Wuhan Coronavirus Resource Thread

Rahul M · Post by **Rahul M** » 25 Mar 2020 23:00

Press Trust of India
@PTI_News
·
1h
British national given HIV antiretroviral drugs to treat his coronavirus infection now tests negative: docs at Ernakulam hospital

Sanju · Post by **Sanju** » 25 Mar 2020 23:01

India is doing an outstanding job, irrespective of its extremely large size and population. There will be hiccups when large scale changes are implemented in such a vast populous land. There is no comparison as far as India is concerned in terms of population + form of govt - neither China with its 1-party dictatorship nor US with a population 1/4 the size of India. We need to stand by the front-line workers, Healthcare workers (both Clinical & Public Health), Civil Airlines staff, Govt. officials, Police, Armed Forces, volunteers and those who are delivering the much needed food and relief across the world.

On a personal note, a Primary school classmate of mine in the DC Area is in the ICU, intubated (sp?) with severe pneumonia due to Covid-19. I hope all you folks are taking care and in good health.

chola · Post by **chola** » 25 Mar 2020 23:06

Suraj wrote:
In the US, the greatest/most powerful/yadayada/stable genius run place, and especially Bay Area, home of almost all major tech companies, people lost their collective heads, emptied out shelves of TP, water (what for ??) and I saw a shirt-pulling brawl over beer at the neighboring grocery between two guys who probably then went back home in their respective Teslas.

I wrote this three weeks ago. In the US, you could see this thing going FUBAR in front of our faces.

chola wrote: I am scared stiff of the system in the US. It's really broken when travellers from Italy are practically unscreened and not even asked to self-quarantine. Two of the three confirmed cases in Massachusetts were connected to Italy.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2020/03/06/ ... e-it-home/

yensoy · Post by **yensoy** » 25 Mar 2020 23:11

At the high level things are going great - tough talk, tough action, clear lines, but a lot of people at the margins are getting crushed. Migrant labour wasn't given the time to reach their natives. If the intent was for them to not proceed to their natives (which is quite logical - we don't want to disperse the virus) this should have been clearly messaged. Not much thought was put into how to house and feed these armies of people on whom our economy runs. Facilities should have been provided for them by the state administration, with prior announcements so they wouldn't try to cram into the few remaining trains and carry WuhanVirus to interior villages. Putting the onus on employers would also not be the right thing to do because (i) employers are themselves hurting and (ii) many of these labourers don't have steady employment and are working gigs, or with other contractors who are themselves migrants.

"Stay within your homes" seems a tad elitist - good for those of us who have steady and stable homes but doesn't work for all. A cousin got booted from a working womens hostel because they were asked to shut down. She has nowhere else to call home. (She got lucky with an alternative arrangement)

This is not a knock on the govt which has its own pressures, just an observation and reminder that there are a lot of unfortunate people out there in worse situations than our own so let's count our blessings.

vera_k · Post by **vera_k** » 25 Mar 2020 23:18

Deans wrote:On the contrary, India is testing those with the highest risk of contracting Corona (visible symptoms or close contact with an infected person).
Yet, the positive cases are under 2.5% - If you exclude the people who arrived in India infected, only about 1 in 80 locals (with most chance of
getting it) have turned positive. That is very encouraging. The most important piece of info I look at is the daily ICMR report of tests conducted.

The point I was driving at is that it is not possible to know prevalence of the virus at a more localized level without more testing. This would be useful in determining which districts could be opened back up from the lock down.

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 25 Mar 2020 23:19

Yes, the real risk is just how long people can live, almost literally without an economy for 2-3 weeks. I see a temporary UBI being issued using the JAM system in place.

vera_k · Post by **vera_k** » 25 Mar 2020 23:23

Philip wrote:In retrospect when allthe warning bells were sounding in Jan.,that a poss. pandemic was round the corner,the sealing off of India from the world should've started.

The lack of warning is on the Chinese government and WHO. I posted the timeline about patient zero in Seattle. He flew in on Jan 15, when the publicly admitted number of infections in Wuhan were 41. Both USA and India implemented travel restrictions on Jan 17.

greatde · Post by **greatde** » 25 Mar 2020 23:24

Suraj wrote:Yes, the real risk is just how long people can live, almost literally without an economy for 2-3 weeks. I see a temporary UBI being issued using the JAM system in place.

Well, demonetization showed our people can manage without cash for certain period. And more than economy, it is food and shelter. Thus, timely deliveries of food to the needy, and shelters for any homeless has to be done...

Primus · Post by **Primus** » 25 Mar 2020 23:27

Bart S wrote:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ET86NhYUwAA ... name=small

Kanika Kapoor at work again

She should be called 'Korona Kapoor', the new Typhoid Mary of India. Celebrities and influencers should set an example and urge everyone to do what is for the common good, stay home and keep everyone safe. Not go gallivanting around, promoting yourself for your two minutes of fame. Shame.

yensoy · Post by **yensoy** » 25 Mar 2020 23:28

vera_k wrote:
Philip wrote:In retrospect when allthe warning bells were sounding in Jan.,that a poss. pandemic was round the corner,the sealing off of India from the world should've started.
The lack of warning is on the Chinese government and WHO. I posted the timeline about patient zero in Seattle. He flew in on Jan 15, when the publicly admitted number of infections in Wuhan were 41. Both USA and India implemented travel restrictions on Jan 17.

There wasn't much of a restriction. There was a temperature check, noting of addresses & seat numbers and then you went on your merry ways. And even that, direct from people who flew in during late Jan/early Feb, was patchy - e.g. I don't think they did it in Delhi.

The problem is that nobody had expected or seen asymptomatic transmission with an incubation period of 14 days before. China should have been more vocal about their findings - but then they only write when they can get a paper published and add to their citation count.

A Sharma · Post by **A Sharma** » 25 Mar 2020 23:34

Was talking to someone who works for IKEA. Their SME supply from India hit just not due to lockdown but also have been asked by Govt to make medical stuff like gowns, gloves etc.

chola · Post by **chola** » 25 Mar 2020 23:36

Primus wrote:
Bart S wrote:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ET86NhYUwAA ... name=small

Kanika Kapoor at work again
She should be called 'Korona Kapoor', the new Typhoid Mary of India. Celebrities and influencers should set an example and urge everyone to do what is for the common good, stay home and keep everyone safe. Not go gallivanting around, promoting yourself for your two minutes of fame. Shame.

She gave it to Prince Charlie. She was our instrument of revenge for the Britshit Raj!

Cain Marko · Post by **Cain Marko** » 25 Mar 2020 23:40

Deans wrote:No country so far has tested even 1% of its population.
Not Italy (High no of cases, very advanced medical system), Not Switzerland (Italy with a low population),
Not SoKo and the GCC countries which have high cases, a small population and a policy of broadening the testing criteria.

Testing capacity in India is significantly higher than the current demand. That capacity will go from 1000/day 3 days ago to 10,000/day within a week,if required. The problem we have is not lack of tests or testing capacity. That said, we should do more random tests in localities where infected people stayed to check for stage 3. Sample size of the only previous test was too low.

Truly. How hard is it really to get some random sampling done. And test accordingly.

Cain Marko · Post by **Cain Marko** » 25 Mar 2020 23:43

chola wrote:
Primus wrote:
She should be called 'Korona Kapoor', the new Typhoid Mary of India. .
She gave it to Prince Charlie. She was our instrument of revenge for the Britshit Raj!

ROFL. Hello your Royal Highness, I'm Korona Kapoor, Kareenas third sister

nam · Post by **nam** » 25 Mar 2020 23:59

vera_k wrote:
The point I was driving at is that it is not possible to know prevalence of the virus at a more localized level without more testing. This would be useful in determining which districts could be opened back up from the lock down.

The issue is, if you want to do localised testing, which locality will that be? how many people? If they come negative now, what is the gurantee it will be the same in two days time?

Despite what might seem logical, it is not worthwhile to do indiscriminate testing. I know it is very tempting to test everyone and weed out infected ones. For this you need to lock down a place completely and mass test. Not possible with 1.3 billion people.

What ICMR is doing, is mentioned in the previous pages on this thread. ICMR is monitoring respiratory patients, to see if any recent referral is positive. So far they are not finding any, hence the reason of saying no community transmission yet.

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 26 Mar 2020 00:10

chola wrote:
Primus wrote: She should be called 'Korona Kapoor', the new Typhoid Mary of India. Celebrities and influencers should set an example and urge everyone to do what is for the common good, stay home and keep everyone safe. Not go gallivanting around, promoting yourself for your two minutes of fame. Shame.
She gave it to Prince Charlie. She was our instrument of revenge for the Britshit Raj!

If Charlie then went and met mummy dear, who proceeds to keel over in another 3 weeks from this, then I might just forgive this lady - she's still an idiot, but will have served the purpose of being a useful idiot.

Gerard · Post by **Gerard** » 26 Mar 2020 00:22

Govt likely to unveil $20 billion-plus stimulus package

Direct payments into the bank accounts of 100 million poor and to businesses affected by the lockdown.

disha · Post by **disha** » 26 Mar 2020 00:25

ChinaVirus

https://www.firstpost.com/health/corona ... 89191.html

Suraj · Post by **Suraj** » 26 Mar 2020 00:26

Gerard wrote:Govt likely to unveil $20 billion-plus stimulus package

Direct payments into the bank accounts of 100 million poor and to businesses affected by the lockdown.

Excellent news. The government is acting in a very predictable, organized and rational manner. Spend years setting up a mechanism for DBT. In a crisis, first trial a lockdown, then 2 days later, organize lockdown, and within a day, announce a massive UBI stimulus disbursal to address the stoppage in economic activity.

Mukesh.Kumar · Post by **Mukesh.Kumar** » 26 Mar 2020 00:37

chola wrote:
Primus wrote:
She should be called 'Korona Kapoor', the new Typhoid Mary of India. Celebrities and influencers should set an example and urge everyone to do what is for the common good, stay home and keep everyone safe. Not go gallivanting around, promoting yourself for your two minutes of fame. Shame.
She gave it to Prince Charlie. She was our instrument of revenge for the Britshit Raj!

Vish-Kanya from the Yeevil Yindoos.

Sicanta · Post by **Sicanta** » 26 Mar 2020 00:37

Well atleast all PSU banks are offering emergency credit to existing customers. Some are even offering it to retail customers.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/wap.busine ... 911_1.html

Mukesh.Kumar · Post by **Mukesh.Kumar** » 26 Mar 2020 00:39

Gurus had anyone seen the article. A TLDR please for mango people

Swarajyamag.com article on modeling State wise projection

Manish_Sharma · Post by **Manish_Sharma** » 26 Mar 2020 00:55

China is pressuring Indian journalists to peddle the Chinese government's propaganda on the #Chinesevirus. Some of them are afraid for their lives and careers if they don't comply.

Most are complying.

I will not be complying.

If I wind up dead, know that China did it.
https://twitter.com/HarbirSinghNain/sta ... 81185?s=19

sajo · Post by **sajo** » 26 Mar 2020 01:06

I just did a quick fact check with some business data available to me for Jan, Feb and March.
Our customers in Shanghai and Beijing were completely normal and operating at full potential with the exception of new year dip if I check the raw numbers. And this wasnt even essential services (Automobile parts), office and warehouse staff were working fine. We used to hold calls with them and their demeanor did not suggest anything other than complete normality.
At the first sign of a shutdown though in India though, the same customer's offices in Pune, Jharkhand and MP are completely shut down. What gives? What (if) are they hiding?

Garooda · Post by **Garooda** » 26 Mar 2020 01:19

India's Corona Dashboard updating every 4 hrs.

India_COVID_19_Dashboard

chola · Post by **chola** » 26 Mar 2020 01:30

Suraj wrote:
chola wrote: She gave it to Prince Charlie. She was our instrument of revenge for the Britshit Raj!
If Charlie then went and met mummy dear, who proceeds to keel over in another 3 weeks from this, then I might just forgive this lady - she's still an idiot, but will have served the purpose of being a useful idiot.

Suraj ji! Have you seen the Queen Mother (of the Hive)? She looks like a 5000-year-old mummy and is probably just as immortal. She looked like this when Princess Diana (bless her soul) married Charlie three decades. No, she won't keel over.

She might even be Victoria in disguise to hide from the Britshits that their Queen is actually a 150-year-old ghoul.

dr.uday · Post by **dr.uday** » 26 Mar 2020 02:08

Deleted on user request

Sumair · Post by **Sumair** » 26 Mar 2020 02:09

kvraghav wrote:I have one question in general. Why do we have less death rate in terms of flu when compared to other developed nations with such wonderfull health care facility?

Interesting question. Someone should write a paper on this. India was also spared the wrath of the SARS virus. It is not the case just with India but most of the tropical countries. My personal opinion is that Indian population in large has immunity to malaria and since corona virus’s infection mechanism in human body is similar to that of malaria, Indians and other tropical populations are less vulnerable. Secondly we are blessed with abundance of sunlight; the primary source of vitamin D in the human body. Vitamin D deficiency is associated with acute respiratory infections along with host of other disease such as Tb, Influenza, COPD, asthma etc. Vitamin D inhibits pro inflammatory cytokines and promotes cathelicidin production. Cathelicidin is the only anti microbial protein that humans make that kills viruses, fungi and bacteria. It is no surprise that influenza case decline in summer times in the northern hemisphere when Vitamin D levels spike due to the sunlight exposure. We will know if this holds true in the coming few weeks.

krithivas · Post by **krithivas** » 26 Mar 2020 02:16

IMO, Major credit is to our traditional food habits. Food has been fine tuned over thousands of years through constant learning/fine-tuning to be more medicinal in addition to the nutritional value. Turmeric, Pepper, Ginger et al provides our internal systems with strong immunity.

Sumair wrote:
kvraghav wrote:I have one question in general. Why do we have less death rate in terms of flu when compared to other developed nations with such wonderfull health care facility?
Interesting question. Someone should write a paper on this. India was also spared the wrath of the SARS virus. It is not the case just with India but most of the tropical countries. My personal opinion is that Indian population in large has immunity to malaria and since corona virus’s infection mechanism in human body is similar to that of malaria, Indians and other tropical populations are less vulnerable. Secondly we are blessed with abundance of sunlight; the primary source of vitamin D in the human body. Vitamin D deficiency is associated with acute respiratory infections along with host of other disease such as Tb, Influenza, COPD, asthma etc. Vitamin D inhibits pro inflammatory cytokines and promotes cathelicidin production. Cathelicidin is the only anti microbial protein that humans make that kills viruses, fungi and bacteria. It is no surprise that influenza case decline in summer times in the northern hemisphere when Vitamin D levels spike due to the sunlight exposure. We will know if this holds true in the coming few weeks.

dr.uday · Post by **dr.uday** » 26 Mar 2020 02:19

Malaria and coronavirus dont have similar mechanism of infection. Please provide any source of this info if available. Rest of the vitamin D part i agree.. and importantly due to overcrowding and poor hygeine, we are repeatedly exposed to more infections and that keeps our immunity more robust. All these infections we have suffered every year are may be blessings in disguise. This theorey is not conclusively proven, but is popular.
And the food habits part mentioned above is right too.

disha · Post by **disha** » 26 Mar 2020 02:21

Suraj wrote: In the US, the greatest/most powerful/yadayada/stable genius run place, and especially Bay Area, home of almost all major tech companies, people lost their collective heads, emptied out shelves of TP, water (what for ??) and I saw a shirt-pulling brawl over beer at the neighboring grocery between two guys who probably then went back home in their respective Teslas.

Suraj'san., Are you trying to out me? ChugBeerHugDeer should be the new mantra!

Jokes apart, there were enough jokers around in my company who were stockpiling on TP. And these are recent data science graduates. When I pointed out to them that they have stockpiled enough of TP to last them a year (if not two) and they do not need to stockpile on water (SF Bay Area has one of the cleanest drinking water on tap in the world so much so that Coca-Cola was bottling SF tap water and re-selling it), stocked up on N95 masks and enough of hand sanitizers to bathe in it daily. I found it ridiculous and there are enough crazies that flout the norm and started having parties at home.

One of them had 30 gallons (@90 ltrs) of milk in the cart. I told him that cows have not got coronavirus yet and they will still give milk tomorrow. I got a birdie along mind your own business look.

Human brain sometimes is pathetic. It is beyond reason when its amygdala takes over.

In that sense, what India is doing is amazing. What Indians are doing is also amazing. I see photos of tiny Kirana shops that have put circles in front of their shop and following social distancing.

Other than some insouciant, arrogant and illegal behaviour from the so-called educated elite who are quick to give advice to all and sundry., This 21 days will pass peacefully and India will pull off a major victory.

I am sure behind the scenes, infrastructure is being setup. A 100 bed here and a 50 beds there, slowly if each state starts adding health care facilities near the clusters which are currently hot, we might pull this through well.

And look at the good part, summer is coming. And there is general social distancing anyway in summer if marriages, places of worship, cinema theatres are closed.

And people generally cooperate. If their fears are addressed and they see that mingling will lead to contagion, they voluntarily avoid mingling. Take a look at Brazil itself. Despite its president huffing and puffing that the case of coronavirus is overblown, the state government and people are doing a kind of self imposed social distancing! https://www.reuters.com/article/us-heal ... SKBN21B2H2

NRao · Post by **NRao** » 26 Mar 2020 02:22

sudarshan · Post by **sudarshan** » 26 Mar 2020 02:23

dr.uday wrote: GUYS PLEASE GO THROUGH. I am not trying to downplay the seriousness of coronavirus but i have an alternate theory. Just point out if there are flaws in my theorey.
....

This will fall in the realm of CT (Conspiracy Theory) and Suraj san will jump on your post, and then on you. Just warning you, because you seem to be new here (operative word being "seem," I don't know how long you have been lurking, so please don't mind if it sounds patronizing). Maybe these kinds of posts would be ok in some other thread, but in this one, I guess the point is to keep it focused on action items.

nam · Post by **nam** » 26 Mar 2020 02:27

The virus is either from the Chini's wet market or a leak from Wuhan's bio lab. It seems some bigwig in CCP force the Chinese government to keep the wet markets open. They closed all of them for 6 months during the SARS outbreak. Then re-opened it.

How did it get to Italy? Well they have direct flights from Wuhan to Venice!

Not even that, Iran outbreak started from Qom, which is heavily inhibited by Chinese working on investment projects. Probably the same with Pak and they realized late, as they didn't have any kit to even test.

dr.uday · Post by **dr.uday** » 26 Mar 2020 02:33

I have been lurking ever since balakot sir. I little bit know the norms here. But this theory has actual impact if it holds true. If some of us can really verify how severe is the lockdown in china, then we can come to a conclusion and stop chasing our tails. And may be we can decrease the economic losses. My only problem is why is everybody going crazy over corona. Didnt 80k die last year in UK with flu? In my practice we see lot of old people just falling really sick of seasonal cold. Is it just me or am i missing something?

Jay · Post by **Jay** » 26 Mar 2020 02:33

Sumair wrote: Interesting question. Someone should write a paper on this. India was also spared the wrath of the SARS virus. It is not the case just with India but most of the tropical countries.

What about the 1918 spanish flu then that it took the life of 12-20 million in India? Without any conclusive proof, it's hard to believe that we may have super immunity to the flu virus.

disha · Post by **disha** » 26 Mar 2020 02:34

sudarshan wrote:
Don't you have to account for the initial number of cases?

Meaning - if you had 600 initial cases and after 5 days, it becomes 728, that's an increase of 128 in 5 days. If you had 10 initial cases and it becomes 138 in 5 days, that is also an increase of 128 in 5 days. Is the R0 the same in both cases?

For the initial cases, they were imported and not part of any local transmission. Now since India is in total lockdown and its ports are sealed, it can be monitored as transmissions in a closed space.

We will know the true picture in a week. It does turn out that most of the cases are in clusters and it is not surprising that those clusters have the most cases. For example., Kasargode, Karimnagar, Bhiwani etc.

disha · Post by **disha** » 26 Mar 2020 02:37

Jay wrote:
What about the 1918 spanish flu then that it took the life of 12-20 million in India? Without any conclusive proof, it's hard to believe that we may have super immunity to the flu virus.

I would posit that Spanish flu was less virulent than coronavirus. Still it killed many! Why?

Under Colonial rule and post WWI, all areas under British Raj had

1. Poverty
2. Absymal healthcare infrastructure
3. Mal-nourishment
4. Zero public health policy
5. Unconcerned colonial masters (remember they would have been happy if the native would just die).
6. Zero medical care

All of the above and more needs to be taken into account before we come back and compare the current population set with that of 1918.

Only morbidities I see in the current population set are:

1. Obesity
2. Hypertension and Type-II diabetes

DavidD · Post by **DavidD** » 26 Mar 2020 02:39

Sumair wrote:
kvraghav wrote:I have one question in general. Why do we have less death rate in terms of flu when compared to other developed nations with such wonderfull health care facility?
Interesting question. Someone should write a paper on this. India was also spared the wrath of the SARS virus. It is not the case just with India but most of the tropical countries. My personal opinion is that Indian population in large has immunity to malaria and since corona virus’s infection mechanism in human body is similar to that of malaria, Indians and other tropical populations are less vulnerable. Secondly we are blessed with abundance of sunlight; the primary source of vitamin D in the human body. Vitamin D deficiency is associated with acute respiratory infections along with host of other disease such as Tb, Influenza, COPD, asthma etc. Vitamin D inhibits pro inflammatory cytokines and promotes cathelicidin production. Cathelicidin is the only anti microbial protein that humans make that kills viruses, fungi and bacteria. It is no surprise that influenza case decline in summer times in the northern hemisphere when Vitamin D levels spike due to the sunlight exposure. We will know if this holds true in the coming few weeks.

It's a temperature preference for the specific virus. The flu is very rare in northern hemisphere countries in the summer because it's not very active in hotter and more humid conditions. MERS on the other hand is a coronavirus that tolerates heat very well and has a reservoir in camels. Dengue and Zika also prefer hotter climates, for example. Each virus is different, and it appears that COVID and Influenza have similar preferences temperature/humidity-wise.

sudarshan · Post by **sudarshan** » 26 Mar 2020 02:39

Jay wrote:
Sumair wrote: Interesting question. Someone should write a paper on this. India was also spared the wrath of the SARS virus. It is not the case just with India but most of the tropical countries.
What about the 1918 spanish flu then that it took the life of 12-20 million in India? Without any conclusive proof, it's hard to believe that we may have super immunity to the flu virus.

Please see my post on this in page 57 of this thread. Suraj discouraged further discussion on this. But the 12-20 million lives in India were due to British mismanagement (most of those deaths were in British India, the princely states got away with way less number of deaths).