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I really don't get why people get so worried about this. Especially on a science oriented forum like HN. At this moment, even if we assume that there are 100 t

I really don't get why people get so worried about this. Especially on a science oriented forum like HN. At this moment, even if we assume that there are 100 times more unreported cases than reported cases, the odds are so low that there is simply no reason to be worried, even if attending an international conference. It's true that people do get sick, and die, and it can happen to anyone. But people also get into all types of unlikely accidents, and we don't let this affect our daily life. Besides, symptoms are mild for most people. We're not talking about Ebola here. I'm blaming the media. They make a "good" job at reporting each new individual case, making you feel that "this could be you" but IMHO this is noise. What I want to know is, how are countries prepared, what steps will be followed if this gets out of control, what is currently the probability of catching the virus, what do we know about the virus, how could the situation evolve in one week, one month and so on.... There are effective ways to mitigate the virus propagation other than canceling all events and stopping our economy, with all the adverse consequences we can imagine. For instance, starting by following the recommendations from health organisations. Such as stay home when showing symptoms, washing hands and so on. This is not followed by most people in Europe (and I suspect the US too). I see people coughing all the time in public transportation (compared with Asia where people wear masks). EDIT: I'm not saying that we shouldn't be concerned or prepared, but I wouldn't go beyond the recommendations from the CDC, and I think that catching the virus now is extremely unlikely.

echelon 7y ago
> I really don't get why people get so worried about this. Especially on a science oriented forum like HN. Because of the death rate. We're basing what we know on China, but can we really trust their numbers? We'll soon have more reliable figures from Japan, Korea, and Italy. Iran has reported a death rate of up to 17%. Healthy people are dying too. Young people. And if the medical system gets overwhelmed, those that develop pneumonia will be fucked. (I'll chase down citations and edit my post to include them.)
- tobias2014 7y ago
  But what about selection bias? The mortality rate is an upper limit at the moment. Is it just wishful thinking that maybe in reality 100 times more people are infected but show no to very little symptoms? The number of people that can be tested is very limited, so only the cases are tested which are above a certain threshold in severity.
  - scarmig 7y ago
    Every person infected on the Diamond Princess was identified (~800 people, older cohort than the general population), and 6 people have died so far, with optimal care. That's a strong indicator that it's much worse than the usual flu, though hardly Captain Trips.
    - tobias2014 7y ago
      Valid point! This is indeed already much higher, and only sets a lower bound. So we should keep an eye on this well controlled sample. So we have a lower bound of somewhere around 1% and an upper bound of somewhere around 7% ( https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ ) at the moment. Not very reassuring.
    - jacobkg 7y ago
      I just finally read the The Stand a couple months ago. Not the best timing in retrospect. Also had just started playing Pandemic Legacy, but I had to stop when the cover image of the game started looking the same as the front page of the newspaper.
- jnbiche 7y ago
  I'm extremely skeptical of a 17% case fatality rate (likely not death rate, which is different). That's almost certainly high due to under-reporting of cases. Iran's public health surveillance system is likely not as good as China, and they've not acted with the alacrity that the Chinese have. But it doesn't have to be a 17% CFR rate to be a disaster. The Spanish Flu of 1918 just had around a 2-3% CFR, but it was easier to transmit than the common flu, so it spread quickly and lots of people died. Covid-19 appears to share the relatively high r0 of Spanish Flu. So there's ample reason to be concerned.
- stock_toaster 7y ago
  > Iran has reported a death rate of up to 17%. Apparently Iran also had a high death rate for spanish flu. From wikipedia: > In Iran, the mortality was very high: according to an estimate, between 902,400 and 2,431,000, or 8% to 22% of the total population died.[67] > -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu
  - 9nGQluzmnq3M 7y ago
    Iran was also at the tail end of 4-year, 3-sided war that killed around 2M people. The very fact that there's 1.5M people (!) leeway in the numbers tells you something about the state the country was in, and how difficult it is to attribute those deaths specifically to one thing like the flu. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Campaign https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Campaign
- zadler 7y ago
  There’s no reason to believe the Iranian number is anywhere near accurate. On the contrary, it’s likely that the cases confirmed number is too low everywhere except maybe the diamond princess. Quoting 17% as the possible death rate is just inciting panic. It’s likely much lower. Which is not to say you should not worry; I think it’ll reach most people and end up killing millions.
- refurb 7y ago
  2,900 deaths in a country of 1.39B. 2 deaths per million people. If the same things happens in the US, that's 800 people dead in the US. Almost 3,000 Americans die each month in traffic accidents. Keep things in perspective.
  - scarmig 7y ago
    2,900 deaths after shutting down the economy for a quarter or more.
  - craftinator 7y ago
    2900 deaths in a few months, with more people getting sick every day. The process of viral expansion isn't linear...
  - vkou 7y ago
    > 2,900 deaths in a country of 1.39B. 2 deaths per million people. 1. You have no guarantee that it's not going to get worse. 2. And this was after a draconian quarantine, and nation-wide mobilization to prevent the spread.
  - yfzhou 7y ago
    How about 2,200 deaths in Wuhan of 10m people, only because it’s sealed off just in time so it’s not replicated in other cities across China?
jnbiche 7y ago
Go check out the case fatality rate and estimated r0 for the Spanish Flu of 1918-the deadliest pandemic of the past several centuries. You'll note that its characteristics are fairly similar to what we know of Covid-19. The only break we get is that young adults don't seem nearly as susceptible to Covid-19 as they were to Spanish Flu. But everything else points to the possibility of a pandemic along the lines of Spanish Flu. That's why we are so concerned. Media aside, the CDC isn't prime to exaggeration, and China isn't prone to completely shutting down the economy of entire provinces of millions of people without dire need. And there's every reason to believe we will have a similar experience to China's.
- themagician 7y ago
  Everything else doesn’t point to that. Media FUD points to that. If we have a similar experience to that of China it seems like it won’t be a big deal. In 2018-2019 80,000 people died from the flu in the United States. 80,000. No one really cared. The death rate for the current coronavirus seems to be about 2%, but it’s likely even lower than that since so many cases are going unreported since the symptoms are so mild in most people. I see this whole thing as some kind of bizarre media externality. The disease here is a social one. It’s like the media has evolved in such a way that FUD has manifested into something that is almost tangible. It’s not the coronavirus you need be worried about, but the meta-coronavirus. It’s making people crazy.
  - shard972 7y ago
    Your repeating bullshit and should delete your comment. Anyone looking at the situation knows there is a serious concern that the deathrates will heavily depend on if people will have access to critical care like drugs and ventilators. If COVID-19 reaches flu levels of infection its insane to believe that countries like africa or even a lot of western countries would be able to give such medical treatment to 10% of their populations.
  - mike_d 7y ago
    > The death rate for the current coronavirus seems to be about 2% The United States has about 2.7 hospital beds per thousand people. Hospitalization and attentive care is the biggest contributor to survival rates for COVID-19 patients. This is why medical professionals are concerned that is spreads effectively without presenting symptoms. One day you are going to wake up and every primary care facility will be overwhelmed.
kebman 7y ago
Given the long incubation period for this disease, and the fact that it has a—give or take—3 percent lethality (though less for the young, but more for the old), then IMHO people should take it very seriously. Some people even report a total of 3.4 percent lethality. To put that in perspective; that's one in about thirty people(!). No, it's not "Ebola," but it's still contageous and deadly. In that regard, the media is actually helping. If it's perhaps making some people more anxious than they really need to be, then it's a price worth paying. As for how serious people take hygiene, IDK, man. I'm taking it very seriously myself, and so should you. If you see people caughing or sneezing without covering themselves, I'd politely ask them if they can please use the bent elbow in instead.
- fspeech 7y ago
  It depends on the kind of care you can get. With early detection and ample care it is likely 1% or lower. Chance for serious pneumonia (meaning having oxygen issues) is around 14% for the current mix of patients. In an overwhelmed medical system mortality rate will be higher than even what Wuhan experienced.
shard972 7y ago
> the odds are so low that there is simply no reason to be worried Which odds? The deathrate is higher than the flu and its more transmissible than the flu, what odds are you talking about?
orblivion 7y ago
It's extremely unlikely for an individual, perhaps, and I'm honestly not particularly afraid for my life. (If anything, I'm worried about my convenience, whether I get sick or just people in my area.) However in aggregate if we act in a conscientious manner, we can slow or stop the spread in our own areas, and/or head off a run on supplies by doing some shopping early. I agree we need to be measured. I'm not changing my behavior much yet since community spread hasn't hit my area. Once it does I might try to reduce my time in public. Even now I may consider staying away from conferences that bring travelers, etc.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
ralusek 7y ago
This is a very silly post, especially for one claiming to be focused on being "science-oriented." Do you not understand incubation periods and exponents? > what is currently the probability of catching the virus Yes, that is the sudden cause for concern: we don't know. The incubation period is as long as 2 weeks before showing any symptoms, and there are now cases that have lost any connection to known vectors. To suggest that there isn't at least cause for worry is a bit ridiculous. We don't know how those people got it, we don't know how many other people got it, and we won't know for some time. Some spread is thought to be possible before any symptoms manifest, which paired with a long incubation period with no symptoms, and the exponential way in which people interact is potential cause for concern... From the CDC: > The virus that causes COVID-19 seems to be spreading easily and sustainably in the community (“community spread”) in some affected geographic areas. Community spread means people have been infected with the virus in an area, including some who are not sure how or where they became infected.
- yodsanklai 7y ago
  > This is a very silly post For the sake of example, suppose I live in a country with 100 millions inhabitants, with 100 reported cases. Suppose that there are currently 100 times more cases. What do you think is the probability to get close enough to one of these cases to get infected? how does it compare with something like having a car accident, or getting complications for the common seasonal flu? This virus is going to be a concern. A rough estimation tells us that number of cases increases tenfold every 10 to 15 days, depending on containment measures. It could peak at 10-20% of the population. We also expect the mortality rate to be something between 0.5% and 1%. So yes, there will be causalities, and we'll need to be especially vigilant in the near future, especially April and May. But right now, the probability to be infected if virtually zero. There is also not much we can do besides following CDC recommendations. The virus is going to spread no matter what.
  - ralusek 7y ago
    Car accidents don't increase in incidence exponentially in a matter of weeks. The chances of being infected right now are kind of irrelevant to this discussion; I don't see very many people panicking that they're necessarily concerned about this very moment, so I think you're arguing against a strawman. People are simply extrapolating a bit, and the trajectory is giving some cause for concern.
nodamage 7y ago
Bill Gates wrote a fairly cogent op-end explaining why we should be taking this seriously: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2003762 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2003762 The short answer is the combination of a high transmission rate and the ability to transmit the virus while asymptomatic means the number of infected people will grow exponentially. The Spanish flu had a transmission rate lower than Covid-19 and ultimately ended up infecting a third of the world's population, and that was before mass air travel was a thing. If Covid-19 reaches anywhere near that level there will be millions of deaths. It is true that if you are young and healthy the mortality rate is low, but a 15% mortality rate in 80+ year olds and 8% in 70-80 year olds is pretty serious.
tristanj 7y ago
> I really don't get why people get so worried about this. The virus has overwhelmed the healthcare system in multiple places (Hubei, Iran). Hospitals operate at or near capacity (empty beds don't make money), and do not have the resources to handle a 4-5x uptick in flu patients. The mortality rate is strikingly different with and without quality medical care. You can see there is a stark difference in the mortality rate within Hubei (previously 4-5%) vs rest of China (0.4%). The mortality rate in Hubei has gone down in recent weeks (to 2.9%) as China has moved thousands of doctors/medical staff to the area and built tens of thousands of patient beds. > Besides, symptoms are mild for most people. This is an extremely deceptive talking point the media has been promoting. The WHO reports 80+% of cases have been mild or asymptomatic, but 14% have been serious and 5% severe [1]. As the virus is projected to infect billions of people this year, that would lead to tens of millions of serious cases, of which many would die due to lack of medical resources. I would strongly recommend reading this article by an Australian professor explaining why the Australian medical system will be overwhelmed in the coming pandemic. It applies to most other western countries as well. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/28/australian-doctors-warn-of-overwhelmed-public-health-system-in-event-of-coronavirus-pandemic https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/28/australian-doc... [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/27/world/asia/coronavirus-treament-recovery.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/27/world/asia/coronavirus-tr...
jokoon 7y ago
> This is not followed by most people in Europe So why aren't you worried? My worry is that I'm hearing we're weighing the economic loss versus the health of people. The disease is spreading MAINLY because of air travel, and I don't see countries really doing thorough checks, or at least discouraging air travel for now, or keeping a list of people who returned from those countries. Spreading fear in the media at least has the cheap virtue of encouraging people to wash their hands, avoid going to those countries, without the government spending money. The drawback is that people view this as fear-mongering.
mikekchar 7y ago
I'm not personally worried, but today I cancelled my hotel reservation for RubyKaigi in April. Do I think I am going to get Corona Virus? No. It's very unlikely. Do I think I am going to catch Corona Virus at the conference? No. It's very unlikely. However large numbers means that the chance it happens to someone at some conference is incredibly likely. Indeed, there were just 8 cases in Hokkaido that seems to have originated from a trade conference. There is no real need for me to go to a conference. I can wait until next year. If we avoid unnecessary interactions in large numbers then it will make a difference. Some people need to meet, but I certainly don't need to get together with a whole bunch of strangers in a remote location to talk about Ruby, so I'm not going to.
hn_throwaway_99 7y ago
> I really don't get why people get so worried about this. Especially on a science oriented forum like HN. That is downright obnoxious. Consider the following facts: 1. As another poster pointed out, millions of people in the US don't have health insurance. If they get a mild flu-like illness there is no chance they are getting tested. They'll pass it on to others in their community. 2. Millions in the US also have no paid sick leave, which is why I just roll my eyes when I hear the "stay at home when showing symptoms" advice you give. It's the ultimate oblivious "just let them eat cake" response to the dishwasher who won't be able to make their rent payment if they don't come in to work. 3. The death rate of those over 70 is in the high single to low double digits range. My parents are in their 70s, and otherwise in great health. I would be devastated if they were killed by coronavirus. Equating the significant possibility of them dying if they contracted the disease, something thousands of times higher than them dying in a random accident, to me shows that your line of thought is "Well, I'm in my 20s, 30s or 40s, so I'll be fine." People are rightfully concerned because they are able to see the future impact the disease will have on others besides themselves.

echelon 7y ago

> I really don't get why people get so worried about this. Especially on a science oriented forum like HN. Because of the death rate. We're basing what we know on China, but can we really trust their numbers? We'll soon have more reliable figures from Japan, Korea, and Italy. Iran has reported a death rate of up to 17%. Healthy people are dying too. Young people. And if the medical system gets overwhelmed, those that develop pneumonia will be fucked. (I'll chase down citations and edit my post to include them.)

tobias2014 7y ago
But what about selection bias? The mortality rate is an upper limit at the moment. Is it just wishful thinking that maybe in reality 100 times more people are infected but show no to very little symptoms? The number of people that can be tested is very limited, so only the cases are tested which are above a certain threshold in severity.
- scarmig 7y ago
  Every person infected on the Diamond Princess was identified (~800 people, older cohort than the general population), and 6 people have died so far, with optimal care. That's a strong indicator that it's much worse than the usual flu, though hardly Captain Trips.
  - tobias2014 7y ago
    Valid point! This is indeed already much higher, and only sets a lower bound. So we should keep an eye on this well controlled sample. So we have a lower bound of somewhere around 1% and an upper bound of somewhere around 7% ( https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ ) at the moment. Not very reassuring.
  - jacobkg 7y ago
    I just finally read the The Stand a couple months ago. Not the best timing in retrospect. Also had just started playing Pandemic Legacy, but I had to stop when the cover image of the game started looking the same as the front page of the newspaper.
jnbiche 7y ago
I'm extremely skeptical of a 17% case fatality rate (likely not death rate, which is different). That's almost certainly high due to under-reporting of cases. Iran's public health surveillance system is likely not as good as China, and they've not acted with the alacrity that the Chinese have. But it doesn't have to be a 17% CFR rate to be a disaster. The Spanish Flu of 1918 just had around a 2-3% CFR, but it was easier to transmit than the common flu, so it spread quickly and lots of people died. Covid-19 appears to share the relatively high r0 of Spanish Flu. So there's ample reason to be concerned.
stock_toaster 7y ago
> Iran has reported a death rate of up to 17%. Apparently Iran also had a high death rate for spanish flu. From wikipedia: > In Iran, the mortality was very high: according to an estimate, between 902,400 and 2,431,000, or 8% to 22% of the total population died.[67] > -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu
- 9nGQluzmnq3M 7y ago
  Iran was also at the tail end of 4-year, 3-sided war that killed around 2M people. The very fact that there's 1.5M people (!) leeway in the numbers tells you something about the state the country was in, and how difficult it is to attribute those deaths specifically to one thing like the flu. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Campaign https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_Campaign
zadler 7y ago
There’s no reason to believe the Iranian number is anywhere near accurate. On the contrary, it’s likely that the cases confirmed number is too low everywhere except maybe the diamond princess. Quoting 17% as the possible death rate is just inciting panic. It’s likely much lower. Which is not to say you should not worry; I think it’ll reach most people and end up killing millions.
refurb 7y ago
2,900 deaths in a country of 1.39B. 2 deaths per million people. If the same things happens in the US, that's 800 people dead in the US. Almost 3,000 Americans die each month in traffic accidents. Keep things in perspective.
- scarmig 7y ago
  2,900 deaths after shutting down the economy for a quarter or more.
- craftinator 7y ago
  2900 deaths in a few months, with more people getting sick every day. The process of viral expansion isn't linear...
- vkou 7y ago
  > 2,900 deaths in a country of 1.39B. 2 deaths per million people. 1. You have no guarantee that it's not going to get worse. 2. And this was after a draconian quarantine, and nation-wide mobilization to prevent the spread.
- yfzhou 7y ago
  How about 2,200 deaths in Wuhan of 10m people, only because it’s sealed off just in time so it’s not replicated in other cities across China?

jnbiche 7y ago

Go check out the case fatality rate and estimated r0 for the Spanish Flu of 1918-the deadliest pandemic of the past several centuries. You'll note that its characteristics are fairly similar to what we know of Covid-19. The only break we get is that young adults don't seem nearly as susceptible to Covid-19 as they were to Spanish Flu. But everything else points to the possibility of a pandemic along the lines of Spanish Flu. That's why we are so concerned. Media aside, the CDC isn't prime to exaggeration, and China isn't prone to completely shutting down the economy of entire provinces of millions of people without dire need. And there's every reason to believe we will have a similar experience to China's.

themagician 7y ago
Everything else doesn’t point to that. Media FUD points to that. If we have a similar experience to that of China it seems like it won’t be a big deal. In 2018-2019 80,000 people died from the flu in the United States. 80,000. No one really cared. The death rate for the current coronavirus seems to be about 2%, but it’s likely even lower than that since so many cases are going unreported since the symptoms are so mild in most people. I see this whole thing as some kind of bizarre media externality. The disease here is a social one. It’s like the media has evolved in such a way that FUD has manifested into something that is almost tangible. It’s not the coronavirus you need be worried about, but the meta-coronavirus. It’s making people crazy.
- shard972 7y ago
  Your repeating bullshit and should delete your comment. Anyone looking at the situation knows there is a serious concern that the deathrates will heavily depend on if people will have access to critical care like drugs and ventilators. If COVID-19 reaches flu levels of infection its insane to believe that countries like africa or even a lot of western countries would be able to give such medical treatment to 10% of their populations.
- mike_d 7y ago
  > The death rate for the current coronavirus seems to be about 2% The United States has about 2.7 hospital beds per thousand people. Hospitalization and attentive care is the biggest contributor to survival rates for COVID-19 patients. This is why medical professionals are concerned that is spreads effectively without presenting symptoms. One day you are going to wake up and every primary care facility will be overwhelmed.

kebman 7y ago

Given the long incubation period for this disease, and the fact that it has a—give or take—3 percent lethality (though less for the young, but more for the old), then IMHO people should take it very seriously. Some people even report a total of 3.4 percent lethality. To put that in perspective; that's one in about thirty people(!). No, it's not "Ebola," but it's still contageous and deadly. In that regard, the media is actually helping. If it's perhaps making some people more anxious than they really need to be, then it's a price worth paying. As for how serious people take hygiene, IDK, man. I'm taking it very seriously myself, and so should you. If you see people caughing or sneezing without covering themselves, I'd politely ask them if they can please use the bent elbow in instead.

fspeech 7y ago
It depends on the kind of care you can get. With early detection and ample care it is likely 1% or lower. Chance for serious pneumonia (meaning having oxygen issues) is around 14% for the current mix of patients. In an overwhelmed medical system mortality rate will be higher than even what Wuhan experienced.

shard972 7y ago

> the odds are so low that there is simply no reason to be worried Which odds? The deathrate is higher than the flu and its more transmissible than the flu, what odds are you talking about?

orblivion 7y ago

It's extremely unlikely for an individual, perhaps, and I'm honestly not particularly afraid for my life. (If anything, I'm worried about my convenience, whether I get sick or just people in my area.) However in aggregate if we act in a conscientious manner, we can slow or stop the spread in our own areas, and/or head off a run on supplies by doing some shopping early. I agree we need to be measured. I'm not changing my behavior much yet since community spread hasn't hit my area. Once it does I might try to reduce my time in public. Even now I may consider staying away from conferences that bring travelers, etc.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

ralusek 7y ago

This is a very silly post, especially for one claiming to be focused on being "science-oriented." Do you not understand incubation periods and exponents? > what is currently the probability of catching the virus Yes, that is the sudden cause for concern: we don't know. The incubation period is as long as 2 weeks before showing any symptoms, and there are now cases that have lost any connection to known vectors. To suggest that there isn't at least cause for worry is a bit ridiculous. We don't know how those people got it, we don't know how many other people got it, and we won't know for some time. Some spread is thought to be possible before any symptoms manifest, which paired with a long incubation period with no symptoms, and the exponential way in which people interact is potential cause for concern... From the CDC: > The virus that causes COVID-19 seems to be spreading easily and sustainably in the community (“community spread”) in some affected geographic areas. Community spread means people have been infected with the virus in an area, including some who are not sure how or where they became infected.

yodsanklai 7y ago
> This is a very silly post For the sake of example, suppose I live in a country with 100 millions inhabitants, with 100 reported cases. Suppose that there are currently 100 times more cases. What do you think is the probability to get close enough to one of these cases to get infected? how does it compare with something like having a car accident, or getting complications for the common seasonal flu? This virus is going to be a concern. A rough estimation tells us that number of cases increases tenfold every 10 to 15 days, depending on containment measures. It could peak at 10-20% of the population. We also expect the mortality rate to be something between 0.5% and 1%. So yes, there will be causalities, and we'll need to be especially vigilant in the near future, especially April and May. But right now, the probability to be infected if virtually zero. There is also not much we can do besides following CDC recommendations. The virus is going to spread no matter what.
- ralusek 7y ago
  Car accidents don't increase in incidence exponentially in a matter of weeks. The chances of being infected right now are kind of irrelevant to this discussion; I don't see very many people panicking that they're necessarily concerned about this very moment, so I think you're arguing against a strawman. People are simply extrapolating a bit, and the trajectory is giving some cause for concern.

nodamage 7y ago

Bill Gates wrote a fairly cogent op-end explaining why we should be taking this seriously: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2003762 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2003762 The short answer is the combination of a high transmission rate and the ability to transmit the virus while asymptomatic means the number of infected people will grow exponentially. The Spanish flu had a transmission rate lower than Covid-19 and ultimately ended up infecting a third of the world's population, and that was before mass air travel was a thing. If Covid-19 reaches anywhere near that level there will be millions of deaths. It is true that if you are young and healthy the mortality rate is low, but a 15% mortality rate in 80+ year olds and 8% in 70-80 year olds is pretty serious.

tristanj 7y ago

> I really don't get why people get so worried about this. The virus has overwhelmed the healthcare system in multiple places (Hubei, Iran). Hospitals operate at or near capacity (empty beds don't make money), and do not have the resources to handle a 4-5x uptick in flu patients. The mortality rate is strikingly different with and without quality medical care. You can see there is a stark difference in the mortality rate within Hubei (previously 4-5%) vs rest of China (0.4%). The mortality rate in Hubei has gone down in recent weeks (to 2.9%) as China has moved thousands of doctors/medical staff to the area and built tens of thousands of patient beds. > Besides, symptoms are mild for most people. This is an extremely deceptive talking point the media has been promoting. The WHO reports 80+% of cases have been mild or asymptomatic, but 14% have been serious and 5% severe [1]. As the virus is projected to infect billions of people this year, that would lead to tens of millions of serious cases, of which many would die due to lack of medical resources. I would strongly recommend reading this article by an Australian professor explaining why the Australian medical system will be overwhelmed in the coming pandemic. It applies to most other western countries as well. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/28/australian-doctors-warn-of-overwhelmed-public-health-system-in-event-of-coronavirus-pandemic https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/28/australian-doc... [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/27/world/asia/coronavirus-treament-recovery.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/27/world/asia/coronavirus-tr...

jokoon 7y ago

> This is not followed by most people in Europe So why aren't you worried? My worry is that I'm hearing we're weighing the economic loss versus the health of people. The disease is spreading MAINLY because of air travel, and I don't see countries really doing thorough checks, or at least discouraging air travel for now, or keeping a list of people who returned from those countries. Spreading fear in the media at least has the cheap virtue of encouraging people to wash their hands, avoid going to those countries, without the government spending money. The drawback is that people view this as fear-mongering.

mikekchar 7y ago

I'm not personally worried, but today I cancelled my hotel reservation for RubyKaigi in April. Do I think I am going to get Corona Virus? No. It's very unlikely. Do I think I am going to catch Corona Virus at the conference? No. It's very unlikely. However large numbers means that the chance it happens to someone at some conference is incredibly likely. Indeed, there were just 8 cases in Hokkaido that seems to have originated from a trade conference. There is no real need for me to go to a conference. I can wait until next year. If we avoid unnecessary interactions in large numbers then it will make a difference. Some people need to meet, but I certainly don't need to get together with a whole bunch of strangers in a remote location to talk about Ruby, so I'm not going to.

hn_throwaway_99 7y ago

> I really don't get why people get so worried about this. Especially on a science oriented forum like HN. That is downright obnoxious. Consider the following facts: 1. As another poster pointed out, millions of people in the US don't have health insurance. If they get a mild flu-like illness there is no chance they are getting tested. They'll pass it on to others in their community. 2. Millions in the US also have no paid sick leave, which is why I just roll my eyes when I hear the "stay at home when showing symptoms" advice you give. It's the ultimate oblivious "just let them eat cake" response to the dishwasher who won't be able to make their rent payment if they don't come in to work. 3. The death rate of those over 70 is in the high single to low double digits range. My parents are in their 70s, and otherwise in great health. I would be devastated if they were killed by coronavirus. Equating the significant possibility of them dying if they contracted the disease, something thousands of times higher than them dying in a random accident, to me shows that your line of thought is "Well, I'm in my 20s, 30s or 40s, so I'll be fine." People are rightfully concerned because they are able to see the future impact the disease will have on others besides themselves.