America First in Epidemic Preparedness!

At least according to something called the “2019 Global Health Security Index”, which claims that:

  • The US, which had, until recently, tested 100x fewer people per capita than Italy.
  • The UK, whose game plan – at least until a couple of days ago – was to let most of its population get infected to make the “herd” immune.
  • The Netherlands, which is still apparently committed to that Galaxy Brain plan.

Meanwhile, Best Korea be like:

Even the Third World be like:

China has successfully contained COVID-19, both within the Hubei hotspot and in local conflagrations elsewhere. There are now more deaths in the world outside of China, than there ever were in China itself.

Now imagine how accurate and unbiased all those “democracy”/”human rights” indices are.

Comments

  1. Please keep off topic posts to the current Open Thread.

    If you are new to my work, start here.

  2. another anon says

    America first in optimism and positive attitude.
    Take that, Corona-chan!!!

    https://www.npr.org/2020/03/17/816501871/poll-as-coronavirus-spreads-fewer-americans-see-pandemic-as-a-real-threat

    In the face of the coronavirus worsening across the U.S. and reordering the daily life of millions of Americans, fewer people view the pandemic as a real threat, according to a new NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll.

    Just about 56% of Americans consider the coronavirus a “real threat,” representing a drop of 10 percentage points from last month. At the same time, a growing number of Americans think the coronavirus is being “blown out of proportion.”

    The differences between political parties are stark, with a majority of Republicans saying it is overblown and the vast majority of Democrats considering it a legitimate threat.

  3. Where’s the study used for the infographic in the top? (Don’t worry I will search after).

    In terms, of whatever they are based on – it could be interesting. But this infographic without context of the article it might illustrate, is not informative.

    • As for the present epidemic of this pneumonia causing virus. There must be a lot of different areas you could discuss, such as state capacity for quarantining (where the USSR has been described in studies as the world’s most effective country by the 1970s). Or state capacity for surveillance – where South Korea seems to have been the most effective one in this particular epidemic so far.

    But perhaps ventilator numbers is the one of the interesting things to compare, as it will minimize deaths.

    Germany has 25000 medical ventilators, and is now ordering production of an additional 10000 medical ventilators from its domestic companies. So, although these extra 10000 might not be available in time (production of all of them will last all year) – to an extent they are, we might expect then even lower ratios of old people among deaths in Germany.

    Germany has possibly the most prestigious manufacturer for production of ventilators (as well as personal protective equipment – I ordered protective equipment from Germany earlier this month).

    UK only has 5000 medical ventilators, which seems a very low number for 66 and a half million people. In addition, UK does not have domestic production of medical ventilators capacity.

    In Russia, a lot of regions are reporting their numbers of medical ventilators, and it seems better than the UK in this area. E.g. In Sverdlovsk region, more than 1500 medical ventilators for 4,3 million people.

    USA is in the strongest position for ventilators though – they have 160,000 medical ventilators operational, with additional 10,000 in storage. (It also has leading companies for production of personal protective equipment like 3M).

  4. Best Korea be like:

    North Korea was the only country survived the zombie apocalaypse in the film World War Z. Apparently the book is different, but I didn’t read it.

    (In the film, Israel survives an extra week because they build a wall, but that wall collapses because hippies are singing, and the zombies destroy them).

    The film’s view is that North Korea survives because it has higher state capacity than any other countries, in certain brutal ways (pulling everyone’s teeth in 24 hours – “Greatest feat of social engineering in history”).

  5. More importantly – USA, like many developed countries, has strong enough food industry and hygiene rules which presumably reduces risk of zoonotic transmission of dangerous viruses to quite low levels, while the attempt of China’s state capacity to prevent this in their country seems to be a constant and regular failure.

    Here about the situation in 2014, when China was trying to improve state capacity in this area and to impose new hygiene legislation. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1201971214014970

  6. yakushimaru says

    If you remove Hubei from China’s statistic, the rest of China is as competent as any other country. And remember, Zhejiang, for example, is about the same size in area and in population as South Korea.

    Also, Zhejiang and Jiangsu, for example, sent many nurses & doctors to help Wuhan. So, actually they are better than say Taiwan or Singapore.

  7. Not sure what data the author in the link is using but using the same criteria as the author – start counting from 10 deaths (or 9 or 11 if there was no 10), here is the graph for Hubei, (China) outside Hubei, US, Italy, Uk, France, Germany:

    https://ibb.co/SBMTkg9

    (The data is here: https://ibb.co/MhMv0RT )

    As one can see, Hubei started off the worst – though the UK seems to be matching it after 6 days – but bent the curve. After that are Italy, France, Germany. Italy though did not yet bend the curve and overshot Hubei after 13 days and may exceed Hubei’s death count soon by this measure. US is next to best – though early days and showing no signs of flattening yet – followed by the rest of China which really flattened the curve.

    Hubei, UK, Italy, France, Germany are between 60-80 m in population so roughly comparable in per capita. US is 320 million. Rest of China is 1.3 billion.

    The data shows that Hubei lost control initially but with strict lockdowns/heroics bent the curve. The rest of China benefitted from the isolation of Hubei and the fact that their systems were not overloaded, as happened in Hubei and is happening in Italy. It is both in absolute terms and per capita terms the best performing.

    Italy is the leader in deaths in the West, and seems – despite lockdowns and the like – not succeeded yet in bending the curve. The rest including the US are still early and on an upward trajectory – France shows some signs of turning – and remain to be seen how they progress.

    We’ll know in another 7-10 days.

  8. Marshal Marlow says

    The curve is really flat if you don’t do testing. Anyone who has had a KPI or performance metric knows that trick.

  9. “The U.S. may not be #1, but the objective evidence shows that authoritarian China is lagging way behind more civilized nations.”

    LOL. Whatever “objective evidence” you want. China did not have any lesson to learn from anyone. US and the rest of the world have months of warning, scientific knowledge, mistakes and lessons demonstrated to them, plus tons of clinical data, WHO guidelines, global supply chain readiness etc. They even have the genome sequenced by China scientists when the “first” official case hit US – assuming the “first” official case is the real first case in US.

  10. After the lockdown, China sent 80% of entire country’s ICU doctors (40,000) and equipments to Hubei province & Built enough hospitals in 2 weeks. That’s the main reasons why death rate has gone down quickly.

  11. Malenfant says

    China is capable of mobilizing its people in response to a crisis.

    The US, obviously, is not. It might once have been, but those days are long gone.

    The US health system is also a disaster, with many people actively avoiding doctors because they fear large bills and rising insurance premiums more than they fear illness.

    Therefore the notion that the US is “more prepared” to fight an epidemic than China is, of course, ludicrous.

  12. I followed the link to “What I learned from Freedom House”, and I have to say that this:

    “n the meantime, Nemtsov is free to continue writing his screeds about Putin’s yachts and Swiss bank accounts”

    …did not age well… The poor gunned down devil.

    Everything else was pretty good though, as always.

  13. LondonBob says

    The Chinese failed to stop their people eating bats and selling live and dead animals in appalling conditions, pretty big fail.

    No real surprise to see Italy and Spain the worst performers in Europe with the Northern European countries outperforming.

  14. LondonBob says

    Actually the British game plan has always been, and still is, herd immunity. The measures around how this is achieved has always been dependent on how the data comes in. Amusing how many other countries are, implicitly, adopting our approach.

  15. sudden death says

    Commie China official absolute numbers are notoriously unreliable and almost useless, the same way as original SARS death rate was around 17% in Canada and Hong Kong, but just 6% in China. So it would be not very out of touch to assume real absolute China numbers over SARS 2.0 were also 3x higher than reported. Still it can be argued that there is some correlation to reality even if absolute numbers are bogus, so the flattening of the curve may really happened in China, but situation is still far from normal normal there as nationwide lockdown has been extended to April, if I’m not mistaken.

    Also it would be useful to revisit absolutely the worst possible calculated script of the spread:

    https://imgur.com/sJFywUP

    Apparently, China lockdown worked and slowed that developed script for about 5 weeks, as using official worldwide data we are on 7th of February with 200 000 cases worldwide but official deaths already overshot even that most pessimistic script by over 2500 deaths at this point!

    However using the premise that only 10% of all real Corona cases are reported, we are already on 13th of February ant that leaves us with nearly 50 thousand missing deaths from official statistics at this point, so I guess that majority of those missing but officially unreported deaths already may really happened in China, but some portion also may be probably atribbuted to Iran also.

  16. Well they’re best prepared to cover it up obviously.

    Ao much for american competence, their virus in the first place

  17. …British game plan has always been, and still is, herd immunity

    Herd immunity means culling the weak from it, old and sick die. The pace and details are left to each herd to manage, but it could be inevitable. Corona may not be that powerful, and this could be a non-event, but the dynamic has been introduced.

    The morons measuring ‘epidemic preparedness‘ know nothing about how it works. It is about the share of vulnerable population, internal cohesiveness, discipline and ability to control it. Only secondarily it’s about resources to treat the symptoms.

    US and EU are asking the young and less vulnerable to freeze their lives, to forgo and sacrifice materially in order to protect the old who have ruthlessly exploited the young and shifted all burdens on them over the last few decades. From medical care and education, to wealth and home ownership, the rules have been set up in a way to enrich the old boomers and enslave the young. A giant generational pyramid scheme.

    The main impact of corona is to make this visible. Will self-interest or compassion prevail? I think it depends on the scale this reaches and what narratives most people end up believing. But the turbulence is here, there will no restoration of status quo ante.

  18. sudden death says

    https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

    btw, original SARS killed 774 people from 2002 to 2004

    SARS 2.0 has killed over 800 people in one day yesterday…

  19. Korenchkin says

    Online arguing with Americans about Corona is like being young again, playing pretend and arguing with that annoying kid which has an invisible shield which protects him from everything

  20. Korenchkin says

    Herd immunity is often used when talking about vaccinations and why it’s important that everyone vaccinates
    But there is no Corona vaccine (yet)

  21. Can’t fix stupid.

    There’s no vaccine and no cure for a society rewarding destructive behavior and embracing absurd dogmatic beliefs.

    Just ask the late Western Roman Empire dead how it went for them in the late fourth century…

    That’s a metaphor (just in case some “genius” takes it literally).

    Maybe we should quarantine the “Apex of Stupid” on the Potomac?

    Might help with worldwide life expectancy…

  22. John Burns, Gettysburg Partisan says

    The British game plan is correct.

    The rest of the world are a bunch of panicky old boomer faggots. The only thing to even remotely worry about is hospital bed capacity.

    Do you people realize how many American small businesses are at risk of being destroyed? But there’s nothing a neo-liberal has ever hated more than goyish self-proprietorship.

    Also, there are less panicky and more industrious boomers in rural America, and they’re being punished too.

  23. LondonBob says

    Looking through the list of countries reporting an infection it seems like every country has a case now. Djibouti has their first, Kyrgyzstan has three now after pilgrims picked it up in Saudi Arabia. The question is what is the Russian government going to do, cases are start to grow exponentially, like the Nordic countries sure they will want take this on during the summer?

  24. LondonBob says

    I wonder if these academics really appreciate such matters, in my experience none at all. The economic impact has been even worse than I thought it would be.

  25. sudden death says

    Super good news:

    https://twitter.com/RiganoESQ/status/1239780304082124800

    Which again shows how counter productive “herd immunity” strategy is as those countries with strict measures will weather the storm under the cover for a while with shutdowns&guarantines while waiting for mass production&delivery of the drug to begin while herd immuners will be running around naked outside during viral tornado.

  26. It is the same as those bullshit “freedom” index ratings.

  27. Just ask the late Western Roman Empire dead how it went for them in the late fourth century…

    It would be great to see a modern Alaric undertake a sack of Washington like the original one did to Rome.

  28. sudden death says

    Also that worst case script with over 7 billion infected and 200 million deaths worldwide over 3 months is the result of ideal herd immunity implementation in practice.

    In reality though my prediction is that all those brave herd immuner countries (Holland, UK etc) will throw in the towel as soon as daily deaths will exceed hundreds like in Italy and suddenly will reverse to full scale shutdowns&quarantines.

  29. Jaakko Raipala says

    Of course super prepared Finland & Scandinavia have messed up completely (Sweden the worst) and after the rising numbers got too embarrassing they just stopped testing. But no worries, they’ve already located the REAL problem.

    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-disinformation/russia-deploying-coronavirus-disinformation-to-sow-panic-in-west-eu-document-says-idUSKBN21518F

    The same Reuters article was of course repeated nearly word for word as a Finnish translation in all our media which, of course, is the most free press in the world according to all the ranking agencies.

  30. I thought the neo-liberal agenda would be to assist the ‘boomer remover’ to eliminate the legacy obligations such as Social Security and even teacher pensions.

  31. sudden death says

    haha, looks like reality finally is begining to set on the skulls of some brave pioneering herd immuners:

    Britain’s coronavirus infections soar 676 in a DAY: Another U-turn from Boris as he announces government in talks to buy four-hour testing kit as he finally admits screening needs to increase from 5,000 to 25,000 a day

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8125461/Labour-demands-coronavirus-tests-NHS-staff-celebrities-buy-375-private-checks.html

  32. Finland is run by a coven of witches, if I recall.

  33. US cases is far over 7000 right now. USA showed the fastest duplication rate during the last three days. Thing will be dark there in the States.

  34. John Burns, Gettysburg Partisan says

    Sudden death,

    It’s pathetic that you and all the other doomers are now reduced to claiming Chinese numbers are false just so you can continue to claim the whole world is ruined.

    You sicken me. But you won’t stop me from enjoying the early spring weather.

  35. John Burns, Gettysburg Partisan says

    If they do throw in the towel, it will be because of smart-mouthed people like yourself running around the internet in a giddy glee actually enjoying yourselves as you panic those with weak minds.

  36. sudden death says

    Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but usually manages to pick himself up, walk over or around it, and carry on.

    Winston Churchill

    http://www.gurteen.com/gurteen/gurteen.nsf/id/L005026/

    Sadly, but in current situation majority of such men will just fall over with potentially fatal double lung pneumonia without usual ability to pick themselves up quickly.

  37. Iran can still dig graves, in America there will nobody doing this as the people will be too busy raiding and butchering each other for a toilet roll and the last twinkie.

  38. Off course every country will be hit. But this picture was used for propagandistic purposes. It is Zooroastrian graveyard and lime is used by practitioners of this religion.

    I would prefer, by far, Germany over the US.

  39. The article you linked mentions the Slovak Prime Minister Pellegrini who was taken to hospital in late February. There was an election on 2/29 and he blamed exhaustion, he is fine now.

    I can confirm that literally within 30 seconds of the announcement that Pellegrini went to hospital, about half of the country said ‘he has corona‘, and ‘he was just in Brussels!!!‘. If Russian operatives somehow managed to spread this disinformation in the intervening 30 seconds, we have a lot more to worry about than corona.

    This highlights the incredibly low intellectual standards of the current European elite. Frankly, they are just very stupid people. And that never ends well. Stupid narcissists with no sense of responsibility, when has that ever worked out?

  40. John Burns, Gettysburg Partisan says

    Winston Churchill……………..you’re quoting Winston Churchill.

    Hitler called that man a “drunken poltroon.” Roosevelt called him a “drunken bum.” When two sources that disparate agree, I’m sure they had a point. Find a better source to support your doomery. I’m not impressed.

  41. sudden death says

    Just come here after 2 weeks again in this same thread, don’t run away if reality will be more harsh then your predictions, then we will still have the chance to talk about doomery, if we will be lucky. Once again can say that myself will be the most happiest man if I am wrong – you can read all my post since January here, but sadly a lot of them came to fruition so far regarding this SARS 2.0 epidemic.

  42. Of course, China is the greatest fail. In terms of food industry hygiene, around a level Europe and America were in the late 19th century.

    (Although I would not blame Chinese people for the lack of development, but rather their incompetent government, and an unfortunate recent history – predation by other powers since the 19th century.)

    A quote from the article of 2014:

    “The emergence of severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5N1, avian influenza H7N9, and severe fever with thrombocytopenia syndrome (SFTS), and the re-emergence of rabies, brucellosis, and other zoonoses have had a significant effect on the national economy and public health in China”
    https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1201971214014970

    No real surprise to see Italy and Spain the worst performers in Europe with the Northern European countries outperforming.

    Partly, this is a bad luck they were the earliest Western victims (due to thousands of workers from China in Italy’s fashion industry), and so too late to use “social distancing” policies before a beginning of the epidemic. Partly this was poor surveillance of the virus in Italy, where it developed for weeks without detection.

    By comparison, Northern European countries have additional days or weeks, in which they can begin policies like “social distancing”.

    There also seems to be a similar temperature range, in all countries where a strong epidemic has developed so far (Wuhan in January, Iran/Italy in February).

    Northern Europe is now in the same temperature range, so it is likely the virus will spread in these climate conditions.

    https://i.imgur.com/Z6d0ELd.jpg

    https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3550308

  43. What about an alternate plan that puts the economy first without lockdowns, that puts emphasis on handing out face masks and hand sanitizers/alcohol out like candy, mass distribution of fapilavir to anyone with even a hint of COVID symptoms, and voluntary work from home schemes?

  44. Nope. The main reason are the isolation measures. Mobilizing doctors certainly helped. The new hospitals were mostly for show.

  45. No real surprise to see Italy and Spain the worst performers in Europe with the Northern European countries outperforming

    It’s way too early to say that. The northern European countries have had an extra month to learn from Italy but we’ll see. Given the the decrepit state of the NHS I don’t have high expectations for Britain.

  46. When it’s useful to have a large prisoner population – captive labour to ramp up production of medical masks:

    https://www.facebook.com/e1news/posts/3105988636080449

  47. on’t have high expectations for Britain

    The most scary thing in the UK.

    UK only has 5000 medical ventilators, with 66 and a half million people. And it seems to have inability to produce new ones in time.

    By comparison, Germany has 25,000 medical ventilators with an additional 10,000 in production.

    America has 160,000 medical ventilators, with an additional 10,000 in storage.

  48. “Now imagine how accurate and unbiased all those “democracy”/”human rights” indices are.” – Good point. One should be skeptical of all kind of made up indices and rather concentrate on specific measurable metrics like for example: how many people killed by police, how many in prisons, how many homeless, how many with diabetes, how many obese, infant mortality…

  49. last straw says

    Of course, China is the greatest fail. In terms of food industry hygiene, around a level Europe and America were in the late 19th century.

    (Although I would not blame Chinese people for the lack of development, but rather their incompetent government, and an unfortunate recent history – predation by other powers since the 19th century.)

    If China were the greatest fail in terms of food industry regulation, and were at a level of late 19th century Europe and America, when life expectancy was in the upper 50s, then it would be hard to envision how China overtakes U.S. for healthy lifespan. Since life expectancy is strictly correlated to per capita income, the Chinese government is actually doing an excellent job in public health overall, considering Chinese have only a fraction of the per capita income of American’s. You need to distinguish China’s current government in the past 40 years from the previous governments. The current government is among the most competitive in the world.

  50. last straw says

    It’s way too early to say that. The northern European countries have had an extra month to learn from Italy but we’ll see. Given the the decrepit state of the NHS I don’t have high expectations for Britain.

    Exactly. Italy and Spain have longer life expectancy than Northern European countries, either because of healthier lifestyle, better healthcare system and public health, or both.

  51. sudden death says

    The Imperial College team plugged infection and death rates from China/Korea/Italy into epidemic modeling software and ran a simulation: what happens if the US does absolutely nothing — if we treat COVID-19 like the flu, go about our business, and let the virus take its course?

    Here’s what would happen: 80% of Americans would get the disease. 0.9% of them would die. Between 4 and 8 percent of all Americans over the age of 70 would die. 2.2 million Americans would die from the virus itself.

    It gets worse. People with severe COVID-19 need to be put on ventilators. 50% of those on ventilators still die, but the other 50% live. But in an unmitigated epidemic, the need for ventilators would be 30 times the number available in the US. Nearly 100% of these patients die.

    So the actual death toll from the virus would be closer to 4 million Americans — in a span of 3 months. 8-15% of all Americans over 70 would die.

    How many is 4 million people? It’s more Americans than have died all at once from anything, ever. It’s the population of Los Angeles. It’s 4 times the number of Americans who died in the Civil War…on both sides combined. It’s two-thirds as many people as died in the Holocaust.

    Americans make up 4.4% of the world’s population. If we extrapolate these numbers to the rest of the world (warning: MOE is high here), this gives us 90 million deaths globally from COVID-19, in 3-6 months. 15 Holocausts. 1.5 times as many people as died in all of World War II.

    Now, of course countries won’t stand by and do nothing. So the Imperial College team ran the numbers again, this time assuming a “mitigation” strategy: all symptomatic cases in the US in isolation. Families of those cases quarantined. All Americans over 70 social distancing.

    This mitigation strategy is what you’ve seen a lot of people talking about when they say we should “flatten the curve”: try to slow the spread of the disease to the people most likely to die from it, to avoid overwhelming hospitals.

    And it does flatten the curve — but not nearly enough. The death rate from the disease is cut in half, but it still kills 1.1 million Americans all by itself. The peak need for ventilators falls by two-thirds, but it still exceeds the number of ventilators in the US by 8 times.

    That leaves the actual death toll in the US at right around 2 million deaths. The population of Houston. Two Civil Wars. One-third of the Holocaust. Globally, 45 million people die: 7.5 Holocausts, 3/4 of World War II. That’s what happens if we rely on mitigation & common sense.

    Finally, the Imperial College team ran the numbers again, assuming a “suppression” strategy: isolate symptomatic cases, quarantine their family members, social distancing for the whole population, all public gatherings/most workplaces shut down, schools and universities close.

    Suppression works! The death rate in the US peaks 3 weeks from now at a few thousand deaths, then goes down. We hit but don’t exceed the number of available ventilators. The nightmarish death tolls from the rest of the study disappear.

    But here’s the catch: if we EVER relax suppression before a vaccine is administered to the entire population, COVID-19 comes right back and kills millions of Americans in a few months, the same as before.

    After the 1st suppression period ends in July, we could probably lift restrictions for a month, followed by 2 more months of suppression, in a repeating pattern without triggering an outbreak or overwhelming the ventilator supply. Staggering breaks by city could do a bit better.

    But we simply cannot EVER allow the virus to spread throughout the entire population in the way other viruses do, because it is just too deadly. If lots of people we know end up getting COVID-19, it means millions of Americans are dying. It simply can’t be allowed to happen.

    How quickly will a vaccine be here? Last week three separate research teams announced they had developed vaccines. Yesterday, one of them (with FDA approval) injected its vaccine into a live person, without waiting for animal testing. That’s an extreme measure, but necessary.

    Now, though, they have to monitor the test subject for 14 months to make sure the vaccine is safe. This part can’t be rushed: if you’re going to inoculate all humans, you have to make absolutely sure the vaccine itself won’t kill them. It probably won’t, but you have to be sure.

    Assuming the vaccine is safe and effective, it will still take several months to produce enough to inoculate the global population. For this reason, the Imperial College team estimated it will be about 18 months until the vaccine is available.

    During those 18 months, things are going to be very difficult and very scary. Our economy and society will be disrupted in profound ways. And if suppression actually works, it will feel like we’re doing all this for nothing, because infection and death rates will remain low.

    It’s easy to get people to come together in common sacrifice in the middle of a war. It’s very hard to get them to do so in a pandemic that looks invisible precisely because suppression methods are working. But that’s exactly what we’re going to have to do.

    https://twitter.com/jeremycyoung/status/1239975682643357696?s=19

  52. sudden death says

    The Imperial College team plugged infection and death rates from China/Korea/Italy into epidemic modeling software and ran a simulation: what happens if the US does absolutely nothing — if we treat COVID-19 like the flu, go about our business, and let the virus take its course?

    Here’s what would happen: 80% of Americans would get the disease. 0.9% of them would die. Between 4 and 8 percent of all Americans over the age of 70 would die. 2.2 million Americans would die from the virus itself.

    It gets worse. People with severe COVID-19 need to be put on ventilators. 50% of those on ventilators still die, but the other 50% live. But in an unmitigated epidemic, the need for ventilators would be 30 times the number available in the US. Nearly 100% of these patients die.

    So the actual death toll from the virus would be closer to 4 million Americans — in a span of 3 months. 8-15% of all Americans over 70 would die.

    How many is 4 million people? It’s more Americans than have died all at once from anything, ever. It’s the population of Los Angeles. It’s 4 times the number of Americans who died in the Civil War…on both sides combined. It’s two-thirds as many people as died in the Holocaust.

    Americans make up 4.4% of the world’s population. If we extrapolate these numbers to the rest of the world (warning: MOE is high here), this gives us 90 million deaths globally from COVID-19, in 3-6 months. 15 Holocausts. 1.5 times as many people as died in all of World War II.

    Now, of course countries won’t stand by and do nothing. So the Imperial College team ran the numbers again, this time assuming a “mitigation” strategy: all symptomatic cases in the US in isolation. Families of those cases quarantined. All Americans over 70 social distancing.

    This mitigation strategy is what you’ve seen a lot of people talking about when they say we should “flatten the curve”: try to slow the spread of the disease to the people most likely to die from it, to avoid overwhelming hospitals.

    And it does flatten the curve — but not nearly enough. The death rate from the disease is cut in half, but it still kills 1.1 million Americans all by itself. The peak need for ventilators falls by two-thirds, but it still exceeds the number of ventilators in the US by 8 times.

    That leaves the actual death toll in the US at right around 2 million deaths. The population of Houston. Two Civil Wars. One-third of the Holocaust. Globally, 45 million people die: 7.5 Holocausts, 3/4 of World War II. That’s what happens if we rely on mitigation & common sense.

    Finally, the Imperial College team ran the numbers again, assuming a “suppression” strategy: isolate symptomatic cases, quarantine their family members, social distancing for the whole population, all public gatherings/most workplaces shut down, schools and universities close.

    Suppression works! The death rate in the US peaks 3 weeks from now at a few thousand deaths, then goes down. We hit but don’t exceed the number of available ventilators. The nightmarish death tolls from the rest of the study disappear.

    But here’s the catch: if we EVER relax suppression before a vaccine is administered to the entire population, COVID-19 comes right back and kills millions of Americans in a few months, the same as before.

    After the 1st suppression period ends in July, we could probably lift restrictions for a month, followed by 2 more months of suppression, in a repeating pattern without triggering an outbreak or overwhelming the ventilator supply. Staggering breaks by city could do a bit better.

    But we simply cannot EVER allow the virus to spread throughout the entire population in the way other viruses do, because it is just too deadly. If lots of people we know end up getting COVID-19, it means millions of Americans are dying. It simply can’t be allowed to happen.

    https://twitter.com/jeremycyoung/status/1239975682643357696?s=19

  53. another anon says
  54. LondonBob says

    London has huge numbers of Chinese tourists and was one of top places for likely outbreak outside China but we are only going exponential now, probably due to it spreading from Italy and Spain, not China. We are just far more competent at monitoring and contact chasing, as well as basic hygiene.

  55. LondonBob says

    So their very worst scenario is eighty percent infected and 0.9% of those dying, those being the already poorly and elderly…

  56. Philip Owen says

    Absolutely right. I have done some of the sums on James’ Thompson’s blog using the Diamond Princess as a model. Here is a follow on.

    normal UK death rate = 9.3/1000/year
    This will become 9.8/1000/year (half a person in your small village)

    Bridgend County Borough has 80000 people and 200 hospital beds. The half persons will die over a period of 8 weeks if mitigation works. So 400 deadly cases = 50 a week (survival rate is week too). That’s a quarter of the beds. Most of the 200 beds are non urgent but comparison. Mitigation can work.

    The future deaths from the economic recession will be at least comparable.

    The big problem is the potential 2nd wave. We won’t know about that until October. Mitigation, infect the superspreaders now, is the only way to deal with it.

  57. Philip Owen says

    Herd immunity means protected the old and sick and letting the young and healthy catch the disease, especially the superspreaders.

  58. yakushimaru says

    An intriguing development in Wuhan. For the last 5 days also, there are new confirmed cases being reported each day by clinic. Around 5 cases in total. But where and how did they get infected? These are not cases shifted from the quarantined group.

    Maybe some bats are still out there?

  59. Hopefully it’ll whipe out the US white population.

  60. Philip Owen says

    83% of the people on the Diamond Princess did not get the disease after a month’s exposure. 80% will get the disease is fantastically in excess of the evidence. This is a very biased modelling effort by Labour party sympathizers aiming to spread alarm.

  61. 80% will get the disease is fantastically in excess of the evidence.

    True. Looking at the % of positive tests in the different European countries they are very low, in single digits. And the tested are the people who show symptoms or who were exposed. There could be other things going on like a long incubation period or bad tests. But it doesn’t currently show that 60-80% of people would get it.

    We keep on thinking of viruses invading a human body. But viruses predate humanity, they have been around for 100’s of million of years. We are as much in their world as they are in ours. Our organism is capable of defending itself, and based on the data most humans do.

  62. Godfree Roberts says

    Statista, whose chart adorns the top of this article, is an Oxford University outfit with a flair for graphics and none for credibility.

    When I questioned the Chinese figures in their world famines chart they referred me to an Irish academic and, when I asked him about them he wrote that he knew nothing about Chinese famines.

  63. Godfree Roberts says

    Not so fast…Chinese children’s healthy life expectancy is already greater than American kids’ and urban life expectancy is already greater than average US life expectancy.

  64. Godfree Roberts says

    Precisely. We began out ‘don’t test’ policy last August, and it’s working a charm. Hence my questions:

    1. When was patient zero detected in the US? 
    2. What are the names of the hospitals who detected Covid-19 earliest?  
    3. How many people are infected? 
    4. After WHO issued a Red Alert January 1, why were US health authorities forbidden to test for Covid-19 until March?
    5. Why does the CDC classify its coronavirus deliberations?
    6. Why are Coronavirus meetings at HHS held in Sensitive Compartmentalized Information Facilities, which are usually reserved for intelligence and military operations?
  65. US and EU are asking the young and less vulnerable to freeze their lives, to forgo and sacrifice materially in order to protect the old who have ruthlessly exploited the young and shifted all burdens on them over the last few decades.

    Harsh.

    I wish you wouldn’t put it out there like that for everyone to see and think about.

  66. sudden death says

    In percentages it doesn’t seem so bad, but in absolute numbers several million deaths and many more seriously sick people in 3 months is absolute overkill which will bury organized healthcare system, infect horrible numbers of unprepared&unprotected non renewable medical staff and in effect will double those deaths as they mention this in study too.

    Quarantines and shutdowns while economically damaging without a doubt gives the time to make clinical trials for the possible promising cures such as hydrochloroquine or remdesivir and for mass production and delivery of those drugs for everybody in need, which in effect drives death rates and absolute deaths down to manageable numbers, also shortens recovery duration.

    Not to mention that avg ages of such critical sector of society as farmers is quite high and seeding season is coming, but what would happen if those people will start to get sick in massive numbers at that time? Whole food production chain may completely collapse as its first link goes down!

  67. another anon says

    America no fear Corona. America Stronk!

    https://twitter.com/CBSNews/status/1240371160078000128

  68. There are obviously far more Chinese in northern Italy than London, with a significant proportion of them being from Wuhan.

  69. USA! USA! USA! USA!

  70. Godfree Roberts says

    “China is the greatest fail. In terms of food industry hygiene, around a level Europe and America were in the late 19th century.”

    Nonsense.

    Life expectancy in urban China already exceeds US average life expectancy.

    Healthy life expectancy for ALL Chinese newborns exceeds American newborns’.

    https://i.imgur.com/ps22JXR.jpg

  71. “God has a special providence for fools, drunkards, and the United States of America.”

    • Bismark

    Sorry poor commies, ex-commies, and commie-symps.

    https://i.redd.it/w3r75dh1kadz.jpg

  72. “Source: Dude trust me”

    How come nearly every other source available on the internet has the Chinese life expectancy at lower than the US (which isn’t even the best in the world)? Can you provide some actual studies rather than a self-compiled graph with no source?

  73. Hyperborean says

    Have you considered writing about the Qianlong Emperor, the An Lushan rebellion or Song literati? At least then it would provide the opportunity for those who read you to learn something new.

  74. Godfree Roberts says

    The source of my data is the WHO, as noted on the chart.

    What are your sources?

  75. Makes perfect evolutionary sense. It is not about the alcohol, or the land whales, but about the young, loose women.

  76. He probably does not know the difference between life expectancy at birth vs (overall) life expectancy.

    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-lifespan/china-overtakes-u-s-for-healthy-lifespan-who-data-idUSKCN1IV15L

  77. Eating bad street BBQ is going to give you bad diarrhea the next day, it’s not going to kill you or put you in the hospital for the last 10 years of your life. Life expectancy and healthy lifespan are perfectly useless measures for evaluating food safety.

    Chinese food safety is poor. Anyone who suggests otherwise has no grasp on reality.

  78. Russia has 40,000 ventilators, which is less than US, but Russia doesn’t spent $3-4 trillion on healthcare annually.

    https://vz.ru/news/2020/3/17/1029305.html

    (Russian paper, apologies to international readers).

    So far Russia has 147 cases, but it is growing fast, with 33 in the last 24 hours. No deaths, 5 recovered. 122,000 tested.

    https://стопкоронавирус.рф

    Russian State Venture Fund got Russian and Japanese scientists to work together on a fast detection kits.

    https://www.intellinews.com/the-russian-fund-for-direct-investment-rdif-ties-up-with-japan-to-mass-produce-state-of-the-art-covid-19-testing-kit-178600/?source=russia

    I would say Russia is doing good with resources it has.

    Generally though, best way to tell if Russia is good at something – silence in Western media. And here in the US, everybody is yelling how bad China and Iran are, but nothing on Russia. Which means Russia must be highly effective.

  79. Godfree Roberts says

    Nonsense. See my comment, #74, above.

  80. LondonBob says

    Update from HK.

    Well, a European teaching assistant returned to HK, did not go into self-imposed isolation and went down with the bug. My daughter is now in isolation with mild, as yet unconfirmed symptoms. The returnee didn’t go back to work, but turned up in the staff room to tell all about her great holiday. All in the room now in lockdown. They weren’t teaching, just getting materials for the on-line lessons. The girl when asked to leave the school went on the piss in Lan Kwai Fong, playground of the rich and famous in HK. How many she infected there yet to be seen. HK was doing well and controlling the numbers. Now with returning students and idiots like this girl, they are seeing a rise in numbers, and the wife and I will worry ourselves sick for the next week.

    When folk don’t follow the rules, this shit happens

  81. reiner Tor says

    Congrats, I’m reading in the Hungarian press that Slovakia is doing very well on this Covid-19 epidemic.

  82. reiner Tor says

    Well, herd immunity could also be achieved by just letting the epidemic run its course. That’s how epidemics stop: they infect (and sometimes kill) so many people that there’s hardly anyone left to infect, so it just stops. Some of the people who have not been infected cannot be infected because those who recovered and are immune (temporarily or permanently) are shielding them – that’s herd immunity. But it’s better to achieve with a vaccine.

  83. How about just giving everybody a mask and a 500ml of hand sanitizer and handing out a bottle or two of antivirals to everybody but going on with business as usual? So if you get the slightest hint of a cold, you take your antivirals.

  84. Thank you, it is ok so far, but the night is young.

    If it gets too crazy in the lowlands, maybe we can all escape into the mountains. Stay safe.

  85. LondonBob says
  86. …99% of Those Who Died From Virus Had Other Illness, Italy Says.

    We are heading into an interesting situation: until the virus becomes curable are we all quarantined in order to prevent harm to the vulnerable? That could be years. Maybe the boomer libertines should cash out all their assets and segregate themselves somewhere in the countryside. The rest of us can go on with our lives.

    This is not solvable unless we address the issue of how and whether to protect the vulnerable. Even if it subsides this time, it could restart next winter. This is the ultimate in divine rebalancing – a virus Russian roulette for the boomer generation.

  87. sudden death says

    99% of Those Who Died From Virus Had Other Illness, Italy Says.

    How many people over 40 worldwide absolutely have no other illnesses such as elevated blood pressure?

  88. for-the-record says

    How many people over 40 worldwide absolutely have no other illnesses such as elevated blood pressure?

    If you look at the actual study that was cited (counting pathologies for a sample of 303 deaths)

    https://www.epicentro.iss.it/coronavirus/bollettino/Report-COVID-2019_17_marzo-v2.pdf

    you will be able to calculate that the pathologies other than “elevated blood pressure” average 1.64 per person. And these are “serious” pathologies (diabetes, cancer, renal insufficiency, etc.). And of course elevated blood pressure in certain cases can also be an extreme pathology.

    Taking into account that the average age of death is 80, there are very few (if any) people in their 40s dying whose only pre-existing condition is high blood pressure.

  89. for-the-record says

    Short video from Italy in 1968 in the midst of the “Influenza Spaziale” (Space flu, presumably because it was associated with the lunar landing) which put 13 million Italians (a quarter of the population) in bed and killed 20,000 of them. Elsewhere known as the Flu Pandemic of 1968 or the Hong Kong Flu. Deaths worldwide estimated at 1,000,000 (100,000 in US).

    You don’t need to understand Italian to note right away the absence of panic, compared to today that is.

    https://patrimonio.archivioluce.com/luce-web/detail/IL5000046121/2/epidemia-influenza-spaziale-13-milioni-italiani-letto.html

  90. sudden death says

    Short video from Italy in 1968 in the midst of the “Influenza Spaziale” (Space flu, presumably because it was associated with the lunar landing) which put 13 million Italians (a quarter of the population) in bed and killed 20,000 of them.

    So death rate in that “Influenza Spaziale” was 0.15%, while SARS 2.0 death rate at 1% is 6,5 times higher than that according to the most optimistic scripts. In Italy at the moment preliminary CFR is about 7% if I’m not mistaken, so 45,5 times higher than in 1968. Those are absolutely incomparable numbers and events, so no wonder there was no panic then.

  91. sudden death says

    Very soon USA will blow Italy’s today numbers out of the water completely:

    https://twitter.com/DrMattMcCarthy/status/1240326698299727889

  92. for-the-record says

    . In Italy at the moment preliminary CFR is about 7% if I’m not mistaken

    The “official” number of cases in Italy is currently reported to be 35,713. That is based on the number of tests carried out (60,761) on people presenting symptoms. To the best of my knowledge, there has been no random testing carried out. I assert, and no one can contradict me at this stage, that there are at least 1 million infected, and more likely 2-3 million, which makes the CFR in the range of 0.1 – 0.3%.

    Note for the record that in an “average” year Italy has around 6 million cases of “normal” flu,

    https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1201971219303285

    so if this virus is so contagious why should the total number be so ridiculously low as it is officially reported?

  93. Toronto Russian says

    They’re unwittingly re-enacting a classic literary work:
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Feast_in_Time_of_Plague

  94. another anon says

    Well, while some are partying, others are preparing.
    I know, by serious prepper-survivalist standards this is nothing, but at least they are trying. If you have to die, die on the pile of rotting fruit and toilet paper!

    https://twitter.com/ResisterDude/status/1240454915509694465

  95. In the narrow but important sense of creating dangerous zoonoses, China is the world’s greatest fail in hygiene food industry regulation. Most of the most dangerous ones of recent years are precisely from China.
    https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1201971214014970

    On the other hand, – although the real death figures in China from COVID-19 are far higher than what China has officially reported – it is possible that it has still saved more lives overall, due to the reduction in air pollution.

    So the reduction in air pollution is the blessing of this epidemic.
    http://www.g-feed.com/2020/03/covid-19-reduces-economic-activity.html

    Chinese government is actually doing an excellent job in public health overall, considering Chinese have only a fraction of the per capita income

    Your mistake is inferring differences of life expectancy is a product of a good government policy or development. Hunter-gatherers had longer life-expectancy than English of first half of 19th century, when England was the master of the world, and at this time the most advanced country in world history. Simple Okinawan or Cretan peasants have the world’s longest life-expectancy, not sophisticated Tokyoites and culturally/economically advanced Hollanders and Danes.

    To some extent China’s health likely benefits on the one hand, from still having some peasant conditions, where people eat traditional diets of vegetables. On the other hand, we can see in China there are some terrible problems of air pollution, contaminated products (for example, milk which is mixed with melamine, resulting in fatal cynanide poisoning), and regular creation of dangerous zoonoses.

  96. As this week has developed, it became evident the first stage (preventing the virus entering the country), seems to have failed now in Russia. The policies for stopping it entering the country were around 1 month too late.

    And the policies were “leaking” too much. Problems of the situation was discussed in comments here. https://www.unz.com/akarlin/russian-corona/#comments (Authorities in Russia were less idiots than Western Europe and America, but still idiots).

    Even now, for example, they are relying on thermal scanning in the airport for people returning from abroad, when they know that COVID-19 is probably transmitted to a significant extent by pre-symptomatic and asymtomatic people. I.e. that everyone should be tested, not thermally scanned (as the latter only discovered symptomatic people who are in a certain stage of the disease).

    However, now the outer wall has been penetrated, defense against the epidemic is at the second stage – social distancing. The disease caused by the virus arrives 1-2 weeks after infection. Russia is a few weeks behind Western Europe in the epidemic, so social distancing now, can prevent the flood in cases that we see in Western Europe.

    In the USSR, by the 1970s, there was the world’s best anti-epidemic state capacity. But there is not the same state capacity today as in the USSR.

    However, I predict, social distancing and quaranting will still be more successful in Russia than in Western Europe – in Russia, there is more state capacity for enforcement of this compared to countries like Spain, Italy, UK. (But less state capacity for quaranting/social distance enforcement than China, and less survellance ability than South Korea).

    More important, these policies are arriving a couple of weeks earlier in Russia than in Western Europe.

  97. What kind of preparations did people here do?

    I don’t have any stockup of buckwheat or toilet paper. But I bought a 150 litre freezer and it is now full of frozen meat, fruit (which we can make into smoothies) and vegetables. The problem will be if there is apocalypse and we lose the electricity.

    I should also be able to still go to the supermarket and breath clean air – if while looking like Darth Vader -, as I was buying a lot of respirators, this week I received from Germany some professional ones with ABEK P3 filtration.

  98. Maybe the boomer libertines should cash out all their assets and segregate themselves somewhere in the countryside. The rest of us can go on with our lives.

    Relevant:

    A somewhat similar institution used to flourish on the outskirts of Calcutta, and there is a story that if you go into the heart of Bikanir, which is in the heart of the Great Indian Desert, you shall come across not a village but a town where the Dead who did not die but may not live have established their headquarters. And, since it is perfectly true that in the same Desert is a wonderful city where all the rich money lenders retreat after they have made their fortunes (fortunes so vast that the owners cannot trust even the strong hand of the Government to protect them, but take refuge in the waterless sands), and drive sumptuous C-spring barouches, and buy beautiful girls and decorate their palaces with gold and ivory and Minton tiles and mother-o’-pearl, I do not see why Jukes’s tale should not be true.

  99. “In the narrow but important sense of creating dangerous zoonoses, China is the world’s greatest fail in hygiene food industry regulation. Most of the most dangerous ones of recent years are precisely from China.”

    Still believe Covid-19 is “caused” by Chinese eating bat soup?

    Still believe most of the zoonoses are “precisely” from China, rather than “blame on” China?

    Still can’t explain why few zoonoses are “precisely” from the many developing countries with much lower food hygiene standards than China? There are over 100 developing countries in the world, with many lower standards than China.

    “Your mistake is inferring differences of life expectancy is a product of a good government policy or development. “

    Of course, it is a combination of multiple factors: government policy and economic development included. China’s life expectancy has risen from 35 in 1949 to close to 80 today. That is a huge improvement.

  100. another anon says

    If you are serious about prepping for disaster, learn to shut up and do not let anyone know.
    If true apocalypse comes, it will be your next door neighbors who would cut your throat to get at your supplies. Prepare accordingly.

    In other words, telling the whole world about your secret doomsday bunker is F grade fail.

    https://twitter.com/TheSun/status/1240388093489950723

  101. There are over 100 developing countries in the world, with many lower standards than China.

    China has the most chickens and pigs of any country in the world. That’s what makes it unique.

  102. I already told this to @A123. He answered that there is no problem because Iran should be worse.

  103. I’ve heard that the president of Finland, an old man, took the prime minister and her coven in hand to create tougher measures.

  104. for-the-record says

    as I was buying a lot of respirators, this week I received from Germany some professional ones with ABEK P3 filtration.

    Probably this will be an unpopular opinion given the “sauve qui peut” attitude that seems to be all-too-common, but for God’s (or anyone else’s sake) please donate these to a hospital or medical center that urgently needs them.

  105. Name one less developed country which has China’s combination of wet market conditions(wild and domestic animals in close proximity, no one wearing gloves, slaughter on site, blood and filth flowing on the street), population density, and poor hygiene. There isn’t one.

    Most zoonoses come from Guangdong, the area of China where people are well known for eating anything. It’s not hard to understand.

  106. By the way, anyone who is touting Chinese life expectancy should take a look at Asian American life expectancy. Bio-Leninism rots the brain.

  107. Jaakko Raipala says

    Actually it was the True Finns party that pushed hard for emergency measures. They’re considered very threatening by our pozzed establishment so the President has been privately telling these girls that they need to do something before the True Finns have 50 % of the vote.

    This may turn out to be a really stupid move, though. I wouldn’t be one bit surprised if it turns out that the President and the girls team up together to somehow use emergency powers against the True Finns.

    Regardless, rumors of a border close are exaggerated as they’re still open to things like transports, politicians, UN personnel and, DRUMROLL, “refugees”. Not ordinary Finnish citizens, of course, and the state plans to do nothing to help Finnish citizens abroad while still condemning evil Greece and promosing to send flights to get those “refugees”here.

    The girls really want to pick a propaganda fight with Russia so it would be amusing if we soon hear that Finns stranded in Russia or the ex-USSR are handled better by the Russian state than by Finland.

  108. Swedish Family says

    Already quoted this tweet in August last year, but it merits a second appearance:

    Whenever I’m looking at data from an economic index, I look for what I call ‘America points’. These are components of the index that simply reward countries for being more like America. Here’s a nice example with ‘ethics boards’ in an innovation index:

    https://chinapower.csis.org/china-intelligent-automation/

  109. Swedish Family says

    However, now the outer wall has been penetrated, defense against the epidemic is at the second stage – social distancing. The disease caused by the virus arrives 1-2 weeks after infection. Russia is a few weeks behind Western Europe in the epidemic, so social distancing now, can prevent the flood in cases that we see in Western Europe.

    This was always a given. How on earth do you wall off the world’s biggest country? And one that borders China at that.

  110. for-the-record says

    Have a look at these graphs which depict pooled death rates for EU countries over the past few years:

    https://www.euromomo.eu/outputs/number.html

    You will see that there were pronounced “excesses” of deaths during the “flu season” in 2016/7 and 2017/8 and to a lesser extent in 2018/9. For 2019/20 (that means now!) the excess has been marginal and in fact as of week 11 (this week!), it is distinctly negative.

    If I am interpreting these figures correctly, it means that in the countries in the sample (which includes Italy and Spain) for the past few weeks we have been experiencing a “below-norm” number of deaths in all age groups. This is presumably due to the strict measures that have been taken to combat coronavirus, which have had the primary effect of reducing death rates from “normal” flu and other such transmissible infections, as well as auto and other accidents.

  111. sudden death says

    Probably this will be an unpopular opinion given the “sauve qui peut” attitude that seems to be all-too-common, but for God’s (or anyone else’s sake) please donate these to a hospital or medical center that urgently needs them.

    Absolute BS, because this clever guy with his own PPE will do more good for hospital or medical center by protecting himself, not becoming a spreader and not showing up there when coughing his lungs out after getting the virus.

    If a simple poster with a drop of common sense already at the end January could foresee a full blown shitstorm coming and started to read everything coming and freely available from medical journals in order to be better prepared and had taken all possible precautions,including buying PPE, then it is simply inexcusable for a decently earning healthcare proffesionals with a medical education not to do the same and not to wait for somebody else (CDC, hospital administration , government etc.) to do this for them.

  112. “Name one less developed country which has China’s combination of …”

    1. Almost every developing countries (and many developed ones) have wet markets. I visited some or know people who visited some in: Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Maldives, Philippines, Polynesian, Europe, Japan, Canada, …
    2. Many people in the world eat exotic animals too. I personally know some white people who eat more exotic food than 99% of Chinese.

    3. It is not proven that most zoonoses are caused by eating habits or hygiene condition. You should know that there are still disputes about the causes (natural vs man-make), or even the origin (US vs China) of Covid-19. In fact, decades after outbreak of SAR, the cause and source of SAR is still unknown.

    “Most zoonoses come from Guangdong, the area of China where people are well known for eating anything. It’s not hard to understand.”

    Then, please tell why Covid-19 was not detected in Guangdong first? Please tell why Ebola, MERS, H1N1, rabies, salmonellosis, west Nile virus, and many others did not originate in Guangdong? Please provide scientific papers or proof that “Most zoonoses come from Guangdong”.

  113. for-the-record says

    Absolute BS, because this clever guy with his own PPE will do more good for hospital or medical center by protecting himself, not becoming a spreader and not showing up there when coughing his lungs out after getting the virus.

    Sorry, but you’re the one who is spouting absolute rubbish. With very very few exceptions, and Dmitri will not be one of them, the only ones who are going to die from this are old people with serious existig pre-conditions.

    I am still waiting for someone to challenge the figures I have presented above showing that European deaths are going DOWN, not up, these past few weeks.

  114. reiner Tor says

    Life is not pretty on the Trump Train, but at least brain cancer is not a big risk there.

  115. sudden death says

    Deaths are only part of a big problem, without PPE Dmitry being a spreader can infect many of those elderly people in the market/store/metro etc and by not doing that he is helping to reduce overload of organised healthcare system:

    http://www.biotecnologi.org/anbi/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Coronavirus-ENG-1024×771.png

  116. 1. Almost every developing countries (and many developed ones) have wet markets. I visited some or know people who visited some in: Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Maldives, Philippines, Polynesian, Europe, Japan, Canada

    The existence of wet markets isn’t the issue. I asked for wet markets which met a similar criteria to China’s. The correct answer is there are none. The closest is Vietnam.

    Many people in the world eat exotic animals too. I personally know some white people who eat more exotic food than 99% of Chinese

    Personal anecdotes are not going to get you anywhere. What is needed is a mechanism for pathogens to spread from wild animals to domestic to humans. Markets in densely populated areas where domestic animals are in close contact with wild animals, and hygienic conditions are bad is the perfect setting.

    China has the largest number of pigs and chickens in the world and is the biggest market for exotic animals. Many individual species are primarily at threat of extinction because of the Chinese(pangolins and rhinos for instance). Try again.

    Then, please tell why Covid-19 was not detected in Guangdong first? Please tell why Ebola, MERS, H1N1, rabies, salmonellosis, west Nile virus, and many others did not originate in Guangdong? Please provide scientific papers or proof that “Most zoonoses come from Guangdong

    Who said anything about Covid-19 originating in Guangdong?

  117. Philip Owen says

    There is even music to go with this epidemic.

    https://youtu.be/jWFb5z3kUSQ

  118. LondonBob says

    Up to a quarter of British deaths are Muslim.

    https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/coronavirus-muslim-mosque-closure-prayer-nhs-a9411936.html

    I was wondering about that, the diverse areas are recording a large number of cases. The areas of London that are still white British have the lowest number of confirmed cases.

  119. last straw says

    I was talking about food safety regulation in China. Some Chinese obviously bend the rules, just like drug dealers and drug addicts will break drug laws. But I don’t think China’s food safety regulation is at the level of pre-FDA era. If it were that bad, it would probably affect China’s healthy life span. Just compare the situation with the drug addiction problem in the U.S. Some researchers actually postulated that the reduction in American life expectancy in the last 2 or 3 years is related to increased drug use. So yes, if China’s food regulation is so bad, it may well affect China’s healthy life span.

  120. last straw says

    If what you said were true, then life expectancy would be inversely correlated to industrial development. This, however, completely contradicts to what we have observed in the past 70 years or so in the real world.

  121. another anon says

    This is wrong. This will be start of globalism with teeth, “global governance” coming through the front door.
    Anatoly Karlin pointed it too.

    https://www.unz.com/akarlin/corona-cost

    But all their efforts would be in vain if just a few (or even one) defeatist, incompetent, or plain stupidly-run countries decline to take the necessary steps, and thereby cut two years off global life expectancy into the indefinite future.

    Epidemic disease is not your “internal affair”.
    The virus does not care about lines you draw on the map. The virus does not care about your “countries” and “nations”. If even one “sovereign country” lets the virus spread, it will be source of infection for the whole world, permanently.
    Would the world put up with it? Should it?

  122. Philip Owen says

    Syria, Libya, Donbass. Less likely the Rohinga camps in Bangladesh.

  123. “The existence of wet markets isn’t the issue. I asked for wet markets which met a similar criteria to China’s. The correct answer is there are none.”

    Really? So there are some OBJECTIVE criteria for measuring cleanliness of wet markets? Does “5 raccoons + 3 dogs + 200 turtles” more dirty than “10000 fishes + 20 octopus”, or something like that? Or is that decided by the amount of blood?

    “China has the largest number of pigs and chickens in the world and is the biggest market for exotic animals.”

    Scientists do not even understand the process of how most of the zoonoses are transmitted to humans, let alone pinpointing it to eating habits. Try again.

    “Who said anything about Covid-19 originating in Guangdong?”

    Remember you are the one who claims WITHOUT PROOF that:

    “Most zoonoses come from Guangdong… It’s not hard to understand.”

    So, other than Covid-19, please tell how many zoonoses are known to scientists today? 100? 200? And how many have been proven to come from Guangdong, or even from China? By “proven”, I mean scientifically, of course.

  124. Philip Owen says

    16-18 actually sent life expectancy gains in the UK into reverse.

    Interesting. There may be hospital capacity yet.

  125. Toronto Russian says

    From a comment long ago:

    Preppers?
    There was once a prepper family in the Donbass, at the exact time and place when S really hit the F. They had generators, all survival quipment, supplies of gasoline, water and food and they thought they were safe.
    They were really, really wrong.

    There was story about them in NYT, because it made the rebels look bad. But this story is plausible and if they were on the other side of the front line, they would fare the same.
    https://www.unz.com/jthompson/the-genetics-of-genius/#comment-1943777

    By the way, toilet paper is already back on the shelves. And my home is swamped with kindergarten lunches from a family member’s job: the kitchen gave them away to employees at the start of the quarantine. Food banks only accept non-perishable items, so we have nothing to do but eat toddler food for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Luckily it’s fancy health food, not something like infamous “Michelle Obama lunches.”

  126. Philip Owen says

    One of my clients is a peanut farmer in Bikaner. I’ll ask him about this place.

  127. Chinese food regulations mean little without proper enforcement.

    Food poisoning is a not a lead cause of death, not in China, not anywhere, not in the late 19th century. Your premise is simply wrong.

    I don’t see much utility in the drug comparison. It’s difficult to overdose on food.

  128. Jaakko Raipala says

    I’m seeing non-East-Asian migrants just loitering and looking for opportunities for mischief. Locals and East Asian migrants are staying in.

    In my neighborhood Middle Eastern kebab places are open, Chinese restaurants are closed.

    Maybe pandemics are eugenic.

  129. Really? So there are some OBJECTIVE criteria for measuring cleanliness of wet markets? Does “5 raccoons + 3 dogs + 200 turtles” more dirty than “10000 fishes + 20 octopus”, or something like that? Or is that decided by the amount of blood?

    You’re just obfuscating. But if you want to go down this route, feel free, remember it was you who asserted the following: “Still can’t explain why few zoonoses are “precisely” from the many developing countries with much lower food hygiene standards than China?” with no evidence given. If you want to call into question common sense notions of cleanliness by demanding studies which give exact measures of cleanliness in wet markets(knowing full well such studies do not exist), that’s fine, but such standards would also have to apply to your claim of weaker food hygiene standards in 100 less developed countries. By all means deny the premise of your own argument, it’s not hurting me any.

    So, other than Covid-19, please tell how many zoonoses are known to scientists today? 100? 200? And how many have been proven to come from Guangdong, or even from China? By “proven”, I mean scientifically, of course.

    To clarify, I was talking about zoonoses in China.

  130. Toronto Russian says

    If what you said were true, then life expectancy would be inversely correlated to industrial development. This, however, completely contradicts to what we have observed in the past 70 years or so in the real world.

    Industrialization reduces child mortality and deaths from conditions that are curable/preventable with technology, like tuberculosis or cholera. But once this factor is out of the way in both “simple” places and more developed places (a Greek islander is as unlikely to die from cholera as a Dutchman), then the “simple” may live longer just because of less stress. Stress may provoke overeating and substance abuse, and is not good for the heart and blood pressure.

    Ultra-orthodox Jewish women in Israel live 1.5 years longer than other Jewish women of similar economic status, despite numerous pregnancies depleting their organisms’ resources. The Amish have exactly the same life expectancy as their normal white American neighbors, despite numerous pregnancies and heavy farm labor. There’s an explanation that being always surrounded by a supportive community makes them less lonely and stressed than a typical urban lifestyle would.

  131. Unless the main goal is post-apocalyptic larping, which is also perfectly OK and normal.

  132. https://twitter.com/akarlin88/status/1236016050912866306

    That said, with Moscow at 199, I am no longer going to any restaurants.

  133. another anon says

    Meanwhile, mighty Corona-Chan protects Iran from wrath of Trump.
    Praise Corona-Chan!

    https://twitter.com/KyleWOrton/status/1240813191950671875

  134. I don’t think such a place really existed outside of folk legend, that was a quote from a Kipling story (The Strange Ride of Morrowbie Jukes).

    One critic on the Kipling Society page thinks the story is an artistic representation of sunstroke delirium.

    Please forgive me for spoiling the joke if you’re being drily sarcastic, it’s hard to tell online.

  135. Philip Owen says

    What’s your blood group. Type A is almost as having diabetes.

  136. Toronto Russian says

    By the way, it’s not about high religiosity. Fundamentalist Evangelicals, in contrast to Jews and Amish, have a custom of raising large families alone, in homesteads or other kind of isolation from community (they may think other people are not holy enough or bad influence). They aren’t known for longevity or health and I’ve read some really disturbing accounts of them falling apart. On the other hand, Cubans are half-pagan (Santería) if they care about religion at all. They’re extroverted, have each other’s back amid the everyday communist hardships, and their vitality in old age is remarkable:

    [Age] doesn’t matter in Cuba. A Cuban woman is equally likely to become a mom and housekeeper by 16 and have affairs with neighbor abuelos (grandfathers) at 70. The only difference is that 16-year-olds will be liked by everybody and 70-year-olds by 70-year-olds, for life expectancy on the Island is all right, and “combat ability” is kept by local machos until the very end.
    https://cubamepapi.wordpress.com/2017/07/26

    Which is the kind of longevity that we really want (I think no one would choose some extra meaningless years as an Alzheimer’s patient over a life ending like this).

    So, social isolation is good for surviving a pandemic but it’s the opposite in normal life.

  137. Coronavirus was not in Northern China, so except in a couple of Chinese tourists, it never came to Russia from China.

    Detected cases were from coming from Europe (mainly returning Russian tourists from Italy), and almost everything has come through Moscow, and then connecting flights.

    Russia had an advantage of far lower per capita connectivity than in Europe, and this is the reason why the epidemic is about two weeks behind north-west Europe.

    However, it seems now (this week) becoming more obvious that this opportunity has been a failure, because of the incompetent authorities and their “leaky” policies. Discussed some of the reasons in the comments here: https://www.unz.com/akarlin/russian-corona/#comments

    The remaining advantage or hope is that social isolation policies are beginning earlier in relation to the epidemic, than in north-west Europe. So all these policies are beginning at an earlier stage in the epidemic, so in two weeks, it could avoid the flood of infected people that happens now in the UK or Sweden.

  138. In early February I was buying disposable N95 and N99 masks. At that time, Chinese people were mass buying them to send to China, so you had to check daily to find them in stock.

    Anyway, I bought about 60 of those disposable masks, as I didn’t know then that you can re-use them indefinitely.

    Then in February I thought I should get something better quality and bought half-mask respirators from Dräger, Honywell and 3M. This style is makes you look like Darth Vader. But you have to wear these with safety goggles (that have EN 166, 5 rating – so they can block particles less than 5 micrometres), and none of the three ones I have are fitting very comfortably with the sealed Bolle safety goggles I have.

    So then I bought a professional full face respirator directly from Germany (which German firefighters use), and also a Mine Safety Appliances one from America. And also another one from a cheaper local shop. This style more convenient as it protects your eyes as well and you don’t need separate goggles – but you will look a bit scary going to the supermarket like this.

    (I haven’t been to the supermarket yet in a German firefighter respirator, so that will be amusing to try next week).

    I should probably donate the disposable masks as I don’t need them – I will send some to people in my family and friends, and then the others if there is a need from a hospital.

  139. Btw, from curiosity, how are you guys surviving in this “event”?

    The office I work in has allowed to work from remotely already since 13 March, and I’ve been “self-isolating” like a hikikomori for 1 week already.

    So far I didn’t have any sense of going “stir crazy” from being inside all day. Well the only symptom has buying too much things online (and some paranoia that I should wash my hands after opening cardboxes from China from aliexpress).

  140. reiner Tor says

    so if this virus is so contagious why should the total number be so ridiculously low as it is officially reported?

    Umm, because the country has been in full lockdown for weeks now?

    I assert, and no one can contradict me at this stage, that there are at least 1 million infected, and more likely 2-3 million, which makes the CFR in the range of 0.1 – 0.3%

    Well I can contradict you based on things like South Korean data. You are assuming that South Korea (where testing is very extensive) is missing the vast majority of infected people.

  141. reiner Tor says

    Okay, and so what is your point?

  142. reiner Tor says

    No, people should show some public mindedness. Only because the government screwed up big time, and as a result most people (who are only normies, so we cannot expect much from them) didn’t make adequate preparations doesn’t mean you have to be a psychopath. As an example I donated blood on Wednesday (there’s a growing blood shortage in most countries because people are reluctant to do so due to the epidemic), despite the appalling conditions (no one wearing face masks yet, having to touch doorknobs without proper hand sanitizer next to them etc.), because I don’t feel well being a selfish sociopath. I did all the necessary precautions to avoid getting infected and infecting others (I don’t expect to die from this myself, I even have 0 blood group, of course bad luck could happen), but it’s appalling that I had to do everything myself, like bringing the tissues I touched doorknobs with etc.

  143. reiner Tor says

    The only prepping I did was stocking up on food, cleaning materials, toothpaste, etc. Yes, toilet paper, too, though I always buy it in bulk and so I didn’t buy more than usual, in fact, I don’t have more than I did, say, two years ago. I finished all prepping by the end of February, and started in January. I always kept vast quantities of certain items like tissues or rice, so I didn’t have to buy everything. If I lived in the USA I’d also keep a handgun with ammo at home. I don’t think it’s a lot of protection, but would be something.

  144. sudden death says

    You are hero for doing that and I’m saying it without any hint of irony. However, myself have no any shame in admitting that I’m not a hero and will be putting my own family survival above anything else.

  145. sudden death says

    Myself panicked already in the end of January, took a week long unpaid leave for prepping, bought a lot of stuff, including PPE, disinfectants,ammo, shitload of canned food, then sold all stocks, after few weeks quit the job altogether and went on to uneployment benefits for nine months. As soon as first Italy escalation news broke out, ordered batch of Scott Promasks with bunch of P3 filters, which personally have been using when going out ever since:

    https://www.prosafetyservices.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Scott-PROMASK-Negative-Pressure-Full-Face-Respirator.png

    Just have in mind that it is absolutely needed to comply with quite strict procedures when taking on/off all that PPE stuff, also disinfecting full face masks after each use in order to be really safe:

    https://www.unz.com/akarlin/corona-will-kill-millions-crater-the-world-economy/#comment-3745610

  146. reiner Tor says

    Unfortunately, most of the risk is borne by others.

  147. Only 1 in 8 Americans are in good metabolic health, so that means that the percentage of the population vulnerable to coronavirus complications even among those of middle age or between 30 and 60 is a lot higher than the people here think, more than 40 percent of Americans of middle age have metabolic syndrome, or have obesity, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and non alcohol fatty liver disease at the same time.

  148. sudden death says

    Yeah, but that risk can be reasonably reduced by personal self-isolation, avoidance and self protection measures. It is impossible to do it for a very long time, but it migh be somewhat feasible to achieve for such duration until/if such drugs as hydrochloroquine/remdevisir become widely effective/available.

  149. reiner Tor says

    I was just saying that in order to be a hero, I’d need to bear most of the risk myself. I might’ve been just reckless, risking others’ lives, to make myself feel good, like the #RefugeesWelcome crowd.

  150. Philip Owen says

    Sarcasm is a fault of mine even for a Brit.

  151. last straw says

    Food poisoning is a not a lead cause of death, not in China, not anywhere, not in the late 19th century. Your premise is simply wrong.

    I don’t see much utility in the drug comparison. It’s difficult to overdose on food.

    Foodborne illness does not have to be a leading cause of death to reduce healthy lifespan/life expectancy. It doesn’t even have to be the top 100. It just has to be one of the myriad factors that cause illness. Foodborne illness causes 3,000-5,000 deaths every year in the U.S. today. Also, it does reduce healthy life:

    Americans lose about 112,000 years of healthy life each year because of foodborne illnesses.

    I brought up the case of drug death to demonstrate that approximately 68,000 premature deaths (people who fatally overdose each year in the U.S.) can potentially impact the life expectancy of 330 million people. If food industry regulation were really so lax in China, I’m afraid proportionally more Chinese would die from food-related infectious disease than those fatally overdose in the U.S. This might well reduce China’s life expectancy. After all, you don’t have to take drugs for your life. But you do need food for survival. Few people are drug addicts, while everyone must eat.

  152. batch of Scott Promasks

    Lol nice, you can basically cosplay from Metro 2033.

    I would add noise cancelling Sony WH1000XM3 (to protect your ears and allow you to stream almost lossless music on the LDAC codec). Then some kind of hood.

    As soon as first Italy escalation

    This was one of my shopping hauls I was proud of when I could get all in a single household good shop around February 15, at the time, before I learned about more professional gas masks. When I was in the checkout, the shopping assistant said to me Chinese people had come to their shop already and bought 5 times more than I did in this haul.
    https://i.imgur.com/29ClyA2.jpg

    comply with quite strict procedures when taking on/off all that PPE stuff, also disinfecting full face masks after each use in order to be really safe:

    I can’t do this as I didn’t get the correct isopropyl alcohol . So the best thing I could do is to just take off everything (including outer clothes), and to leave it for 3 days. I assume the virus will mostly deactivate in 2-3 days. A problem can be the outside packet of foods you buy for the freezer, as the virus might be active indefinitely in the freezer.

  153. Normie credentials revoked. Congrats!

    • Bought 20 kg of carbs weeks ago, have about 10 kg of meat in the freezer.
    • Bought supplies to minimize shopping in general
    • Bought 25 n95 masks and 100 surgical masks (though giving away a substantial part of them to relatives)
    • The institute where I work part-time has gone into work from home mode as of March 12
  154. Impressive!

  155. Johann Ricke says

    The same Reuters article was of course repeated nearly word for word as a Finnish translation in all our media which, of course, is the most free press in the world according to all the ranking agencies.

    You mean the Russians aren’t saying that COVID-19 was an American weapon let loose on the world? Which would presumably reduce public support among the public in NATO member countries for an alliance headed by such a wicked nation (based on the pozzed standards of our time)?

  156. Well, I realize I’m late to this thread, but that “objective international” chart at the top is really hilarious given the ongoing situation in the US, especially in New York.

    I’ve been thinking for weeks now that the Coronavirus outbreak could easily be the Chernobyl for the decaying USSA and its world empire. An important difference being that I don’t think all that many people actually died from Chernobyl radiation, while lots of reasonable projections have a million or more Americans dying of the virus within the next couple of months or so.

    Here’s a related comment I’d left a week ago:

    Well, I’ve often pointed out the negative consequences of having a country run by its Ministry of Propaganda.

    For decades, America government and society has become more and more crazy and incompetent, with that reality concealed by our ever more sweeping propaganda. But since the Coronavirus doesn’t pay attention to the MSM, we’ll soon find out the consequences of that strategy.

    https://www.unz.com/isteve/arguably-wrong-potential-american-deaths-range-from-5k-to-5-million/#comment-3766311

    The crucial problem faced by the ruling American elites is that you can’t deplatform the Coronavirus from Twitter when it behaves in ways you don’t like…

  157. 25 n95 masks

    Also if you wear that type, it is recommend to add some goggles, as the virus can probably transmit to the eyes. Something with EN166, 5 – which stops particles smaller than 5 microns.

    This one is an example, it has a nice motorcycle style, and is shaped to allow using a respirator at the same time (it’s not too low on the nose). https://www.bolle-safety.com/uploads/tech/chronosoft-pompier-gb-ft-2016.pdf

  158. I’ve been thinking for weeks now that the Coronavirus outbreak could easily be the Chernobyl for the decaying USSA and its world empire.

    Decaying?

    For decades, America government and society has become more and more crazy and incompetent,

    Crazy?

  159. Just Passing Through says

    Coronavirus = God saying White Genocide is inevitable.