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Perhaps monitoring twitter and other social media for symptoms that deviate from the expected for the timeframe is the kind of surveillance mentioned in the art

Perhaps monitoring twitter and other social media for symptoms that deviate from the expected for the timeframe is the kind of surveillance mentioned in the article [1]. It is definitely unrealistic to be on the hunt for pathogens by inspecting every single person, but using social media for guided search could prove useful. [1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32937679/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32937679/

mc32 6y ago
There was the Wuhan ophthalmologist[1] who pulled the alarm but got a visit by police and eventually succumbed to the disease. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Wenliang https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Wenliang
- SiempreViernes 6y ago
  He was the first that publicly recognised the original outbreak as something new, but that's not the sort of preventive surveillance we're interested in. Of course it would have been great if the Chinese were more transparent during those early days (and in general honestly), but it's pretty clear that the original outbreak was just the first smoke escaping from inside the burning roof: by late December it was already an uncontained epidemic that had spread far outside Wuhan. We'd like something that would pick up the disease before it makes it to the epidemic status.
- beagle3 6y ago
  Which is weird in itself - The probability of death for a healthy 30-something year old is lower than their probability to die in a car crash (1/10 to 1/100 of all cause mortality for that age group). It’s a game of probability, of course, but it turns out that whistle blowers often suffer from “coincidences” and “low probability events”, and whenever that happens, I try to take note.
  - Retric 6y ago
    I think doctors at outbreaks like this are at much higher risk of death than the average person due to stress and a much higher viral load than normal. Medical professionals only start to use protective gear after they realized how dangerous a disease is. Before that their spending significant time around highly infectious people in inclosed spaces while under extreme stress. Wuhan lost a significant number of medical professionals presumably due to this.
  - ad404b8a372f2b9 6y ago
    I assume that's the average death rate for healthy 30 year olds over the whole pandemic, I don't think it applies to how things were in the beginning with overrun hospitals and overworked health professionals. If you look at the SARS epidemic you see plenty of cases like these.
    - SketchySeaBeast 6y ago
      Not only that, but no known effective medications or treatments. They were flying totally blind at the beginning.
  - herendin2 6y ago
    It is unlikely, but unlikely events happen. It does not have to be a conspiracy. Think about this: If he hadn't died, he probably would have received much less attention. There were a few other eloquent Chinese whistle-blowers from the early days, Jan-Feb 2020, who have been silenced by government threats or by being detained, who do not have the public recognition of Dr Li - probably because they didn't die.
  - jjk166 6y ago
    With regards to the car crash probability: those are the odds that if something were to kill you that it would be a car crash, not the odds of actually dying in a car crash. In reality the odds of any specific 30 year old male in the US dying in a car crash over the course of a year is 0.02% (I don't have data for driving fatalities for china, but I presume they are not substantially higher). This is about 50 times less likely than a 30 year old who has tested positive for covid dying from covid, or equivalently getting covid at 30 raises your risk of death as much as a second lifetime worth of driving.
    - beagle3 6y ago
      No, the IFR for a 30 year old is approximately 0.02%, remarkably similar to dying in a car crash according to recent CDC update: https://www.nbc26.com/news/coronavirus/cdc-estimates-covid-19-fatality-rate-including-asymptomatic-cases https://www.nbc26.com/news/coronavirus/cdc-estimates-covid-1... The 0.02% number covers 20-49; It is lopsided, so it's likely that 30 is much less and 49 is much more ... ; So, it's not 1/100 or 1/1000 as I claimed, likely 1/10. Your numbers are off by a factor of at least 50.
johnchristopher 6y ago
There are already long term studies (in France for instance there is the constance cohorte https://www.constances.fr/cohorte/presentation-constances.php https://www.constances.fr/cohorte/presentation-constances.ph...) that ask volunteers to come and get tested for a lot of things. This data is being looked at and it seems there were already covid cases months before reports of cases in Wuhan https://www.francetvinfo.fr/replay-radio/samedi-investigation/covid-19-des-francais-contamines-bien-avant-les-premiers-cas-officiels-temoignent-pour-la-premiere-fois_4348403.html https://www.francetvinfo.fr/replay-radio/samedi-investigatio....
- PartiallyTyped 6y ago
  This is very interesting, do you have a translated article?
  - johnchristopher 6y ago
    https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20210311-surprises-about-french-health-emerge-from-long-term-cohort-study-covid-19-november-2019-constances https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20210311-surprises-about-french...

mc32 6y ago

There was the Wuhan ophthalmologist[1] who pulled the alarm but got a visit by police and eventually succumbed to the disease. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Wenliang https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Li_Wenliang

SiempreViernes 6y ago
He was the first that publicly recognised the original outbreak as something new, but that's not the sort of preventive surveillance we're interested in. Of course it would have been great if the Chinese were more transparent during those early days (and in general honestly), but it's pretty clear that the original outbreak was just the first smoke escaping from inside the burning roof: by late December it was already an uncontained epidemic that had spread far outside Wuhan. We'd like something that would pick up the disease before it makes it to the epidemic status.
beagle3 6y ago
Which is weird in itself - The probability of death for a healthy 30-something year old is lower than their probability to die in a car crash (1/10 to 1/100 of all cause mortality for that age group). It’s a game of probability, of course, but it turns out that whistle blowers often suffer from “coincidences” and “low probability events”, and whenever that happens, I try to take note.
- Retric 6y ago
  I think doctors at outbreaks like this are at much higher risk of death than the average person due to stress and a much higher viral load than normal. Medical professionals only start to use protective gear after they realized how dangerous a disease is. Before that their spending significant time around highly infectious people in inclosed spaces while under extreme stress. Wuhan lost a significant number of medical professionals presumably due to this.
- ad404b8a372f2b9 6y ago
  I assume that's the average death rate for healthy 30 year olds over the whole pandemic, I don't think it applies to how things were in the beginning with overrun hospitals and overworked health professionals. If you look at the SARS epidemic you see plenty of cases like these.
  - SketchySeaBeast 6y ago
    Not only that, but no known effective medications or treatments. They were flying totally blind at the beginning.
- herendin2 6y ago
  It is unlikely, but unlikely events happen. It does not have to be a conspiracy. Think about this: If he hadn't died, he probably would have received much less attention. There were a few other eloquent Chinese whistle-blowers from the early days, Jan-Feb 2020, who have been silenced by government threats or by being detained, who do not have the public recognition of Dr Li - probably because they didn't die.
- jjk166 6y ago
  With regards to the car crash probability: those are the odds that if something were to kill you that it would be a car crash, not the odds of actually dying in a car crash. In reality the odds of any specific 30 year old male in the US dying in a car crash over the course of a year is 0.02% (I don't have data for driving fatalities for china, but I presume they are not substantially higher). This is about 50 times less likely than a 30 year old who has tested positive for covid dying from covid, or equivalently getting covid at 30 raises your risk of death as much as a second lifetime worth of driving.
  - beagle3 6y ago
    No, the IFR for a 30 year old is approximately 0.02%, remarkably similar to dying in a car crash according to recent CDC update: https://www.nbc26.com/news/coronavirus/cdc-estimates-covid-19-fatality-rate-including-asymptomatic-cases https://www.nbc26.com/news/coronavirus/cdc-estimates-covid-1... The 0.02% number covers 20-49; It is lopsided, so it's likely that 30 is much less and 49 is much more ... ; So, it's not 1/100 or 1/1000 as I claimed, likely 1/10. Your numbers are off by a factor of at least 50.

johnchristopher 6y ago

There are already long term studies (in France for instance there is the constance cohorte https://www.constances.fr/cohorte/presentation-constances.php https://www.constances.fr/cohorte/presentation-constances.ph...) that ask volunteers to come and get tested for a lot of things. This data is being looked at and it seems there were already covid cases months before reports of cases in Wuhan https://www.francetvinfo.fr/replay-radio/samedi-investigation/covid-19-des-francais-contamines-bien-avant-les-premiers-cas-officiels-temoignent-pour-la-premiere-fois_4348403.html https://www.francetvinfo.fr/replay-radio/samedi-investigatio....

PartiallyTyped 6y ago
This is very interesting, do you have a translated article?
- johnchristopher 6y ago
  https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20210311-surprises-about-french-health-emerge-from-long-term-cohort-study-covid-19-november-2019-constances https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20210311-surprises-about-french...