Coronavirus 'could infect 60% of global population if unchecked'

The Guardian (UK) ^

[TigerClaws]

The coronavirus epidemic could spread to about two-thirds of the world’s population if it cannot be controlled, according to Hong Kong’s leading public health epidemiologist.

His warning came after the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) said recent cases of coronavirus patients who had never visited China could be the “tip of the iceberg”.

Prof Gabriel Leung, the chair of public health medicine at Hong Kong University, said the overriding question was to figure out the size and shape of the iceberg. Most experts thought that each person infected would go on to transmit the virus to about 2.5 other people. That gave an “attack rate” of 60-80%.

“Sixty per cent of the world’s population is an awfully big number,” Leung told the Guardian in London, en route to an expert meeting at the WHO in Geneva on Tuesday.

Even if the general fatality rate is as low as 1%, which Leung thinks is possible once milder cases are taken into account, the death toll would be massive.

He will tell the WHO meeting that the main issue is the scale of the growing worldwide epidemic and the second priority is to find out whether the drastic measures taken by China to prevent the spread have worked – because if so, other countries should think about adopting them.

The Geneva meeting brings together more than 400 researchers and national authorities, including some participating by video conference from mainland China and Taiwan. “With 99% of cases in China, this remains very much an emergency for that country, but one that holds a very grave threat for the rest of the world,” the WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in his opening remarks. To date China has reported 42,708 confirmed cases, including 1,017 deaths, Tedros said.

[TigerClaws]

PING!

Who is this guy?

Leung – one of the world’s experts on coronavirus epidemics, who played a major role in the Sars outbreak in 2002-03 – works closely with other leading scientists such as counterparts at Imperial College London and Oxford University.

His article in the Lancet:

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30260-9/fulltext

[TigerClaws]

This is also worth a look:

CHINA IS SPRAYING ENTIRE CITY BLOCKS TO CONTAIN OUTBREAK

THE FOOTAGE IS APOCALYPTIC: WORKERS ROLL GIANT MACHINES DOWN EMPTY STREETS, BLASTING HUGE PLUMES OF DISINFECTING SPRAY.

https://futurism.com/neoscope/watch-china-spray-entire-city-blocks-contain-outbreak

[Travis McGee]

From what I’ve gleaned, the death rate is under 2% if a patient has access to 1st world ICU level treatment.

But once a medical system is overwhelmed, as in China, all bets are off, and the death rate could go to 20%.

[Moonman62]

Another article designed to scare people.

[null and void]

A couple good video clips at TigerClaws' link.

No one seems to know what they are spraying/fogging as a disinfectant...

Bring Out Your Dead

Post to me or FReep mail to be on/off the Bring Out Your Dead ping list.

The purpose of the “Bring Out Your Dead” ping list (formerly the “Ebola” ping list) is very early warning of emerging pandemics, as such it has a high false positive rate.

So far the false positive rate is 100%.

At some point we may well have a high mortality pandemic, and likely as not the “Bring Out Your Dead” threads will miss the beginning entirely.

*sigh* Such is life, and death...

If a quarantine saves just one child's life, it's worth it.

[duckman]

Good luck with the spraying. Will prove totally non effective if the virus is spread thru ‘common’ A/C Heating vents. This was reported on Fox yesterday. Restricting H/K residents to their 1000 apartments in one building makes for one large petri dish.

[exDemMom]

The death rate is just above 2%. I wonder what the case fatality rate will turn out to be.

Given that most coronaviruses cause common colds, and this one appears to spread as readily as colds, this is worrisome. Good solid data on the incubation period will help to assess the efficacy of containment measures already in place.

I believe that an area is deemed cleared of a disease once two incubation periods have passed without a new case.

[Texas Fossil]

If you look at stats from the epicenter of this in China, Hubei province, it is over 30%.

https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

[Blueflag]

I saw video of that.

Good optics, but wholly ineffective.

[richardtavor]

Wow. Another “We’re all gonna die!” scream....I love “could” articles. WE could get struck by an enormous meteor, thus ending life as we know it. We could be burnt to a crisp by a an exploding sun. etc. The bottom line is that God is in control. All the yelling and worrying won’t change that.

[BureaucratusMaximus]

Fake news and fear mongering...borderline fatalism. This is real life...not an end-of-the-world DOOM novel ideation session.

[Robert DeLong]

4.48 billion people, I don’t think so. We are well beyond the mid 1300s when the Black Plague occurred. This is just sensational journalism.

[I want the USA back]

Wrong. If unchecked, it could affect 100% of the world’s population. Also, it could affect 0%. The idea is that jet travel from third-world countries spreads it throughout the world. Aids spread from Africa to here how? Not from licking postage stamps on mail from Africa.

[chris37]

The reason they are spraying with those giant trucks is because the virus is aerosol.

It can just hang right there in the air indefinitely as I understand.

No way this isn’t a bio weapon. They made this.

[Pearls Before Swine]

I believe that an area is deemed cleared of a disease once two incubation periods have passed without a new case.

If that's true, the passengers on the Diamond Princess (the cruise ship docked/impounded in Japan) are in for a very long "cruise" to nowhere.

[neverevergiveup]

“This was reported on Fox yesterday. Restricting H/K residents to their 1000 apartments in one building makes for one large petri dish.”

Yep.

[dynoman]

I did updates on the 2914 ebola outbreak on the thread linked below. Reality turned out to be way different than projections. Interesting to review and think about in respect to the current coronavirus outbreak.

The updates are the last posts on the thread.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3210773/posts

[Jim Noble]

From what I’ve gleaned, the death rate is under 2% if a patient has access to 1st world ICU level treatment

That appears to be a generally sound opinion (although the illness plays out over 21 days, with a lot of fatalities in Week 3), so it's a bit premature.

The problem is, there is essentially no surge capacity for that level of care.

Japan has been very generous to take 140 people off that ship and put them in what amounts to BL3 isolation - but they could not, and should not be asked, to do that for 4000 people. That would crash their care system, denying care to many other people with equally serious needs.

I like the island idea. There are going to need to be large, open air quarantine facilities all over the world, I agree that keeping 3500 passengers on that ship is brutal, but as of this morning, all the alternatives, including sinking the ship in international waters, are worse.

If true mortality is 2% and the virus spreads worldwide as it has in China, ICU care will not be made available to people in quarantine/isolation, because it will be impossible to do.

[SueRae]

That is exactly what is happening to those poor souls stuck on that cruise ship. One giant petri dish.