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OMG, thank you so much for this. the reality is self isolation is not a game plan. at some point we have to go back to living.
folks will have to go back to work
kids will have to go back to school.
You are living. This 'novel' (new) virus is amazingly unpredictable. Since its new, obviously not all that much about it is known, unlike the flu that we have had 100 years or more to study.
Many healthcare professionals claim they have never seen anything like this virus. Some people merely lose their sense of smell and taste, as has been seen among some younger people in Britain, while others have their lungs fill with 'ground-glass' pattern infiltrates and fluid and die.
Keeping that in mind, although its a big inconvenience and even a hardship for many - how much do you really want to gamble your life, and your kids lives so they can get back to school and you can get back to work?
If you are lucky in that exercise - nothing will happen. If you aren't so lucky, you and your kids wont be doing much learning or living if you all die.
In the words of Dirty Harry, "Are you feeling lucky punk?"
Self-isolation and social distancing are all we have for sure right now. That, and tests. Viruses don't really have a cure for the most part, you can only manage the symptoms, and wait for them to run their course. There is no studied vaccine or anything else because this is new.
As someone who is going to work everyday because I am considered essential and work in a frontline facility - I can only say that everyone is doing the best they know how, and the best minds in science all over the world are looking at this virus and giving their recommendations.
On the bright side - and its not out yet - but, there is a new test to detect antibodies. In theory, once someone tests positive for the antibodies, and negative for the virus, they can go back to work, and school, and anything else they want to do.
Right now, the best way to stay living is to stay home and make a good faith effort to keep your distance when you need to go out.
I have a personal game plan, to expand on my Emergency Preparedness related plan that is part of my job training. I plan to have a few PPEs in storage (once things settle down and go back to normal) and save up enough money so that if I am in the situation where I cant work for a few months, the cash is there for me to live off of - an "Emergency Preparedness Fund" to go along with the 30 days of non-perishable food and water I currently maintain.
Last edited by ComeCloser; 04-02-2020 at 04:55 AM..
Who's been locked down for 15 days? A couple places maybe, but some States haven't even begun to consider it.
The long term plan is to keep from overwhelming hospitals and to have enough beds and equipment and, hopefully, treatments to keep the sickest from dying until we find a cure/vaccine. We may not find one though, and we won't be able to prevent people from getting sick as long as the virus is active in the wild. One thing for sure, no plan will ever include shutting down the worlds economies again. Bouncing back will be difficult because we are all so dependent on each other these days. We MUST be better prepared for plagues and such and there are things we can do, but in a battle between humans infectious diseases we will always be the underdog.
If you’re over age 30 odds are you’ll never see anything like this again. This is a 1 in 200 or 500 year event. Most pandemic viruses have a fatality threshold or incubation period that don’t make them this ideal for killing and spreading. As a result they typically fall off the radar quickly or they get contained in a small area.
Who's been locked down for 15 days? A couple places maybe, but some States haven't even begun to consider it.
The long term plan is to keep from overwhelming hospitals and to have enough beds and equipment and, hopefully, treatments to keep the sickest from dying until we find a cure/vaccine. We may not find one though, and we won't be able to prevent people from getting sick as long as the virus is active in the wild. One thing for sure, no plan will ever include shutting down the worlds economies again. Bouncing back will be difficult because we are all so dependent on each other these days. We MUST be better prepared for plagues and such and there are things we can do, but in a battle between humans infectious diseases we will always be the underdog.
So we can expect a lockdown until a working vaccine or theraputic is found? Maybe in a year, maybe 2. Barring that, we can expect a 4-year lockdown at the current burn rate of the virus and capacity of the health care system.
I think you are correct, actually. THAT is the long-term plan, but no politician will articulate it, because telling people that they cannot go to work, go to a playground, travel outside their house, or visit a friend for at least a year and up to 4 years is as much of a non-starter as telling them that the health care system will be allowed to collapse and we will have 5 million dead Americans in 3 months.
The thing is, I don't believe that plan will work either. You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all the people all the time. Eventually most people will decide they are willing to take their chances rather than stay shut in their homes for 12-48 months. I give us until month 2 (beginning of June) before social unrest brings people out of their homes in defiance of the lockdown. I'm not advocating, I'm just predicting.
If it were articulated clearly, that this lockdown will continue until a cure is found, and that timeline is realistically 1-to-4 years, and we were given a choice, I would certainly choose take my chances with a 1-in-500 chance of death. I would allow my children to be infected with a 1-in-multiple-thousands chance of death (the yearly influenza is more dangerous to them, even WITH the vaccination). My 80-year-old parents also told me they are willing to take their 1-in-10 or 1-in-5 chance of death. My 85-year-old father told me that he has been prepared for death every day since he underwent surgery for heart disease 10 years ago. He is following the law, but he would rather be out enjoying his last days, even if it means shortening them by 3-5 years, and I agree with him.
So, if that IS the plan, it needs to be articulated for open discussion. Because you can't count on the compliance of the majority of people past a month or two. That means the plan needs to include provisions for full transition to a police state with sufficient forces (police and military on the streets, as China did) to ENFORCE the lockdown.
I suspect the economy will gradually or suddenly reopen no later that Jun 1. I suspect older folks and vulnerable people will be expected to stay home, and possibly some accommodations will be made for them for awhile.
But we have to get past the peak of infections first. Hospital ERs need to be able to get back to some sort of normalcy. And, remember, that healthcare pros will still be exhausted. So it is not as if things will be suddenly pop back into the normalcy we had before.
But the way to normalcy is to do distancing now, conscientiously.
I agree. We will be given pretend dates on which the situation will be supposed to be better and things will start reopening, and when we get there, we'll be told it's not time yet and a new pretend date will be set. Flattening the curve (i.e. keeping the spread of contagion down to a certain level) keeps the medical system from being overwhelmed, but will mean it takes years before enough people have achieved immunity to make it "safe" to resume ordinary life.
There is a good reason they are doing it this way!
FEMA has a lot of say right now, since we are in an official pandemic, FEMA has the authority to withhold or alter news and information, if they feel it may cause a public panic...that is the reason we are seeing vague time lines and dates thrown around.
You can actually go online and read the FEMA protocols for responding to disasters, its very easy to see they are following it to a 'T'. they are trying to avoid a public panic right now, that is their main goal.
So we can expect a lockdown until a working vaccine or theraputic is found? Maybe in a year, maybe 2. Barring that, we can expect a 4-year lockdown at the current burn rate of the virus and capacity of the health care system.
I think you are correct, actually. THAT is the long-term plan, but no politician will articulate it, because telling people that they cannot go to work, go to a playground, travel outside their house, or visit a friend for at least a year and up to 4 years is as much of a non-starter as telling them that the health care system will be allowed to collapse and we will have 5 million dead Americans in 3 months.
The thing is, I don't believe that plan will work either. You can fool some of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all the people all the time. Eventually most people will decide they are willing to take their chances rather than stay shut in their homes for 12-48 months. I give us until month 2 (beginning of June) before social unrest brings people out of their homes in defiance of the lockdown. I'm not advocating, I'm just predicting.
If it were articulated clearly, that this lockdown will continue until a cure is found, and that timeline is realistically 1-to-4 years, and we were given a choice, I would certainly choose take my chances with a 1-in-500 chance of death. I would allow my children to be infected with a 1-in-multiple-thousands chance of death (the yearly influenza is more dangerous to them, even WITH the vaccination). My 80-year-old parents also told me they are willing to take their 1-in-10 or 1-in-5 chance of death. My 85-year-old father told me that he has been prepared for death every day since he underwent surgery for heart disease 10 years ago. He is following the law, but he would rather be out enjoying his last days, even if it means shortening them by 3-5 years, and I agree with him.
So, if that IS the plan, it needs to be articulated for open discussion. Because you can't count on the compliance of the majority of people past a month or two. That means the plan needs to include provisions for full transition to a police state with sufficient forces (police and military on the streets, as China did) to ENFORCE the lockdown.
You are right, this is going to go from 'concerns about spreading the virus' to avoiding public panic (due to the economy collapsing), which I have a feeling, it already has, we just havent 'seen' or felt it yet.
I work for one of the top 3 largest gas station chains in the country, and they are taking steps to close multiple stores in May, they have also suspended fuel delivery to all stores in mid May. If my company is doing this, I guarantee, others are too.
You are right, this is going to go from 'concerns about spreading the virus' to avoiding public panic (due to the economy collapsing), which I have a feeling, it already has, we just havent 'seen' or felt it yet.
I work for one of the top 3 largest gas station chains in the country, and they are taking steps to close multiple stores in May, they have also suspended fuel delivery to all stores in mid May. If my company is doing this, I guarantee, others are too.
If it were articulated clearly, that this lockdown will continue until a cure is found, and that timeline is realistically 1-to-4 years, and we were given a choice, I would certainly choose take my chances with a 1-in-500 chance of death. I would allow my children to be infected with a 1-in-multiple-thousands chance of death (the yearly influenza is more dangerous to them, even WITH the vaccination). My 80-year-old parents also told me they are willing to take their 1-in-10 or 1-in-5 chance of death. My 85-year-old father told me that he has been prepared for death every day since he underwent surgery for heart disease 10 years ago. He is following the law, but he would rather be out enjoying his last days, even if it means shortening them by 3-5 years, and I agree with him.
I agree with you on all points. I don't want to get infected, but if it's inevitable, I'd rather have it sooner than later. Same principle as getting my teeth filled and other unpleasant but necessary things.
My parents are both deceased, but I think they would have agreed with your parents. However, I think there are a lot of 80+ year-old people who firmly believe that society should shut down indefinitely to protect them.
I don't get why most countries have a country-specific plan. This virus is global; that's why it's called a PANdemic. It's in almost every country now. The world needs a coordinated, unified, consistent response, not piecemeal by country. All it takes is ONE person traveling from country X (with slightly looser protocols) to country Y (with strict protocols) to start another local epidemic in country Y.
The world needs to place the WHO in charge of all this and let their national governments focus on non-health issues. WHO should be entrusted with the authority to tell countries what to do.
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