Pharaoh
Brigadier General
- Messages
- 20,308
Sive,
I think the authors of that letter are playing word games. Maybe their organization has its own definition requiring a 5% infection rate to qualify as an epidemic. If so, I'd love to see what they'd call it if Ebola started spreading across Russia and was only infecting 4% of the population.
I suggest everyone read this:
https://www.cdc.gov/csels/dsepd/ss1978/lesson1/section11.html
"Epidemic refers to an increase, often sudden, in the number of cases of a disease above what is normally expected in that population in that area."
and
"Pandemic refers to an epidemic that has spread over several countries or continents, usually affecting a large number of people."
These definitions predate the current COVID-19 pandemic by many years.
The good news is that this isn't related to Ebola. If it was, people wouldn't be wasting time coming up with conspiracy theories. Instead, they'd be staying at home as much as possible and staying as far away from other people as possible when they go outdoors. Oh wait, maybe I'm wrong. There are some people in the current Ebola outbreak zones who are trying to claim the disease is fake and is being used as part of some sort of conspiracy.
This not the flu. This is a coronavirus. There are many coronaviruses, but this is the 3rd one that was bad enough to gain serious attention, and the first of those to go global. The previous two, SARS and MERS, were eradicated in humans, but may still be infecting animals.
The death rate from COVID-19 is literally all over the map. It's a new virus and the percent killed varies wildly. Any papers talking about the percent who die get outdated before they get reviewed and published. Some of the variability is due to hospitals being overrun in some areas and not others. Some is due to some areas having more elderly people with additional health problems than others. Some may be due to different strains or environmental conditions. Again, it's a NEW virus, so a lot of great sounding ideas that explain what it happening right now in one area will end up being proven wrong as more data comes in. What we do know is that the more heavily hit cities are running out of hospital beds and ventilators. We also know that a lot of medical workers have caught this and some, even young and heathy ones, have died from it.
The world has a chance to eradicate COVID-19, but only of governments and people take proper precautions. Or, everyone can say "It's not so bad. Let's all go back to work, to school, to church, out to eat, or to the movies. So what if we add another few hundred thousand (or few million or few tens of millions) to the word's annual death toll from disease."
I have some simple question for everyone. Do you have any elderly family members or any family members with other medical conditions? If so, do you want to reduce their chances of dying? Even if you are so horribly shallow and self-centered that you don't care how many millions of deaths this could cause, are you ready to live with the damage even a mild case may cause to your lungs? Do you guys out there know that SARS did cause testicular damage in some victims, leading to lower rates of production of certain hormones? Guess what, it looks like COVID-19 may do the same.
Staying home as much as possible and taking precautions when you go out will protect you and your family. It will also have an added benefit. Other diseases will also find it harder to spread if everyone does this.
Or, you can believe that some rich evil conspirators who are behind it don't care that their own vast stock portfolios all took a massive hit. You can believe that every country accused of deliberately releasing this was dumb enough to not realize how badly it would damage their own economy. You can believe it's only as bad as a common seasonal flu, despite the rapidly growing body counts in many countries. Darwin has some special awards waiting for you.
Will evil people and even some governments try to misuse the situation to their own advantage? Sure, some will. But that doesn't mean the problem itself isn't real and should be ignored.
I think the authors of that letter are playing word games. Maybe their organization has its own definition requiring a 5% infection rate to qualify as an epidemic. If so, I'd love to see what they'd call it if Ebola started spreading across Russia and was only infecting 4% of the population.
I suggest everyone read this:
https://www.cdc.gov/csels/dsepd/ss1978/lesson1/section11.html
"Epidemic refers to an increase, often sudden, in the number of cases of a disease above what is normally expected in that population in that area."
and
"Pandemic refers to an epidemic that has spread over several countries or continents, usually affecting a large number of people."
These definitions predate the current COVID-19 pandemic by many years.
The good news is that this isn't related to Ebola. If it was, people wouldn't be wasting time coming up with conspiracy theories. Instead, they'd be staying at home as much as possible and staying as far away from other people as possible when they go outdoors. Oh wait, maybe I'm wrong. There are some people in the current Ebola outbreak zones who are trying to claim the disease is fake and is being used as part of some sort of conspiracy.
This not the flu. This is a coronavirus. There are many coronaviruses, but this is the 3rd one that was bad enough to gain serious attention, and the first of those to go global. The previous two, SARS and MERS, were eradicated in humans, but may still be infecting animals.
The death rate from COVID-19 is literally all over the map. It's a new virus and the percent killed varies wildly. Any papers talking about the percent who die get outdated before they get reviewed and published. Some of the variability is due to hospitals being overrun in some areas and not others. Some is due to some areas having more elderly people with additional health problems than others. Some may be due to different strains or environmental conditions. Again, it's a NEW virus, so a lot of great sounding ideas that explain what it happening right now in one area will end up being proven wrong as more data comes in. What we do know is that the more heavily hit cities are running out of hospital beds and ventilators. We also know that a lot of medical workers have caught this and some, even young and heathy ones, have died from it.
The world has a chance to eradicate COVID-19, but only of governments and people take proper precautions. Or, everyone can say "It's not so bad. Let's all go back to work, to school, to church, out to eat, or to the movies. So what if we add another few hundred thousand (or few million or few tens of millions) to the word's annual death toll from disease."
I have some simple question for everyone. Do you have any elderly family members or any family members with other medical conditions? If so, do you want to reduce their chances of dying? Even if you are so horribly shallow and self-centered that you don't care how many millions of deaths this could cause, are you ready to live with the damage even a mild case may cause to your lungs? Do you guys out there know that SARS did cause testicular damage in some victims, leading to lower rates of production of certain hormones? Guess what, it looks like COVID-19 may do the same.
Staying home as much as possible and taking precautions when you go out will protect you and your family. It will also have an added benefit. Other diseases will also find it harder to spread if everyone does this.
Or, you can believe that some rich evil conspirators who are behind it don't care that their own vast stock portfolios all took a massive hit. You can believe that every country accused of deliberately releasing this was dumb enough to not realize how badly it would damage their own economy. You can believe it's only as bad as a common seasonal flu, despite the rapidly growing body counts in many countries. Darwin has some special awards waiting for you.
Will evil people and even some governments try to misuse the situation to their own advantage? Sure, some will. But that doesn't mean the problem itself isn't real and should be ignored.
