4 ms·

The earliest known case, just as the mid-November suspected cases you cited, is a suspected case. If you read the original paper claiming the Dec 1 case, you ar

by rfoo 7y ago

The earliest known case, just as the mid-November suspected cases you cited, is a suspected case. If you read the original paper claiming the Dec 1 case, you are going to see they made the conclusion based on symptoms and epidemiology. This is something which can only happen retrospectively. It does not mean someone can magically realize there is a novel virus when the first few patients just showed up.

emmelaich 7y ago
OK, the first known case was 8 Dec. Do you doubt that health officials in Wuhan were - to put it mildly, incurious about the novel flu like sickness?
- rfoo 7y ago
  The health officials surely isn't (and won't be) curious about isolated flu-like cases, they can't because there are simply too many such patients, to the point it is not realistic to track them all. The doctors who saw these cases are certainly curious, but unless one sees a number of related cases with similar symptoms, "novel infectious disease" would not be among the first few explanations one turns to. There are simply too many other possible reasons (and more probable in routines) for flu-like symptoms. Unfortunately due to the nature of this virus early cases are indeed pretty isolated. From what I read, the virus was first detected by an mNGS run in late Dec, which as far is still a "fuck I believe this must be caused by microbe but I'm seriously out of idea what could this be"-thing to Chinese doctors.
  - emmelaich 7y ago
    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51364382 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51364382
    - rfoo 7y ago
      The report Dr. Li tried to send out is one of the mNGS report I mentioned above, it happened on Dec 30, i.e. late Dec. The mNGS run itself happened around Dec 26 if you look at the original photo Dr. Li posted. Could you please highlight where in this news article a date earlier than late December (like, Dec 1 or Dec 8 as you said) was mentioned? It brings a valid point, that China government sat on the problem for three weeks, but the timeline does not match yours.

by rfoo 7y ago

emmelaich 7y ago

OK, the first known case was 8 Dec. Do you doubt that health officials in Wuhan were - to put it mildly, incurious about the novel flu like sickness?

rfoo 7y ago
The health officials surely isn't (and won't be) curious about isolated flu-like cases, they can't because there are simply too many such patients, to the point it is not realistic to track them all. The doctors who saw these cases are certainly curious, but unless one sees a number of related cases with similar symptoms, "novel infectious disease" would not be among the first few explanations one turns to. There are simply too many other possible reasons (and more probable in routines) for flu-like symptoms. Unfortunately due to the nature of this virus early cases are indeed pretty isolated. From what I read, the virus was first detected by an mNGS run in late Dec, which as far is still a "fuck I believe this must be caused by microbe but I'm seriously out of idea what could this be"-thing to Chinese doctors.
- emmelaich 7y ago
  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51364382 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51364382
  - rfoo 7y ago
    The report Dr. Li tried to send out is one of the mNGS report I mentioned above, it happened on Dec 30, i.e. late Dec. The mNGS run itself happened around Dec 26 if you look at the original photo Dr. Li posted. Could you please highlight where in this news article a date earlier than late December (like, Dec 1 or Dec 8 as you said) was mentioned? It brings a valid point, that China government sat on the problem for three weeks, but the timeline does not match yours.