Warning to All MLW Members - Fear and the Cronavirus

[Guest ProudConservative]

I havn't been around for a while. It looks like our worse fears with the coronavirus is coming true. The Dow Jones has lost almost 5000 points this week. The shelves in some Italian supermarkets are empty.

Some experts are predicting that 70% of the worlds global population will be infected with the virus....

Tomorrow morning as soon as the strores are open, you need to Stock up on as much dried food as you can.

I have purchased over 200lbs of Brown rice, dried beans, frozen meats, frozen fruit, and frozen vegitables. It only cost me about $300

You don't want to be one of the last people in line at the supermarkets, when the food runs out.

Justin Trudeau is complely distracted with the rail blockaid... 

We are about to have extream shortages.

So whatever you think you need to buy for the next few months.... Go to to stores tomorrow, and make sure to buy it.

Once the pandemic starts, food can be contaminated.... So make sure to sterilize the kitchen, and cook all your food.

 

[Moonlight Graham]

Fear is a virus, and you've been infected.  Doesn't hurt to be prepared but let's keep things in perspective.

[Argus]

1 hour ago, Moonlight Graham said:

Fear is a virus, and you've been infected.  Doesn't hurt to be prepared but let's keep things in perspective.

It's hard to get a perspective on this since we don't really know how it's going to go. The health authorities do say it's only a matter of time. And if you examine what is known or what we think about this disease it's not good AT ALL.

For example. Ontario hospitals are grossly overcrowded. In flu season they're often at over 100% capacity. What would Covid-19 look like if it became out of control? By which I mean there's too much of it to quarantine individuals as we're doing now.

To start with, it's more than twice as contagious as the flu. So there's going to be twice as many cases. But there's no vaccination so more like three times as many. The flu has a mortality rate of about 0.05%. Covid-19 has a mortality rate of 2-3% Even at two that's 40 times the mortality rate of the flu - with three times as many cases. So instead of 1500 deaths per year we're talking about 50,000.

Now let's look at severe cases. Approximately 1% of influenza cases are severe enough to require hospitalization. With Covid-19 5% of cases require critical care treatment. A total of about 16%-18% require hospitalization. Put as baldly as I can, our hospital system cannot possibly cope with anything remotely like those kinds of numbers. We're talking about a hospitalization rate of about 50 times that of the flu. And we can barely cope with the flu.

Now let's look at the economic ramifications. From what I'm seeing in Italy, South Korea and China, widespread Covid-19 turns cities into ghost towns. Nobody is going to movies or sports games. Nobody is attending school. Nobody is going to church or temple. Nobody is traveling, taking buses or subways, going to restaurants or anywhere else there are crowds. Tourism dies out completely. Hotels are empty. People are only venturing out to buy the necessities. They're not going out to buy new and fashionable clothes or shoes or anything else they don't need immediately. Many people stay home from work. Others have no work to go to because they have no customers or clients.

So yeah, it's gonna be a mess if it gets out into the general population.

[Zeitgeist]

45 minutes ago, Argus said:

It's hard to get a perspective on this since we don't really know how it's going to go. The health authorities do say it's only a matter of time. And if you examine what is known or what we think about this disease it's not good AT ALL.

For example. Ontario hospitals are grossly overcrowded. In flu season they're often at over 100% capacity. What would Covid-19 look like if it became out of control? By which I mean there's too much of it to quarantine individuals as we're doing now.

To start with, it's more than twice as contagious as the flu. So there's going to be twice as many cases. But there's no vaccination so more like three times as many. The flu has a mortality rate of about 0.05%. Covid-19 has a mortality rate of 2-3% Even at two that's 40 times the mortality rate of the flu - with three times as many cases. So instead of 1500 deaths per year we're talking about 50,000.

Now let's look at severe cases. Approximately 1% of influenza cases are severe enough to require hospitalization. With Covid-19 5% of cases require critical care treatment. A total of about 16%-18% require hospitalization. Put as baldly as I can, our hospital system cannot possibly cope with anything remotely like those kinds of numbers. We're talking about a hospitalization rate of about 50 times that of the flu. And we can barely cope with the flu.

Now let's look at the economic ramifications. From what I'm seeing in Italy, South Korea and China, widespread Covid-19 turns cities into ghost towns. Nobody is going to movies or sports games. Nobody is attending school. Nobody is going to church or temple. Nobody is traveling, taking buses or subways, going to restaurants or anywhere else there are crowds. Tourism dies out completely. Hotels are empty. People are only venturing out to buy the necessities. They're not going out to buy new and fashionable clothes or shoes or anything else they don't need immediately. Many people stay home from work. Others have no work to go to because they have no customers or clients.

So yeah, it's gonna be a mess if it gets out into the general population.

I’m starting to see people quietly scramble to buy masks and stockpile food, but no one wants to create a panic or look like a paranoid survivalist.  The fatality rate is about 3%, as out of 80,000 people infected, there have been 2800 deaths.  The mortality rate for SARS was much higher at around 10%, but the infection rate was slower and total infected was much less.  
 

I think what’s difficult is that, while I think we should require pretesting of entrants from high infection zones and permit zero visits from people who started their journey in the epicentre, we may soon get to a point where widespread infection is unpreventable without essentially putting everyone in isolation and shutting down the economy, which probably isn’t worth the cost to the economy and wellbeing.  It means we may all end up walking around in masks, avoiding close proximity with people, frequently washing our hands, and being very selective of our outdoor activities.  It would mean a slowdown AND accepting that the virus is all around us and the risk of infection is there.  Unless the virus suddenly drops off, I can see this kind of slowdown being a way of life until vaccines are widely available around 18 months from now.  
 

That’s why it’s worth being extra cautious now about who we let into Canada and how we interact and diagnose (feel sick, get checked).  The longer we have small numbers of infected, the less painful the wait for a vaccine.  

Edited February 28, 2020 by Zeitgeist

[August1991]

“Be Fearful When Others Are Greedy and Greedy When Others Are Fearful”

Warren Buffet

 

 

Edited February 28, 2020 by August1991

[SpankyMcFarland]

Masks don’t offer much protection to the wearer; I do like to see them on other people, though.

[SpankyMcFarland]

3 hours ago, Argus said:

To start with, it's more than twice as contagious as the flu. So there's going to be twice as many cases. But there's no vaccination so more like three times as many. The flu has a mortality rate of about 0.05%. Covid-19 has a mortality rate of 2-3% Even at two that's 40 times the mortality rate of the flu - with three times as many cases. So instead of 1500 deaths per year we're talking about 50,000.

 

I’ve seen a flu mortality rate of 0.1% quoted as well. The mortality rate of COVID-19 may be overestimated, given that many Chinese patients were asymptomatic and were not tested. It may also just be 1.5 times as contagious as flu. Best case scenario with my possibly rosy figures is a particularly serious flu season which would still be very bad news for the country. My local hospital is already inundated with elderly patients who can’t easily be placed anywhere and that seems to be a general problem across the country. We may have to build in some redundancy in the system before the next pandemic. 

Edited February 28, 2020 by SpankyMcFarland

[Guest ProudConservative]

I never really feared pandemics, until I became a trader, and learned about explodential growth. Put it this way. I would rather have 1000 cases in Ontario with Ebola, than the 14 confirmed cases we have in Canada. A pandemic is a war against math, and if the math is in your favour, you can contain it.

Now let me compare expodential groth.... Say if one virus spreads at 1% a day and another virus spreads at 3% a day.

Will start with 1000 cases at 1%

Day 1

1010 cases

Day 30

1348 Cases

Day 60

1817 Cases

Day 90

2449 Cases

Day 365

37786 Cases

Here's 1000 cases at 3%

Day 1

1 030 Cases

Day 30

2 427 Cases

Day 60

5 892 Cases

Day 90

14301 Cases

Day 365

48483046 Cases

 

So basically a virus with an infectivity level that causes an increase of 1% a day gives you 38 Thousand after a year, but if you change it to 3% you get 48 million cases.

It's much better to have a deadly disease that is slightly contagious, and a mild desease that is highly contagious.

Now you can slow the infection rate, but you basically have to lock people in their homes and shut down the economy.

I would stock up on food tomorrow.... Don't waste it on sushi and expensive crap.... Get the stuff that can keep you alive if their is a food shortage.

If it cost more than a dollar per pound, you don't need it.

Edited February 28, 2020 by ProudConservative

[Guest ProudConservative]

My biggest fear is not the virus... I can stay inside for months.... My biggest fear is social unrest, and being trapped in a large city with no way out.... If that happenes, you're safer to leave the city, but you can have gangs breaking into homes looking for food, or the government confiscating food.

If it comes down to it, i'm going to head far north.... even if everything from my house gets stollen.

Edited February 28, 2020 by ProudConservative

[August1991]

27 minutes ago, ProudConservative said:

I never really feared pandemics, until I became a trader, and learned about explodential growth.

----

So basically a virus with an infectivity level that causes an increase of 1% a day gives you 38 Thousand after a year, but if you change it to 3% you get 48 million cases.

 

Oh my God! We're all going to die!!!

====

It is a bad common cold, infectious, with fever.

The death rate is "low", about 1/1000 of those infected die - most deaths are people older than 60.

By comparison, about 30% of those infected with Smallpox - another virus - died.

=====

IMHO, there is a similarity between "Global Warming", "Climate Change", "Peak Oil", "SARS" and "CoronaVirus" :

Rich people are neurotic. 

Edited February 28, 2020 by August1991

[August1991]

The US is foolishly involved in a debate about "medical insurance" and "pharmaceutical costs".

1) Discussions of State Health Care (M4A, State paid heath care, single-payer health care) are in fact questions of life itself.

2) Without America, we in the rest of the world would have no idea how to value life, protect life. (Our medical systems would become increasingly Soviet, unsustainable.} 

Edited February 28, 2020 by August1991

[Dougie93]

[SpankyMcFarland]

1 hour ago, August1991 said:

Oh my God! We're all going to die!!!

====

It is a bad common cold, infectious, with fever.

The death rate is "low", about 1/1000 of those infected die - most deaths are people older than 60.

By comparison, about 30% of those infected with Smallpox - another virus - died.

=====

IMHO, there is a similarity between "Global Warming", "Climate Change", "Peak Oil", "SARS" and "CoronaVirus" :

Rich people are neurotic. 

The reported fatality rate so far is 2/100. That may turn out be too high but it’s got a long way to fall to 1/1000. And it’s a flu, not a cold - the symptoms are mainly below the head. 

[August1991]

55 minutes ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

The reported fatality rate so far is 2/100. That may turn out be too high but it’s got a long way to fall to 1/1000. And it’s a flu, not a cold - the symptoms are mainly below the head. 

Flu/cold - same diff - both viruses. 2 of 100? You greatly exaggerate.

In northern climates, we fear "infections" - a rise in temperature is dangerous. We take antibiotics.

In southern climates, people know viruses - a rise in temperature is normal. We sweat it out.

Edited February 28, 2020 by August1991

[betsy]

8 hours ago, Zeitgeist said:

I’m starting to see people quietly scramble to buy masks and stockpile food, but no one wants to create a panic or look like a paranoid survivalist.  The fatality rate is about 3%, as out of 80,000 people infected, there have been 2800 deaths.  The mortality rate for SARS was much higher at around 10%, but the infection rate was slower and total infected was much less.  
 

I think what’s difficult is that, while I think we should require pretesting of entrants from high infection zones and permit zero visits from people who started their journey in the epicentre, we may soon get to a point where widespread infection is unpreventable without essentially putting everyone in isolation and shutting down the economy, which probably isn’t worth the cost to the economy and wellbeing.  It means we may all end up walking around in masks, avoiding close proximity with people, frequently washing our hands, and being very selective of our outdoor activities.  It would mean a slowdown AND accepting that the virus is all around us and the risk of infection is there.  Unless the virus suddenly drops off, I can see this kind of slowdown being a way of life until vaccines are widely available around 18 months from now.  
 

That’s why it’s worth being extra cautious now about who we let into Canada and how we interact and diagnose (feel sick, get checked).  The longer we have small numbers of infected, the less painful the wait for a vaccine.  

 

What's worrisome is that they don't really understand this virus yet.  Yesterday,  it was reported that a person was re-infected.  It was the first case for re-infection.  Therefore, having had it and recovered from it doesn't grant immunity from it.  What are the perils attached to re-infection? 

We are now advised to prepare and have a stock of food for 2 weeks (just in case we have to self-isolate).

With the blockades still in place, we all know supplies won't be delivered on time.  We can't prevent people from panicking and emptying the shelves. 

Also.....we don't know where this blockade dispute will lead to.  Anarchists and terrorists might also exploit the situation.  Stock up on ready-to-eat food just in case our power supply gets disrupted. 

 

Edited February 28, 2020 by betsy

[Rue]

11 hours ago, ProudConservative said:

I havn't been around for a while. It looks like our worse fears with the coronavirus is coming true. The Dow Jones has lost almost 5000 points this week. The shelves in some Italian supermarkets are empty.

Some experts are predicting that 70% of the worlds global population will be infected with the virus....

Tomorrow morning as soon as the strores are open, you need to Stock up on as much dried food as you can.

I have purchased over 200lbs of Brown rice, dried beans, frozen meats, frozen fruit, and frozen vegitables. It only cost me about $300

You don't want to be one of the last people in line at the supermarkets, when the food runs out.

Justin Trudeau is complely distracted with the rail blockaid... 

We are about to have extream shortages.

So whatever you think you need to buy for the next few months.... Go to to stores tomorrow, and make sure to buy it.

Once the pandemic starts, food can be contaminated.... So make sure to sterilize the kitchen, and cook all your food.

 

1. The Dow Jones as is the case with all stock exchanges operates on panic and hysteria and goes up and down. Market prices drop, escalate. To look at a stock drop in an isolated manner as you have shows an ignorance of the nature of stock fluctuation and market corrections nothing else.

2. There are countless viruses that come and go. There are in fact so viruses so many science don't even name them all. They can't be treated by anti-biotics since they are not a bacteria. The vast majority don't even give you symptoms and you carry them never knowing you have them. The ones that do usually are contained by your own body. It is people with pre-existing medical conditions that compromise their immunity systems like people on drugs for organ transplants, people with diabetes,, lupus, asthma, aids, cancer, that have to watch when they get viruses as do older people but 90-95% of viruses are not fatal and can be treated with  rest, hydration and believe it or not you friggin wash your hands and just not sneezing on people or running around in hysteria. 

3.Fear mongering is irresponsible. 

4. https://www.spectator.co.uk/2020/02/the-most-dangerous-thing-about-coronavirus-is-the-hysteria/ for quote below:

"There is something more to the Covid-19 panic. It is the latest phenomenon to fulfil a weird and growing appetite for doom among the populations of developed countries. We are living in the healthiest, most peaceful time in history, yet we cannot seem to accept it. We constantly have to invent bogeymen, from climate alarmism, nuclear war and financial collapse to deadly diseases. Covid-19 has achieved such traction because it has emerged at just the right time. At the end of January, Brexit had just been completed without incident. The standoff between the US and Iran — which preposterously led the ‘Doomsday Clock’ to be advanced closer to midnight than during the Cuban missile crisis — fizzled into nothing. The Australian bush fires, which caused an explosion in climate doom-mongering (even though the global incidence of wildfires has fallen over the past two decades) had largely gone out. What more was there to worry about?

Then along came a novel strain of disease and the cycle of panic began again. But there are already strong signs that it has peaked. In the seven days before 24 February, the WHO recorded 6,398 new infections in China — down from 13,002 the previous week. On Monday it was 415. Very soon we are going to have to find another thing to agonise about. Asteroids? The next ‘freak’ weather incident, now the storms have died down? Who knows, but we will certainly find something."

 

 

 

 

Edited February 28, 2020 by Rue

[Zeitgeist]

You’re not wrong.  There’s always something.  As a child in the 70’s it was fear of nuclear holocaust.  We had about a decade after the fall of the Soviet Union when everything seemed to be getting better, just about.  After 911 we began living under fear of terrorism.  Now it’s fear of extinction.  I do think we have to take all these threats seriously without letting them paralyze us or spoil the many great achievements: longer lives, better health, higher living standards, etc.   We just have to remember moderation and the hard work that made all these achievements possible.  Shutting down and waiting for others to fix everything is counterproductive.  I think we have a duty to be positive and productive.  

[Argus]

12 hours ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

I’ve seen a flu mortality rate of 0.1% quoted as well. The mortality rate of COVID-19 may be overestimated, given that many Chinese patients were asymptomatic and were not tested. It may also just be 1.5 times as contagious as flu. Best case scenario with my possibly rosy figures is a particularly serious flu season which would still be very bad news for the country. My local hospital is already inundated with elderly patients who can’t easily be placed anywhere and that seems to be a general problem across the country. We may have to build in some redundancy in the system before the next pandemic. 

Given 1% of flu patients need hospitalization vs about 18% of Covid-19 I don't think it can properly be compared to just a bad flu season.

Edited February 28, 2020 by Argus

[Argus]

8 hours ago, August1991 said:

Flu/cold - same diff - both viruses. 2 of 100? You greatly exaggerate.

No, he does not exaggerate at all. This is NOT the flu. We don't know the exact mortality rate due to uncertainty with Chinese results, but it is more contageous and far more cases require hospitalization. It also appears to have a much higher mortality  rate.

So far this flu season, about 0.05% of people who caught the flu have died from the virus in the U.S., according to CDC data. 

The death rate for COVID-19 appears to be higher than that of the flu. 

In the study published Feb. 18 in the China CDC Weekly, researchers found a death rate from COVID-19 to be around 2.3% in mainland China. That's much higher than the death rate linked to flu, which is typically around 0.1% in the U.S., according to The New York Times.

https://www.livescience.com/new-coronavirus-compare-with-flu.html

[bush_cheney2004]

Canada has more confirmed COVID-19 cases per capita than the United States.

The U.S. CDC is not a great source for Canadian stats, but Canada still loves to go there, as usual.

For those who don't know this exists:

Public Health Agency of Canada

[SkyHigh]

12 minutes ago, bush_cheney2004 said:

Canada has more confirmed COVID-19 cases per capita than the United States.

Didn't they do a big study last year at a Mayo clinic, or john Hopkins, that coincidentally used a version of the corona virus, that concluded the states were the best equipped to handle an outbreak?

Kind of similar to the thinest kid at fat camp, but still

[bush_cheney2004]

3 minutes ago, SkyHigh said:

Didn't they do a big study last year at a Mayo clinic, or john Hopkins, that coincidentally used a version of the corona virus, that concluded the states were the best equipped to handle an outbreak?

Kind of similar to the thinest kid at fat camp, but still

 

These scenarios are routinely studied in the U.S.

Canada had 44 SARS deaths...the U.S. had none.

Hopefully, Ottawa and  Ontario learned the lesson.

The Rolling Stones are going to Vancouver this time around.

[Zeitgeist]

10 minutes ago, bush_cheney2004 said:

 

These scenarios are routinely studied in the U.S.

Canada had 44 SARS deaths...the U.S. had none.

Hopefully, Ottawa and  Ontario learned the lesson.

The Rolling Stones are going to Vancouver this time around.

Big difference in Asians as percentage of U.S. population compared to Asians as percentage of Canada population:

18.5 % of Canadians are Asian

5.6 % of Americans are Asian

The percentages are even higher in the cities, particularly Toronto and Vancouver.  Vancouver should be very worried about Coronavirus.  Almost half of that city is of Asian ethnicity, the highest percentage of any city outside of Asia.

https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=14&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjbuama5vTnAhVOhOAKHbw6AIMQFjANegQIAhAB&url=https%3A%2F%2Fvancouversun.com%2Flife%2Fvancouver-is-most-asian-city-outside-asia-what-are-the-ramifications&usg=AOvVaw37oyKhpX2eOSXzLZ56Bsbj

 

Edited February 28, 2020 by Zeitgeist

[bush_cheney2004]

1 minute ago, Zeitgeist said:

Big difference in Asians as percentage of U.S. population compared to Asians as percentage of Canada population:

18.5 % of Canadians are Asian

5.6 % of Americans are Asian

The percentages are even higher in the cities, particularly Toronto and Vancouver.  Vancouver should be very worried about Coronavirus.

 

 

Not buying the Asian scare, but there are far more Asian Americans than Canadian (21 million).

SARS investigation in Canada slammed the government's lack of preparedness, which should be much improved now:

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/sars-report-slams-governments/article1167669/

[SkyHigh]

14 minutes ago, bush_cheney2004 said:

 

These scenarios are routinely studied in the U.S.

Canada had 44 SARS deaths...the U.S. had none.

Hopefully, Ottawa and  Ontario learned the lesson.

The Rolling Stones are going to Vancouver this time around.

Lets hope!

Sars did let me bring my girl to my native Toronto for her first vist cheap though, the year after they had crazy deals to promote tourism.

I do feel bad for T.O. about the stones, I know someone (not well, but i see no reason to not trust them) that was at one of their surprise warm up shows they did before many of their world tours