World Coronavirus News II with Updates

[skeeter]

@corbe, that is doubly funny! Images of Pooh Bear are banned there!

I thought about sending it to some friends over there but decided I didn't want to get 'em in trouble.

[berdie]

We'll see how things go in the next couple of weeks after the spring breakers brought it to the resort areas.

I thought of that myself.

[libertybele]

So far the WHO has proven to be a useless entity.  Deaths were being announced in China, the virus then moved outside of China and into several countries .... they took their sweet time reacting and also in their declaration of a pandemic.  The CDC hasn't exactly been much better.

[Smokin Joe]

What is the acceptable trade off, for human life vs. 401Ks this week?

Let me turn that around.
What is the unacceptable number of lives lost to the virus? 
How many is too many?
(Please spare me the "If it saves just one life", thing, because that ship has sailed. If that was the case, Abortion would have been outlawed 60,000,000 babies ago.)

A few hundred?
A few thousand?
Should we go there for fewer 'casualties' than the ordinary flu season?
Should we wait until it rivals auto accident death tolls?

How long is long enough to shut things down?
Because if that number gets too long, the following apply:
How many people should lose all they have, go bankrupt for the second time in just over a decade, go hungry?
How many should lose all they have, again?
As far as human lives go, those who lose their jobs and businesses and insurance won't be able to afford health care either, should they need it, so even if they weren't in the high risk group, their lives may be forfeit because they likely won't seek health care they just can't afford until it is too late.

How far do you think the economy can crash before it takes another decade or more to recover (Note: the oil industry won't pull it out this time, not with oil in the 20s) or a conflict on the order of WWII to rebuild it?
(We lost 418,500 people in that one.)

You tell me.
What's your perspective?

[TomSea]

Donald Trump Jr. actually tweeted this article out:   

How The Chinese Regime's Silencing Of Whistleblowers Turned A Local Outbreak Into A Global Epidemic
By S.G. Cheah     Mar 20th 2020

It’s mind-boggling for people like us, the citizens in the free world, to imagine a government so capable of intentional evil. And yet, that is exactly how the Chinese Communist government of China operates. It’s an authoritarian regime that has historically caused the death of countless millions. Once you understand that, you will understand why we are dealing with this unprecedented global health crisis of the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic today.

Recently, there have been news reports about how patient zero of the Wuhan coronavirus was traced back to as early as November 17. By December, Chinese scientists were already aware of the existence of the deadly virus and alerted Beijing about it. What was the Chinese government’s response? They received a gag order from China’s National Health Commission, with instructions to destroy the samples. Basically, the first critical month was spent covering up the crisis instead of taking preventive measures to stop the outbreak from worsening.

In fact, back in early January, when news broke out about this new deadly virus, American representatives from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control alerted the American government, and America offered to send a team of experts from the CDC to help with the investigation for the coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan. The Chinese government refused to authorize this request.

Read more at:  https://www.eviemagazine.com/post/how-the-chinese-regimes-silencing-of-whistleblowers-turned-a-local-outbreak/

I will add on, after a day or so, coronavirus related threads in the main World News Forum will be merged into the "big" thread unless someone wishes to object.

[TomSea]

Just think too, WHO doesn't even recognize Taiwan as an independent nation.

[DB]

I don't know if anyone remembers but initially Beijing tried to blame the mayor of Wuhan and the local party chief for "hiding" the problem from them. That they didn't act because they didn't know.

It was all lies.

[DB]

And that is why Taiwan locked it's border with China sooner than everyone else and benefited from it. They knew China was lying and covering things up.

[Elderberry]

Huge Column Of Military Trucks Is Taking The Coffins Of Those Who Died From Corona in Bergamo, Italy, To Other Cities

By Strange Sounds -Mar 20, 2020

Bergamo, Italy: The military is taking the coffins of those who died from Corona to other cities.

Because the city’s cremation system is overwhelmed even if running 24/24 and 7/7.


A long column of army trucks transporting coffins from Corona victims out of
Bergamo, Italy for cremation. Picture via Twitter

This is just terrifying! This impressive column of military vehicles crossed the heart of Bergamo yesterday.

[TomSea]

Authorities in Tibetan Capital Lhasa Arrest 10 for Breaching Coronavirus Protocol
2020-03-19

Authorities in the Tibet Autonomous Region’s capital Lhasa have arrested 10 people for violating government rules meant to prevent the spread of COVID-19, but critics say the charges are merely a guise for politically motivated harassment detentions.

The Tibet Daily reported March 12 that “the security bureau office in Lhasa is striking back against those social elements who go against the measures of containing and controlling the spread of COVID-19.”

More: https://www.rfa.org/english/news/tibet/coronavirus-arrest-03192020210110.html

Another article, worth noting, Singapore per this next article was hard hit early on but they calmed it down and nobody died.

How Taiwan and Singapore managed to contain COVID-19, while letting normal life go on
Tom Blackwell

Sandra Johnson’s husband had already left for work by the time she talked to the National Post Thursday — early Friday morning where she lives in Singapore.

His office was open, and the expat from Mississauga, Ont., was herself planning to visit a nearby mall later. She had gone to the chiropractor the day before.

The city-state of six million is an eastern Asian transportation hub and for a few days had the world’s second-highest number of COVID-19 cases. But its total stood at a modest 345 Friday, with no deaths.

Read more at:  https://www.msn.com/en-ca/news/world/how-taiwan-and-singapore-managed-to-contain-covid-19-while-letting-normal-life-go-on/ar-BB11tEGQ?li=AA524b

[Fishrrman]

[Fishrrman]

[TomSea]

This below, is talking about what Taiwan's economic plan to get things back in an upswing.

Sat, Mar 21, 2020 page1

    Virus Outbreak: Going shopping is better fix, Su says
        By Sean Lin / Staff reporter

    The government aims to provide an economic stimulus by encouraging consumption, not by sending people big checks, Premier Su Tseng-chang (蘇貞昌) said yesterday in response to calls by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers for the government to up the ante on planned coupons to revitalize sectors affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

    Su made the remarks when fielding a question from KMT Legislator Lo Ming-tsai (羅明才) during a plenary session at the Legislative Yuan in Taipei on whether the government could give each resident NT$10,000 (US$330) in cash instead of coupons with a face value of NT$800.

...

The government hopes to improve on the former administration’s policy by using a different approach, one that incentivizes people to go shopping, Su said.

See more at:  https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2020/03/21/2003733095

I don't have a full picture of what Taiwan is doing but what if the pay out to citizens only allowed people to shop locally? Coupons or something? That sounds pretty good.

[DB]

"How China can be held legally accountable for coronavirus pandemic"

https://www.foxnews.com/world/china-legally-accountable-coronavirus

[sneakypete]

It’s mind-boggling for people like us, the citizens in the free world, to imagine a government so capable of intentional evil.

Not for anybody that knows anything about the history of China or ANY of it's rulers.

Evil bastards,one and all.

[Elderberry]

Daily #Coronavirus #COVID-19 Data Graph Page

WUWT : https://wattsupwiththat.com/daily-coronavirus-covid-19-data-graph-page/

[Elderberry]

Crush the Curve: Italian town with first death in Italy stopped the virus

JoNova 3/20/2020

http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/crush-the-curve-italian-town-with-first-death-in-italy-stopped-the-virus/

The first epicentre in Italy was Vò, a little town of 3,000. It was shut down, fully tested and twice and nine days apart. By testing, isolating, and tracking, they reduced the spread to almost nothing, and this is despite the extraordinary discovery that when the first death happened, already 3% of the town had the disease.

At that point surely the Italian government should have immediately closed everything?
In one Italian town, we showed mass testing could eradicate the coronavirus

Andrea Crisanti and Antonio Cassone, The Guardian, March 20.

Our experiment came to be by chance. The Italian authorities had a strong emotional reaction to news of the country’s first death – which was in Vò. The whole town was put into quarantine and every inhabitant was tested.

In the first round of testing, 89 people tested positive. In the second round, the number had dropped to six, who remained in isolation. In this way, we managed to eradicate coronavirus from Vò, achieving a 100% recovery rate for those previously infected while recording no further cases of transmission.

The headline is a bit silly — mass testing doesn’t eradicate anything, but it does make strict isolation and containment easier to achieve. Now we probably need mass blind shutdowns to achieve the same effect when earlier action and mass testing then could have crushed the curve with much less effort.

More at link.

[kevindavis007]

Time to decouple from China.

[mystery-ak]

Taiwan: We Tried Warning WHO About the Wuhan Coronavirus
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/bethbaumann/2020/03/21/taiwan-we-tried-warning-who-about-the-wuhan-coronavirus-n2565422

[cato potatoe]

The US is about to surpass Spain for third on the number of cases identified.  I don't know what happened in New York, but they seem to be driving our numbers.

[libertybele]

The US is about to surpass Spain for third on the number of cases identified.  I don't know what happened in New York, but they seem to be driving our numbers.

I can't answer why NY's numbers have skyrocketed.  Perhaps a huge population in a tiny state, lots of international travel, people not complying, it's hard to say.  But NY isn't the only state.  IL, MI, FL, CA, LA, and WA all now have over 500 cases.

[mystery-ak]

Coronavirus: Italy Sees Worst Day Yet, 793 Dead in 24 Hours
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/03/21/coronavirus-italy-sees-worst-day-yet-793-dead-in-24-hours/

[Hoodat]

I can't answer why NY's numbers have skyrocketed.

Testing.  Put a hundred infected people in a room, test one, and you have one case.  The next day, test the other 99.  Now you have 100 cases.  A hundredfold increase over night.  Yet the number of people actually infected remained unchanged.

[aligncare]

Testing.  Put a hundred infected people in a room, test one, and you have one case.  The next day, test the other 99.  Now you have 100 cases.  A hundredfold increase over night.  Yet the number of people actually infected remained unchanged.

A frame of reference certainly helps to flatten that panic curve and hopefully calm some nerves that have people unduly amped up (Give credit where credit is due, send your ‘thank you’ notes to CNN, Atlanta, cc: Rachel Maddow in New York, for their part in stoking mass hysteria and losses in stock markets.)

[mountaineer]

Coronavirus: Italy Sees Worst Day Yet, 793 Dead in 24 Hours
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/03/21/coronavirus-italy-sees-worst-day-yet-793-dead-in-24-hours/

Why have so many coronavirus patients died in Italy?
The country's high death toll is due to an ageing population, overstretched health system and the way fatalities are reported
By Sarah Newey, Global health Security Correspondent 21 March 2020 • 9:09am

The coronavirus pandemic is exacting a heavy toll on Italy, with hospitals overwhelmed and a nationwide lockdown imposed. But experts are also concerned about a seemingly high death rate, with the number of fatalities outstripping the total reported in China.

Of the 47,000 people confirmed coronavirus patients in Italy, 4,032 so far have died - with a record increase of 627 in the last 24 hours. ...

According to Prof Walter Ricciardi, scientific adviser to Italy’s minister of health, the country’s mortality rate is far higher due to demographics - the nation has the second oldest population worldwide - and the manner in which hospitals record deaths.  ...

“On re-evaluation by the National Institute of Health, only 12 per cent of death certificates have shown a direct causality from coronavirus, while 88 per cent of patients who have died have at least one pre-morbidity - many had two or three,” he says.  ...  Full story at the Telegraph