 | 12:43 am
#183
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This isn't necessarily a bad thing if a high percentage of these people get well quickly and on their own. That points to the death threat being a lot lower than initially portrayed.
If everyone has a cold at work no one is panicked over it because the death percentage is low. If this ends up with the same death rate, it won't matter if the whole planet is infected since this won't be the extinction level event it is currently being made out to be.
If everyone has a cold at work no one is panicked over it because the death percentage is low. If this ends up with the same death rate, it won't matter if the whole planet is infected since this won't be the extinction level event it is currently being made out to be.
I dont think anyone has implied its. An extinction level event.
Mar 8, 2020 | 1:06 am
#184
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This isn't necessarily a bad thing if a high percentage of these people get well quickly and on their own. That points to the death threat being a lot lower than initially portrayed.
If everyone has a cold at work no one is panicked over it because the death percentage is low. If this ends up with the same death rate, it won't matter if the whole planet is infected since this won't be the extinction level event it is currently being made out to be.
If everyone has a cold at work no one is panicked over it because the death percentage is low. If this ends up with the same death rate, it won't matter if the whole planet is infected since this won't be the extinction level event it is currently being made out to be.
Agreed, nobody is talking about extinction. But conservative estimates make this an order of magnitude worse than influenza. SamirD you may want to check out this earlier post: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/32115699-post2839.html
Also this information from a epidemiologist.
https://www.businessinsider.com/coro...rt-2020-3?IR=T
Mar 8, 2020 | 1:08 am
#185
Join Date: Apr 2013
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With both the numerator and denominator uncertain, it is hard to pin down the exact number.
The fact is that humans have no immunity against this new virus so it will be tougher on us. On top of that, this thing transmits easily - people with no symptom can transmit it. Even at 0.5%, it is a lot. Therefore, we need to take it seriously.
The fact is that humans have no immunity against this new virus so it will be tougher on us. On top of that, this thing transmits easily - people with no symptom can transmit it. Even at 0.5%, it is a lot. Therefore, we need to take it seriously.
Mar 8, 2020 | 1:14 am
#186
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At SFO yesterday someone had a sneezing fit in the boarding area. You would have thought someone had opened up with an AR-15. Quite what people will do for drama after this is worrying to me.
Mar 8, 2020 | 1:15 am
#187
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Not true. People can recover from things that dont have immunity to. It just means they are likely to get it if exposed. And that is the concern.
Mar 8, 2020 | 1:19 am
#188
Join Date: Apr 2013
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Have you seen the grocery stores? lol. My wife has read that San Francisco is completely out of toilet paper. 
(and some surrounding cities too). Someone needs to tell 'the people' because I don't think a nuclear holocaust would even cause this much panic. People need to Netflix and chill. The problem is the ones that are, are watching Contagion: 
https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/7/21...nt-coronavirus
omg, I could see that. TSA was probably on them like they were carrying an AR-15.
(and some surrounding cities too). Someone needs to tell 'the people' because I don't think a nuclear holocaust would even cause this much panic. People need to Netflix and chill. The problem is the ones that are, are watching Contagion: https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/7/21...nt-coronavirus
Last edited by NewbieRunner; Mar 11, 2020 at 1:47 pm Reason: Merge consecutive posts by same member
Mar 8, 2020 | 1:21 am
#189
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If one is a casual reader of the news around COVID-19, even if one looks up the headlines daily, it just wouldn't compute the potential magnitude of a global pandemic. Headline numbers: 75k cases in China, 1k cases worldwide, of which 60% from one source. It doesn't appear to be a 'global threat'.
Couple that with the repeated mantra that the overall mortality is ~1%, and heck, that doesn't sound so bad does it?
What's not really factored is that there is zero host immunity to SARS-CoV2. Potentially, every single person on the planet could get infected. This just isn't true for pretty much any endemic disease which can be spread by casual contact. Now, the vast majority (how vast? 80% or more likely 95%??) will have mild disease. But let's say overall mortality IS just like seasonal influenza, around 0.1%. BUT, 60% of the world gets infected. That would still result in >4M excess deaths: around 10x more than seasonal influenza, because typically, people only get infected every 5 or 6 years by the flu due to pre-existing immunity, vaccination and other reasons.
And as I've repeatedly said, the biggest 'fear factor' for me is what proportion need hospitalization. If it's above 5% of total numbers infected, it's essentially a total disaster if this really runs rampage through the population.
I'm pretty certain that none of these factors have been priced into the market. Now, I have no idea if this will come to pass. But I think odds on it will in some form or other. Self-isolating behaviours, even informally, may mitigate spread to some extent. But even then I would guess 10% of the global population would get infected. The biggest unknowns are a) seasonality or not, b) true extent of severity across demographics.
tb
PS I have no (financial) skin in this game: just don't have enough capital to speculate in any meaningful way...so I have nothing to gain or lose with all the above...
Couple that with the repeated mantra that the overall mortality is ~1%, and heck, that doesn't sound so bad does it?
What's not really factored is that there is zero host immunity to SARS-CoV2. Potentially, every single person on the planet could get infected. This just isn't true for pretty much any endemic disease which can be spread by casual contact. Now, the vast majority (how vast? 80% or more likely 95%??) will have mild disease. But let's say overall mortality IS just like seasonal influenza, around 0.1%. BUT, 60% of the world gets infected. That would still result in >4M excess deaths: around 10x more than seasonal influenza, because typically, people only get infected every 5 or 6 years by the flu due to pre-existing immunity, vaccination and other reasons.
And as I've repeatedly said, the biggest 'fear factor' for me is what proportion need hospitalization. If it's above 5% of total numbers infected, it's essentially a total disaster if this really runs rampage through the population.
I'm pretty certain that none of these factors have been priced into the market. Now, I have no idea if this will come to pass. But I think odds on it will in some form or other. Self-isolating behaviours, even informally, may mitigate spread to some extent. But even then I would guess 10% of the global population would get infected. The biggest unknowns are a) seasonality or not, b) true extent of severity across demographics.
tb
PS I have no (financial) skin in this game: just don't have enough capital to speculate in any meaningful way...so I have nothing to gain or lose with all the above...
Mar 8, 2020 | 1:26 am
#190
Join Date: Apr 2013
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Agreed, nobody is talking about extinction. But conservative estimates make this an order of magnitude worse than influenza. SamirD you may want to check out this earlier post: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/32115699-post2839.html
Also this information from a epidemiologist.
https://www.businessinsider.com/coro...rt-2020-3?IR=T
Also this information from a epidemiologist.
https://www.businessinsider.com/coro...rt-2020-3?IR=T
The problem as has been stated in the thread quite well is that no one really knows the numerator and denominator in the equation as it keeps changing. I'm pretty sure we'll know in a month or two with some certainty, but right now the numbers move in big ways every hour.
Exposure is a given. I think in the next few years or so everyone will end up being exposed to this--at least until some sort of vaccine or counter drugs are available.
Im not an infectious disease specialist, but according to a member who is, there is no pre-existing immunity. That is not to say that peoples bodies cannot fight off the virus and potentially develop immunity. But until that happens there is no immunity. People whose bodies are fighting the virus may struggle. This is where being admitted to a hospital and getting oxygen and an IV and maybe a ventilator and whatever else can be done is effective. It helps their body to devote more resources to fighting the virus. Those who have fought of the virus may or may not have immunity for some period of time. At this point it seems we are unsure of this. Another earlier post:
The problems seems to start when the symptoms are bad enough to get to the hospital--that's seems to be where the death danger begins. Luckily, even a good chunk of hospital bound people seem to recover.
Last edited by NewbieRunner; Mar 11, 2020 at 1:48 pm Reason: Merge consecutive posts by same member
Mar 8, 2020 | 1:46 am
#191
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I agree. The definitely for 'immunity' was more strict than I'm normally accustomed to, but makes perfect sense.
The problems seems to start when the symptoms are bad enough to get to the hospital--that's seems to be where the death danger begins. Luckily, even a good chunk of hospital bound people seem to recover.
The problems seems to start when the symptoms are bad enough to get to the hospital--that's seems to be where the death danger begins. Luckily, even a good chunk of hospital bound people seem to recover.
A lot of us I'm sorry worry more about our elderly relatives than about ourselves, too, given that they won't have a flu shot and immunity as a safety "blanket" of sorts.
Mar 8, 2020 | 3:55 am
#192
Join Date: Jan 2016
Posts: 905
No. There is more than sufficient good quality data to support the WHO projection of a mortality rate in the order of 2%, ie between 10 and 20 times more deadly than season flu.
While it is true that there has been some irrational fear and behaviour, it is also true that there is very good cause to be concerned, and to take appropriate preventive measures.
Governments around the world are not spending tens of billions, concurrent with letting economies grind to a halt, on a whim or fancy, or because of irrational fear.
While it is true that there has been some irrational fear and behaviour, it is also true that there is very good cause to be concerned, and to take appropriate preventive measures.
Governments around the world are not spending tens of billions, concurrent with letting economies grind to a halt, on a whim or fancy, or because of irrational fear.
Mar 8, 2020 | 4:23 am
#193
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Funny and there is a difference between the US and France. I was on the TGV yesterday and someone a couple rows behind me was coughing heavily, about once a minute, for over an hour. But nobody said a thing or moved from their seat. We've heard coughing fits before.
Mar 8, 2020 | 4:58 am
#194
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Seems not much commentary yet on news from Italy. Quarantine of 1/4 of country's population - was something like this ever done in history? How much in terms of economy this is going to hurt Italy?
Who/what place is next? Will France or Germany have guts to do something like this?
I personally don't expect anything this scale to happen in US.
I honestly don't envy any politician or public health expert who is in charge right now...
Who/what place is next? Will France or Germany have guts to do something like this?
I personally don't expect anything this scale to happen in US.
I honestly don't envy any politician or public health expert who is in charge right now...