re: It feels like the nation is starting to panic

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many people have it and aren’t affected at all. Many people will never be tested because they won’t seek medical care, and even more still have probably already recovered because their symptoms were so mild it didn’t warrant a trip to the doctor in their minds.

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This is part of the reason they want people to stay in. They don’t want people to unknowingly transfer the virus. They estimate 80% of cases will have mild symptoms, or none at all. We’ve kind of been conditioned to think that if you get this, you’re going to end up in the hospital, when that’s really not the case. So it would be easy to think, “hey since I’m not struggling to breathe, I must not have the virus” and they’ll go about their daily life spreading it to others they come in contact with. What does nothing to one person, could cause hospitalization and / or death to others. If unchecked it would lead to millions of infections and 1-3 % of those will die. It would bog down the healthcare system indefinitely, and it wouldn’t stop until they find a vaccine or it dies off with weather.

ETA: the incubation period is like 5.7 days. During that time the person doesn’t have any symptoms, but they are still contagious.