Thanks! I love Khan Academy - helped out a lot while trying to get the kids up to speed on things.
The one point I’ll make before looking at the video - all of those other events are finished. Covid-19 isn’t yet. Regardless - it doesn’t seem as bad as some of the others. So why the huge reaction to it by the Chinese - and now all of the other countries.
Sometimes I think it is a HUGE deal and will be terrible (and am treating it that way - heck - the effect it is having already are terrible). But then other times I wonder why China, and the rest of us are reacting to it so strongly when it doesn’t seem much worse than previous viruses?
I really hope that I am wrong and I (and mainly my wife) can look back on it and laugh. Along with some of the stuff that I did in preparation for Y2K (mostly my wife laughs at me about that - she isn’t now with regard to the virus.)
I think the strong reaction is because whereas ‘normal’ flu is more an upper respiratory infection, and deaths are usually from a secondary bacterial invasion, COVID is a lower respiratory infection that goes straight for the 02 exchange system. COVID requires a higher level of PPE, and a larger team to provide care. Critical care means induced coma so the person can be intubated. COVID also seems to affect more organs than the lungs. The RO rate is higher than normal flu so it can spread faster. And some can spread the disease for a week or more while remaining asymptomatic.
Those with normal flu can generally take some antivirals, some OTC meds and go back to work. Not so with COVID, because live virus is shed in bodily fluids for some time. Fewer patients can be treated in a hospital because more sick that are sicker longer, take up more hospital resources (manpower and equipment) for a longer period of time ( a few days versus 20+ days = higher risk for cross-contamination to hcw’s).
And probably just as concerning is the age groups affected - what seemed dangerous mainly to 80+, has reduced down into the 20s and 30s, some otherwise healthy with no pre-existing. We’ve seen a few cases involving symptomatic children and also at least two births resulting in infected babies - the long-term effects as yet unknown. Everything about this virus is wacky. And because it’s a RNA virus, and harder to build a vaccine for, it’s much safer to just shut it down than let it burn thru the population and risk worse mutations. But that’s just my viewpoint of course.