Eros Fine Art Photo wrote:
It just hit Italy, so I imagine it will spread pretty quickly over there.  If it's not contained, it could spread to Europe.  Once that happens, I think it'll be very easy for it to get over here to the U.S. 

It's not a matter of being paranoid, but I think we should all be cautious and start preparing some supplies for a possible two week quarantine.  Looking at the W.H.O.'s situation reports, it looks like the infections are doubling every week.  By March, over 1 million people in China will be affected by it.  If that occurs, then it'll spread exponentially and become a global pandemic by summer time. 

Fortunately, the mortality rate is below 3%, so most people will likely just get sick for a bit.  The elderly and infants are at the highest risk, as well as communities where there's very poor medical care and unclean living conditions.

It is extremely likely that we have "carriers" already here.
There have been outbreaks in South Korea, lots of travel to and from there as well.
And folks who've been to China and returned, to say nothing of Canadians who may have visited these places and then came to Bellingham to shop etc...

Shadow Dancer wrote:
Even if we closed all of our borders (something we can't do because there is too much $$$$ flowing in both directions), it is already here.

Haven't some countries closed their borders?

LnN Studio wrote:
Wash you hands frequently, with soap and don't touch you eyes, nose or face.

Surgical gloves?

Eros Fine Art Photo wrote:
but I think we should all be cautious and start preparing some supplies for a possible two week quarantine. .

2 weeks? I was thinking a couple months.

Tony From Syracuse wrote:
its all about access.  we have to lock down the country from people from china at the least. it will be painful, but with these things one has to look out for #1

Tony- I am certainly not arguing that quarantines are not appropriate. Restricting travel to and from known hotspots seems like an absolute no-brainer.

But I am hearing epidemiologists saying it is almost impossible to contain a virus this contagious. Meaning, eventually, as we are already seeing, it will "leak".

We are already restricting anyone who has traveled in China for the past 21 days. So, should we also be restricting Italians? Koreans? Japanese?

Anyone who has traveled thru Iran?

At some point, short of complete isolation, quarantines stop being a viable option. Personally, I think we passed that point a couple weeks back.

edit to add: I am NOT saying to abandon quarantines- leave them in place- but lets be realistic about how successful they will be in protecting us.

nwprophoto wrote:

Surgical gloves?

Infectious disease specialists say the general public is better served by steeply increasing hand washing.

They say masks and gloves are less help unless you are in an area where you KNOW the infection is prevalent- your spouse or child is sick in your home for instance. In a case like that you should use the same gear health care workers would use.

Health care workers should use full protective gear- masks, face shields, gloves and disposable gowns...

It is important to remember... the VAST majority (~98%) of people who get the virus will recover, most without ever going to the doctor or hospital------- but they are contagious, and statistics say they WILL infect that 2% who may die.

nwprophoto wrote:

Haven't some countries closed their borders?

I don't know, do you have a link?

Brooklyn Bridge Images wrote:
We should expect panic, Irrational fears and a windfall for those who seek to profit from all aspects of those fears

Yours is post of the week if not month.   In an age of inexpensive international travel there is no stopping any highly infectious disease or virus.   With weeks long incubation periods the infected will likely spread the disease which by most accounts isn't all that deadly.   My guess is we will have a cure in a few weeks and this will all be over and a chosen few will make millions.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/25/worl … -news.html   Anybody remember Ebola?

Tony Lawrence wrote:

Yours is post of the week if not month.   In an age of inexpensive international travel there is no stopping any highly infectious disease or virus.   With weeks long incubation periods the infected will likely spread the disease which by most accounts isn't all that deadly.   My guess is we will have a cure in a few weeks and this will all be over and a chosen few will make millions.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/25/worl … -news.html   Anybody remember Ebola?

Yes Ebola...
That was after SARS was going to wipe out mankind

LnN Studio wrote:
Today the market was rebounding then a leak from somebody at the FDA about "potential" possibilities and most pf the rebound immediately gone.
Administration announced how much they were going to spend and Schumer immediately said it wasn't enough, Nancy said it is too late. Seriously
What happened to the demonstrations in Hong Kong?
It is a Presidential election year.
What % of the problem is medical and what media hype for eyeballs/readers and what part political opportunism?
Guess we will have the answers next year.

Market prices are frequently shifted by Automated Buying and Selling.
Computers track changes and make decisions. If a large shareholder (just for hypothetical example Morgan Stanley) has a computer start selling a big chunk of shares of a particular holding, the price will start to go down, triggering computers at other large shareholders to either sell that stock or buy it, depending on the data that has been entered. If they all start selling, the price will go way down. Then, the Buy triggers will hit and it will start going back up.

It is Digital Herd Behavior and it involves so many shares that small investors can only watch and react as best as they see fit. These dips can be buying opportunities if you chose well.

FIFTYONE PHOTOGRAPHY wrote:
Going with 'Media hype'

..."Liked"

LnN Studio wrote:
What % of the problem is medical and what media hype for eyeballs/readers and what part political opportunism?

The era of nano second market reactions by the the high speed traders.

With so many working parents these days just take the prospect of schools
closing down and the snowball effect that would have on the economy.

nwprophoto wrote:
What should we expect in the USA? Get prepared for?

I already got two of those white germ suits for my both of my cameras so I think I'll be fine!!! LoL
John

Ken Marcus Studios wrote:
Exactly 102 years ago last month, the Spanish Flu Pandemic was started in the US and then killed between 50 and 100 million people worldwide.
Spanish flu killed more people than any pandemic disease before or since, including the sixth-century Plague of Justinian, the medieval Black Death, the AIDS epidemic or Ebola.

Flu is not a thing to be taken lightly . . .

"The risk to the American people remains very low," Trump said,

Brooklyn Bridge Images wrote:
"The risk to the American people remains very low," Trump said,

VP Pence is now in charge of our response to this Virus.

"Legum outlined a series of cost-cutting decisions made by the Trump administration in preceding years that gutted the nation’s infectious disease defense infrastructure. The “pandemic response team” is a reference to news stories from spring 2018 reporting that White House officials tasked with directing a national response to a pandemic had been ousted."

GRMACK wrote:
Not that concerned about it here.

Nothing wrong with being prepared though.

FIFTYONE PHOTOGRAPHY wrote:
Going with 'Media hype'

+1