COVID-19 Coronavirus UPDATES, BANS, CLOSURES, ADVISORY, etc.

I don't know what type of Virus I had. I was pretty sick. Wedsnday night,Thursday & Friday, but feel a heck of a lot better today. Just a little tired and weak.

Brent in Az said:

Hey...those are fight'n words. I like Corona beer, and I ain't no yuppie

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Corona beer has propylene glycol (antifreeze) as an ingredient in it. Switch to Busch! Ha! Ha!

You say that's a cold weather beer?

Newboomer said:

You say that's a cold weather beer?

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Yes it is! It’ll keep your insides from freezing!

Red Leg said:

I didn't get a flu shot in the fall and came down with type B in mid-November (you have not lived until you have your nostrils swabbed for a flu test - knew I was in trouble when the PA says "are you ready"). Tamaflu prevents the virus from replicating but it doesn't cure anything. I was a sick puppy for the better part of three weeks. I am inoculated for the spring outbreak. Chances of avoiding are better even with a swag.

If coronavirus is a biological weapon, it is a pretty pathetic one. Looking at the total death rate, it is right around what we see with the flu. Those rates are clearly higher in Wuhan, but that city's medical infrastructure was, and likely still is, overwhelmed. Have to love the precious people in deepest blue Austin. Went to the REI store which sits next to Whole Foods, and at least half a dozen people were walking around in masks. Two had latex gloves. Can't make it up.

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Biological weapons don't seem to ever work as they might be billed to work. The ones with high mortality rates seem difficult to weaponize. However, let's not lose sight of the value of even relatively ineffective bioweapons as instruments of discord.

Consider small pox. AFAIK, it only exists in 2 labs in the world. Mortality rate from small pox is about 1 in 3. But it is a ghastly infirmity which is infectious for 45-60 days. But think what it would do to our economy if most people were wise enough to self-quarantine. I could easily work remotely, as even when I'm in the office, everything I do is remote anyway. But we have engineers and supervisors and welders and electricians who have to physically be there to build stuff. The real danger, assuming this virus is truly pandemic, is to put the brakes on our economy. That would be no less effective at neutering the US than a high mortality rate.

sgt_zim said:

Biological weapons don't seem to ever work as they might be billed to work. The ones with high mortality rates seem difficult to weaponize. However, let's not lose sight of the value of even relatively ineffective bioweapons as instruments of discord.

Consider small pox. AFAIK, it only exists in 2 labs in the world. Mortality rate from small pox is about 1 in 3. But it is a ghastly infirmity which is infectious for 45-60 days. But think what it would do to our economy if most people were wise enough to self-quarantine. I could easily work remotely, as even when I'm in the office, everything I do is remote anyway. But we have engineers and supervisors and welders and electricians who have to physically be there to build stuff. The real danger, assuming this virus is truly pandemic, is to put the brakes on our economy. That would be no less effective at neutering the US than a high mortality rate.

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Well yes. But who is talking about small pox, the plaque, anthrax or even measles. I am talking about a virus with a roughly, according to this evening's WHO statistics, a .02% death rate. But we can be certain to sensationalize every news and conspiracy theory iota out of it.

Considering the sources, 0.02% is...shall we say, a little unreliable? We don't know what we don't know. The Chinese government and WHO are unreliable, are they not?

sgt_zim said:

Considering the sources, 0.02% is...shall we say, a little unreliable? We don't know what we don't know. The Chinese government and WHO are unreliable, are they not?

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Agree... We have a communist oligarch who is trying to save face by hiding certain numbers. I hope and pray I'm wrong about this but everything ive read (mainstream and not so mainstream media) that the US has offered CDC assistance to China. Have yet to read where they have accepted the offer. Now we have these infected people landing in San Antonio and San Diego, upwards of 300, being brought into the US. WHY!??? You guys try to convince me this isn't international!

35bore said:

Agree... We have a communist oligarch who is trying to save face by hiding certain numbers. I hope and pray I'm wrong about this but everything ive read (mainstream and not so mainstream media) that the US has offered CDC assistance to China. Have yet to read where they have accepted the offer. Now we have these infected people landing in San Antonio and San Diego, upwards of 300, being brought into the US. WHY!??? You guys try to convince me this isn't international!

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You are seriously asking that question? They are brought here because they are American citizens just like you. Let's say one of them was your daughter working for the consulate. Would you want her home with world class medical care or languishing with the rest of the proletariat in China? They will be housed in isolation at bases with adequate facilities - medical and otherwise - for two weeks. Then they will go home or to new assignments/jobs.

China screwed up the outbreak, because like most totalitarian regimes through history, it doesn't reward bad news reported up the chain of command. We should all hope they are getting their act together, and accepting international help will be another step forward.

sgt_zim said:

Considering the sources, 0.02% is...shall we say, a little unreliable? We don't know what we don't know. The Chinese government and WHO are unreliable, are they not?

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You are right. It is a secret virus -concocted to sicken the western world (destroying their trading partners - but what the hell, getting those occidentals is the ultimate goal.) They are hiding the real death rate, so that the contagion will become fully rooted worldwide before the awful truth is known. Then, when western civilization is on its knees, the immunized hordes will emerge to steal our precious bodily fluids.


Sorry, I don't mean to aim this at you personally, but I am so tired of the "oh my God we are all going to die" hysteria that I am past patience. Obviously, I am being facetious. I have no doubt that the Chinese government was initially trying to minimize the reporting on this. But the death rate is being tracked and estimated pretty closely by a lot concerned governments. Let's say it is double or even triple what has been reported - it is still less than a bad flu year and far less than 1918. I think is just as likely, if not more so, that the western press and the internet nut jobs can't miss an opportunity to sensationalize the virus. - like every other one over the last thirty years. I think it was equally likely, that a lot more cases occurred and weren't reported not because they were "hidden", but because the the people who were ill weren't that sick.

Red Leg said:

You are seriously asking that question? They are brought here because they are American citizens just like you. Let's say one of them was your daughter working for the consulate. Would you want her home with world class medical care or languishing with the rest of the proletariat in China? They will be housed in isolation at bases with adequate facilities - medical and otherwise - for two weeks. Then they will go home or to new assignments/jobs.

China screwed up the outbreak, because like most totalitarian regimes through history, it doesn't reward bad news reported up the chain of command. We should all hope they are getting their act together, and accepting international help will be another step forward.

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As a US citizen I have also taken an oath to protect this country from enemies foriegn and domestic. If I put myself in a position where some shit like this broke out, I would not put myself above this country! So please don't make me out to be some kind of insensitive prick!... My daughter IS SERVING ABROAD and I just quoted her bubba....

35bore said:

As a US citizen I have also taken an oath to protect this country from enemies foriegn and domestic. If I put myself in a position where some shit like this broke out, I would not put myself above this country! So please don't make me out to be some kind of insensitive prick!... My daughter IS SERVING ABROAD and I just quoted her bubba....

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I was not trying to make you out to be an "insensitive prick," and sincerely apologize that you took it that way. I took the oath too. And I am proud of and grateful for your daughter's service. I respect yours. But were she mine, and in an exposure zone for ebolo much less a mere SARS related virus, I would want the US government to be doing exactly what it is doing right now (ok maybe a stricter quarantine for ebola). Part of what makes this country relatively unique is that we go to great extremes to look after our own. And we are fortunate to have smart, experienced professionals handling the situation at our end. If you don't agree with that policy, fine. We'll simply disagree. But it is what we have done and will continue to do in such health emergencies.

I think we are also, unfortunately, a people that tend to get hysterical about this sort of thing (and no, I am not calling you hysterical - I said "we"). But in the last thirty years, we were all going to die from either SARS, or the Norovirus, or bird flu, or Nile fever, or ebola, etc, etc. The hyperventilation has only become worse through the internet, social media and the 24 hour news cycle. None of us are getting out of here alive no matter what we do. I suspect the most likely bug that will kill off quite a few of us will be a particularly virulent form of the flu. But who knows? What is clear is that China is finally taking fairly Draconian steps to get a handle on the spread within China. Western governments are taking prudent steps to protect their own citizens to include responsibly getting them out of the hot zone and under quarantined observation. And at the end of the day, we are talking about something with a relatively low death rate no matter how much the media and fear mongers want to spin it. And yes, it is a virus and could mutate into something more lethal, but I think it is at least equally likely that it will burn out as spring progresses or that a vaccine is rather quickly developed.

35bore said:

As a US citizen I have also taken an oath to protect this country from enemies foriegn and domestic.....

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Other than the oath of allegiance that naturalized citizens take I am unfamiliar with any oath like this other than the oath taken by military service members...

Are you saying you are an actively serving member of the US military?

Or a naturalized citizen?

Or is there some other oath out there I am unaware of?

Red Leg said:

. . . Have to love the precious people in deepest blue Austin. Went to the REI store which sits next to Whole Foods, and at least half a dozen people were walking around in masks. Two had latex gloves. Can't make it up.

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Austin has alway been blue, but back in the day of “Keep Austin Weird” everyone was too busy getting stoned or drunk. Unfortunately, the hippies have been push out by the invasion of Californians and Austin will never be the same.

We do have proven (to some degree) medication for Ebola (demonstrated in Dallas first in the US IIRC), even if not fully FDA approved. I have yet to see reports of any effective medication for this coronavirus from the Wuhan area, approved by WHO or any other agency, or not.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/api.na...bola-outbreak-dallas-airborne-health-medicine

I haven't yet seen a rush on hospital masks and such here in The Alamo City, yet.

No reason for hysteria...this will die down as the other recent viruses...the media is hyping it up as usual..

Lean back..relax..and have a cigar

Red Leg said:

You are right. It is a secret virus -concocted to sicken the western world (destroying their trading partners - but what the hell, getting those occidentals is the ultimate goal.) They are hiding the real death rate, so that the contagion will become fully rooted worldwide before the awful truth is known. Then, when western civilization is on its knees, the immunized hordes will emerge to steal our precious bodily fluids.

Sorry, I don't mean to aim this at you personally, but I am so tired of the "oh my God we are all going to die" hysteria that I am past patience. Obviously, I am being facetious. I have no doubt that the Chinese government was initially trying to minimize the reporting on this. But the death rate is being tracked and estimated pretty closely by a lot concerned governments. Let's say it is double or even triple what has been reported - it is still less than a bad flu year and far less than 1918. I think is just as likely, if not more so, that the western press and the internet nut jobs can't miss an opportunity to sensationalize the virus. - like every other one over the last thirty years. I think it was equally likely, that a lot more cases occurred and weren't reported not because they were "hidden", but because the the people who were ill weren't that sick.

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Classic Colonel Jack Ripper. Well done Mandrake!

Red Leg said:

You are right. It is a secret virus -concocted to sicken the western world (destroying their trading partners - but what the hell, getting those occidentals is the ultimate goal.) They are hiding the real death rate, so that the contagion will become fully rooted worldwide before the awful truth is known. Then, when western civilization is on its knees, the immunized hordes will emerge to steal our precious bodily fluids.

Sorry, I don't mean to aim this at you personally, but I am so tired of the "oh my God we are all going to die" hysteria that I am past patience. Obviously, I am being facetious. I have no doubt that the Chinese government was initially trying to minimize the reporting on this. But the death rate is being tracked and estimated pretty closely by a lot concerned governments. Let's say it is double or even triple what has been reported - it is still less than a bad flu year and far less than 1918. I think is just as likely, if not more so, that the western press and the internet nut jobs can't miss an opportunity to sensationalize the virus. - like every other one over the last thirty years. I think it was equally likely, that a lot more cases occurred and weren't reported not because they were "hidden", but because the the people who were ill weren't that sick.

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No offense taken.

Between the habitual prevaricators in the news media and in government, it's difficult to ferret out reality with these types of issues.

Something to understand about almost all pathogens that cause pneumonia is they are largely opportunistic infections (meaning it's a rare day when a person with a mature, healthy immune system will get pneumonia). The only exception that comes to mind is Hantavirus, but you only get that from breathing in rat turd dust, and it's mostly confined to the arid SW US.

An interesting article on the Coronavirus and the work being done in the US:

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/fighting-the-coronaviruswith-truth-125142120.html

ANDY SERWER: Are you working on that vaccine right here in Bethesda?

Dr. FRANCIS COLLINS: We are. The vaccine research center—which is only 100 yards from here—[‘Yikes,’ I said to myself.] is a central part of developing that vaccine. It's a very high-tech approach where you're not actually growing the virus, you actually have information about it's RNA sequence, and from that, you make something that can be injected into a muscle. And the muscle will then make one of the viral proteins—not the whole thing, just a little piece of it—that the immune system will look at and go, oh, no, you don't—and make an antibody. It's very much in the forefront of what's possible. But we believe it will work in this situation, and it would be the fastest way that you can get to a vaccine at a time like this.

Every few years there is a new flavor of the month virus that the media over hypes, then the general population has a semi panic about it, then, nothing happens. It is easy to view this new corona virus through the same prism.

That might be a mistake. It is early and there are a lot of unknowns, but there are a few characteristics that when combined could make this virus a real problem.

1. Reproductive rate. I haven't seen new data, but a week or so ago, the RO 2.5-3.8. This is an extremely high number for a pathogen.

2. An individual can be asymptomatic for over 10 days yet be contagious. In other words, all these thermometers we see around China have been virtually worthless during the first couple of weeks that an individual has been contagious.

3. 5 million people left Wuhan for Chinese New Year. This happened before the city was shut down. These people went all over the world. The key we don't know is how many were infected. We do know that the virus has escaped all possibilities of confinement.

4. The CCP has a vested interest in not providing factual information. The information coming out of China is probably significantly less than the real numbers. Individuals have mentioned significantly larger numbers on social media sites coming out of China. The problem is these people disappear within a day or two.

5. Getting an accurate mortality rate is almost impossible at this moment. The GIGO factor with China is too great. We will get better mortality numbers when we have a large enough data set in first world countries. The problem with this number is that it will be low due to first world medical care. It will be a long time before we have good information for third world countries.

6. Many medical professionals are saying the virus is airborne.

7. Even using the CCP's probable under reported numbers, this virus already surpasses other contagions in the past 50 years. (This is off the top of my head without doing proper research. Perhaps I am mistaken but I can't think of any.)

8. The only level 4 virology lab in China is in Wuhan. I am not saying it escaped from the lab, but you have to wonder how out of the entire of China, a virus starts in a city that holds 1% of the population. Could a technician been sloppy with their PPE's.

First world countries should be able to handle this virus pretty well. Especially since the virus life cycle should start dying down in the northern hemisphere in 2-3 months. Third world countries will have an extremely difficult time with this virus when it gets there. Third world countries could be in for very real problems that they are not close to being equipped to handle. Look at China, the second largest economy in the world and 400 million people are now in quarantine. Don't be surprised to see this virus die down through the summer and pick back up next fall throughout the northern hemisphere.

The best way to view this is probably through social media coming out of China, not MSM sites. The information coming out through social media is much different than reported coming through the CCP machine. The problem is an individual makes a few posts and then disappears. Why is the CCP arresting individuals if what they are saying is the truth.

I am not trying to be an alarmist, but when you combine many of the characteristics mentioned above, have we seen a virus like this in a hundred years. Could I be wrong? You bet. In fact I hope I am. I have three trips to third world countries planned for this year. All I am saying is to keep an eye on this. It may not be the typical pathogen we have grown to expect.