Health experts warn Congress coronavirus may hit US hard in next two to four weeks
Posted on 02/12/2020 2:00:46 PM PST by RightGeek
Leading health officials expect to see a significant uptick in coronavirus cases nationwide.
“We're going to start to see those outbreaks emerge sometime in the next two to four weeks,” said Scott Gottlieb, former Food and Drug Administration commissioner. “We should be leaning in very aggressively to try to broaden diagnostic screening right now, particularly in communities where there is a lot of immigration where these efforts could emerge to identify them early enough that they'll be small enough that we can intervene to prevent — prevent more epidemic spread in this country.”
Gottlieb, one of five panelists who briefed the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on Wednesday, said although U.S. customs officials blocked some travel and are screening travelers returning from the Chinese city of Wuhan, where the virus is believed to have originated, they could not have stopped every person with coronavirus from getting into the United States.
“I don't think we should be planning for the onesie-twosie cases that we've been seeing thus far in the United States,” said Asha George, executive director of the Bipartisan Commission on Biodefense. “We have to plan for the possibility that we have thousands of cases, you know.”
Hundreds of thousands of coronavirus cases could break out globally, George said, adding federal, state, and local governments should start planning for an outbreak on a massive scale.
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Gottlieb said he believes China first saw the epidemic spread internally in November and doubts the Chinese government’s data are sound. The coronavirus was confirmed to be in the U.S. in January, unbeknownst to the public.
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“We’re going to know much much more in the next two weeks as we examine what's happening in Singapore. And what's happening on a very unfortunate cruise ship...
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonexaminer.com ...
Health experts warn Congress coronavirus may hit US hard in next two to four weeks
Haven’t been to China recently and I don’t know anyone who has. So there’s not much I can do but wait. Actually,I guess I can stay out of “Chinatown”.
The panel members said they are watching the world to see how the virus progresses because it will show how cases exported from China become a global pandemic. Singapore has reported 50 cases, which Gottlieb said is “concerning” because it is the middle of summer there.
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It’s concerning that he doesn’t know Singapore is 85 miles north of the equator.
And then there is the problem that most generic Rx drugs these days use ingredients from China.
IMO this virus outbreak is potentially very serious.
It has the factors that create a dangerous pandemic.
-Long incubation period during which the infected seem to be able to infect others even though they are asymptomatic.
-Not an extreme mortality rate so the virus does not burn out like Ebola which kills so many and so quickly it has limited spread.
-Ten percent or more of the infected require ICU beds...this will quickly result in their being no ICU beds left. This leads to many deaths from non-Covid19 causes.
-Extremely infectious! The number of infected on the cruise ship point to an R0 greater than 2.5 IMO.
This is NOT an ordinary flu so take care.
In Singapore, flu season tends to arrive during the cooler periods between May to July, and December to February.
From: This site.
November huh.... three months later and how many cases in the US?
Methinks panic may be the objective.
And yet novel Coronavirus is spreading in Singapore.
And stop eating bat meat. Just stop.
“ Haven’t been to China recently and I don’t know anyone who has. So there’s not much I can do but wait. Actually,I guess I can stay out of “Chinatown”.”
******
I haven’t been to the PRC in about eight years. But, I know that wet markets are there alive and well. But, to be fair, they exist all over Asia, South America, Africa, probably East European countries. And, fertilizing with human feces is still common. There’s so much to do to clean up sanitary practices it boggles the mind.
Bring Out Your Dead
Post to me or FReep mail to be on/off the Bring Out Your Dead ping list.
The purpose of the “Bring Out Your Dead” ping list (formerly the “Ebola” ping list) is very early warning of emerging pandemics, as such it has a high false positive rate.
So far the false positive rate is 100%.
At some point we may well have a high mortality pandemic, and likely as not the “Bring Out Your Dead” threads will miss the beginning entirely.
*sigh* Such is life, and death...
If a quarantine saves just one child's life, it's worth it.
“It’s concerning that he doesn’t know Singapore is 85 miles north of the equator.”
However, I think that the point that he was making was that it is warm there, and there is plenty of sunshine even in mid-February...and those things are supposed to inhibit the virus and, apparently, aren’t.
We still know just about nothing about this virus, so it is a guessing game for even trained people. My position has always been that we need to be very careful about this, but also not go off the deep end with the end-of-the-world stuff.
Honestly - I would hate to be an American Chinese food Restaurant owner here in the US. A lot of people I imagine are choosing to dine elsewhere until this situation is stable. Might be a good time to get some deals on General Tso Chicken.
Worth reading the WHOLE ARTICLE.
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Do we do that on FR? ;)
I think it likely that within the next three to four months you’re going to be seeing massive die-offs on the West coast, with the death rate probably exceeding fifty percent, and resources overwhelmed by the magnitude of what looks to be one of the worst pandemics to afflict the human race. Or not, as the case may be.
Hang on....I just filled two freezers with bat meat down in the basement! What am I supposed to do with it?????
But, it’s the flu...right?
(Sarcasm)
At the nully hacienda we’ve been in bare outside world contact mode for nearly 2 weeks already, everything is off the calendar for the next month. We’re nearly fully stocked.
But bat meat is so good. Bat jerky is the best.
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