Merged 2019-nCoV / Corona virus

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Vixen said:
I travelled at least four times during December and January through this airport via Heathrow and have always been struck by the sheer number of Asian travellers wearing (what I thought was pointless) face masks. Looking back over the last tow months, I can't help wondering if they knew something we didn't. Well, they have had the swine flu care, avian flu scare, together with SARS and MERS.
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That's the height of regular flu season, so it probably wasn’t anything more than that.
 
Vixen said:
On learning that in London, every time you go out, you are likely to be captured by 30 different CCTVs - the most filmed place in the world -
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Well only if, for example, you walk down half of Oxford Street, then down Regent Street, then across Trafalgar Square, down Whitehall and past the Houses of Parliament. And in any case, what the heck do you think is happening to any images of you that are captured on CCTV in London that is in any way malevolent?




and not to mention data-mined when you step into a department store who track your movements via the gps on your phone (they claim this is done anonymously for logistics purposes),
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This is complete and utter batcrap stupid. And it's borne of sheer ignorance about how smartphones actually work, together with ignorance about basic data protection rules.

Firstly, smartphones are GPS receivers, and not GPS transmitters. In other words, they receive signals from GPS satellites to fix your location, but do not transmit your location in any way.

Secondly, GPS doesn't even work once you're more than about 5m indoors, so there's basically no way your phone would even receive your GPS location while you're walking round a department store.

Thirdly, in order for a department store to have any chance of receiving any communication whatsoever from your phone, it would either have to have a Bluetooth connection with your phone (which could never ever happen without your knowledge and consent), or you'd have had to be logged on to a WiFi network run by the store (which, again, could never ever happen without your knowledge and consent), or you'd have to have an app controlled by the store running on your phone (which, once again,.....). Outside of this, the store would need to be receiving real-time data from your phone via a third party (either another third-party app that was running on your phone, or your mobile service/network operator), which would constitute a serious criminal offence of data protection breaching.




I was so indignant I made a point of wearing a baseball cap and putting my phone on flight mode before stepping into MNC stores (if I remembered).
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This is absolutely hilarious. I'm sure you looked entirely normal.




There is one junk-reputation sports shop with chains across the UK where you can buy hooded sweat shirts and baseball caps really cheaply. On entering one of these stores, I was approached by a manager and told to remove the hood I had over my head (presumably so I'd come up on heir CCTV). The irony.
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No, I'd imagine it was actually because you were looking shifty and very strange. The irony.
 
LondonJohn said:
Firstly, smartphones are GPS receivers, and not GPS transmitters. In other words, they receive signals from GPS satellites to fix your location, but do not transmit your location in any way.
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You're wrong about that. They don't transmit your location over GPS signals, but they do transmit your location over the cell phone network. How do you think Google Maps knows when there's a traffic jam? By tracking the location data of cell phones that have Google Maps on them.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/oth...hrough-streets-with-99-cell-phones/ar-BBZDY2F

A store wouldn't be able to track you by GPS, but Google does.

Plus, your cell service provider automatically has rough location data on you just by having your phone turned on, even without GPS. They know the location of their cell towers, and they know which tower you're closest to.
 
Vixen said:
Re masks: Helsinki has a lot of travellers in transit from the far east as Finnair offers connecting flights all over the world to this market, although I have heard it is not particularly so profitable for them that they couldn't shut down all flights to China (it was still offering flights to Shanghai and Beijing) until recently and it is now on hold until the end of the month. I travelled at least four times during December and January through this airport via Heathrow and have always been struck by the sheer number of Asian travellers wearing (what I thought was pointless) face masks. Looking back over the last tow months, I can't help wondering if they knew something we didn't. Well, they have had the swine flu care, avian flu scare, together with SARS and MERS.
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No, it's ridiculous to think "they knew".

I've been through the airport plenty of times myself, and many of the flights come from Japan and Hong Kong. Japanese people generally like to wear the face masks whenever they travel on public transport, and some people seem to wear them all year round.
 
Just now checked the wiki. No deaths in first world countries. And aside from China, 30 recoveries and 2 deaths.

Tempest in a tea pot anybody? It's oo-long.
 
The Atheist said:
The original whistleblower's death has opened a very large can of worms for Xi and the government: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51409801

Another noteworthy point in that story is that the doctor died three weeks after contracting the virus.

There's plenty more legs in this story to come.
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The thing that I find a little troubling is I am guessing he was a healthy individual before. I had been hearing that almost all deaths were people with other conditions and almost all healthy people recovered.

Still remember Wuhan has 11,000,000 people and China has 1.? billion people so the number of deaths and cases is pretty small.
 
casebro said:
Just now checked the wiki. No deaths in first world countries. And aside from China, 30 recoveries and 2 deaths.

Tempest in a tea pot anybody? It's oo-long.
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No.

The reason this isn't a global problem already is because of the unprecedented measures China has take to stop travel and confine people to their homes.

The jury is firmly out on what happens next.

eeyore1954 said:
The thing that I find a little troubling is I am guessing he was a healthy individual before. I had been hearing that almost all deaths were people with other conditions and almost all healthy people recovered.
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A doctor aged 31? Certainly does not fit the scenario of old folk dropping dead, but he could have been asthmatic.

eeyore1954 said:
Still remember Wuhan has 11,000,000 people and China has 1.? billion people so the number of deaths and cases is pretty small.
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Again, this is entirely due to the massive operation to contain it.

Given the fairly long delay between infection and symptoms, we're still in the lap of fate at the moment.

Very sensible piece on the whole picture here: https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/he...-on-with-serious-consequences-for-new-zealand

One thing's for certain - tourism companies around the world are in pain. Go short their shares.
 
Ziggurat said:
You're wrong about that. They don't transmit your location over GPS signals, but they do transmit your location over the cell phone network. How do you think Google Maps knows when there's a traffic jam? By tracking the location data of cell phones that have Google Maps on them.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/oth...hrough-streets-with-99-cell-phones/ar-BBZDY2F

A store wouldn't be able to track you by GPS, but Google does.

Plus, your cell service provider automatically has rough location data on you just by having your phone turned on, even without GPS. They know the location of their cell towers, and they know which tower you're closest to.
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Ughhhhhh of course I know all that.

But guess what: YOU give google maps permission to access your location info. And neither google nor your cellphone service/network operator has your permission to provide your location information to a department store.

Read my post again.
 
casebro said:
Just now checked the wiki. No deaths in first world countries. And aside from China, 30 recoveries and 2 deaths.

Tempest in a tea pot anybody? It's oo-long.
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Not completely. One reason for so few cases in first world countries so far is the serious effort to isolate cases and do extensive contact tracing.

That's possible because the center of the epidemic is in China. And China is actually making a significant effort to stop it spreading further.

However, once outbreaks start in more countries, (India, Mexico, the Middle East and Africa), it will become harder and harder to keep a lid on things. It will be harder to stop as more mild or asymptomatic cases occur.

That doesn't mean mass casualties. Typically mild cases spread mild cases. And there is still the pattern that elderly and people with certain medical conditions are suffering more severe illness.

And I don't think it's been addressed yet what smoking is contributing. We'll know more about that as the virus spreads to countries with fewer smokers.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
Not completely. One reason for so few cases in first world countries so far is the serious effort to isolate cases and do extensive contact tracing.

That's possible because the center of the epidemic is in China. And China is actually making a significant effort to stop it spreading further.

However, once outbreaks start in more countries, (India, Mexico, the Middle East and Africa), it will become harder and harder to keep a lid on things. It will be harder to stop as more mild or asymptomatic cases occur.

That doesn't mean mass casualties. Typically mild cases spread mild cases. And there is still the pattern that elderly and people with certain medical conditions are suffering more severe illness.

And I don't think it's been addressed yet what smoking is contributing. We'll know more about that as the virus spreads to countries with fewer smokers.
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I know where you are coming from on this, you think that the disease will evolve into a less fatal strain. But there is no evidence for this, the fatality is more dependent on the host than the pathogen. 'Mild cases' may infect elderly immunocompromised persons who die; 'severe cases' may infect fit young women who shrug it off. (There is a reason we talk about man 'flu.) Smallpox remained a highly fatal illness over centuries. The mortality from TB probably fell because the susceptible hosts were killed, not because TB became less fatal (and because of improvements in general health). Transmission mainly occurs early, there is little selective pressure to be less fatal, but there is pressure to be more transmissible.
 
Planigale said:
I know where you are coming from on this, you think that the disease will evolve into a less fatal strain. But there is no evidence for this, the fatality is more dependent on the host than the pathogen. 'Mild cases' may infect elderly immunocompromised persons who die; 'severe cases' may infect fit young women who shrug it off. (There is a reason we talk about man 'flu.) Smallpox remained a highly fatal illness over centuries. The mortality from TB probably fell because the susceptible hosts were killed, not because TB became less fatal (and because of improvements in general health). Transmission mainly occurs early, there is little selective pressure to be less fatal, but there is pressure to be more transmissible.
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Look at the history of the 1917-18 flu pandemic. It circulated a couple seasons after the worst of it, became more attenuated each year and by the 3rd year it circulated the strain was completely attenuated to the level of an average flu strain.

Not every pathogen becomes attenuated. TB and small pox are simply not comparable.
 
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a_unique_person said:
An infected Australian woman barely felt any discomfort from the virus.
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It does look like it's worse the closer to epicentre you got it, which is encouraging for everyone outside China, but the jury is still out for another week, I'd say. The doctor who died is a good case in point - it took him three weeks from knowing he had it to his death.

Algorthmic growth in cases has definitely ceased at the moment, with just under 3000 new cases yesterday. The rise in deaths to 82 is fairly meaningless, as that reflects people who were infected 3-4 weeks ago.

The evidence coming in from other countries is the main thing to watch as we can use that data with great confidence.

I wouldn't have thought 61 infections inside a sardine can on board a cruise liner shows a high rate of infection.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
Look at the history of the 1917-18 flu pandemic. It circulated a couple seasons after the worst of it, became more attenuated each year and by the 3rd year it circulated the strain was completely attenuated to the level of an average flu strain.

Not every pathogen becomes attenuated. TB and small pox are simply not comparable.
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Is this virus like TB and smallpox (stay deadly for a long time) or flu (ceases to be a killer after a few years)?



The Atheist said:
It does look like it's worse the closer to epicentre you got it, which is encouraging for everyone outside China, but the jury is still out for another week, I'd say. The doctor who died is a good case in point - it took him three weeks from knowing he had it to his death.

Algorthmic growth in cases has definitely ceased at the moment, with just under 3000 new cases yesterday. The rise in deaths to 82 is fairly meaningless, as that reflects people who were infected 3-4 weeks ago.

The evidence coming in from other countries is the main thing to watch as we can use that data with great confidence.

I wouldn't have thought 61 infections inside a sardine can on board a cruise liner shows a high rate of infection.
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One person infecting 61 other people! That is one infectious virus. If other passengers catch it from these 61 people then society has a major problem. If the rest of the passengers are safe then so is society.
 
rjh01 said:
Is this virus like TB and smallpox (stay deadly for a long time) or flu (ceases to be a killer after a few years)?
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Already answered and it's no.

rjh01 said:
One person infecting 61 other people! That is one infectious virus. If other passengers catch it from these 61 people then society has a major problem. If the rest of the passengers are safe then so is society.
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Except it's not one person infecting 61, it's probably one person infecting half a dozen, times three generations of infection. You need to factor in two things - people are infectious before symptoms appear, and cruise ships are superb breeding grounds for infection, hence the constant norovirus outbreaks.

All the evidence to date suggests an R0 of about 2.5 - one person infects 2.5 others. Compare that to norovirus, which is about 4. Measles is over 8.
 
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