It will definitely happen. The hope is it will be slowed significantly due to changes in behavior.

Didn't most of these come about right around election times as well? I'm not going to do the research, but I feel like this has happened before. Ebola too maybe?

WHO updates the fatality rate to 3.4%, well above the 2% number previously being kicked around

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/03/who-...y-thought.html

gg olds

I think a lot of that is Iran dragging down the average. Also less aggressive testing will spike the # because only really sick people get tested (like the US is doing).

S. Korea is testing aggressively (100k+) and their death rate is around .5%. But that could rise since it usually takes about a month to be fatal.

flying BAL->PIT thursday night, will update the thread on # of masks i see. came back from mexico ~2 weeks ago, 0 masks.

i also have cold induced asthma which makes me cough a lot in winter, really looking forward to not having anyone next to me on the plane or within 10 feet of me anywhere in the airport

Corrona has already killed way more than SARS, but that is not the point, the point is a disease does not need to kill to be a problem, a highly infectious disease that puts lots of people in hospital/makes lots of people miss work but kills no one is a much bigger problem to modern interconnected economies than a disease that kills most people who catch it but has a much lower infection rate.

People need to stop concentrating on the mortality rate. You need to look at the collectivised effect, not the risk to your personal individual health.

Also its worth remembering with China that they did not have full information on the disease when they put all their reactions and policies into effect and had to make some worst case assumptions.

It happens to be winter time = flu season. As it gets colder, your body weakens and becomes more susceptible to getting sick. The flu also slowly mutates and slowly circles the earth. This circling of the earth is how scientists can "know" what strains to put in your flu vaccine.

If the elections were in July, we could create conspiracies about people blowing their fingers off with fire works. USA#1 would be accused of spraying stupid-juice all over the place so her injured citizens couldn't pull the level in the voting booth.

I don't know what the numbers are for taking work off for flu -vs- what's happening now.

It was Chinese New Year on Feb. 12. During this time, the entire country shuts down and everyone goes back home to visit family. This would be the worst time to spread a disease like this. Wuhan has 19 million people and is an industrial hub, so people who live there would be heading home under normal circumstances.

I'm not really sure if that information adds or subtracts to your thoughts.

CNY was 1/25 this year.

This doesn't have scientific backing.

We don't really know why colds and flu are winter things. Dry nasal passages, people inside more, virus reproduction or survival rates higher in cold, all plausible.

Wonder what the mortality rate will ultimately be, when all the globe is exposed. My own guess is one percent of the population will perish. Will just wait and see if "winning" the lottery. Life is full of risks, but what can you do.

Wait. One percent of 7 billion people means 70 million. Like the Spanish flu. GL to us all.

Speaking of lottery... would it be unethical to bet on this?

I wouldn't do it.

40-70% would catch it. So maybe 20-50 million.

Lol 1 percent higher than deaths in world War 2

That Harvard expert with the 40-70% rate has adjusted his range to 20-60%.

Fwiw I literally just flew into DC from 2 week stay in Vietnam (stopped @ incheon south korea airport for 4 hours)

Customs simply asked me if I’d been to china, I said no and that was it, no tests no nothin...

Yep.

Last weekend I flew from HCMC to Tokyo to JFK ... I was amazed that nobody checked my temperature or spoke to me at JFK. The only thing COVID-19 related that happened was the JAL gate crew in Tokyo walking up to everyone before boarding with a laminated placard asking them if they had been to China in the past two weeks.

The bottom line is that COVID-19 can't be contained. It's something humans will have to live with. Talk of no Olympics and a crowdless March Madness is a joke. For the rest of humanity, no more crowds!

Chinese travelers tell me they are actually asking fewer questions now. It's "have you been in China in past 14 days?" then they shoo you away. The customs people are scared and are trying to minimize contact.

Why are people stocking up on toilet paper? If push comes to shove and you don't have any, simply jump in the shower. i get the run on hand sanitizer, masks, gatorade, rice, beans etc. but toilet paper runs just seem silly to me.

I still have paper newspapers delivered. Will not be the first time I will have to resort to using them.

Max Max Fury Road II: TP Town

The virus was found in feces, too, so this might be more relevant than we think.

Is there any body fluid it hasn't been found in?