I've been telling my friends and family that they should be gathering extra food, medications, etc. if for no reason other than the coming supply chain disruptions. At first they laughed, but at this point they seem like they're actually mad at me, and in some senses blame me for the currently bare shelves in supermarkets. It sucks.
Because of the distrust in our government and institutions, people won’t believe anything until it’s way too late.
I’m also frustrated with the “happy talk” people, who think if we just stay positive, everything will be fine in the end.
I’ve must have explained a dozen times the difference between what happens when a virus has a mortality rate of 0.1% like the flu vs. Covid19 (on average) at 1–3%, which means it’s 10–30 times more deadly.
I was typing it so often that my iPhone was autocompleting chunks of my sentences!
I’ve already been invited to a less public discussion group on Facebook for people who get it and are sharing tips, strategies and information on getting through this.
I’m thinking about getting my cousins on a conference call to check where their heads are at.
The human mind is indeed fascinating.
Still if only one person was saved because of this, it was worth it.
We're at "just" 2 deaths and slightly over 30 confirmed cases, but we had the gates open for way too long and just this week people coming from Europe is "asked" to quarantine themselves, but the government doesn't want to suspend classes.
Nobody has started to blame me for the situation, but plenty laughed at me at the time when I tried to warn them what is coming. They have stopped laughing.
I have a certain friend who, for years, have been trying to tell everyone that normal food is bad and imported "superfoods" are the way to go.
Same goes for scaremongering of every other kind. I feel for everyone who warned about the corona virus in January there are 5 or 10 who warned about everything else which turns out to be a significantly smaller problem.
What is your motivation for doing so? Is it because you assume essentials will be unavailable because of other people stocking up, or because of eventual pandemic related supply chain issues?
Maybe I'm naive, but I just can't imagine that because of the pandemic society will be collapsing to a point that it becomes hard to obtain the food I need for me and my family.
2. To avoid buying food from the grocery store that may have been coughed/sneezed on and still have live virus on it. Stock up on non-perishables while they’re still more likely to be clean.
3. Anticipate shortages due to other people stocking up.
4. This virus came from an animal and can also infect animals. So maybe the outbreak infects animal feedstock and reduces our food supply. Or the outbreak infects Ag workers and reduces our food supply. Or the outbreak disrupts supply chain between farms and table. That kind of thing.
I don't anticipate the need to isolate but I figured I'd play it safe. I thought this was what others were doing, but now that I think of it I'm just assuming people think as I do. I personally didn't buy 40 rolls of toilet paper.
Additionally, if the virus is rampant in your area, you may not wish to go to grocery stores and risk exposing yourself.
There are already enough "it's just a flu" people out here I don't really want to wade into that any more than I have to.
Would most of the people who predicted COVID-19 escaping also have been able to predict SARS would have minimal effect outside of Asia?
(Don't forget that China had pretty aggressive lockdowns going on during SARS -- schools closed, gatherings limited, etc. -- though not to the level Wuhan got to).
At this point the only issue is how much we can delay the peak and minimise the time we are above the capacity of the medical system.