Yeah, who cares if only the sick and elderly die, eh? Real humanitarian sentiment.
Besides, this complacency is totally misplaced. The epidemics in China and Italy have pushed even advanced health care systems in the affected regions close to collapse, with many doctors and nurses becoming infected themselves (with even hospital staff in their 20s in some cases dying, presumably due to exposure to high viral loads)...there's no vaccine for it to protect hospital staff. Intensive care beds are a limited resource, if the disease spreads in an uncontrolled way, one runs out of capacity soon, and death rates will shoot up, because many in need of intensive care can't be treated anymore with ventilators etc. Of course the old and sick will be affected worst (they'll just be left to die), but once the health care system has collapsed, fatalities could spread beyond those risk groups.
And a collapsed health care system obviously won't be able to provide services more generally, so lots of people might die of other causes unrelated to Covid-19 as well.

Coming from an Emergency Management family, I will say...

... do not underestimate the effects of both the virus...

... and the social effects / disruption brought by a pandemic.

COVID 19 has two known strains:

COVID 19L

COVID 19S

COVID 19S is ATM more widespread but lacks severity. Most end up with general flu symptoms.

COVID 19L is the virus steadily spreading from Wuhan China since late 2019 and is EXTREMELY deadly and EXTREMELY contagious.

Most who have been claiming COVID 19 is nothing more than "normal" flu have probably been experiencing COVID 19S or hearing reports based on COVID 19S.

It is theorized that COVID 19 may ultimately spread to 3/4 of the population and will probably not "die out" in Spring and Summer as influenza usually diminishes as temperatures rise. Although COVID 19 does seem to prefer colder temperatures, scientists theorize that the virus is more heat resistant than influenza.

Whether infected or not, the problem with pandemics is social disruption and broken supply chains. If the virus progresses quickly in cities and towns, there is a high possibility that those cities or towns will need to be "cordoned off." This possibility is already being discussed by the US Surgeon General. Should this happen...

... make certain that you have adequate supply of necessities -- food, prescription medication, toilet paper, paper towels, hand sanitizer (above 60% alcohol), trash bags, etc. I would suggest 2 - 3 months supply if possible. I would also suggest protective eyewear and N95 masks should you have to leave the house during an outbreak.

It is best to prepare prior as there will be runs on all of the above once reports of additional deaths (which there will be) come in. Whether COVID 19 is catastrophic will only be known in time. But COVID 19 will be a severe stress to the social and healthcare systems. This is known.

Currently in California there are many reports that major grocery chains are out of toilet paper and hand sanitizer or are rationing what's left. My wife and I are also seeing empty soup and canned good shelves across multiple stores in Los Angeles.

I urge everyone not to underestimate this pandemic (yes, I know it hasn't been labeled "pandemic" yet, but it already fits all of the pandemic criteria). I also urge you to stay calm and prepare asap should this pandemic continue escalation. Should things get bad, there is the distinct possibility -- if you waited to prepare -- that you will find empty shelves.

I'll skip the daily habits to deal with the virus. Those are readily found online.

Hopefully this does not become a catastrophic situation and wishing you all safety to you and your loved ones until this outbreak is over.

Stay safe.

I really thank you for your participation in this thread and for your concern about the subject, but I would also notice that this particular information is not currently confirmed by an official source such as World Health Organization.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

You mean the people in China's pocket who blundered their way through this whole mess?

If they had done their job instead of getting down on their knees for Chinese money, MAYBE the situation could've been a lot more controlled.

It's time to stop putting stock on corrupt, blundering, incompetent buffoons LARPing as "officials".

Funny thing is, I don't see China downplaying this.

Unfortunately, the same can't be said for our Western "leaders".

The time for alarmism and swift and decisive action would have been over a month ago. Even the dumbest asshole should realise that when a country quarantines cities of tens of millions of people. But the politicians didn't. Neither did the media, which was instead busy brainwashing you into thinking that closing your borders to prevent further spread is rayciss.

It's too late now. Continued inaction will ensure that this thing will spread far and wide.

WHO has still not listed COVID-19 as a pandemic... even though it met their own definition long ago.

If you wait for the WHO you will get very little timely information.

Here's an article on the COVID-19 strains and documentation links (within article):

https://www.forbes.com/sites/lisettevoytko/2020/03/04/discovery-of-2-strains-of-covid-19-coronavirus-hints-at-how-it-evolved/#23d080c7094c

The study:

https://academic.oup.com/nsr/advance-article/doi/10.1093/nsr/nwaa036/5775463?searchresult=1

Fronzel is right, though. Internally, China did not downplay it, hence the very speedy building of containment cages that our trustworthy media called "hospitals".

They did downplay it externally, so as to avoid looking bad.

Either way, with all their brute force, they couldn't contain it, and now the retarded pedophiles that serve as our politicians are acting like this is about racism, or something.

It's appalling. Good thing I don't give a shit, or I would be miffed.

I know some doctors in China who would say otherwise...

... but...

... at this point it doesn't matter. There's more than enough blame to spread around... and truth is focusing on blame is not constructive in an emergency.

The virus is spreading.

What people did or didn't do early on seems irrelevant.

I know what you mean, but what they were telling the doctors & what they were doing were very different things.

Either way, they couldn't act all over the suspected infected regions at the same time, even when it was "just" Wuhan, so it's likely some doctors in one region were told one thing, others were told another, while they were doing something else.

It was all very fast. I'd only be surprised if there WEREN'T conflicting stories.

Disturbing study about the potential spread of the virus on buses:
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3074351/coronavirus-can-travel-twice-far-official-safe-distance-and-stay
Not exactly an argument for the safety of public transport.

It could also depend on how authorities there are dealing with that kind of info: truly open or economical with the truth?

This has been very badly handled in Europe, practically no precautionary measures have been taken, just have to look at the situation in Italy now for example. There is also France, when you have massive stocks of masks and other necessities given as aid by the government to China, all very well and good except that now hospitals/pharmacies are left out in the cold as those necessities are now cruelly scarce. Don't know it it's poetic justice at work or what, but after going out of their way to say that there was nothing to worry about, 'we're ready' and blah blah blah, some members or government there are now infected.

You guys in Hong Kong could be safer than us in Europe, have a friend working/living there who's now more worried about me than he is for himself, given that he's applying the basis to keep and remain safe, and plenty of level headed people seem to do the same there.

That's the sad reality of in this perverse optimism in technology where we have lived too convenient and padded lives, added with the mentality "nothing is going to happens us, just others", we got literally caught with our pants down.

Overpopulation combined with bad hygiene / cross-contamination and static mentality is a bad combo...

[url=Why new diseases keep appearing in China]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPpoJGYlW54[/url]
Journalist goes undercover at wet markets where the Coronavirus started

Really appalling how this has been mishandled in Europe, whereas China seems to have brought it under control, Taiwan and Singapore didn't allow it to spread, and South Korea and Japan also seem to be doing relatively well.
I agree with fronzel, imo the situation in Germany will get really ugly.

I was recently talking about those kinds of markets with my friend based in Hong Kong, and he was telling me that the crack down on those seem more severe in HK than on the mainland, with surprise inspections/shut downs and this, not just once in a while but quite often.
Staggering rise in a 2 weeks span. May you be/keep safe.

Just the brazenness of Merkel declaring that 60-70% of the population will get this, but at the same time refuse to do anything about it. You know, put some cities under quarantine, close the schools until April (what Austria did, starting today),... you know, stuff that should've been done rather sooner than later. It's absolutely absurd!

Hopefully, with the WHO declaring this a pandemic, the pressure will grow on these assholes to ACT.

Just to put this into perspective: If China (which has been completely sidelined by this disease, unlike the rest of the world, which had a good month or two to take precautions) had the population size of Italy, they wouldn't have had more than 4000 cases. Italy has over 10000 now. Think about that!

I don't want to dog on the Italians too much, though. At least they've taken the necessary measures now. It's too late, but at least they've done something. Unlike Germany, which is still busy picking its nose.