The Virus

[jar]

One issue is that the symptoms seem to be rather generic, it's not as simple as if someone infected suddenly developed mauve stripes. Also, the current testing procedure gives returns in days at best.

But it will be a boon to Bezos and Matt Maloney.

[dneal]

One issue is that the symptoms seem to be rather generic, it's not as simple as if someone infected suddenly developed mauve stripes. Also, the current testing procedure gives returns in days at best.

But it will be a boon to Bezos and Matt Maloney.

As a respiratory illness, it looks like the flu or common cold. Symptoms are near identical. Here's a good link from LiveScience I just got in my inbox today.

Funny that you mention Bezos. Amazon.com now ships items stocked internationally with their Amazon Global Store. I just bought a Pelikan M200 brown marble for $80 that was shipped from the UK, and have some extra Lamy 2000 nibs coming from Germany. If corona virus breaks out in mid-Missouri... blame Bezos, not me!

[ethernautrix]

Isn't the main difference between seasonal flu and COVID-19 that one can be contagious for two weeks before symptoms show?

I'm already a hands-washer (not Howard Hughes level; Japanese-mother level [walk into the home. Japanese mother says, Wash your hands. So, an old habit. ]). Now I just have to stop touching my face (allergies, sneezing). Heh.

Here's a YouTube video, uploaded in October 2018, a documentary about the 1918 Spanish Flu: https://youtu.be/UDY5COg2P2c.

The most useful information was how two U.S. cities responded in drastically different ways (until the second or third wave -- after the first, San Francisco let its guard down).

I don't have any advice that others haven't already mentioned. Staying calm and taking precautions -- yeah? Makes sense.

I don't think they know at this point. You're contagious with influenza for about a day before symptoms appear, and 5-7 days after.

Other corona viruses (this is just one particular strain) like SARS have contagious periods of about 2 weeks after symptoms appear, and a day or two (at most) before. I think you may be confusing how long a person is contagious before symptoms, with the incubation period (time from exposure until symptoms appear).

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019.../symptoms.html
Ah. I see now. "Symptoms may appear 2-14 days after exposure*: ... *This is based on what has been seen previously as the incubation period of MERS-CoV viruses."



https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019...nsmission.html
"Current understanding about how the virus that causes coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) spreads is largely based on what is known about similar coronaviruses. COVID-19 is a new disease and there is more to learn about how it spreads, the severity of illness it causes, and to what extent it may spread in the United States."

Since this is a new strain, I'd rather be cautious. Cautious, not idiotic (is it true that some people are afraid of Corona beer? And Chinese food? Please let that be just media hype.). I mean, I don't want any flu. And take my seasonal allergies, please. (Nice warm, spring day in Wrocław yesterday with signs of crocus bulbs emerging. )

[TFarnon]

Shrug. I'll just have to keep going and doing unless I'm so ill I can't go and do, or until I'm likely to be contagious. I work in a hospital. We were understaffed even before the winter flu season began. We are still understaffed. It's just how it is. If it gets bad, it means more overtime, and more overtime pay. I wash my hands a lot. I cough and sneeze into my elbow. I wash my hands some more. The closest case is now 100-150 miles away. I'm not beyond caring, but I am beyond worrying, because worrying wouldn't accomplish anything for me.

[manoeuver]

Cheers to those of you who are changing behaviors to slow the spread of a disease we don't know enough about. You're buying time for susceptible people and likely saving lives.

Cheers to those of you who are laying in supplies in case of the unthinkable. You're positioning yourselves to be able to be helpers, lessening the load on public servants, likely saving lives.

Dealing with uncertainty that includes risk of ruin, it's not possible to know what overreacting looks like.

Calmly taking precautions (I really like sgphoto's suggestions) harms no one.

Looking at what's happened in China and the unprecedented response there, it's reckless to assume we're dealing with just another flu.

[Chrissy]

One change we've made is that despite the fact that it's my OH's birthday in a few days, we've decided to stay in and eat our own special lunch at home rather than go out to a restaurant for lunch. Nothing much, but probably worth doing.

My OH just told me a news story about a guy on a crowded underground train who was coughing over other passengers close to him and a nurse stepped up to him and asked if he wouldn't mind covering his mouth with his hand or a tissue when he was coughing. He replied that he didn't have any bugs, and the nurse interjected that he certainly did have some bugs. Then he replied he didn't care about what bugs he transmitted and if other passengers wanted to be bug free then they should travel in a chauffeur driven limo and leave the underground to people like him. This type of mentality is why there will be a pandemic.

[Fermata]

A lot of people are saying 'its just flu' no big deal.

When you have Trump, Johnson and the head of EU making carefully prepapred statements, at Press Conferences I can only think that there is cause for concern,

I really dont want to die as a result of flu type virus and will take all sensible measures to ensure that I have a few more years in me and if that means frequent hand washing, avoiding very crowded places and public transport then thts fine with me.

Reports in the local press of one set of schoolchildren who have been sent home from their closed schools going around supermarkets, without their parents and opening packets of food, taking a bite or a mouthful of chips and then putting the packet back, opening cartons of milk taking a drink and putting the milk back on the shelf and such like. Not actually stealing food in the sense of taking it out of the door and they are all under 10 years old.

Going food shopping tomorrow, not only will I be leaving my gloves on as I go round I will also be checking that the items have not already been opened.

The idea that this situation could be permanent is depressing

[Chrissy]

A lot of people are saying 'its just flu' no big deal.

When you have Trump, Johnson and the head of EU making carefully prepapred statements, at Press Conferences I can only think that there is cause for concern,

I really dont want to die as a result of flu type virus and will take all sensible measures to ensure that I have a few more years in me and if that means frequent hand washing, avoiding very crowded places and public transport then thts fine with me.

Reports in the local press of one set of schoolchildren who have been sent home from their closed schools going around supermarkets, without their parents and opening packets of food, taking a bite or a mouthful of chips and then putting the packet back, opening cartons of milk taking a drink and putting the milk back on the shelf and such like. Not actually stealing food in the sense of taking it out of the door and they are all under 10 years old.

Going food shopping tomorrow, not only will I be leaving my gloves on as I go round I will also be checking that the items have not already been opened.

The idea that this situation could be permanent is depressing

What we do when arriving home from food shopping is to wash our hands as soon as we arrive home, before we unpack the shopping, then wash them again after we've unpacked the shopping. Being careful to not touch our eyes, or nose, or mouth while out shopping, as well as when we return home. It's about as good as we can get.

I remember when swine flu appeared and I caught it over the end of Christmas and the beginning of New Year. I have never been so ill. I thought I was going to die and after 15 days in bed almost couldn't even manage to care whether I survived or not. It was so bad I can still remember it. I'm going to try everything I can do in order to not catch this virus at my age.

[sgphoto]

One change we've made is that despite the fact that it's my OH's birthday in a few days, we've decided to stay in and eat our own special lunch at home rather than go out to a restaurant for lunch. Nothing much, but probably worth doing.

My OH just told me a news story about a guy on a crowded underground train who was coughing over other passengers close to him and a nurse stepped up to him and asked if he wouldn't mind covering his mouth with his hand or a tissue when he was coughing. He replied that he didn't have any bugs, and the nurse interjected that he certainly did have some bugs. Then he replied he didn't care about what bugs he transmitted and if other passengers wanted to be bug free then they should travel in a chauffeur driven limo and leave the underground to people like him. This type of mentality is why there will be a pandemic.

You've brought up valuable points.

1. Some people will be happy to spread any contagion and feast on the misery of others. That's always been with us.

2. I would avoid any ready-to-eat foods such as food trucks, restaurants, fast food, cart vendors, etc. The only food I would consider if forced to eat out would be deep fried foods like fish or chicken and that's only if it's fried at my order - nothing sitting around. But I won't be eating out. I rarely do as I've seen too many kitchens and people in those kitchens. Fortunately, I'm a good cook so that's not a real problem for me.

But it would be wise to avoid eating out for a while.

This virus will pass - there's nothing so far to indicate it won't. But before it does it has great potential to cause serious sickness and death. This is the time to err on the side of great caution.

Avoid crowds and fools.

Cheers.
Sg

[Fermata]

Avoid crowds and fools.

Cheers.
Sg

No FPN then.

[calamus]

Until it is closed or deleted (which it won't be) we can just make certain that no one is under any illusion as to the depth of inquiry here...

Probably the biggest push behind the coronavirus fear-mongering in the U.S. media has been the Looney Left's dishonest attempts to somehow blame it all on Trump. Typical of them -- they never let a good crisis go to waste. They've been telling a lot of outright lies about the President in this connection. They always do, but in this case it's been particularly egregious, and especially easy to debunk. Here's a link to an article about the AP calling out both Biden and Bloomberg for lying about Trump's response to the coronavirus: https://www.redstate.com/elizabeth-v...to-coronavirus. Here's a bit of relevant text from the article: "An Associated Press fact check shows Biden and Bloomberg both lied about President Trump’s response to the coronavirus. This is no surprise. Democrats began their campaign against the Trump Administration’s handling of this growing threat on Sunday after the Russia 2.0 hoax collapsed."

[Jon Szanto]

Hey, Calamus: as if.

[calamus]

You're welcome, Comrade.

[calamus]

I realize that the majority of people on this forum are liberal or left of liberal. I attribute this to the fountain pen-wielding community's level of education (most fountain pen users are well-educated), and the fact that university faculties tend largely to be notoriously infested by Marxist professors and their "fellow travelers," and that students are impressionable and vulnerable to propaganda presented as fact by their teachers. It's gotten so bad that people are literally forbidden to discuss conservative views on most college campuses. It's called "hate speech," even when it's presented calmly, logically and without any insults or other hostile or demeaning language. You will be shouted down, and very possibly expelled from school. That's the reality.

Anyway, since I am clearly neither liberal nor left of liberal, I realize that some people here will dismiss anything I say as coming from a deplorable, knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing imbecile. Nevertheless, I do have some information which people may or may not care to learn about.

First of all, you need to understand that the medical establishment is dominated by the pharmaceutical industry. That industry is instrumental is choosing the gatekeepers that control the flow of "approved" medical information (editors and publishers of "peer reviewed journals, for example). Information which even suggests the possibly that a nonpharmaceutical approach to preventing a particular disease exists and might even be better than pharmaceutical drugs for that purpose will be suppressed.

You're not going to hear much about it, but there has been research that suggests that a deficiency of vitamin D, such as occurs from less sunlight exposure during winter months, may lead to a significant increase in vulnerability to certain diseases including influenza and even possibly Ebola. I once read an account of something that happened in a hospital in Spain in 1918, during the Spanish Flu outbreak. In that hospital, patients in its geriatric ward were receiving large doses of vitamin D daily as part of an experimental trial to see if it affected longevity. When the flu hit, it wiped out many younger patients and even staff, but none of the geriatric patients who'd been receiving vitamin D caught it. Here is a link to a Web page discussing vitamin D and influenza: https://vitamindwiki.com/tiki-index....20D%20-%202009 . I've been taking 500 IU of vitamin D daily for about 20 years, have received no flu vaccines during that period of time, and only once experienced flu-like symptoms, which were very light and lasted only 24 hours. For what it's worth, I'm turning 74 later this year.

Something else that you may not have known: elderberry has very effective anti-viral properties. If you have an illness caused by a virus, such as COVID19, the disease under discussion, which is caused by the virus SARS-CoV-2, taking elderberry extract will lessen the severity of the infection, and its duration. I'm not referring to the homeopathic version, which has not been studied in extensive clinical trials, unlike the straightforward extract. It makes a noticeable difference. You can also take it for prophylaxis, because it works by building up your immune response.

[Jon Szanto]

Since we don’t have an active admin/moderator on FPG, most have agreed to keep political (and religious and non-pen contentious subjects) in the dedicated sub-forum known as Politics, Religion and Society (I believe that’s the correct name). If my graphic above is over the line I’ll take it down, but I won’t reply any more and be trolled into a political discussion. If anyone wants that, they can start a new thread in the appropriate place.

Sorry if I took things off-course. I’m out.

[calamus]

I thought that the discussion of controversial subjects was permitted anywhere in the Lounge. My apologies to everyone if I was mistaken.

[Jon Szanto]

I thought that the discussion of controversial subjects was permitted anywhere in the Lounge. My apologies to everyone if I was mistaken.

Take a look at this sub-forum. It isn’t just that the content is best put there, but it is also the only forum (that I’m aware of) that does not show up in the What’s New filter, thus avoiding the possibility of annoying people or dragging them in. No one will enforce this, it was simply a general agreement among members a good few years ago.

[jar]

But the post was worthy of a chuckle or three. Humor is always good.

[Jon Szanto]

But the post was worthy of a chuckle or three. Humor is always good.

Man, that is what I thought, and look what happened. Some days you just can't win.

[Jon Szanto]

My OH asked me what I thought about all the concerns about Covid.

I told her that the delivery times were poor but they had a huge ink capacity.