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

I work in a hospital wouldn’t be visiting them until this passes anyway. The place I live is certainly not as shitty as STL, so you can frick right on off

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Can someone explain to me why we have never reacted this way to a virus ever in the history of ever?

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We have....the 1918 Spanish Flu pandemic. How Cities Tried to Halt the Spread

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By mid-September, the Spanish flu was spreading like wildfire through army and naval installations in Philadelphia, but Wilmer Krusen, Philadelphia’s public health director, assured the public that the stricken soldiers were only suffering from the old-fashioned seasonal flu and it would be contained before infecting the civilian population.

As civilian infection rates climbed day by day, Krusen refused to cancel the upcoming Liberty Loan parade scheduled for September 28. Barry writes that infectious disease experts warned Krusen that the parade, which was expected to attract several hundred thousand Philadelphians, would be “a ready-made inflammable mass for a conflagration.”

Krusen insisted that the parade must go on, since it would raise millions of dollars in war bonds, and he played down the danger of spreading the disease. On September 28, a patriotic procession of soldiers, Boy Scouts, marching bands and local dignitaries stretched two miles through downtown Philadelphia with sidewalks packed with spectators.

Just 72 hours after the parade, all 31 of Philadelphia’s hospitals were full and 2,600 people were dead by the end of the week

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The public health response in St. Louis couldn’t have been more different. Even before the first case of Spanish flu had been reported in the city, health commissioner Dr. Max Starkloff had local physicians on high alert and wrote an editorial in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch about the importance of avoiding crowds.

When a flu outbreak at a nearby military barracks first spread into the St. Louis civilian population, Starkloff wasted no time closing the schools, shuttering movie theaters and pool halls, and banning all public gatherings. There was pushback from business owners, but Starkloff and the mayor held their ground. When infections swelled as expected, thousands of sick residents were treated at home by a network of volunteer nurses

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According to a 2007 analysis of Spanish flu death records, the peak mortality rate in St. Louis was only one-eighth of Philadelphia’s death rate at its worst

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Why now?

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The Spanish Flu was spread by soldiers travelling domestically and internationally for WWI. Even with the relative slow transportation in that era, trains and boats, the flu spread like wildfire. Today we have much faster methods of getting for one place to the next - we can fly across the country in 4 hours and drive to a neighboring state in a relatively sort time. Plus more people have access to these fast modes of transportation than ever before. The ability to spread this virus is exponentially greater today than it was in 1918.

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First US case was in mid January.

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I’m not arguing against you but that’s first known case. Hard to know if any were present previously without testing.

I agree. It’s been here for a while and it’s widespread and has been for some time.

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It's just that 80% of people who have it don't know they have it and another 15% think they have a cold so they don't go to a doctor or get tested.

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I’m not sure where you are getting these numbers but there definitely are not 80% of people who never develop symptoms. 80% of people have flu like symptoms.

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Same point. Dumb to think it just got here then IMO.

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From a practical standpoint I agree with you, but the genetic analysis of the virus samples just doesn't back that up. It is pretty solid science, but no science is perfect I suppose.

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I’m not sure where you are getting these numbers but there definitely are not 80% of people who never develop symptoms.

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He's getting that from the doc who is head of infectious disease at OLOL in BR. He basically said that 100% of people will get it, and 80% will never show symptoms.

Someone should be updating the American death toll daily

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Might want to check my location again Jabroni.

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Honestly don’t care. Love where I live. Love my job, and love that my gym is still open

Louisiana just reported their 4th death after the update this morning. With 171 cases.