Posted on 01/24/2020 9:51:30 AM PST by Zhang Fei
China's communist rulers draw on a deep well of public acquiesence -- partly due to control of the internet, no free press and a brutally efficient security apparatus.
"I can't imagine there would be too many countries that would be able to do something on this scale as quickly as China has done," Kamradt-Scott said.
Even so, Kamradt-Scott warned a lockdown that extends for a week or more would produce "growing levels of discontent and frustration".
- Quarantine 'illusion' -
Kamradt-Scott said that, even though the virus would inevitably spread, the quarantine appeared designed to buy authorities time to put in place other measures.
He cited China's plans to build a 1,000-bed hospital in Wuhan in just 10 days.
Zi, from the S. Rajaratnam School, also said there was some hope the quarantines would have a level of success in containing the outbreak.
"I believe it is possible given China's expertise in this area of population control, or urban control," Zi said.
Yet the history of quarantine suggests controls will be far from watertight.
The concept emerged in Venice in the 14th century, where ships arriving at the city state from infected ports were held offshore for 40 days.
Over the centuries the US attempted quarantines to combat yellow fever, European nations tried to subdue cholera outbreaks, and several West African nations sealed off townships to hem in Ebola in the last decade.
Quarantine is "purely an illusion", said Bruno Halioua, a historian of medicine at the University of Paris IV.
"Quarantine has never worked. Each time, there have been problems."
And after seeing the situation in Wuhan first-hand, Guan Yi of Hong Kong University shared an equally pessimistic outlook.
"I've never felt scared," Guan said. "This time I'm scared."
(Excerpt) Read more at france24.com ...
That’s the problem. They want to control who lives and how dies.
A pandemic might take out some of the enlightened and they can’t have that - especially since many of them are constantly jetting around the world.
They are a HUGE BUNCH of fear mongers aren’t they????
“When the Spanish flu was killing people, we had no antibiotics for any secondary infections involving bacteria, we had very little access to IV technology for hydration (that took off in the 1950s), and aspirin was considered new, cutting edge treatment for fever.
The high death rate for Spanish Flu says a lot about the medical situation in 1918.”
Exactly. I made this point in a discussion with a friend yesterday.
It’s already everywhere with zero chance of containment.
14 day incubation and heartiness for several days on cold surfaces ensured that.
By the time the 10th person fell ill, it was already out of the bag.
Hope for benign mutations.
A different time with less science/medical knowledge and the advanced labs to address it. I read that the labs are already close to a preventative vaccine for this strain.
Only a small percentage, in a nation with lousy health care, die.
And we’re all gonna die anyway.
“...If a quarantine saves just one child’s life, it’s worth it....”
Then the whole stinkin’, communist RAT party should be put under “quarantine” and never be allowed to interface with the public ever again.
Yes, I have three intl flights booked over the next 6 weeks and somewhat nervous, none are to China but still.
They blocked off about 20 million people.
Think about that. They feel this is so serious they are willing to put 20 million people on the table. That is huge.
I am not so sure it’s our problem, until everything they buy from us, and export to us stops.
They used to say, “Imagine if everyone in China drank one Pepsi every day—what does that mean in dollars. Conversely, if 22 million people in China stopped breathing, working, producing, and consuming—-what does that mean in dollars.
[Exactly. I made this point in a discussion with a friend yesterday.]
The media wants people to be hyped up, terrified, and scared nearly to death. I personally find it creepy that they have all these news babes in tight dresses and big boobs front and center who intone "You won't want to miss this next section, viewer discretion is advised..." Selling sex and innocent's misfortune in a combination package...deliberately, in order to bring viewers in, just creeps me out. Maybe it is just me who sees it that way...
I stopped watching or reading anything from the media decades ago, the only time I see them is when my wife has the news on. I always thought the Don Henley song "Dirty Laundry" was spot on. I know that guy is a deranged Leftist, but anyone who can write this has at least this right:
“But I suspect this is nothing at all.”
It’s not nothing. But it isn’t at the panic stage that the media likes to hype.
“Perhaps I’m wrong, but this stuff gets hyped every year. Maybe this is the year it’s a real thing and we all die. But I suspect this is nothing at all.”
—
It has to something for China to lock down 14 cities.
People in the medical field shouldn’t be so pessimistic this early on. Mass graves is a bit over the top.
Let’s see how it progresses before we panic.
[It has to something for China to lock down 14 cities.]
I’d like to see the rate of dead/resolved-cases. Right now they’re determining ‘mortality rate’ from dead/infected-cases. The latter number is likely to be much smaller than the real mortality rate.
Thanks for the balance...
The Chicoms don’t care if millions die, they just don’t want it to be disruptive. If the can slow the spread down so that people who have been exposed and recovered can pick up the reins as more fall ill, then all is well.
And as they say, we all die eventually.
We care about millions dying, but we don’t do anything intelligent to prevent it.
Yeah, 40 million or so quarantined at present. The government is also building a 1000 bed hospital to treat patients, it is supposed to be finished by Feb.
You don’t lock don’t cities, rush to build hospitals, deploy the military and throw a monkey wrench into a nation’s economy just for the heck of it.
Seen a few videos along the line of this one that are sobering.
“Coronavirus outbreak: Video shows dead bodies in halls of China hospital”
https://nypost.com/2020/01/24/coronavirus-outbreak-video-shows-dead-bodies-in-halls-of-china-hospital/
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.