As of Monday night, the government said a total of 42,638 cases have been confirmed and 1,016 people have died in China.
Here's what confuses me about the virus. I was reading an article that said that the virus likely started as early as October and that officials sat on it far too long.
But even considering the long incubation period, and even IF we say it didn't start as early as October...it still seems oddly concentrated in China. Given the fact that people have been flying all over the world unhindered (until about mid-January when concerns started to rise outside of China)...and given the two-week incubation period...still seems like there would be more cases outside of China.
I'm not sure what this means, exactly -- I'm not a conspiracy theorist and don't want to say the Chinese government is up to no good, but....just seems odd, is all.
I’ve been lurking on this site forever, but finally made an account just for this topic.
There’s a ton of misinformation going around about the Wuhan virus right now. I’ve been obsessed with the story since it first broke into the public consciousness in late January, and have been doing my best to sort through fact and fiction. Here’s what we know so far:
- The virus originated from bats, not snakes as was initially reported. Experts think it went through at least one other animal vector before making the jump to humans (currently they’re looking at pangolins), but aren’t 100% certain on that. The virus is a very close cousin to SARS, which also came from bats.
- The Hunan Seafood Market was named as the initial source of infection, with the theory being that infected bats were kept near other animals & people to facilitate the viral mutation. This no longer seems to be the case, as some of the earliest cases identified in December had no direct link to the market. Experts are now theorizing that the virus was circulating among the community in Wuhan as early as November or even October, and the wet market was a key hub of transmission. (This makes a lot of sense, because you have to have a certain number of cases identified before you can know there’s really an outbreak happening.)
- China has absolutely been fudging the numbers since the very start of the outbreak, and that is fueling a lot of the underlaying panic & hysteria we’ve been feeling. 8 doctors were arrested in December after discussing - in private messages to their group - what they thought was a SARS outbreak & the need for immediate action. Had authorities acted to contain the outbreak then (instead of hiding the story & pretending everything was normal), the situation would likely not have become so dire so quickly. At least one of those 8 doctors has since passed because of the virus.
- Current models predict the outbreak in Hubei province will complete itself sometime in April. Outbreaks in other parts of China most likely have a lag time of 1 to 2 weeks behind the epicenter. Assuming the virus acts similar to SARS (and so far it has), warm weather should help curb the spread - but it’s not certain at this point in time. Experts think the epidemic/pandemic should burn itself out by the end of summer as long as containment measures are kept up with.
This is absolutely a scary situation and well worth a cautious mindset - but we can’t allow ourselves to panic. Right now the graver threat from the outbreak is economic disruption, so stock up in supplies while you can & wash your hands often. If anyone has any questions about the virus (or related conspiracies) I will happily do my best to answer them. This isn’t a world-ending situation, but it is definitely a world-changing one!
@saokymo Thank you for weighing in and welcome to the forum! It will help if you cite sources to your statements so people can evaluate them. If my intuition on this situation is working, I will add that I have not yet felt panicked about it. I see others, however, including medical professionals, sounding the alarm.
The captain on the Diamond Princess just announced that there are an additional 38 people who have the virus. That means 173 total have been infected. The Quarantine continues.
Good news over all for today.
There were 95 deaths reported overnight according to health officials and Chinese news sites. That’s down from 116 reported for Monday - a drop of 22%.
- New cases reported for the Chinese mainland on Tuesday is 1,696. That is down from a peak of over 3,000 new cases on 4 February and the lowest number of new infections since 1,347 were reported on 31 January.
- The Diamond Princess announced a the virus count for today is actually 39, not 38.
A lighter story from China.
A Chinese marathon runner has completed a 50km run around his living room in order to relieve the boredom of coronavirus lockdown, writes Naaman Zhou.
Pan Shancu, from the city of Hangzhou in Zhejiang province, completed 6,250 laps of track consisting of two large tables set up inside his apartment.
“I have not been outside for many days, today I cannot bear sitting down any more!” he posted last week. “One lap is about 8m – I ran 50km, did it in 4:48:44, sweated all over, feels great!”
The Lancet scientific journal has an excellent resource site with various academic articles concerning the coronavirus, which has now been named Covid-19: https://www.thelancet.com/coronavirus