2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV), Wuhan, China
This is an emerging, rapidly evolving situation and CDC will provide updated information as it becomes available, in addition to updated guidance.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-nCoV/summary.html#cdc-response
Health officials can reassure us all they want, but our system failed
The very first part of the coronavirus system that our health officials are so keen to tell us all about isn't only not working, it can't work, period
Sorry I do not have the time to unpack the paragraph after paragraph of opinion that Sean posted claiming numerous sources without citing a single fucking one. You agreed with him so I felt free with commenting on your post. I am ignoring him but if you agree with something he posts I will comment.
You are not ignoring me you are continuting to pick stupid fights like an imature passive-aggressive twerp.
The things I referenced are not at all obscure. You can google each one of them and find it in seconds. Ask a friend if you have any and they can show you how.
The problem with posting English language sources here is that some troll here is going to pick at each and every one that is not the official mouthpiece of the state. Instead, I took the fact that there are volumes of these from many media and anyone here can easily find them. Yes, sure they are mostly western media but there are many of them and a tremendous amount of smoke here. I think some of these articles are biased but I do not think that the entire lot are making up everything like some grand conspiracy. I do not think that all of these reports are false. I did not suggest that every single part of them is true either. But the volume is a direction. My point was there is no reason to beleive any of these governments here or there and there is cause for some alarm.
I posted the opinion that one side is not more trustworthy than the other and both are lying. I am not in having an arsehold here tell me that I can believe the sources that he likes without question and have to discard everything else. Having a left perspective never was a cult to me and I think people can read multiple sources and re-interpret what it means and not assume that all media is lying expect for a a handful that are telling the truth becuase they are saying what someone here wants to hear.
Truth is often found by reading multiple sides and understanding the biases of each not by restricting tow a few heavily biased points of view on one side only. In this case I do nto think any side is reporting with out bias and I also do not think any side is completely lying. For this reason I am more interested in discussing the overall direction of the media out there than submitting to some fucker a list of sources that he will discard out of hand becuase they have imperialist biases in opinion.
Now do a better job of ignoring me than you are pretending to do.
Wuhan coronavirus: China will contain ‘demon’ outbreak, Xi Jinping says as death toll mounts
Interview with Toronto teacher in Wuhan (audio)
https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-39-metro-morning/clip/15757805-to...
"Stephen Li, a Torontonian teaching in Wuhan, says the city is like a ghost town. He himself hasn't been outside for 11 days other than to take out the trash..."
..this is bad for business. there will be huge pressure to cover up, lie, deny and all round..not do the right thing here in the west. just like the climate crisis.
Being Chinese in America right now...
..this is bad for business. there will be huge pressure to cover up, lie, deny and all round..not do the right thing here in the west. just like the climate crisis.
This crisis really touches the weak points of societies and political cultures. This is one of the reasons I have been arguing that we should not trust anyone.
Canada is saying not to worry but it is doing no screening. Maybe becuase it is aware that screening as for SARS is ineffective.
All countries have severe weaknesses in health systems. Where you can get free medical care, ther eis a legitimate worry that if you want to know if you ahve the disease you will have to go and spend time around people who may be sick. In other words if you do not have it this is one way you can get it. Screening has been proven to be unreliable so the only option is expensive tests and most Western countries are not as doing much of that as we can see from many reports. (No I am not going to find a random sample of a link as anyone following this story has already seen many. You can google the doctor in the UK who is frustrated by not being tested as well as complaints from Canada. If you do not have a Heibi connection you will not get tested and even if you do you still may not.)
The lack of symptoms in many who have it -- or symptoms that look like other illnesses -- complicates diagnosis. In Canada we encourage people with a cold not to seek help becuase they only spread infection and cost the system. This may work against proper and timely understanding of the spread of the disease.
I heard from a doctor friend that the information they were reading is that the mutations are fast enough that this doctor is worried. I have yet to learn more about this problem.
In the US many do not have access to health care. Many more cannot take the time off work to seek it and are generally discouraged from accessing it becuase medication is too expensive and they cannot take time off work either to see a doctor or to follow advice of a doctor. This is less of a factor in Canada but not completely non-existant.
In the middle of all this there are many reports today, that the financial markets are ocncerned and money is being lost. (Again I am not going to provide links because these are all over the media that anyone following this story can see.) This raises some conflitct of interest questions from government about how much theya re trying not to panic poeple by telling them the truth.
Finally, in the west there are so many conspiracy theories about causes and that tell lies about how you can treat it without any responsibility or accountability telling people what to do. These are motivated by internet fame rather than helping people or the truth.
I think the present social, political, finanaical and health systems are very vulnerable to this situation.
Being Chinese in America right now...
There is a lot of panic and tribalism now. In Canada there were stories I saw on my flipboard this morning about Canadians trying to avoid Chinese people and you can expect this to worsen. A flight from Japan had people from Shanghai refuse to board a plane with people from Wuhan (they were speaking in a Wuhan dialect and the Shanghainese people reporting seeing that they were taking pills before the flight. Obviously these pills could have been anything -- and may not have been what the observers thought to be pills to mask symptoms.
Logic is not part of the conversation: I suspect that people who take pills to mask symptoms would more likely take them before going to the airport but if they took an asperin at the airport now it would create mass panic.
China Continues Coronavirus Quarantine (and vid)
https://www.rt.com/shows/boom-bust/479343-coronavirus-chinese-economy-lo...
"The coronavirus continues to sweep China as more cities have gone into lockdown - casting a shadow on the world's second-largest economy. We take a deep dive into not just the market impact of the disease, but also China's policies to contain the outbreak with Chris Martenson of Peak Prosperity.com "
No cites but nice conjecture that highlights why we disagree about many things. You just normalized racist behavior as tribalism.
In Canada there were stories I saw on my flipboard this morning about Canadians trying to avoid Chinese people and you can expect this to worsen.
I am sure there are many racists in Canada, I just don't think their point of view needs to be given any credence nor there actions reported on except in the context of decrying them. Its pretty hard to avoid "Chinese" people in Richmond or Burnaby given they are almost 50% of the population. Since they are mostly all Canadians I guess they are really having a tough time avoiding those pesky "Chinese", especially if they have a mirror handy.
On the CBC they reported the first presumptive case in BC but it seems that like most people he immediately self quarantined and took precautions when going into the ER to report himself. For every asshole who might risk others peoples health by their selfish actions there are countless others who think of others first.
On a lighter note.
TORONTO – Public health officials in Toronto have confirmed its first 50,000 cases of being a misinformed fuckwit as xenophobic conspiracy theories and tales of false cures continue to spread across social media.
“Becoming a complete moron during an infectious disease outbreak is far more viral than we first thought,” said Dr. Jeanne Smith of Toronto Public Health. “Fact resistance is abnormally high especially among the dullard population, and the bottom 5% of your graduating high school class.”
Tens of thousands of people were affected by a novel fake news claim that the Chinese government was developing coronavirus at Canada’s National Microbiology Lab leaving at least 10,000 people stupider.
https://thebeaverton.com/2020/01/report-outbreak-of-idiocy-spreading-100...
No cites but nice conjecture that highlights why we disagree about many things. You just normalized racist behavior as tribalism.
In Canada there were stories I saw on my flipboard this morning about Canadians trying to avoid Chinese people and you can expect this to worsen.
I am sure there are many racists in Canada, I just don't think their point of view needs to be given any credence nor there actions reported on except in the context of decrying them. Its pretty hard to avoid "Chinese" people in Richmond or Burnaby given they are almost 50% of the population. Since they are mostly all Canadians I guess they are really having a tough time avoiding those pesky "Chinese", especially if they have a mirror handy.
On the CBC they reported the first presumptive case in BC but it seems that like most people he immediately self quarantined and took precautions when going into the ER to report himself. For every asshole who might risk others peoples health by their selfish actions there are countless others who think of others first.
You know very well that your interpretation is just shit to pick a fight. You are getting more and more desperate with this aggression. Seriously: get some help.
I did not in any way excuse Canadians for avoiding Chinese I represented it as a problem. I did not cite it because this is all over the media and any person here not trying to be a supreme asshole knows it. As well this includes racism but it goes beyond it as you can see from the story related to the Shanghainese and Wuhanese
Here is a link if you cannot make google work for you:
Google translate will translate the text.
Only a troll would try to say that the presentation of a problem is an agreement with it.
The other story about the people from Shanghai avoiding being with people from Wuhan is more tribalism than racism. But you probable cannot see this past your big dick that you are waving in my face. The two seen together is an example of people in panic avoiding any other and goes beyond racism - that is why I said tribalism. I do not deny or condone that in Canada this is mixed with racism -- but the fear shown among Chinese suggests that there is more than racism at work. People are scared.
And by the way I have friend in both Chinese cities so accusing me of taking a side is really stupid. I am only pointing to the fear.
You have to twist everything into your narrative and misrepresent anything posted to keep a fight going.
Is there really nothing else you can do for fun?
"I did not in any way excuse Canadians for avoiding Chinese I represented it as a problem."
You just don't get it. Canadians are also Chinese the idea of saying that our Chinese citizens are the other is the problem. It is racism 101. Just because in Ottawa less than 4% of residents are Chinese does not mean they are not every bit as Canadian as others. In Burnaby where I lived and worked for decades the Chinese population is nearly 34% of the total population and whites are in a minority. My Canada includes Chinese people, some of my close friends in Burnaby come from Chinese settler families whose immigration pre-dates the 20th century. I am sure they would still be Chinese to the racists not Canadian.
Burnaby Population Demographics
The total visible minority population makes up 63.6% of the total population. This includes South Asians, Chinese, Blacks, Filipinos, Latin Americans, Arabs, and other groups. Chinese people make up
The loss of life that has happened so far because of this outbreak is tragic. Having said that, I'm about to post a contrarian viewpoint. Of the numbers we have as of this posting, in China it shows 132 deaths from 5974 cases with a quarantined population in the tens of millions. No deaths reported outside of China. Here in Canada, we're at one case so far? It's good to keep an eye on it, but based on the numbers, why all the panic? Seems quite needless if you ask me. Especially since easily preventable infectious diseases continually wreak havoc on the populations of many parts of the developing world, without any media attention. Where are their headlines? Once coronavirus fades away, infections diseases will continue to ravage the populations of the developing world in far greater numbers than coronavirus will. Why not focus some of our attention on that?
Here is a down to earth news report about the first presumptive case in BC.
A man in his 40s returned from Wuhan City, China last week, where he travels regularly for work. He is doing well while he remains in isolation at home.
B.C. Provincial Health Officer Bonnie Henry says people close to the man have been contacted.
“Those people do not have any symptoms so there’s no testing needed,” she explains. “We don’t have a map of where [the man] went. This was a gentleman who was well aware of what was going on in China and when he returned he voluntarily self-isolated.”
She says screening measures at airports are working and while people have self-identified for testing.
...
When it comes to online rumours about the virus, Henry says they are creating unnecessary work and confusion.
“Take all those rumours with a grain of salt and recognize they are just that –rumours,” she says, adding information regarding which flight or what day the man travelled will not be released.
A statement from the province says the situation is being monitored.
“The risk of spread of this virus within British Columbia remains low at this time. All necessary precautions are being taken to prevent the spread of infection. We have multiple systems in place to prepare for, detect and respond, in order to prevent the spread of serious infectious diseases in the province.”
Officials say there is no reason to take any special precautions.
“Regular hand washing, coughing or sneezing into your elbow sleeve, disposing of tissues appropriately and avoiding contact with sick people are important ways to prevent the spread of respiratory illness generally,” the statement reads.
https://www.citynews1130.com/2020/01/28/first-case-of-wuhan-coronavirus-...
Here is a down to earth news report about the first presumptive case in BC.
A man in his 40s returned from Wuhan City, China last week, where he travels regularly for work. He is doing well while he remains in isolation at home.
B.C. Provincial Health Officer Bonnie Henry says people close to the man have been contacted.
“Those people do not have any symptoms so there’s no testing needed,” she explains. “We don’t have a map of where [the man] went. This was a gentleman who was well aware of what was going on in China and when he returned he voluntarily self-isolated.”
She says screening measures at airports are working and while people have self-identified for testing.
...
When it comes to online rumours about the virus, Henry says they are creating unnecessary work and confusion.
“Take all those rumours with a grain of salt and recognize they are just that –rumours,” she says, adding information regarding which flight or what day the man travelled will not be released.
A statement from the province says the situation is being monitored.
“The risk of spread of this virus within British Columbia remains low at this time. All necessary precautions are being taken to prevent the spread of infection. We have multiple systems in place to prepare for, detect and respond, in order to prevent the spread of serious infectious diseases in the province.”
Officials say there is no reason to take any special precautions.
“Regular hand washing, coughing or sneezing into your elbow sleeve, disposing of tissues appropriately and avoiding contact with sick people are important ways to prevent the spread of respiratory illness generally,” the statement reads.
https://www.citynews1130.com/2020/01/28/first-case-of-wuhan-coronavirus-...
I believe the individual who was confirmed to have the virus in Toronto is also doing well.
"I did not in any way excuse Canadians for avoiding Chinese I represented it as a problem."
You just don't get it. Canadians are also Chinese the idea of saying that our Chinese citizens are the other is the problem. It is racism 101. Just because in Ottawa less than 4% of residents are Chinese does not mean they are not every bit as Canadian as others. In Burnaby where I lived and worked for decades the Chinese population is nearly 34% of the total population and whites are in a minority. My Canada includes Chinese people, some of my close friends in Burnaby come from Chinese settler families whose immigration pre-dates the 20th century. I am sure they would still be Chinese to the racists not Canadian.
Burnaby Population Demographics
The total visible minority population makes up 63.6% of the total population. This includes South Asians, Chinese, Blacks, Filipinos, Latin Americans, Arabs, and other groups. Chinese people make up
Hey pathetic little man: I never said Chinese were not Canadian. there are Canadians avoiding Chinese Canadians and Chinese people here and there is no contradiction here and I never said I agreeed with it. Put your dick away.
Now of course you have no idea about me or the people close to me and your out of control garbage would be even more obviously stupid if you did.
Please just stop this stupid campaign of trying to attack me with ridiculous posts. You are spraying your across multiple threads. Just stop. You are not accomplishing anything here. Everyone already knows you are an asshole.
<to kropotkin>Everyone already knows you are an asshole.
Please do not presume to speak for me. I am somone, and I am here, and I do not think krop is any more of an asshole than many other babblers, myself included.
The loss of life that has happened so far because of this outbreak is tragic. Having said that, I'm about to post a contrarian viewpoint. Of the numbers we have as of this posting, in China it shows 132 deaths from 5974 cases with a quarantined population in the tens of millions. No deaths reported outside of China. Here in Canada, we're at one case so far? It's good to keep an eye on it, but based on the numbers, why all the panic? Seems quite needless if you ask me. Especially since easily preventable infectious diseases continually wreak havoc on the populations of many parts of the developing world, without any media attention. Where are their headlines? Once coronavirus fades away, infections diseases will continue to ravage the populations of the developing world in far greater numbers than coronavirus will. Why not focus some of our attention on that?
The last figures I saw a couple of hours ago had 1,940 cases in China outside of Hubei province with only 6 deaths.
<to kropotkin>Everyone already knows you are an asshole.
Please do not presume to speak for me. I am somone, and I am here, and I do not think krop is any more of an asshole than many other babblers, myself included.
He has been hounding me across the board with ridiculous attacks for over a year now. I respond but I am not initiating these fights.
But sure I will go with almost everyone. It is clear that this is a hobby for him and he just does not stop.
Sean if you had said that some racists were avoiding other Canadians I would consider you an ally. You doubled down on Canadians avoiding Chinese. Sorry I cannot change the fact that we do not see the world the same way.
<to kropotkin>Everyone already knows you are an asshole.
Please do not presume to speak for me. I am somone, and I am here, and I do not think krop is any more of an asshole than many other babblers, myself included.
thank you.
Wuhan Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) Global Cases (by Johns Hopkins CSSE)
As of Jan 28, 2020 6 pm EST
https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6
Coloured side out is the only way to wear a surgical mask.
Sean if you had said that some racists were avoiding other Canadians I would consider you an ally. You doubled down on Canadians avoiding Chinese. Sorry I cannot change the fact that we do not see the world the same way.
Bullshit. It was clear what I was saying and it was the very opposite of what you are attenpting to pretend that I was saying. You are being nothing but a troll trying to pick fights. Get some help this can't be healthy for you.
Coronavirus: Australian scientists first to recreate virus outside China
Image copyrightPETER DOHERTY INSTITUTE FOR INFECTION AND IMMUNITY
Image captionThe new coronavirus has been grown outside China for the first time
Scientists in Australia have become the first to recreate the new coronavirus outside of China in what they have called a "significant breakthrough".
The discovery will be shared with the World Health Organization (WHO) in the hope it may help efforts to diagnose and treat the virus.
Scientists in China have also recreated the virus and shared its genome sequence, but not the virus itself.
The outbreak has killed 132 people in China and infected close to 6,000.
There are at least 47 cases confirmed in 16 other countries, including in Thailand, France, the US and Australia. No deaths have been reported outside China.
Researchers at a specialist lab in Melbourne, Australia, said they were able to grow a copy of the virus from an infected patient. The sample was sent to them last Friday.
"We've planned for an incident like this for many, many years and that's really why we were able to get an answer so quickly," said Dr Mike Catton of the Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity.
Hope of 'game changer'
Doctors said the copy could be used as "control material" for testing and "will be a game changer for diagnosis".
That could involve an early-diagnosis test which could detect the virus in people who have not displayed symptoms.
Chinese authorities have said the virus - like a normal flu - is able to spread during its incubation period.
But the WHO has said it remains unclear whether it is contagious before symptoms appear.
Media captionWhat are viruses? And how do they spread?
"An antibody test will enable us to retrospectively test suspected patients so we can gather a more accurate picture of how widespread the virus is, and consequently, among other things, the true mortality rate," said Dr Catton.
"It will also assist in the assessment of effectiveness of trial vaccines."
According to the WHO, the incubation period can range from two to 10 days.
In recent days, the number of virus cases in China has jumped rapidly, despite authorities scrambling to contain its spread.
Chinese authorities have taken extensive action to effectively lock down Wuhan in Hubei province, where the virus originated, and surrounding cities.
Facing new coronavirus, Chinese medics did their job, politicians did not
In an emergency, the good thing about a dictatorship is it can respond very fast. The bad thing is it won't respond at all until the dictator-in-chief says it should.
The Coronavirus Is Already Politically Fraught
What to know about the virus that’s spun China and WHO into a frenzy.
https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2020/01/24/Coronavirus-Politically-Fraught-China-WHO-Frenzy/
Coronavirus: Not Looking Good
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2020/01/coronavirus-not-looking-good.html
"World Health Organization increases global risk degree of novel coronavirus from moderate to high..."
Coronavirus...the catalyst?
Freeport-McMoRan CEO Fears "Global Black Swan" As "Devil"-Virus Sparks Record Copper Collapse
by Tyler Durden
Tue, 01/28/2020 - 23:55
Twitter Facebook Reddit Email Print
Freeport-McMoRan's shares are on the cusp of a bear market as the world's largest copper producer warned about plunging copper prices on concerns coronavirus has severely impacted China's economy, reported Reuters.
Chief Executive Richard Adkerson said in an interview on Tuesday that the outbreak of coronavirus in China is a "real black swan event" for the global economy......
...watching and waiting for the catalyst, the breakdown of a totally dysfunctional financial/economic/social/cultural system, dependant totally on continual accumulations of liquidity and debt, ultimately sourced from you the taxpayer....until, the players can no longer finance their interest payments....is this its turning point?
Sean if you had said that some racists were avoiding other Canadians I would consider you an ally. You doubled down on Canadians avoiding Chinese. Sorry I cannot change the fact that we do not see the world the same way.
Bullshit. It was clear what I was saying and it was the very opposite of what you are attenpting to pretend that I was saying. You are being nothing but a troll trying to pick fights. Get some help this can't be healthy for you.
If Sean had said "Canadian are avoiding other Canadians", it wouldn't have conveyed the idea, which he clearly was trying to convey, that the shunning was based on racism. It would be like saying "The KKK in the Deep South used to lynch Americans".
Now yes, many if not most of the people being stigmatized are probably Canadian citizens, but it is their Chinese ancestry, not their Canadian citizenship, that is the cause of the venom being directed their way. I guess Sean COULD have said "There are reports of Canadians avoiding Canadians of Chinese descent", but that would exclude non-Canadian Chinese people, who are likely also being shunned.
Sean's original quote:
There is a lot of panic and tribalism now. In Canada there were stories I saw on my flipboard this morning about Canadians trying to avoid Chinese people and you can expect this to worsen. A flight from Japan had people from Shanghai refuse to board a plane with people from Wuhan (they were speaking in a Wuhan dialect and the Shanghainese people reporting seeing that they were taking pills before the flight. Obviously these pills could have been anything -- and may not have been what the observers thought to be pills to mask symptoms.
Fortunately although the numbers will probably skyrocket this coronavirus is nowhere near as deadly percentagewise as SARS.
Sean and Kropotkin, you are both disrupting multiple threads with your pointless pissing contest. I don't give care who starts it, you are both active participants and if you don't stop I will suspend you both.
I'm with Aristotle and his post 66 on this:
" Of the numbers we have as of this posting, in China it shows 132 deaths from 5974 cases with a quarantined population in the tens of millions. No deaths reported outside of China. Here in Canada, we're at one case so far? It's good to keep an eye on it, but based on the numbers, why all the panic? Seems quite needless if you ask me."
The largest practical result of the media coverage of this in Canada seems to be increasing anti-Chinese racism.
I'm with Aristotle and his post 66 on this:
" Of the numbers we have as of this posting, in China it shows 132 deaths from 5974 cases with a quarantined population in the tens of millions. No deaths reported outside of China. Here in Canada, we're at one case so far? It's good to keep an eye on it, but based on the numbers, why all the panic? Seems quite needless if you ask me."
The largest practical result of the media coverage of this in Canada seems to be increasing anti-Chinese racism.
Here is why:
Sars was a big deal here. It strained the system and it was worthy of fears. Let's compare.
This virus is still expanding. At its conclusion SARS had 5327 confirmed cases (8096 probable). As of Wednesday this virus already has 5974 confirmed cases. The total deaths from SARS was 800 while so far it is only 132 now it is likely many more already diagnosed will lose their lives given the stage this is in. Experts assume the virus is only starting to spread and cannot be stopped soon. There are also reports of mutation. A friend of a friend who is a doctor told us that the literature says it is mutating and was afraid of that. Also this disease is thought to be contagious before symptoms. SARS was not.
I also think there is a widespread concern that the health systems are not prepared and faced with severe budget restrictions that they leave little confidence. Hallway care, long wait times on good days leave little confidence that bad days can be handled. All countries use other regions to provide surge capacity locally. This works except where you ahve more national health emergencies.
Virus Fears Spark Online Outbreak of Rumours, Hoaxes
https://www.pressreader.com/canada/toronto-star/20200129/281483573358834
"...As rumours and hoaxes about the global outbreak flood social media, officials are asking GTA residents to take a moment; don't trust everything you see, rely on official sources and think of who you might be hurting when you amplify unverified information. Much of it is already affecting the region's Chinese communities, said Avvy Go, the director of the Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic, one of several organizations that on Tuesday released a joint statement denouncing discrimination and xenophobia in the wake of the global outbreak. Dr Eileen de Villa, Toronto's medical officer of health, said officials understand 'there is a certain amount of fear and anxiety' around the new virus, but it is 'worsened by the spread of disinformation.' As the news unfolds, de Villa urged people to consult credible sources of information such as Toronto Public Health's own website. Meanwhile, de Villa emphasizes that the risk to Toronto residents remains low..."
https://twitter.com/TOPublicHealth
Evelyn Kwong: Online Racism Spreads Faster Than A Virus
https://www.thestar.com/life/opinion/2020/01/28/i-experienced-anti-chine...
"Brace yourselves fellow Asians, the 'yellow-peril' has officially resurfaced. The ongoing news of coronavirus cases, including two identified in Toronto, has triggered a firestorm of racist trolls against Asian communities. To many Asian-Canadians, this comes as no surprise. We're often all lumped together and the idea of 'yellow peril' - a racist stereotype that generalizes Asians as unsanitary, lower-class and alien - is embedded in our nation's history..."
Virus Fears Spark Online Outbreak of Rumours, Hoaxes
https://www.pressreader.com/canada/toronto-star/20200129/281483573358834
"...As rumours and hoaxes about the global outbreak flood social media, officials are asking GTA residents to take a moment; don't trust everything you see, rely on official sources and think of who you might be hurting when you amplify unverified information. Much of it is already affecting the region's Chinese communities, said Avvy Go, the director of the Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic, one of several organizations that on Tuesday released a joint statement denouncing discrimination and xenophobia in the wake of the global outbreak. Dr Eileen de Villa, Toronto's medical officer of health, said officials understand 'there is a certain amount of fear and anxiety' around the new virus, but it is 'worsened by the spread of disinformation.' As the news unfolds, de Villa urged people to consult credible sources of information such as Toronto Public Health's own website. Meanwhile, de Villa emphasizes that the risk to Toronto residents remains low..."
https://twitter.com/TOPublicHealth
Evelyn Kwong: Online Racism Spreads Faster Than A Virus
https://www.thestar.com/life/opinion/2020/01/28/i-experienced-anti-chine...
"Brace yourselves fellow Asians, the 'yellow-peril' has officially resurfaced. The ongoing news of coronavirus cases, including two identified in Toronto, has triggered a firestorm of racist trolls against Asian communities. To many Asian-Canadians, this comes as no surprise. We're often all lumped together and the idea of 'yellow peril' - a racist stereotype that generalizes Asians as unsanitary, lower-class and alien - is embedded in our nation's history..."
The problem is that the official sources -- science based sources are not as reassuring as the authorities are pretending they are.
The second part is correct -- it will feed racism, But this will get fed worse in the long term also if the authorities lose credibility by offering assurances that they are in no position to offer.
there is the threat that some of the most dangerous pathogens, including coronaviruses that are stored in Biosafety Level 4 (BSL-4) laboratories around the world, could accidentally be released into nurturing environments. With such unintended releases of such deadly biological warfare agents, climatic and social factors permit such deadly bugs as coronaviruses to infect large numbers of humans and animals.
The United States signed, along with the United Kingdom and the USSR, the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on their Destruction or “BWC.” Evidence suggests that the CIA merely transferred its bio-war programs to the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) in Fort Detrick, Maryland where bio-warfare research was being conducted under the cover of “non-proliferation” enforcement and research. Other banned research was conducted at Fort Detrick’s British counterpart at the Defense Evaluation and Research Agency (DERA) in Porton Down in Wiltshire, England.
The Chinese Academy of Sciences operates China’s only known BSL-4 research laboratory, coincidentally or not, at the Wuhan National Biosafety Laboratory, in the same city where the new coronavirus first appeared.......
...and the Alberta bioweapons lab in Sutter? Alberta....who was involved in establishing the Chinese bioweapons lab in Wuhan City?
And the extensive networks of CIA bioweapons labs? Why is this not being considered? Why are these biolabs allowed to exist? Why are there not protests in the millions?
There is also one in Toronto, near the 401 and the airport
there is the threat that some of the most dangerous pathogens, including coronaviruses that are stored in Biosafety Level 4 (BSL-4) laboratories around the world, could accidentally be released into nurturing environments. With such unintended releases of such deadly biological warfare agents, climatic and social factors permit such deadly bugs as coronaviruses to infect large numbers of humans and animals.
The United States signed, along with the United Kingdom and the USSR, the Convention on the Prohibition of the Development, Production and Stockpiling of Bacteriological (Biological) and Toxin Weapons and on their Destruction or “BWC.” Evidence suggests that the CIA merely transferred its bio-war programs to the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) in Fort Detrick, Maryland where bio-warfare research was being conducted under the cover of “non-proliferation” enforcement and research. Other banned research was conducted at Fort Detrick’s British counterpart at the Defense Evaluation and Research Agency (DERA) in Porton Down in Wiltshire, England.
The Chinese Academy of Sciences operates China’s only known BSL-4 research laboratory, coincidentally or not, at the Wuhan National Biosafety Laboratory, in the same city where the new coronavirus first appeared.......
...and the Alberta bioweapons lab in Sutter? Alberta....who was involved in establishing the Chinese bioweapons lab in Wuhan City?
And the extensive networks of CIA bioweapons labs? Why is this not being considered? Why are these biolabs allowed to exist? Why are there not protests in the millions?
While far from impossible, there is no proof at this point that this has leaked from a lab.
Wuhan is both natural for a lab and for a possible outbreak - it is the seventh largest city. It is a major transportation hub and the site of one of the most important cities. In short, Wuhan would be central when it comes to research and it would also be central when it comes to any potential outbreak. I would not draw very much from the fact that it is both home to this outbreak and labs to investigate outbreaks. Possible, certainly but coincidence is more likely I think.
I am not familiar with Wuhan as a bioweapons research centre (I know the university is a place where there is considerable medial research). Still, if there were to be a bioweapons lab, it might be located there due to the civilian research into health that Wuhan's university is famous for. Wuhan University is one of the top in the world - in the top 250 or so in the world. I knew someone from there a few years ago: it is a major health/medical university.
By the way, as you see the number of international people being flown out of the city, you can see that this is a very large city of international importance. I think it is possible people who do not realize how big a centre and University it is might read more into the coincidence of co-location. It would be in Canadian terms a bit like finding it odd that there would be co-locations of things in Toronto.
Anti-Chinese racism has been prevalent in many places in the world. The history of BC is one of recurring cycles of racist outbreaks. The fight against normalizing racist discourse is an ongoing one in many place not just Canada. The colonial era stereotypes are insidious, prevalent and persistent among the racist Canadian minority. They need to be condemned whenever they open their mouths.
Painting the coronavirus as a Chinese problem was like “dealing with the problem with a sledge hammer, implicating all Chinese nationals rather than dealing with bad food safety practices and diets”, said National University of Singapore sociologist Tan Ern Ser.
Nanyang Technological University (NTU) sociologist Laavanya Kathiravelu said xenophobic social media posts were an extension of colonial-era stereotypes.
“Chinese, in these xenophobic accounts, are seen as taking resources away from deserving local populations, and having uncouth behaviour. More broadly, this can also be seen as informed by older stereotypes of Chinese as dirty, having bad hygiene and undesirable culinary practices,” she said.
https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/health-environment/article/3048104/made-c...
Canada Preparing Plane to Fly Canadians From Wuhan Once China Gives OK
https://www.nationalnewswatch.com/2020/01/29/canada-preparing-plane-to-f...
"Canada has a plane preparing to fly Canadians out of the province in China at the centre of an outbreak of a new coronavirus, Foreign Affairs Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne said. Not all of them want to leave, he emphasized in an appearance on Parliament Hill..."
Russia's Ministry of Health Names Three Drugs That Can Treat New Chinese Coronavirus
"...The new coronavirus can be fought with ribavirin, lopinavir and interferon beta-1b, they believe. These drugs are typically used to treat hepatitis C, HIV and MS respectively. The Ministry of Health not only offers recommendations, but also describes how the treatments work and in what quantities they should be prescribed. The guidelines are intended for doctors in hospitals throughout the country. Yesterday, Deputy Prime Minister Tatyana Golikova explained that there is a considerable risk of the coronavirus entering Russia, despite the current confirmed cases remaining at zero..."
China's Coronavirus: We Survive Much Worse Every Year, But the Panic is the Real Danger
"The new illness that has emerged in Wuhan, China has created panicked headlines across the world. But as history has shown time and time again, while the deaths are saddening, the over-reaction is downright dangerous..."
Coronavirus: What We Mean When We Say ‘Pandemic’
The word is scary. Though when pandemics just hit poor countries, richer ones don’t tremble.
https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2020/01/29/Coronovirus-Pandemic-Scary-What-We-Mean/
The over reaction of Western governments is mind blowing. I think flying people out of China is an absurd waste of money done for show and political points not medical reasons. The seasonal flu likely kills more people in Canada every year than this virus will ever kill here and maybe even globally.
For example, tuberculosis kills well over one million people worldwide each year and as many as one-third of the world’s population may be infected with it – although for the vast majority of people, their immune systems will keep the disease in check. Similar numbers may be dying from malaria. AIDS-related illnesses killed well over half a million people in 2018. Seasonal influenza kills, according to one estimate, anything from just under 300,000 to nearly 650,000 people globally per year. And these death tolls are small compared to the biggest killers of all: heart disease, strokes, cancer and dementia.
https://www.rt.com/op-ed/479600-chinas-coronavirus-survive-wuhan/
However this articles numbers on flu deaths seems high but even the more conservative estimates below are significantly greater than the actual deaths so far in this epidemic. I wonder how many people in the tourism service industry all over China will lose their businesses in the face of a major transportation closure during the most lucrative time of the year. That will definitely shorten the life spans of many people just from the stress.
How reliable are the computer model estimates? "I don't think they're reliable at all," Dr. Tom Jefferson told me. He is a Rome-based researcher with the Cochrane Collaboration, and he spends his days reviewing all the research on acute respiratory infections and vaccines. He said hard data on flu deaths "are difficult to get hold of for obvious reasons. So enter modelling, which is nothing more than guesswork, highly sensitive to the assumptions you feed into the model. 'Give me a model and I will make it say whatever you want,' a colleague of mine always repeats."
The models are only as good as the data sets that are fed into them. And death can be complicated. If someone already extremely fragile with heart or lung disease is tipped over the edge with a flu infection, is that a flu death, or a heart death or a lung death? Which database gets to claim it?
"The only mortality estimates which have any credibility are those based on post mortem examinations and tests which were done before death," Jefferson said.
Flu death statistics not collected
In a perfect world, the flu death statistic would be based on an actual count of confirmed deaths after infection with the flu virus. But that's difficult to do, because autopsies are almost never done, lab tests for the flu virus are rarely done, and someone could die from the complications of flu even though the virus is no longer detectable in their bodies.
The numbers we do have don't even come close to the computer estimates. In Statistics Canada's "deaths and mortality" table, under "cause of death: influenza," there were only about 300 deaths a year between 2000 and 2008. Public health officials don't trust that number. They believe it underestimates the true death toll from flu.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/flu-deaths-reality-check-1.1127442
