re: Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) ***W.H.O. DECLARES A GLOBAL PANDEMIC***

Confirmed in Australia. Still nothing in Madagascar tho.
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I think we don’t know enough real data right now to panic or dismiss. Now that there are documented cases outside of China we should get a better idea of what we are dealing with.

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The fact that the Chinese government is so sensitive to criticism means they are more likely to hide and underreport a crisis

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Which is the exact opposite of how they would have handled the Hong Kong protests, instead of sending in loyalists to attack innocent people for the world to see.

I mean underreporting is unsurprising but just letting a disease spread, in 2020 of all times, and especially after the criticisms for doing the exact thing when SARS happened, is a bit different.

In fact, because of the whole SARS debacle, an overreaction in the opposite direction seems more likely.

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Think about this for a minute - 61,000 people were killed by the flu in America last year,.a shot exists that significantly helps keep those numbers down, and MOST Americans don't even get the damn shot, but if 8,000 people across the world get this new coronavirus, we panic?

It's patently absurd.

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But approximately 45 million were infected with the flu. So far this seems to be about 10 times more deadly than the flu. If it is as contagious and without vaccination, it could be a pretty serious pandemic if it spreads to as many people as the flu did and actually is 10 times or more more fatal. It also could be contained like SARS was and be a small blip on the radar.

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The only reason this is a big deal and the seasonal flu isn't is because this is new

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I'm not panicking, I'm pointing that there COULD be an amplified threat from this virus because of the fact that it's new. Next year's strains of influenza will likely be slightly different from this years, and large numbers of high risk people (elderly, immunocompromised, etc.) will be vaccinated again because it's new. Hopefully we soon have a vaccine for this coronavirus strain (not guaranteed), but as of now that newness confers an additional risk to at least some people.

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Can you and slackster find somewhere else to take your hot takes? We have an actual person on this board in China in a closed off zone looking for news on this thread. It’s real for him and his family. We don’t need 4 pages of shitposting from you and slackster.

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He's looking for real news and you're giving him the 90k cases number. Okay guy.

Honkus, if you're looking for real news, stick to the CDC and WHO. , good luck brother.

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Even if the numbers are in the hundreds, that still makes up an extremely tiny portion of the population of these areas that have been affected

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Total numbers aren’t concerning but the rate of rise is.

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2018 was a bad year and there were 800k hospitalizations and 60k deaths.

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But whether it’s a more or less severe flu season overall, I would think had would show up in the number of hospitalizations itself. But the severity and mortality of those who get to that point would seem more consistent from year to year.

These Chinese cities also have a very high population density and aren’t the most sanitary places to begin with. It also really doesn’t help that it’s probably the busiest traveling time of year in China because of their New Year celebrations.