Above - Palm civets seized in China's Anhul province earlier this month. Consuming such wild game - likely infected (by bats) with the virus, is plausibly how this latest coronavirus outbreak began. (From WSJ, p. A17, Jan. 28th.)
"What worries me more than the new disease is that fear of a vague and terrifying new illness might spiral into panic, and that it might be used to justify unnecessarily severe limits on movement and on civil liberties, especially of racial and religious minorities around the world.
I also worry that the online world may give rise to dangerous skepticism, and that in the event of an actual pandemic a large number of people may delay treatment or refuse vaccines because they don’t believe the science or are suspicious of the government."- Farhad Manjoo,
'Beware The Pandemic Panic', NY TIMES, Jan. 29
"As we celebrate the Year of the Rat and the world takes on the Wuhan coronavirus, it is good for all of us to remember that we have been here before and failed to act. As one Chinese academic who was involved in research on the source of SARS pointed out: “We later published many papers and popular science articles, urging everyone to stop eating wild animals and not to have too close contact with wild animals.” Seventeen years on, that message is finally being heard by those in a position to take action."- Christian Walzer and Aili Kang, WSJ, 'Abolish Asia’s ‘Wet Markets,’ Where Pandemics Breed', Jan. 28, p. a17.
Thanks to my psychologist post-doc niece Shayle for sending me the following article ('The Chinese Coronoavirus Is Not The Zombie Apocalypse') from Psychology Today, by Robert Bartholomew, regarding the erupting coronavirus hysteria:
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/its-catching/202001/the-chinese-coronavirus-is-not-the-zombie-apocalypse
Excerpt:
"I am not downplaying the seriousness of the new Coronavirus that has been spreading around the world. People are dying and every death is a tragedy, but it is not the end of civilization as we know it, contrary to some media outlets which risk causing undue alarm and panic. The headlines are ominous: “Wuhan is Ground Zero for Deadly Coronavirus.” “Situation in China is Grave.” One paper carried an image of a Wuhan medic breaking down in tears. Another showing a pile of corpses was fake.
The Daily Mail quoted a researcher as saying, “'This time I am scared,' an expert who helped tackle SARS warns.” Another scientist reportedly simulated a similar epidemic that he projected would kill 65 million people. What the headline didn’t say is that it was a worst-case scenario for a virus deadlier than SARS and easier to catch than the flu, an extremely unlikely scenario. "
The last is especially critical to grasp. As with the case of the lethal 1918 Spanish flu, e.g.
100 Years Later: A Look At The Deadliest Pandemic...
The key aspect is to know the parameters, particularly the so-called R0, ("R nought") or reproduction number, which conveys the ease of transmissibility, or the infection rate per person. This is currently pegged by the World Health Organization at between 1.4 and 2.5. In other words, each person infected can infect from 1.4 to 2.5 other people. By comparison the value for SARS (a variant of coronavirus) was 5.5. and for the Spanish flu, 1.8.
Watching a video from an Alt News site called "AMTV" showed me how the right wingers are behind the sowing of a lot of hysteria on this illness- as they have been with the Q-Anon conspiracy bull. Certainly when I see and hear the host on Youtube put his hands out in scare quotes and blab: "This will be eye opening for a lot of you because it plays into not just 'climate change' but also people like Bill Gates who are pro-vaccination and stand to profit in the billions and billions."
All of which is humping unproductive irrationality and hysteria. What then are we really dealing with? Is it almost like the "Black death" or the Spanish flu as many of these crackpots claim? People need to chill out, take a deep breath and start to process facts as opposed to concocted fictions and fake news from suspect sites. Heck, even Holman Jenkins Jr. was correct when he wrote in his WSJ column today ('The Cure For The Chinese Flu', p. A13):
"Americans likely face a bigger risk from fear of the disease than the disease itself."
Proving once again that even a 'broken' ideological 'clock' is right at least twice a day.
Does Jenkins have a point? Sure, and so does Mr. Bartholomew. The current range of R0 for this disease is nowhere near even the SARS value (5.5.), or approaching the fictional R0, for the disease featured in the 2011 movie 'Contagion' ( R0 > 4.0). Hence, the recent blaring headline in The New York Post, e.g.
Is so much balderdash. The fatality rate thus far (3%) is also nowhere near that for the diseases to which this virus is compared (e.g. 80-90 % for "the Black Death"). The truth is that from the data we have so far this virus does not appear to be any worse than the annual flu, say the H3N2 - which I got in 2014. Yeah, it was awful and for all intents I was a literal zombie for a week, but it was not the 'zombie apocalypse" as some of these Alt news sites try to portray. Also, for perspective it's always wise to compare whatever disease outbreak there is to past flu outbreaks. For reference, 80,000 Americans died from the H3N2 influenza outbreak in 2014, and we are in no way likely to attain such numbers with this novel virus. Nor will we see any "martial law" as the Reich bloggers and crackpots claim will occur when the health alerts reach a "level 3". If it didn't occur with the H3N2 in 2014 it will not occur now, I promise you. Another point from the Psychology Today piece:
In the image at the top of this post I show civet cats collected in the Chinese Anbul province earlier this month. As reported (Jan. 28, p. A17) in The Wall Street Journal the sale of these critters constitutes part of a "wet market" - "where live and dead animals, including many wildlife species, are sold for consumption." Adding that: "China has closed all such markets that sell wildlife and temporarily banned the sale and shipment of wildlife throughout the country." As they should have.
Why? Because (WSJ, p. A17, Jan. 27) "bats are the likely origin for the virus itself and it got from bats to people in the wildlife market".
Here is where the final five minutes of the film 'Contagion' can be instructive. It shows a flock of bats (originally perched on trees) which then fly over a pig farm in Guangdong province and drop bat guano over the pig feeding area. The guano is already infected with the virus. The pigs then consume the guano, and become infected themselves. In the film the Chinese hog butcher slaughters one of these pigs, gets pig blood all over his hands - wipes it off. He then greets Gweneth Paltrow's character (on a visit on behalf of her corporation) and she shakes the butcher's hand. She then becomes "Patient zero" - which we learn only at the end- though we suspect it earlier.
The moral of this story? It is not a good idea for humans to be eating wild meat or game, especially from the Chinese wet markets. This brings us to the question of how a potential epidemic in the U.S., can be properly contained. Here we can thank Betsy McCaughey for her WSJ article 'U.S. Hospitals Aren't Ready'' (January 27, p. A17). In the piece she compares the lessons for two different Canadian cities (Vancouver and Toronto) during the SARS outbreak of 2003.
We learn therein: "In Vancouver the disease didn't spread. But in Toronto, one infection was allowed to become a deadly outbreak which killed 44 people in two months"
The difference arose because in Toronto, "infection control was not a high priority ...in Vancouver, by contrast, 'a robust worker safety and infection control culture' enabled the virus to be contained.."
She goes on to note that here in the U.S. infection control is just as lax as in Toronto. For example, a 2017 literature review of shortcomings in U.S. ERs found: "a lack of adequate distance between patients, use of contaminated equipment, failure to use shields to protect healthcare workers, e.g. who are intubating patients and failure to ask coughing patients to wear masks."
Another infection breakdown point noted is when nurses, doctors wear their uniforms home after work, infecting their families. That nonsense needs to stop if this latest Chinese virus is to be successfully contained. And of course, let's not neglect the washing of hands which is the best way to prevent viral spread, e.g.
As well as not touching one's face every five seconds! Below I show a summary piece on what to know about this virus, taken from the WSJ, in yesterday's paper (p. A4):
Read through it carefully, using your time profitably, as opposed to going to wacko websites that only inflame panic.
See Also:
Why? Because (WSJ, p. A17, Jan. 27) "bats are the likely origin for the virus itself and it got from bats to people in the wildlife market".
https://www.livescience.com/new-coronavirus-origin-bats.html
Here is where the final five minutes of the film 'Contagion' can be instructive. It shows a flock of bats (originally perched on trees) which then fly over a pig farm in Guangdong province and drop bat guano over the pig feeding area. The guano is already infected with the virus. The pigs then consume the guano, and become infected themselves. In the film the Chinese hog butcher slaughters one of these pigs, gets pig blood all over his hands - wipes it off. He then greets Gweneth Paltrow's character (on a visit on behalf of her corporation) and she shakes the butcher's hand. She then becomes "Patient zero" - which we learn only at the end- though we suspect it earlier.
The moral of this story? It is not a good idea for humans to be eating wild meat or game, especially from the Chinese wet markets. This brings us to the question of how a potential epidemic in the U.S., can be properly contained. Here we can thank Betsy McCaughey for her WSJ article 'U.S. Hospitals Aren't Ready'' (January 27, p. A17). In the piece she compares the lessons for two different Canadian cities (Vancouver and Toronto) during the SARS outbreak of 2003.
We learn therein: "In Vancouver the disease didn't spread. But in Toronto, one infection was allowed to become a deadly outbreak which killed 44 people in two months"
The difference arose because in Toronto, "infection control was not a high priority ...in Vancouver, by contrast, 'a robust worker safety and infection control culture' enabled the virus to be contained.."
She goes on to note that here in the U.S. infection control is just as lax as in Toronto. For example, a 2017 literature review of shortcomings in U.S. ERs found: "a lack of adequate distance between patients, use of contaminated equipment, failure to use shields to protect healthcare workers, e.g. who are intubating patients and failure to ask coughing patients to wear masks."
Another infection breakdown point noted is when nurses, doctors wear their uniforms home after work, infecting their families. That nonsense needs to stop if this latest Chinese virus is to be successfully contained. And of course, let's not neglect the washing of hands which is the best way to prevent viral spread, e.g.
As well as not touching one's face every five seconds! Below I show a summary piece on what to know about this virus, taken from the WSJ, in yesterday's paper (p. A4):
Read through it carefully, using your time profitably, as opposed to going to wacko websites that only inflame panic.See Also:
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