Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

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Arun.prabhu
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

That 900million number is impossible. Fully 50% of the infections are so mild that they are asymptomatic. The disease kills the old and the sick. Even if all those die, we’re looking at 200-300 million dead, worst case. AIIMS have already recommended a treatment regimen for use, not palliative by the way, but curative. Two separate drugs. Take heart. We’ll beat this thing and though there’ll be deaths, life will go on. As always.

syam wrote:Everything has price. I guess this is the price we have to pay for the globalization and cheap chinese products. we could have been much better prepared if ccp is honest with their situation. even as the world plunging into darkness, they still keeping the data to themselves. do they realize their days are over and going into negative with each passing day?

cholaji will say the global systems will survive. no system is worth the cost of humanity itself. we paid for it. Good thing is we have 1.4 billion people. I am sure even it worst case scenario, at least 500 millions will survive. grim and battle hardened 500 million. It's upto individual and families to battle it out.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

Some of those are dead folks, others don’t have the money to pay for their plans because of being stuck in door, others are probably presumptive organ donors awaiting to donate their organs in political prison camps for the glory of the party.
Cain Marko wrote:
Suraj wrote: The problem with the claim is that cell operators sweep their SIM records regularly for inactive numbers that are removed in bulk. Very little can be inferred from a few million change in numbers - both China and India have subscriber counts north of 1 billion now, and both have periodically scaled down numbers when invalid sims were removed from the counts.
This is possible but does not explain why it did not happen over the past 2 years. The numbers are consistently increasing since 2017. And then the drop of 8 million. And that too exactly coinciding with the outbreak?

What am I missing?
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Dileep »

IndraD wrote:
Dileep wrote:Wrong assumption. I am sure it is way less than that. Maybe 10%.
kindly cite evidence in your support
A leading, well known hospital in my city have more than 50 ICU beds at various departments and only 5 ventilators shared among them. I know because I was told so by the caregiver when we had a crisis.

There are doctors on board here who should have firsthand data. Let them refute my statement.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by arshyam »

Arun.prabhu wrote:That 900million number is impossible. Fully 50% of the infections are so mild that they are asymptomatic. The disease kills the old and the sick. Even if all those die, we’re looking at 200-300 million dead, worst case. AIIMS have already recommended a treatment regimen for use, not palliative by the way, but curative. Two separate drugs. Take heart. We’ll beat this thing and though there’ll be deaths, life will go on. As always.
Well said, we can't let despondency overtake us. There is always a way out, we (India as well as humanity) have seen far worse situations in the past.

Today will be a test of the country's will and staying power. I expect us to pass it with flying colours, some idiots notwithstanding.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

Oh and if you’re one of those folks buying up disposable or n95 masks, do all of us a favour and look up the proper procedure to wear them. Clean shave everyday because otherwise the seal between skin and mask isn’t made for the n95s.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by sudarshan »

sanjaykumar wrote:
With any toxin, the mantra is - "dosage matters." Low doses, sufficiently below threshold level, are often even beneficial. Maybe that's the way to build immunity, have sub-toxic exposures to the virus (that's one form of vaccination). But there's a couple of devils in those details - how much is safe, and of course this varies by individual.
Hormesis may perhaps work in some cases (Mithridates at least), HOWEVER this is a virus that by definition can make multiple copies of itself given the appropriate cell machinery. All you need is ONE virus. In other words do not try this at home.
No of course I won't try it at home. But surely, if there's one guy going around the prisons in the country releasing all the prisoners, who then spread to other prisons and do the same, the police (if they aren't snoozing) are going to have an easier time dealing with that initial crime, than if a million guys do it simultaneously all over India? Of course, technically, even one virus is going to replicate to infinity (or a close approximation thereof) but the immune response doesn't get overwhelmed, like if there were a trillion initial virus particles?

This worldometer site keeps messing up my regression. They do an initial count of cases per day, then suddenly they move a lot of those cases to the next day and bump the count down. Today they bumped down by more than 2500 cases for the USA, all of which they moved to tomorrow's count. The past few days they've been moving a couple of hundred cases to the next day, today it was a couple of thousands. This GMT 0:00 thingy is proving tricky I guess, Italy gives an update at the end of their day, worldometer breaks up according to GMT (or maybe Italy is on GMT, I don't know). For India, they're done with the day's count in one swoop, around IST 5:30 AM I think (again, GMT 0:00). My regression keeps regressing.

CM ji, glad you found it funny. These latino women are the worst I say, Europe, S. America, Mexico. They are effusive and hug-o-philic, when my turn comes I stand back and offer my hand. They're like - "oh come on." "Ma'am, here's my hand...." "Oh what are you, a monk?" <<<*>>> "Oh I'm sorry, you aren't a monk, you're a beanpole! Monks are alive at least." What do you do? They put it down to shyness. Hope they see my point now, not gloating or wishing them bad though.
Arun.prabhu
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

Nods. For that 200-300 million number, we’d have to two and a half times the mortality rate in Italy where they are triaging all the seniors to death so as to save the young and the middle aged.
arshyam wrote:
Arun.prabhu wrote:That 900million number is impossible. Fully 50% of the infections are so mild that they are asymptomatic. The disease kills the old and the sick. Even if all those die, we’re looking at 200-300 million dead, worst case. AIIMS have already recommended a treatment regimen for use, not palliative by the way, but curative. Two separate drugs. Take heart. We’ll beat this thing and though there’ll be deaths, life will go on. As always.
Well said, we can't let despondency overtake us. There is always a way out, we (India as well as humanity) have seen far worse situations in the past.

Today will be a test of the country's will and staying power. I expect us to pass it with flying colours, some idiots notwithstanding.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Dileep »

I read that Chloroquine shows some indication of fighting the virus.

When I was a kid, there was widespread use of this medicine to pre-empt Malaria. Advertisements like "Fever? Maybe Malaria!! Take Chloroquine" on the back of regular "Inland Letter Cards" of postal service. In Malayalam!! People used to get it liberally from the govt health centers and special extension centres under the National Malaria Eradication programme.

Now, why can't we all take that? The medicine have a half life of more than a month. Even if it 'slows down' the virus, it will help healthy individuals to eliminate the virus load, and stop the pandemic.

Why can't we all?
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Santosh »

Arun.prabhu wrote:They are going to get infected anyways. There is no immunity except by genetic quirk or if you have already had the disease. How are you going to save the people? By forcing them to stay within their houses? For how long? Farmers have to be out in the fields. Grocery shops have to be manned. Medicines produced. Power produced. Trucks maintained. Borders guarded. How is a daily wage labourer to survive for weeks of being stuck in their house when his/her family depends on that wage to put that money on the table.
No country is following what you are suggesting. When countries have to decide between doing what's good for the economy vs what is ethical and moral, they will always choose the later. And if they don't their situation will be worse than what's happening in Italy right now. At that point people will stay home bringing economy to a grinding halt anyway. So doing it couple weeks earlier doesn't make it any worse. Actually makes it better by giving governments some degree on control.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

Because The sick and the first line responders need it and there is only so much inventory in the system. Give it a month for production to ramp up, assuming we aren’t sourcing the precursor from China, the enemy, of course.
Dileep wrote:I read that Chloroquine shows some indication of fighting the virus.

When I was a kid, there was widespread use of this medicine to pre-empt Malaria. Advertisements like "Fever? Maybe Malaria!! Take Chloroquine" on the back of regular "Inland Letter Cards" of postal service. In Malayalam!! People used to get it liberally from the govt health centers and special extension centres under the National Malaria Eradication programme.

Now, why can't we all take that? The medicine have a half life of more than a month. Even if it 'slows down' the virus, it will help healthy individuals to eliminate the virus load, and stop the pandemic.

Why can't we all?
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by chola »

syam wrote:Everything has price. I guess this is the price we have to pay for the globalization and cheap chinese products. we could have been much better prepared if ccp is honest with their situation. even as the world plunging into darkness, they still keeping the data to themselves. do they realize their days are over and going into negative with each passing day?

cholaji will say the global systems will survive. no system is worth the cost of humanity itself. we paid for it. Good thing is we have 1.4 billion people. I am sure even at worst case scenario, at least 500 millions will survive. grim and battle hardened 500 million. It's upto individual and families to battle it out.
Actually I think the global system is dead. Every country will try to build their own supply chain as much as possible. Trust has eroded as everyone is embargoing everyone else. The Chini-US trade war already started this and it will remain even after the virus is under control.

Read my posts here in this thread from January to the beginning of March. I thought the chini challenge the US was dead and buried with the empty streets of Wuhan, Beijing and Shanghai.

The world had shut down travel and communications with Cheen. Flights were down 95% to and in China. It was economically a basket and the rest of the world was mainly untouched.

People outside Cheen did not account for the secondary sites like Italy and Spain and boom now everyone is under quarantine just like Cheen.

We'll be in a brave new post-globalization world where every region attempts to create its own full-stack supply chains. Europe, North America and the Far East will enjoy their self-contained eco-systems. We'll need to make do with SAARC.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by sudarshan »

Dileep wrote:I read that Chloroquine shows some indication of fighting the virus.

When I was a kid, there was widespread use of this medicine to pre-empt Malaria. Advertisements like "Fever? Maybe Malaria!! Take Chloroquine" on the back of regular "Inland Letter Cards" of postal service. In Malayalam!! People used to get it liberally from the govt health centers and special extension centres under the National Malaria Eradication programme.

Now, why can't we all take that? The medicine have a half life of more than a month. Even if it 'slows down' the virus, it will help healthy individuals to eliminate the virus load, and stop the pandemic.

Why can't we all?
You know it's toxic? Hydroxychloroquine (seems to be a metabolic byproduct of chloroquine) seems to be less toxic, but I guess also less effective. Like somebody posted before (how true it is, I don't know), apparently one of the side effects is increased cancer. You don't just take it on a whim, is my guess.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

Such innocence. Do you think that men with starving families won’t revolt or riot in a lockdown?

People who put ethics and morality at the forefront of decision making have no job ruling a nation. Raja dharma is different than dharma. Mercy and ethics and morality doesn’t enter into the picture for a leader who follows it. What is good for the country is good. Everything else is dross.


Santosh wrote:
Arun.prabhu wrote:They are going to get infected anyways. There is no immunity except by genetic quirk or if you have already had the disease. How are you going to save the people? By forcing them to stay within their houses? For how long? Farmers have to be out in the fields. Grocery shops have to be manned. Medicines produced. Power produced. Trucks maintained. Borders guarded. How is a daily wage labourer to survive for weeks of being stuck in their house when his/her family depends on that wage to put that money on the table.
No country is following what you are suggesting. When countries have to decide between doing what's good for the economy vs what is ethical and moral, they will always choose the later. And if they don't their situation will be worse than what's happening in Italy right now. At that point people will stay home bringing economy to a grinding halt anyway. So doing it couple weeks earlier doesn't make it any worse. Actually makes it better by giving governments some degree on control.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by DrRatnadip »

Dileep wrote:
IndraD wrote: kindly cite evidence in your support
A leading, well known hospital in my city have more than 50 ICU beds at various departments and only 5 ventilators shared among them. I know because I was told so by the caregiver when we had a crisis.

There are doctors on board here who should have firsthand data. Let them refute my statement.
I agree dileep sir.. typical 12 to 15 beded ICU usualy have 4 to 5 ventilaters.. most hospitals also have fair share of refurbished ventilaters which are very commonly used especialy in tier and 3 cities.. these ventilaters may not be good for heavy workload (continuous ventilation for weeks) ..
Once govt hospitals are overwhelmed private setups will be used next.. Biggest worry hospitals will face is keeping Morales of staff. Many of whome might feel its not worth risking their life for paltry sum they receive.
Reports of effectiveness of chloroquine are encouraging.. It is commonly available ,cheap and reasonably safe..
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

Surprise. It’s on the AIIMS recommended drug list. And it’s poisonous if you take many doses at once or give a full dose to a child. Children aren’t at risk of death from this disease and so wouldn’t be given the drug anyways. As for the dosage used in malaria, you need 500gms cumulative of chloroquine phosphate and 1000gms of hydroxychloroquine before you go blind. That is a 1000 doses for the former and 2500 doses for the latter btw.

All the chloroquine is poison news I’ve read are from Chinese client states - Nigeria, Pakistan et al - or presumably paid chinese shills. If you get sick, go to your doctor and if he/she thinks you are at risk of developing serious form of the disease or have developed it, he’ll recommend a course of either of the two drugs AIIMS have recommended. Follow instructions and don’t second guess your doctor and don’t self-medicate.
sudarshan wrote:
Dileep wrote:I read that Chloroquine shows some indication of fighting the virus.

When I was a kid, there was widespread use of this medicine to pre-empt Malaria. Advertisements like "Fever? Maybe Malaria!! Take Chloroquine" on the back of regular "Inland Letter Cards" of postal service. In Malayalam!! People used to get it liberally from the govt health centers and special extension centres under the National Malaria Eradication programme.

Now, why can't we all take that? The medicine have a half life of more than a month. Even if it 'slows down' the virus, it will help healthy individuals to eliminate the virus load, and stop the pandemic.

Why can't we all?
You know it's toxic? Hydroxychloroquine (seems to be a metabolic byproduct of chloroquine) seems to be less toxic, but I guess also less effective. Like somebody posted before (how true it is, I don't know), apparently one of the side effects is increased cancer. You don't just take it on a whim, is my guess.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by DrRatnadip »

Chloroquine acts by increasing pH of lysozomes.. It is commonly used for viral illnesses in India.. It has significant anti inflammatory and immunomodulator properties which might help in fighting COVID 19 infection.. It is fairly safe in routinely used doses...
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by SriKumar »

chola wrote:
syam wrote:Everything has price. I guess this is the price we have to pay for the globalization and cheap chinese products. we could have been much better prepared if ccp is honest with their situation. even as the world plunging into darkness, they still keeping the data to themselves. do they realize their days are over and going into negative with each passing day?

cholaji will say the global systems will survive. no system is worth the cost of humanity itself. we paid for it. Good thing is we have 1.4 billion people. I am sure even at worst case scenario, at least 500 millions will survive. grim and battle hardened 500 million. It's upto individual and families to battle it out.
Actually I think the global system is dead. Every country will try to build their own supply chain as much as possible. Trust has eroded as everyone is embargoing everyone else. The Chini-US trade war already started this and it will remain even after the virus is under control.
As long as China is able to produce what it does, at the price it does, even 1 year from now, I think there will be buyers for that. IT will take that long to set up alternative production lines. Setting up China level supply-chains will take China-level indifference to land rights, environment, human rights. Atleast in India and many other countries I see Chinese products being purchsed by people unless the respective countries' governments explicitly outlaw it. Even in USA, I dont see people willing to pay higher prices, the only caveat being if this thing turns into an national pride thing, which it very well could. Chinese Govt (CCP) mislead the world in several ways, primarily concealing information and severity of the WUhan outbreak which cost lives, and they deserve every bit of boycott and embargo they get. THey have to pay a price for what they did not do ....after Wuhan was locked down. So far, they are into bluster and protest and no contrition. Unacceptable. Some of this is OT here perhpas...but I am also interested in your statement in a previous post where you posit that 'goods have to change hands' for economic activity and that work from home is a temporary stop. A lot of Wall Street stuff (buying/selling) is practically WFH activity- is this borderline hotair? There are many other jobs too IT-vity type jobs. I dont see these as ecnomically trivial contribution. Feel free to respond on this thread: "Perspectives on the global economic changes".
Last edited by SriKumar on 22 Mar 2020 10:08, edited 1 time in total.
Arun.prabhu
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

Money is just one part of the chain. Production is another. Warehousing and transportation is another. Sales is another. All require people out on the streets. The money men and the IT guys can stay indoors. Everyone else has to be out working or a critical and irreplaceable link in the chain breaks.
SriKumar wrote:
chola wrote:
Actually I think the global system is dead. Every country will try to build their own supply chain as much as possible. Trust has eroded as everyone is embargoing everyone else. The Chini-US trade war already started this and it will remain even after the virus is under control.
As long as China is able to produce what it does, at the price it does, even 1 year from now, I think there will be buyers for that...atleast in India and many other countries- unless the respective countries' governments outlaw it. Setting up China level supply-chains will take China-level indifference to land rights, environment, human rights. Even in USA, I dont see people willing to pay higher prices, the only caveat being if this thing turns into an international pride/cultural thing, which it very well could. Chinese Govt (CCP) mislead the world in several ways, primarily concealing information and severity of the WUhan outbreak which cost lives, and they deserve every bit of boycott and embargo they get. THey have to pay a price for what they did not do ....after Wuhan was locked down. So far, they are into bluster and protest and no contrition. Unacceptable. Some of this is OT here perhpas...but I am also interested in your statement in a previous post where you posit that 'goods have to change hands' for economic activity and that work from home is a temporary stop. A lot of Wall Street stuff (buying/selling) is practically WFH activity. There are many others too. I cannot see that as ecnomically trivial. Feel free to respond on this thread: "Perspectives on the global economic changes".
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by KLNMurthy »

Srikanth P wrote:
KLNMurthy wrote:
Q to docs:

Is there some concern about lasting lung damage, even if one survives?

Doctor here. Yes Lung function is expected to be hit when people recover from any viral ARDS. The infection and inflammation causes fibrosis (scarring) that remains even after the infection is wiped out. H1N1 was notrious for this. But the degree of lung damage vaires from undetectae to very severe. Most people who have recovered (from H1N1) do well in the long run.
Thanks for the info, doc. To give context to my question, I have younger white American colleagues exhibiting a lot of bravado, saying, let’s just get the virus so it won’t be an issue any more. I was wondering if some such folks actually follow through on the idea, if there would be a long-term personal impact for them, aside from the known danger of infecting and possibly killing older loved ones, like that guy from E.Delhi.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Cain Marko »

Arun.prabhu wrote:Some of those are dead folks, others don’t have the money to pay for their plans because of being stuck in door, others are probably presumptive organ donors awaiting to donate their organs in political prison camps for the glory of the party.]
All of these dead folks and losses in affordability had to coincide with COVID 19 outbreak? Couldn't have happier for 2 years prior?
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Deans »

Cain Marko wrote:
SwamyG wrote:This is the time when we start projecting our fears and see our biases and pet peeves in tje data.
Can you be a bit more specific sir? Where do you see these biases? Let's thrash these out as far as possible
I have been optimistic that we will get through this and that India will emerge stronger, relative to the rest of the world. As an investor in India, (of my own money), I've put my money where my mouth is. That said, If India gets into a full blown stage 3 situation, the consequences are too dreadful to contemplate. These factors will make me psychologically more receptive to `good' news, particularly if it is coherently argued.

Every day that the slope of the daily casualty rate (new cases + deaths) continues, will, in my back of envelope estimate, result in 2 weeks longer for the world community to recover.

Cain Marko ji, in response to your earlier perceptive comment that `no one dies in a economic depression', that is correct. However, it can (and currently is) starting to reduce millions of people, who had escaped absolute poverty, back to subsistence level. About 90% of Indian households have cash savings of barely Rs 10,000 (excluding gold). Economic growth in India is distorted. If we have 6% GDP growth (4.5% per capita), it translates to 7.5% for the top 1% (who have 33% of income) and 1.5% for the bottom 90% (who have another 33%). A 10% GDP drop in 1 quarter would mean it takes over 1.5 years for 90% of India, to get back to where they were before this crisis - during which time they lose their savings and become more vulnerable.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by syam »

Arun.prabhu wrote:That 900million number is impossible. Fully 50% of the infections are so mild that they are asymptomatic. The disease kills the old and the sick. Even if all those die, we’re looking at 200-300 million dead, worst case. AIIMS have already recommended a treatment regimen for use, not palliative by the way, but curative. Two separate drugs. Take heart. We’ll beat this thing and though there’ll be deaths, life will go on. As always.
When was a virus scare started in china and end up scaring people in remote tribal areas in odissa? We are underestimating the progress we made and the systems we built over the time. We are damn well connected with each other from donald trump to some tribal guy in chattishgarh. this is very grim situation, sir. no matter how much we want to deny it, we are well connected with each other. it will be just matter of time before it reaches every person benefited from the system.

Better prepare for the worst, sir.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

They shutdown the economy and asked people to pay for quaratine while allowing retailers with connections to price gouge. the factory line workers ran out of money having lost their livelihood and being prey upon by the party. sounds likely.
Cain Marko wrote:
Arun.prabhu wrote:Some of those are dead folks, others don’t have the money to pay for their plans because of being stuck in door, others are probably presumptive organ donors awaiting to donate their organs in political prison camps for the glory of the party.]
All of these dead folks and losses in affordability had to coincide with COVID 19 outbreak? Couldn't have happier for 2 years prior?
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

So two or three percent infected die off sparks a crisis that kills 60% of total population. call me unimpressed by your reasoning here.
syam wrote:
Arun.prabhu wrote:That 900million number is impossible. Fully 50% of the infections are so mild that they are asymptomatic. The disease kills the old and the sick. Even if all those die, we’re looking at 200-300 million dead, worst case. AIIMS have already recommended a treatment regimen for use, not palliative by the way, but curative. Two separate drugs. Take heart. We’ll beat this thing and though there’ll be deaths, life will go on. As always.
When was a virus scare started in china and end up scaring people in remote tribal areas in odissa? We are underestimating the progress we made and the systems we built over the time. We are damn well connected with each other from donald trump to some tribal guy in chattishgarh. this is very grim situation, sir. no matter how much we want to deny it, we are well connected with each other. it will be just matter of time before it reaches every person benefited from the system.

Better prepare for the worst, sir.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Cain Marko »

Arun.prabhu wrote:They are going to get infected anyways. There is no immunity except by genetic quirk or if you have already had the disease. How are you going to save the people? By forcing them to stay within their houses? For how long? Farmers have to be out in the fields. Grocery shops have to be manned. Medicines produced. Power produced. Trucks maintained. Borders guarded. How is a daily wage labourer to survive for weeks of being stuck in their house when his/her family depends on that wage to put that money on the table. You aren’t considering the economic side of the coin. We would need a month or two or shutdown to bring down the numbers. With fourteen day quarantine, 64 out of 10000 carriers get through into the normal population, starting the cycle all over again.

As for saving lives, does India have the beds and ventilators and ICU and critical care capacity to accommodate all the serious and critically ill and still cater to the normal flow of serious and critically ill patients? No, then we are going to have triage anyways and let a lot of people die. As Italy is doing now. As the whole world must once the hospital infrastructure is overwhelmed. So how many people do you think ruining the economy will save from death by disease and triage and how many do you think will be lost because of financial ruin?
This is not just defeatist but also heartless to the extreme. Like I said earlier show me the data that suggests economic loss will translate into loss of life. This assumption has no basis whatsoever.
As far as farmers eventually going out and contracting disease, you should know that farming is not done in cubicles even in the most laborious practices. The rate of infection will be lower and more manageable.
As far as means of production and distribution are concerned, government takeovers of essential supply chains are hardly new. Yes there will be inconvenience during the transfer. Many of the older folks here have probably experienced rationing, not to mention zero income and deferred payments for months together in the past. Yes it was tough but we lived and so did our families and elders.
This herd immunity BS has got to stop. There is absolutely no reason to give up and suffer huge losses in life when obviously this can be mitigated as in the case of Korea. Isolation works. Use it. For how long? As long as it takes to find a reasonable cure. 24 months or more if necessary. Declare a national emergency and call the army, do what it takes.

People can live a lifestyle of simplicity and frugality till then. There need not be a sacrifice of the elderly on the altar of consumption.
Last edited by Cain Marko on 22 Mar 2020 10:50, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Cain Marko »

Deans wrote:
Cain Marko wrote: Can you be a bit more specific sir? Where do you see these biases? Let's thrash these out as far as possible
Cain Marko ji, in response to your earlier perceptive comment that `no one dies in a economic depression', that is correct. However, it can (and currently is) starting to reduce millions of people, who had escaped absolute poverty, back to subsistence level. About 90% of Indian households have cash savings of barely Rs 10,000 (excluding gold). Economic growth in India is distorted. If we have 6% GDP growth (4.5% per capita), it translates to 7.5% for the top 1% (who have 33% of income) and 1.5% for the bottom 90% (who have another 33%). A 10% GDP drop in 1 quarter would mean it takes over 1.5 years for 90% of India, to get back to where they were before this crisis - during which time they lose their savings and become more vulnerable.
I take your point DeanSji, and agree. But if it comes down to a choice between millions dead (herd immunity) and a great loss of economic capital, I think the choice should be starkly clear.
I think the entire world sees these as the 2 choices available and has made the decision, even those stiff upper lipped goons in the UK. We can rebuild economic loss and have done so before.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by syam »

Arun.prabhu wrote:So two or three percent infected die off sparks a crisis that kills 60% of total population. call me unimpressed by your reasoning here.
Let's do the pessimist and optimist guy routine.

The causality rate is much less in younger people. But the deaths are there in over 30 years old people. Italy might be pig state, but they have better health care than us. the icu and ventilator is not the option for us when we have to save people at the current massive scale.

now we look into giving meds directly to the infected before critical stage. how feasible it can be. at maximum it can handle 80% of the infected. and then we have to look at the doctors aspect also. they won't be working at 100% of their capacity it worst case scenario.

I put average age an indian lives at 70 years. make it half which is 35 years old. if we assume the below 30 is safe. you can see how big the numbers going to be over 30 years. We have more than 50% potential vulnerable humans out there. I don't think death per infected rates going to stay low for long time.

p.s. damn, I am not contributing anything to the thread except more panic. :(
Last edited by syam on 22 Mar 2020 10:56, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Cain Marko »

Arun.prabhu wrote:They shutdown the economy and asked people to pay for quaratine while allowing retailers with connections to price gouge. the factory line workers ran out of money having lost their livelihood and being prey upon by the party. sounds likely.
Cain Marko wrote: All of these dead folks and losses in affordability had to coincide with COVID 19 outbreak? Couldn't have happier for 2 years prior?
In the absence of data to support your hypothesis, your explanation is just as likely as the one suggested by Syamji.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Kati »

Pardon me, if this has been posted before:

Covid-19 Is Traveling Along the New Silk Road
https://www.wired.com/story/covid-19-is ... silk-road/
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by chola »

SriKumar wrote:
chola wrote:
Actually I think the global system is dead. Every country will try to build their own supply chain as much as possible. Trust has eroded as everyone is embargoing everyone else. The Chini-US trade war already started this and it will remain even after the virus is under control.
As long as China is able to produce what it does, at the price it does, even 1 year from now, I think there will be buyers for that. IT will take that long to set up alternative production lines. Setting up China level supply-chains will take China-level indifference to land rights, environment, human rights. Atleast in India and many other countries I see Chinese products being purchsed by people unless the respective countries' governments explicitly outlaw it. Even in USA, I dont see people willing to pay higher prices, the only caveat being if this thing turns into an national pride thing, which it very well could. Chinese Govt (CCP) mislead the world in several ways, primarily concealing information and severity of the WUhan outbreak which cost lives, and they deserve every bit of boycott and embargo they get. THey have to pay a price for what they did not do ....after Wuhan was locked down. So far, they are into bluster and protest and no contrition. Unacceptable. Some of this is OT here perhpas...but I am also interested in your statement in a previous post where you posit that 'goods have to change hands' for economic activity and that work from home is a temporary stop. A lot of Wall Street stuff (buying/selling) is practically WFH activity- is this borderline hotair? There are many other jobs too IT-vity type jobs. I dont see these as ecnomically trivial contribution. Feel free to respond on this thread: "Perspectives on the global economic changes".
Kumar Ji, the global system won't disappear in the next year or five or 10 years. But it is dead in that globalization is no longer growing. The thought beginning in the 1980s was that efficiency will drive things so that industries will always find the lowest cost quality balance. The trade war broke that notion. The virus accelerated the implementation and affect of that notion. Countries are cutting off trade, travel and interchange with one another.

For the other part of your question, I'll go into basic economics. There are three sectors in an economy -- primary (raw resources), secondary (manufacturing) and tertiary (services.) The first two are wealth creating sectors. The third one is wealth consuming.

Trading stocks, writing software and any service you can do from home is tertiary. The primary and secondary sectors create physical goods that must be handled in order to create actual wealth. When no one is mining or manufacturing then no wealth is created. Stocks being bought or sold are only worth something if supported by actual goods from the primary and secondary sector.

In an economy where people are either working from home pushing documents or ideas or just transporting existing stocks of manufacture or raw goods, GDP will ground to zero and then contract as real wealth is consumed by the service sector. You cannot create wealth without goods exchanging hands. It is that simple.
Last edited by chola on 22 Mar 2020 11:02, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Deans »

Cain Marko wrote: I take your point DeanSji, and agree. But if it comes down to a choice between millions dead (herd immunity) and a great loss of economic capital, I think the choice should be starkly clear.
I think the entire world sees these as the 2 choices available and has made the decision, even those stiff upper lipped goons in the UK. We can rebuild economic loss and have done so before.
I agree that Herd immunity is BS and even if there is a scientific rationale, you cant sell it to voters. However, we have to balance economic disruption vs. loss of lives. There are 2 opposite ways of looking at `rebuilding after economic loss'. 1. Poorer countries can rebuild faster because there is not much economic loss in there first place & 2. Richer countries can rebuild faster because their have an economic base (minimum per capita income) to build upon. I don't see easy solutions. As an example from history (hope it never happens here), epidemics like the Black death in Europe, coincided with the large scale burning of witches. Though the church tried to give it a religious justification, it was just an attempt to get rid of unproductive members of society (older women branded as witches) competing for scarce food resources.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

I'll show you all those farmers who have been committing suicide because of most of livelihood and rest my case on economic loss leads to loss of life front.

As for farmers being infected in lower numbers being acceptable - which I the implication of your logic - but not those in cubicles, why are those in cubicles more worthy than farmers, one wonders. The farmers work in villages with little access to good medical care and if they get infected, a disproportionate number of them who develop the serious forms of the disease will die because of lack of said care. Farmers whose lives could have been saved if they had access to city hospitals and city doctors and city care or if they had stayed home and let you and I die.

Government can take over supply chain, but can't replace workers. They still have to work during the crisis and after. Now, that is heartless.

BTW, cain, I never argued against isolation. I argued against locking down cities and states and countries en masse. Target specifically and not everyone in the general population. Shutting down everything is pure laziness and sheer bloodymindedness. Do the calculations. Shutting down the society delays the disease by two weeks. Assume that thirty percent of the population will get the disease and that it will run its course not in three years but in three or four months. Why that short duration? Because the population doesn't have any meaningful resistance to the disease so it'll cut through us like knife through butter. So, 30% of population is 390 million infected. That's 390 million divided by 18 weeks for around 20 million new patients on average. Roughly 20% will need hospitalization for two or three weeks. That's between <edited because I screwed up the math> 8 and 12 million </edit> needed admission and ICU or critical care at any given time. Does India have the beds? For that matter, does the world have that many beds? How many do you think we'll save with those two extra weeks bought?

As for containment, the testing we've been doing is only those who have travelled internationally and those we can ascertain are close contacts with them. What about all those who slipped through our net? The ones who aren't in either of these watch lists. Keep telling yourself I'm heartless and keep telling yourself the lockdown will be short and that you and I can stay at home while others go out to ensure both of us get water and power and food and medicine. The difference between us is that I don't think my life is worth any more than that of the farmer. If he can go out and put himself at risk to serve me and my family, why shouldn't I be out of the street keeping the economy running so that he can put food in his.
Cain Marko wrote:
Arun.prabhu wrote:They are going to get infected anyways. There is no immunity except by genetic quirk or if you have already had the disease. How are you going to save the people? By forcing them to stay within their houses? For how long? Farmers have to be out in the fields. Grocery shops have to be manned. Medicines produced. Power produced. Trucks maintained. Borders guarded. How is a daily wage labourer to survive for weeks of being stuck in their house when his/her family depends on that wage to put that money on the table. You aren’t considering the economic side of the coin. We would need a month or two or shutdown to bring down the numbers. With fourteen day quarantine, 64 out of 10000 carriers get through into the normal population, starting the cycle all over again.

As for saving lives, does India have the beds and ventilators and ICU and critical care capacity to accommodate all the serious and critically ill and still cater to the normal flow of serious and critically ill patients? No, then we are going to have triage anyways and let a lot of people die. As Italy is doing now. As the whole world must once the hospital infrastructure is overwhelmed. So how many people do you think ruining the economy will save from death by disease and triage and how many do you think will be lost because of financial ruin?
This is not just defeatist but also heartless to the extreme. Like I said earlier show me the data that suggests economic loss will translate into loss of life. This assumption has no basis whatsoever.
As far as farmers eventually going out and contracting disease, you should know that farming is not done in cubicles even in the most laborious practices. The rate of infection will be lower and more manageable.
As far as means of production and distribution are concerned, government takeovers of essential supply chains are hardly new. Yes there will be inconvenience during the transfer. Many of the older folks here have probably experienced rationing, not to mention zero income and deferred payments for months together in the past. Yes it was tough but we lived and so did our families and elders.
This herd immunity BS has got to stop. There is absolutely no reason to give up and suffer huge losses in life when obviously this can be mitigated as in the case of Korea. Isolation works. Use it. For how long? As long as it takes to find a reasonable cure. 24 months or more if necessary.
People can live a lifestyle of simplicity and frugality till then. There need not be a sacrifice of the elderly on the altar of consumption.
Last edited by Arun.prabhu on 22 Mar 2020 11:16, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

Under 60, the death rate is 0.2% if you're healthy. Over 70, it starts to get bad and over 80, you stand a 1 in 7 chance of dying. If your cardiovascular system is compromised by disease such as hypertension - basically your life style if crap - then your respiratory system isn't going to be much healthier and you stand a bigger risk of death because your body is already weak.

Pensioners dying en masse is to quote that Irish bureaucrat's heartless remark - saves the government pension monies. We can bear 0.2 or even 0.5 percent of death among working age population because our country has a very healthy demographic in terms of age spread with lots of young people and we will adapt and overcome.

One of the recommended meds has been around 80 years. What we need to do is ramp up production and I hope someone in government has been trying to do exactly that the last couple of months. That chloroquine works for the disease has been known since February - early or mid - and that it works for coronaviruses has been known since 2005.
syam wrote:
Arun.prabhu wrote:So two or three percent infected die off sparks a crisis that kills 60% of total population. call me unimpressed by your reasoning here.
Let's do the pessimist and optimist guy routine.

The causality rate is much less in younger people. But the deaths are there in over 30 years old people. Italy might be pig state, but they have better health care than us. the icu and ventilator is not the option for us when we have to save people at the current massive scale.

now we look into giving meds directly to the infected before critical stage. how feasible it can be. at maximum it can handle 80% of the infected. and then we have to look at the doctors aspect also. they won't be working at 100% of their capacity it worst case scenario.

I put average age an indian lives at 70 years. make it half which is 35 years old. if we assume the below 30 is safe. you can see how big the numbers going to be over 30 years. We have more than 50% potential vulnerable humans out there. I don't think death per infected rates going to stay low for long time.

p.s. damn, I am not contributing anything to the thread except more panic. :(
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Arun.prabhu »

Now, you're arguing for argument's sake. If everything is equally valid, let's accept we don't know why the numbers went down and leave be.
Cain Marko wrote:
Arun.prabhu wrote:They shutdown the economy and asked people to pay for quaratine while allowing retailers with connections to price gouge. the factory line workers ran out of money having lost their livelihood and being prey upon by the party. sounds likely.
In the absence of data to support your hypothesis, your explanation is just as likely as the one suggested by Syamji.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by nvishal »

sudarshan wrote:
Dileep wrote:I read that Chloroquine shows some indication of fighting the virus.

When I was a kid, there was widespread use of this medicine to pre-empt Malaria. Advertisements like "Fever? Maybe Malaria!! Take Chloroquine" on the back of regular "Inland Letter Cards" of postal service. In Malayalam!! People used to get it liberally from the govt health centers and special extension centres under the National Malaria Eradication programme.

Now, why can't we all take that? The medicine have a half life of more than a month. Even if it 'slows down' the virus, it will help healthy individuals to eliminate the virus load, and stop the pandemic.

Why can't we all?
You know it's toxic? Hydroxychloroquine (seems to be a metabolic byproduct of chloroquine) seems to be less toxic, but I guess also less effective. Like somebody posted before (how true it is, I don't know), apparently one of the side effects is increased cancer. You don't just take it on a whim, is my guess.
The Chinese had placed an order for it from Pakistan back in Feb

https://tribune.com.pk/story/2162276/1- ... -19/?amp=1

http://www.gwadarpro.com/mobile/index.p ... le_id=4818
BEIJING, Feb. 22 (Gwadar Pro) - Chloroquine phosphate has been proved to be an effective treatment for novel coronavirus (COVID-19) and 300,000 tablets of Resochin (chloroquine phosphate) from one of Bayer’s subsidiaries in Pakistan have been expedited supply and transportation to China.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Deans »

There are some things we have to do now, can we suggest these (whatever makes sense) to PMO / Health Ministry ?
All are immediately implementable and cost relatively little.

1. Use every foreign returned medical college graduate (awaiting a license to practice in India) should be called for duty and assigned to a hospital/ municipal team/ quarantine facility/ test lab. Let State govt's decide where. Give them a salary and make the grant of license contingent on their full participation in the program.
2. Same with all dental college graduates/ final year medical students (suspend college).
3. Increase by 50% the salary of every govt health worker dealing with Corona, till the crisis lasts.
4. Any attack on medical staff/ denial of facilities etc should be a punishable offense.
5. Large no of small hotels (6-20 rooms) are completely empty. Convert them to quarantine facilities for those who find home quarantine difficult (too crowded) and can pay for a better facility. Insurance companies could pick up some of the cost. Govt can pay hotel owners, for those cases requiring treatment (and not alternatives to home quarantine). This can help a significant part of the hotel industry. The cost of a mid priced hotel on OYO is less than a hospital room with only basic treatment provided. Man each hotel with a medical graduate (point 1 & 2) helper and security to prevent people absconding. In the same way create 1 Coronavirus ward in some schools and colleges that will be closed for the summer break.(can be done for all cases not requiring ICU).
6. Data base of every patient's movements prior to testing positive, so that anyone with internet can find out if they have a risk of infection. Currently city authorities are doing it very inefficiently. People need to approach govt to say they might be at risk, not the other way around.
7. Ban EVERY religious function, wedding, protest, gathering of more than 5 people. Deploy the territorial army/Traffic police/Civil defence/
Armed forces if required and give them sweeping powers to fine violators (mass arrest will lead to more spread of disease).
8. Release a daily count of : People screened at airports, people tested, people under observed quarantine (and capacity), people being treated (and capacity) and ICU count (and capacity). Website of all those told to undergo home quarantine. (names & address). Punishable offence for anyone trying to harass them if they are at home. It will build confidence that Govt has things under control.
9. Build a large capacity hospital in 10 days (an audacious project that will boost national morale). It can for e.g. be located near a tourist sport (Agra?) and used as a low cost tourist hostel subsequently.
10. Increase the testing fee to Rs 5000 (from 4500) but remove GST. Some people will have their test costs covered by insurance. Come down heavily on insurance companies that object to the inclusion of these tests in their existing policies.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by Deans »

The fatality rate for the 20-49 age group (worldwide) is 0.32 %
Assuming half of all cases are too mild to be reported, the fatality rate is 0.16%
Excluding smokers, it would be approx 0.14 %

Data on deaths show that in warmer and/or more humid countries, the death rate is lower. There is also one study suggesting that the R0 in Indian heath & humidity conditions (see the `cut the clutter' youtube video) is lower by about 15% If we use the same percentage reduction (which I'm doing for want of anything better), we have a 0.12% fatality rate (1 in 800). 1 in 200 cases (25% of fatalities) needed ICU/Ventilator support. (approx 3/4 of those in ICU /ventilator support recovered including the above 50 age group).

Assuming a 300 million urban population (in cities and large towns) that can be potentially exposed to the virus - 83% are under 50.
Given a infection rate of 400 per million reporting to a hospital (no warm country has crossed 100 and Hubei is about 400) we have, in a stage 3 epidemic scenario 120,000 hospital cases, with about 700 deaths.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by madhu »

Physical distancing, not social distancing- WHO
The World Health Organization (WHO) is discouraging the use of the phrase ‘social distancing’. The organization urges people to use the phrase ‘physical distancing’ instead.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by kvraghav »

Looking at the number of middle East returned people infections, either they were clubbed with lots of Chinese labor or middle eastern countries are hiding their numbers.
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Re: Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Post by vimal »

kvraghav wrote:Looking at the number of middle East returned people infections, either they were clubbed with lots of Chinese labor or middle eastern countries are hiding their numbers.
Thats where they go to learn advanced skills of pelting stones, molotov cocktails and general nonsense. Maybe they have cheene instructors who gave them this gift.
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