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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsTHIS IS NOT A DRILL....
Last edited Wed Mar 11, 2020, 11:43 PM - Edit history (2)
From a friend on FB~
THIS IS NOT A DRILL.... NOR A JOKE!
If you dont believe me, please read this!
The author is a senior doctor in a major European hospital. She asked to remain anonymous because she has not been authorized to speak to the press.
AllaNO1Bear found the link where this came from: https://www.newsweek.com/young-unafraid-coronavirus-pandemic-good-you-now-stop-killing-people-opinion-1491797
I'm a doctor in a major hospital in Western Europe. Watching you Americans (and you, Brits) in these still-early days of the coronavirus pandemic is like watching a familiar horror movie, where the protagonists, yet again, split into pairs or decide to take a tour of a dark basement.
The real-life versions of this behavior are pretending this is just a flu; keeping schools open; following through with your holiday travel plans, and going into the office daily. This is what we did in Italy. We were so complacent that even when people with coronavirus symptoms started turning up, we wrote each off as a nasty case of the flu. We kept the economy going, pointed fingers at China and urged tourists to keep traveling. And the majority of us told ourselves and each other: this isn't so bad. We're young, we're fit, we'll be fine even if we catch it.
Fast-forward two months, and we are drowning. Statistically speakingjudging by the curve in Chinawe are not even at the peak yet, but our fatality rate is at over 6 percent, double the known global average.
Put aside statistics. Here is how it looks in practice. Most of my childhood friends are now doctors working in north Italy. In Milan, in Bergamo, in Padua, they are having to choose between intubating a 40-year-old with two kids, a 40-year old who is fit and healthy with no co-morbidities, and a 60-year-old with high blood pressure, because they don't have enough beds. In the hallway, meanwhile, there are another 15 people waiting who are already hardly breathing and need oxygen.
The army is trying to bring some of them to other regions with helicopters but it's not enough: the flow is just too much, too many people are getting sick at the same time.
We are still awaiting the peak of the epidemic in Europe: probably early April for Italy, mid-April for Germany and Switzerland, somewhere around that time for the UK. In the U.S., the infection has only just begun.
But until we're past the peak, the only solution is to impose social restrictions.
And if your government is hesitating, these restrictions are up to you. Stay put. Do not travel. Cancel that family reunion, the promotion party and the big night out. This really sucks, but these are special times. Don't take risks. Do not go to places where you are more than 20 people in the same room. It's not safe and it's not worth it.
But why the urgency, if most people survive?
Here's why: Fatality is the wrong yardstick. Catching the virus can mess up your life in many, many more ways than just straight-up killing you. "We are all young"okay. "Even if we get the bug, we will survive"fantastic. How about needing four months of physical therapy before you even feel human again. Or getting scar tissue in your lungs and having your activity level restricted for the rest of your life. Not to mention having every chance of catching another bug in hospital, while you're being treated or waiting to get checked with an immune system distracted even by the false alarm of an ordinary flu. No travel for leisure or business is worth this risk.
Now, odds are, you might catch coronavirus and might not even get symptoms. Great. Good for you. Very bad for everyone else, from your own grandparents to the random older person who got on the subway train a stop or two after you got off. You're fine, you're barely even sneezing or coughing, but you're walking around and you kill a couple of old ladies without even knowing it. Is that fair? You tell me.
My personal as well as professional view: we all have a duty to stay put, except for very special reasons, like, you go to work because you work in healthcare, or you have to save a life and bring someone to hospital, or go out to shop for food so you can survive. But when we get to this stage of a pandemic, it's really important not to spread the bug. The only thing that helps is social restriction. Ideally, the government should issue that instruction and provide a financial fallbackcompensate business owners, ease the financial load on everyone as much as possible and reduce the incentive of risking your life or the lives of others just to make ends meet. But if your government or company is slow on the uptake, don't be that person. Take responsibility. For all but essential movement, restrict yourself.
This is epidemiology 101. It really sucks. It is extremebut luckily, we don't have pandemics of this violence every year. So sit it out. Stay put. Don't travel. It is absolutely not worth it.
It's the civic and moral duty of every person, everywhere, to take part in the global effort to reduce this threat to humanity. To postpone any movement or travel that are not vitally essential, and to spread the disease as little as possible. Have your fun in June, July and August when thishopefullyis over. Stay safe. Good luck.
AllaN01Bear
(18,114 posts)is annoyed at great brittan and the usa.
good for her .
link below .
https://www.newsweek.com/young-unafraid-coronavirus-pandemic-good-you-now-stop-killing-people-opinion-1491797
i wanted to post this but didnt know which forum to publish this in.
babylonsister
(171,050 posts)the OP; this is the source.
BigmanPigman
(51,582 posts)Inslee said to think about this in terms of keeping your own grandparent alive. If young people can't grasp the concept that others will be infected by them than draw their attention back to their own, personal family and relatives who are very susceptible.
If i were still working in a dept store or in an elem school (my past 2 professions) I would have stopped going to work 10 days ago. My family would have helped me financially (if it came to it).
uponit7771
(90,329 posts)... calculate it, we'd think there'd be an algebraic equation already.
Pobeka
(4,999 posts)Everything -- I mean everything depends on us reacting as a collective. Social distancing right now while the number are low has a huge impact. This is the flatten the curve approach, and it works. But we have to have mass number of people doing it right now. Mass complacency is going to kill untold number of people as they hit the medical system at the same time.
Look at the SIR model in wikipedia.
ret5hd
(20,489 posts)Put a penny on a chessboard square. Put 2 on the next. Put 4 on the next. Put 8 on the next.
How many dollars worth of pennys are on the chessboard by the time you finish?
Over $180 quadrillion dollars.
lunatica
(53,410 posts)where you double the amounts every day. The numbers become astronomical very quickly.
The spread of the disease can be exemplified visually a an every expanding circle of water or blood.
Pobeka
(4,999 posts)I implore every one reading this. It is not a time for complacency. It is not a time to think "I'm healthy, I'll survive fine".
Do you know and older person you care about? Think about them.
Remove your self, as much as possible as a link in a transmission chain.
The effect is profound if we can all reduce our interactions even just 25 or 30% .
Some can't miss work, that's ok.
Our economy is going to be crushed for a while. It will be crushed far worse if we collapse our medical system by doing nothing.
Do something, anything more than you did yesterday. Wash your hands, don't gather in a large group with close contact (< 6 feet).
Do get out and breathe fresh air.
Do stay in touch with friends and relatives.
58Sunliner
(4,379 posts)GulfCoast66
(11,949 posts)A majority of the people I work with still say its just like the flu.
Stuart G
(38,414 posts)Native
(5,939 posts)we've heard nothing here. The autopsies they've done in Wuhan show extreme lung damage. And the media in the EU is saying if you recover, you risk living with irreversible lung damage. The lungs ended up looking like ground glass. Glad this is mentioned in this piece you've posted.
Haggis for Breakfast
(6,831 posts)We have a family member who is a respiratory therapist. She got an e-mail from an old colleague recently who told her that the autopsy reports on patients who have died from COVID-19 reveal that the lungs were blown out. The alveoli had not just ruptured, they were liquefied.
Even if you survive a brush with this virus, your lungs are permanently damaged.
Be safe, everyone, stay safe.
SergeStorms
(19,192 posts)what are the chances of you contracting the virus and presenting complications again? The chances are pretty good, I'll wager. If you do get it again, no matter what age you are, your chances of surviving a second round of COVID-19 are probably minuscule.
thecrow
(5,519 posts)and he suffered permanent lung problems for the rest of his life.
I am hoping that we have different meds and antivirals to treat
folks that contract this virus.
I would heed the advice in this article!
😷
leighbythesea2
(1,200 posts)If you are a twitter user....
I follow her and she shared this info 6 days ago. My daughter travelled 7 days ago and i sent it along. (Worried!)
Im really like Dr. Grayson for timely updates, as an expert.
SergeStorms
(19,192 posts)from Jamaica. I'm afraid to go near her, my son-in-law, or my grandchildren for at least 2 weeks now. All four of the grandparents are over 70 in different degrees of health. This is seriously going to screw up and lot of lives even if we don't get the virus.
leighbythesea2
(1,200 posts)Tomorrow. Shes stressed.. Says shes self quarantine-ing. Im my moms caregiver, shes 78, lives with me. My sister has ms. Im taking every precaution as im sure you are. Stay safe!
SergeStorms
(19,192 posts)Just trying to keep ourselves alive is going to be a full-time job for awhile. Hang in there leighbythesea2. We're all in this together.
Native
(5,939 posts)yaesu
(8,020 posts)own, we have no leaders, everything is shutting down, panic will happen & happen quick.
Karadeniz
(22,490 posts)leighbythesea2
(1,200 posts)Excellent. Sorry if its already been shared.
Shes an infectious disease expert, worked on Ebola med, wife of Alan Grayson.
She did this early on. How to help yourself.
Shes not impressed with US early response. I counted the # of times she said "unfortunately ": 28.
Link to tweet
?s=19
bucolic_frolic
(43,121 posts)I'm no doctor or scientist, but my gut tells me 7 months minimum and 10 to 15 would not surprise me.
Other than the illness itself, systems in our society are at risk of being altered, disrupted, suspended. Some aspects may approach shortages like the WWII period.
I worry about distribution systems, manufacturing, retail.
SergeStorms
(19,192 posts)from Trump's dismantled government to help. It's all on the state level now and the "private sector". Republicans won't be happy unless their donors are getting filthy rich off of this. I honestly hope Trump gets this and dies. I know it's not nice to wish ill will on anyone, but I'm willing to make an exception in that asshole's case.
Laffy Kat
(16,376 posts)Response to babylonsister (Original post)
VOX This message was self-deleted by its author.
VOX
(22,976 posts)smirkymonkey
(63,221 posts)burrowowl
(17,636 posts)question everything
(47,462 posts)Hermit-The-Prog
(33,309 posts)I was working on my truck and he stopped by to rant about all the teachers in this area who are just repeating the Fox fools. He pulled out his phone and said, "Let me read this thing I found ..."
He's considering taking his sick days and vacation days starting next week if they don't close the school down. He teaches middle school.
Hekate
(90,624 posts)Including my brother, who still wants to take his wife and 3 teenagers to the Galapagos Islands.
So, thanks.
ret5hd
(20,489 posts)Dark n Stormy Knight
(9,760 posts)Fuuuuuuck!
femmedem
(8,200 posts)Last edited Thu Mar 12, 2020, 08:15 AM - Edit history (1)
Our mayor is getting some pushback for cancelling our St. Patrick's Day parade and I'm still seeing social media posts from my friends about how people are overreacting, they're still going to go out, etc. I hope this has an effect.
Edited to add: one of the young people I know who had posted just two days ago that she was going to keep on going out and people were overreacting just shared this. It's having an effect.
Fresh_Start
(11,330 posts)nt
TexasBushwhacker
(20,165 posts)the last 10 days of the rodeo and livestock show. Of course, it wasn't his decision alone. City council voted on it and he got input from the directors of our county health system. But he gets criticized no matter what he does, because he's black.
HotTeaBag
(1,206 posts)he warbled something to the effect of 'if you're young and healthy you have nothing to worry about', but what about the (depending on where you live) hundreds of people you came into contact with before you realized you were infectied? They may not be so young or healthy.
Dickhead.
JudyM
(29,225 posts)Closed circuit camera on bus shows much broader spread of virus.
By the time the bus stopped at the next city, the virus had already jumped from the carrier to seven other passengers, including those sitting close to him and also two victims six rows away.
All passengers were diagnosed when they presented with the characteristic symptoms - a cough, a fever and shortness of breath. One other bus passenger was diagnosed but did not have symptoms.
Another group of passengers got on the bus about 30 minutes after patient A and his fellow travellers disembarked. One passenger sitting near the front on the other side of the aisle also became infected.
...
Patient A took another bus that day, for around one hour. In that time, the virus jumped to two other passengers, one of whom was also sitting 4.5 metres away.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8094933/How-one-man-spread-coronavirus-NINE-people-bus.html
cwydro
(51,308 posts)Mm hmm.
femmedem
(8,200 posts)cwydro
(51,308 posts)I have no doubt.