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> For example when things started happening in Italy As someone who lived in Italy and now lives in the US, this was driving me absolutely crazy. They have a g

by davidw 7y ago

> For example when things started happening in Italy As someone who lived in Italy and now lives in the US, this was driving me absolutely crazy. They have a great health care system, and are a transparent democracy. When things started to happen rapidly there, it was very, very clear that the same situation would play out in the US, and yet there were still a lot of "just a flu" people.

ardy42 7y ago
> When things started to happen rapidly there, it was very, very clear that the same situation would play out in the US... When it was still restricted to China, I was able to reassure myself into complacency with memories of the original SARS. China contained that, so maybe they will contain this one, too? As soon as it hit Italy hard, that story didn't work anymore, and it was clear it was only a matter of time before it spread everywhere.
briandear 7y ago
However the history of flu in Italy is interesting— they have a much higher fatality rate in general than the rest of Europe. Their 2017 flu season killed as many people as Coronavirus killed this year. Italy doesn’t have a great track record with infectious disease and they also have among the fewest ICU beds of any developed country: about 8 beds per 100k while the US has 32 beds per 100,000 population. They also have some ridiculous politics that led them to not closing borders sooner. Didn’t the mayor of Florence have a “hug-a-Chinese” day in February? There was so much political correctness around banning travelers from China that it probably cost significant lives.
- davidw 7y ago
  > Didn’t the mayor of Florence have a “hug-a-Chinese” day in February? There was so much political correctness around banning travelers from China that it probably cost significant lives. They were one of the first countries to ban travel from China. What you call "political correctness" was just an anti-racism message. Italy certainly had some things go wrong in some areas, but they were also unlucky in some ways, being the first country to get hit hard.
  - jakeogh 7y ago
    A lot of power is derived from and dependent on pretending there is division where there is not.
- fspeech 7y ago
  And yet the Chinese community in Italy didn't suffer much from Covid outbreaks https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-italy-chinese/from-zero-to-hero-italys-chinese-help-beat-coronavirus-idUSKBN21I3I8 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-italy-..., neither did Chinatown in San Francisco https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/17/us/san-francisco-coronavirus-chinese-hospital.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/17/us/san-francisco-coronavi...

by davidw 7y ago

ardy42 7y ago

> When things started to happen rapidly there, it was very, very clear that the same situation would play out in the US... When it was still restricted to China, I was able to reassure myself into complacency with memories of the original SARS. China contained that, so maybe they will contain this one, too? As soon as it hit Italy hard, that story didn't work anymore, and it was clear it was only a matter of time before it spread everywhere.

briandear 7y ago

However the history of flu in Italy is interesting— they have a much higher fatality rate in general than the rest of Europe. Their 2017 flu season killed as many people as Coronavirus killed this year. Italy doesn’t have a great track record with infectious disease and they also have among the fewest ICU beds of any developed country: about 8 beds per 100k while the US has 32 beds per 100,000 population. They also have some ridiculous politics that led them to not closing borders sooner. Didn’t the mayor of Florence have a “hug-a-Chinese” day in February? There was so much political correctness around banning travelers from China that it probably cost significant lives.

davidw 7y ago
> Didn’t the mayor of Florence have a “hug-a-Chinese” day in February? There was so much political correctness around banning travelers from China that it probably cost significant lives. They were one of the first countries to ban travel from China. What you call "political correctness" was just an anti-racism message. Italy certainly had some things go wrong in some areas, but they were also unlucky in some ways, being the first country to get hit hard.
- jakeogh 7y ago
  A lot of power is derived from and dependent on pretending there is division where there is not.
fspeech 7y ago
And yet the Chinese community in Italy didn't suffer much from Covid outbreaks https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-italy-chinese/from-zero-to-hero-italys-chinese-help-beat-coronavirus-idUSKBN21I3I8 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-italy-..., neither did Chinatown in San Francisco https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/17/us/san-francisco-coronavirus-chinese-hospital.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/17/us/san-francisco-coronavi...