Any idea how many people have been tested in Alabama? About 100 in total. I wouldn’t confuse lack of cases with lack of confirmations. How many residents have flown through Atlanta or other metros? Just 100? How many college kids traveled over the past few weeks? Just 100?

If you never come in contact with the virus you won’t get it. I think that is obvious, but why do you wonder about this? How would they theoretically get the virus?

this has been my suggestion all along, before these data were presented. And we don’t need surgical masks. 2 examples I have seen this week in Cozumel.

Thanks for relating the part about the time of viral shedding. But about the masks, how do they prevent the virus from entering a host through the eyes? Or ears? Asking because I'd like to know.

As stated, the point of mask wearing is to prevent onward transmission.

And in China, they've managed to wear masks for 7 weeks without societal collapse, and certainly much less collateral damage than having all hospitals full. But the reality is, outside of Hubei, i.e. acting EARLY, wearing masks for about 3 weeks (and the other measures: I'm not claiming masks are a panacea) actually had the biggest impact in essentially grinding transmission in low prevalence areas down to a tiny trickle.

IF MASKS WEREN'T LIMITING (which is a real issue, I acknowledge), other than ego, and a "feeling" that it's not practical, what are the downsides? It won't curb economic activity, which is your greatest concern...

tb

AUB students and faculty and others in Alabama often use Atlanta as their gateway to fly. Just like ORD gets a lot of people originating there for trips to/from Indiana or Wisconsin, so do plenty of people in Alabama drive to ATL to fly In and out.

When it comes to rural medical centers in the parts of the the US that are wealthier than the rural South in the US, it seemed like many of the ones that were asked didn’t have any in-house ability to test in-house (or even with affiliated private labs in the same counties) for this even on Friday. Even in rather rural parts of the US, teachers and students have been abroad rather recently even in places that have been heavily hit by this coronavirus. One case I know about in rural WI has the substitute teacher under quarantine of sorts because they know of a visit to Italy but they weren’t able to get the substitute teacher tested fast enough .... due to the lack of testing kit availability.

Sorry if I wasn't clear, but in the west we simply do not have masks. I have one single mask myself, but I'm saving it for when I might actually need it. You cannot buy masks here as the shops are sold out. The hospitals are hoarding what they have. Hopefully the mask producers can whip up a hundred billion more masks ASAP.

Aye. As many don't actually know if they have it or not, wearing a mask is a good way to contain the spread.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-51835856German...

Another word, slow the spread while we prepare.

“Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, an agency within HHS, told the Senate committee on Tuesday that masks are usually recommended for those who are infected and health-care workers, but not for the general population. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently does not recommend the use of face masks by the general public to prevent COVID-19.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/03/us-c...cial-says.html

I wouldn’t call that “spreading lies”. There aren’t enough masks to put one on everyone even if some people didn’t have boxes of fifty at home.

People were buying (hoarding) masks because they want to wear them to protect themselves. I don’t think many people went to the drug store with the thought that they should wear them in case they are infected and that a mask would protect strangers from catching the infection from them. I don’t think the CDC is lying when they say that self-protection approach isn’t going to work for the average person.

Even if we had enough masks stockpiled for the government to give every person one, I am not sure what percentage of Americans would actually wear them unless it came with a mandate to wear them in public 100% of the time (and enforcement measures).

https://thediplomat.com/2020/03/less...-bad-and-ugly/

“Koreans, quite fortunately, tend to be very socially conscious, willing to go out their way to reduce risks for others. From the perspective of virus containment, this is an incredible gift. In fact, most Koreans will readily admit they wear masks, not only to protect themselves, but also to help protect others. Get caught in the streets these days without one and you will most certainly be greeted with reproach. It is the potential absence of this cooperative culture that will likely be the first hurdle for many other countries when implementing their own containment efforts.”

Massive jump in cases reported in Qatar today

Now a pandemic but I thought it was last week.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/li...latest-updates

Couple of things I found useful/interesting:

Singapore appears to have a program to distribute masks: https://www.maskgowhere.gov.sg

Mask guide by Singapore gov: https://www.hsa.gov.sg/consumer-safe...nd-respirators

I was talking about this side of the pond, specifically Germany.

The government-funded Robert Koch institute (kind of a German pendant to the CDC) has repeatedly stated that masks do not help. They formulate it like "there is currently no evidence that wearing a mask significantly reduces the risk of a healthy person contracting infection". Which may be legally correct, but it creates a broad impression that masks are pointless. Of course, government-managed "public" TV channels then spread lies to the general public and tell that one should not wear a mask and that washing hands is enough for now.

Or for example, a few days ago, the health minister of the Brandenburg federal state publicly said that "it is totally pointless to walk around wearing a mask".

These are just blatant lies. If everyone were wearing a mask (even just a surgical one), the disease would be spreading much, much slower.

It looks like Kuwait is suspending all commercial passenger flights starting Friday for an indefinite period.

Coronavirus: Kuwait to suspend all flights from Friday until further notice - Al Arabiya English

Coronavirus officially labeled as pandemic by WHO. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-51839944