World must act fast to contain coronavirus: WHO's Tedros

[rabas]

55 minutes ago, NCC1701A said:

Pierce plays me recreating my heroic actions saving dozens of bar girls here in Hua Hin by setting a quarantine facility at my house for them to live in.

   

.... as Western disease experts and Thai Seals in hazmat suits with air tanks make a brazen rescue to save them from the depths of you cavernous home?

[URMySunshine]

As an ageing farang smoker (wildly speculating here) you succumb to the virus early on and the rescued girls phone the meat wagon to take your body away. Meanwhile they find your hidden safe and with the aid of their Thai boyfriends liberate the cash , gold and performance enhancing drugs and most tellingly a laptop containing cttv of your various conquests over the years.

 

A lone young and hansum farang 'digital pikey' bf of one of the girls spies the porn and uploads the tranche to a profit sharing Pornhub site. Ongoing profits start to pour in with the ladyboy 'stuff' being particularly valuable. At the wat the loot is used to fund a large party gambling and drinking to scare the pii away before the funeral. TVF owner who comes to the funeral gets an offer he can't refuse and the forum is sold to the young un. A new TVF TERROR begins. 

 

A Nation (geddit) mourns and the 'last girls standing' celebrate their ill gotten gains. You never got to be that mod after all. 

 

//CLOSED// 

 

Rolls credits.....

Edited February 22, 2020 by URMySunshine

[Lodestone]

5 hours ago, WaveHunter said:

Dr. Ghebreyesus is doing a horrible job of running the World Health Organization IMO. 

 

 

 

Here's another one:

 

 

[URMySunshine]

10 minutes ago, Lodestone said:

 

Here's another one:

 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/feb/22/coronavirus-russia-disinformation-campaign-us-officials

[geriatrickid]

Yes, the  WHO has  responded poorly.  Sadly, it is a repeat of the Ebola response.

China has been an important  source of  money for Ethiopio and I do not believe that this was lost on the  director who comes from the Ethiopian ruling elite group. It is why the core group of scientifically advanced countries has worked in parallel to WHO. (i.e. EU, USA, Canada, Japan, Australia). WHO is  necessary as it facilitates access to hotspots where the core countries are not welcome.

 

15 hours ago, Dumbastheycome said:

Without any desire to go into the realms of conspiracy theories it strikes me as remarkably strange that now random infections are occurring as in "There are different patterns of transmission in different places, Briand said, adding: "We have lots of diversity, different outbreaks showing different phases." ".

Not random. People have been exposed and infected. Due to to delay in manifesting illness, others have been infected.

 

15 hours ago, smedly said:

How did it get to Iran ?

Do Iranians holiday in China ?

As previously mentioned, Iran has commercial contacts with China. It sells oil and purchases military supplies.  Thousand of Iranians  holiday in Thailand. It is probable that some Iranians were exposed while in  their preferred destination of Pattaya.  IMO, this was expected and should not come as a surprise.  At some point, people will connect the dots and see that the large number of  carriers entered Thailand undetected and shared their infection with others.

[Sunderland]

17 hours ago, smedly said:

How did it get to Iran ?

 

Do Iranians holiday in China ?

"Tehran–Qom–Isfahan High Speed Rail is the first truly high-speed rail project in Iran, currently under construction.

Civil works are undertaken by Chinese consortium led by China Railway Engineering Corporation."

 

[Sunderland]

Italy had 3 cases of COVID-19 by Thursday, and none reported in about 2 weeks. Tonight they have 62 confirmed cases, mostly in the Lombardy and Veneto regions of northern Italy, and at least one of these cases is in the Turin area (Piedmont) and one in the city of Milan. 

 

Look at Italy. Look at South Korea. Look at Iran (harder to trust the figures I know). 

If you haven't started preparing here yet, you are in for a shock.

Edited February 22, 2020 by Sunderland

[URMySunshine]

3 hours ago, Sunderland said:

Italy had 3 cases of COVID-19 by Thursday, and none reported in about 2 weeks. Tonight they have 62 confirmed cases, mostly in the Lombardy and Veneto regions of northern Italy, and at least one of these cases is in the Turin area (Piedmont) and one in the city of Milan. 

 

Look at Italy. Look at South Korea. Look at Iran (harder to trust the figures I know). 

If you haven't started preparing here yet, you are in for a shock.

On a practical level Keep Calm and Carry On - the CDC produced an informative leaflet for flu pandemics a couple of years ago.

 

https://www.cdc.gov/nonpharmaceutical-interventions/pdf/gr-pan-flu-ind-house.pdf

[WaveHunter]

5 hours ago, URMySunshine said:

On a practical level Keep Calm and Carry On - the CDC produced an informative leaflet for flu pandemics a couple of years ago.

 

https://www.cdc.gov/nonpharmaceutical-interventions/pdf/gr-pan-flu-ind-house.pdf

I've got my fair share of criticism of the CDC too on how they are informing the public on how this outbreak may affect the US, and also on their current criteria for quarantining / release of confirmed cases. 

 

That's not to say I don't have a great deal of respect for the CDC, which is perhaps the best public health organization in the world when it comes to having expert scientists to deal with such outbreaks. 

 

But the way they are informing the public leaves a lot to be desired, and their stated criteria for releasing those currently in quarantine seems to be very flawed, and thus presents a very real danger for the spread of the virus within the United States.

 

Take, for instance Nancy Messonnier, the Director of CDC's National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases recent CDC Telebriefing - Update on COVID-19 released on 21 February.

 

 

IMO, she is not being very transparent, in fact she is being very cagy in her discussion.  The briefing discusses how the CDC is changing how they are tracking cases and now using two criteria; one tracks people repatriated by the State Department, and the other tracks all other cases in the US. So, repatriated cases include those on the State Department Wuhan evacuation flight (3) and those from the Diamond Princess (18)

 

She goes on to say that nearly all of the remaining people form the Wuhan repatriation flight have completed their quarantine and are returning to home, work, and school.  According to her, she stresses that these people are not at risk of spreading the virus, and specifically they are not infected.  IMO, THAT is a very declarative statement and perhaps not actually true.

 

Why do I say this?  Because there are many reports coming out of China and from other countries with COVID-19 cases right now that have significantly longer incubation periods beyond 14 days.  See Washington Post news article.  

 

Also consider this news story about a person who tested positive for the coronavirus was accidentally released from US military hospital isolation

   

As I said, I mean no disrespect to the CDC overall, but the lack of transparency in this recent news briefing, and (IMO) the very dangerous quarenteening criteria in place right now pose a significant risk to greater spread of the virus in the US.

 

There is also a federal restraining order that was just granted on behalf of the city of Costa Mesa CA to temporarily block the transfer of up to 50 people who were in federal quarantine because of exposure to the new coronavirus to a complex the city said was not suitable to house patients in the city of Costa Mesa California.  See news article

Edited February 23, 2020 by WaveHunter

[WaveHunter]

CURRENT INTERNATIONAL NUMBERS (as of 22 February)

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries

 

Comparing this to previous numbers outside of China, there is a significant outbreak in new cases occurring in South Korea, Japan, Italy, and Iran, compared to previous numbers.

 

The numbers for the United States, and also for Thailand are very puzzling.  Something is just not right about the numbers here.  The numbers for both places just seem stuck and that just doesn't make sense, at least to me.  It could very well be true, but still you have to wonder about the data on new cases, and changes in case status seem so static in both places.

 

The places such as South Korea and Italy are testing very aggressively, compared to other countries, so that may account for the high reported increase in new cases, compared to those number in other places like the United States and Thailand which are not testing nearly so aggressively, particularly in the case of South Korea.

 

Also, it should be considered that the numbers coming out of places like South Korea, and especially Singapore are very reliable numbers due to officials being incredibly transparent and forthcoming, compared to what's coming out of China.

 

Consider South Korea:

New cases appear to be doubling every day.  This could be due to more aggressive testing (much more so than in the US) so maybe they are just detecting it faster and maybe its' been there for a while. 

 

What this actually means is still not clear (i.e.: whether new infections are actually doubling every day, or this is just a reflection of more tests being conducted).  Hopefully it just is indicative of better detection by public health officials in South Korea.

 

Consider Italy:

Italy has, by far, the highest number of "serious/critical cases right now outside of China and the Diamond Princess cruise ship; at 18 cases, that is twice as many as in South Korea.

 

Consider Iran:

 

 

Consider this concerning the Canada, Lebanon news story... What are the chances that these two people ran into one of the 29 confirmed cases currently being reported?  The probability is ZERO or very close to it, so based on this, it's safe to assume that Iran is a genuine hot spot right now.

 

The real concern about this is that Iran is one of those regions in the world that experts most fear for an outbreak to occur due to the extremely high population density of the region where all of these cases have occured, and due to the extremely poor public health infrastructure of that country to deal with such a potential epidemic like this could become. 

 

So, how serious does the global public think these developments are?  Not very serious, if you judge that by the front pages of mainstream newspapers in the United States on Friday apparently.  ALL of the above-fold headlines are about politics with nothing mentioned about COVID-19 at all:

 

So, I guess a lot of people aren't too concerned, or at least that's what mass media is trying to say.  Personally, in light of the facts and data, I feel otherwise.

 

Edited February 23, 2020 by WaveHunter

[WaveHunter]

10 hours ago, Sunderland said:

Italy had 3 cases of COVID-19 by Thursday, and none reported in about 2 weeks. Tonight they have 62 confirmed cases, mostly in the Lombardy and Veneto regions of northern Italy, and at least one of these cases is in the Turin area (Piedmont) and one in the city of Milan. 

 

Look at Italy. Look at South Korea. Look at Iran (harder to trust the figures I know). 

If you haven't started preparing here yet, you are in for a shock.

IMO what's really concerning about Italy is the number of critically serious cases they have.  The latest number is 18, and that is twice as high as South Korea which has the highest total of confirmed cases (outside of China and the Diamond Princess cruise ship).

 

While 18 is not a high number compared to China which is 11,477 by last count, it is a much higher Serious Complication Rate (SCR) at 22%, compared to China's overall SCR which is around 15%.

 

What this means is that 22% of confirmed cases are going on to requiring ICU care in Italy, whereas 15% of confirmed cases are requiring ICU care in China.

 

ICU cases are what really tax the public health system because the duration of time for ICU care in the case of COVID-19 is a week or more, and it requires a lot of man-hours from doctors and nurses.

 

If things get out of control with confirmed cases therefore, the health care system can very quickly be overwhelmed.

Edited February 23, 2020 by WaveHunter

[tifino]

3 minutes ago, WaveHunter said:

IMO what's really concerning about Italy is the number of critically serious cases they have.  The latest number is 18, and that is twice as high as South Korea which has the highest total of confirmed cases (outside of China and the Diamond Princess cruise ship)

wait for them to complete a prior travel/prior Chinese contact history for each of them

 

a Link will surely be made

 

 - just like the innocent man who was labelled the spreader of the virus from Singapore to thre UK. They have the means to track Histories, and will do again...

 

[DrTuner]

8 minutes ago, WaveHunter said:

IMO what's really concerning about Italy is the number of critically serious cases they have.  The latest number is 18, and that is twice as high as South Korea which has the highest total of confirmed cases (outside of China and the Diamond Princess cruise ship)

They probably only woke up to testing people after some started getting critical. Thailand will only start to react when the body piles are so high it's impossible to hide them.

[WaveHunter]

4 minutes ago, tifino said:

wait for them to complete a prior travel/prior Chinese contact history for each of them

 

a Link will surely be made

 

 - just like the innocent man who was labelled the spreader of the virus from Singapore to thre UK. They have the means to track Histories, and will do again...

 

I'm not sure what you are saying has to do with the serious complication rate being so much higher in Italy than in China?

[WaveHunter]

7 minutes ago, DrTuner said:

They probably only woke up to testing people after some started getting critical. Thailand will only start to react when the body piles are so high it's impossible to hide them.

Right now in the United States there is a lot of criticism about testing criteria and a big push by many for the government to quickly adopt a more community-based testing approach such as what seems to be happening in SIngapore and South Korea.

 

When you think about it, that is a much more proactive approach, and I hope the US adopts it as well as any country where there is a strong likelihood of contamination...like Thailand, for sure!

 

Edited February 23, 2020 by WaveHunter

[tifino]

5 minutes ago, WaveHunter said:

11 minutes ago, tifino said:

wait for them to complete a prior travel/prior Chinese contact history for each of them

 

a Link will surely be made

 

 - just like the innocent man who was labelled the spreader of the virus from Singapore to thre UK. They have the means to track Histories, and will do again...

 

I'm not sure what you are saying has to do with the serious complication rate being so much higher in Italy than in China?

you believe the numbers?

Openness needs to be practiced by all parties

[thaibeachlovers]

Isn't he the guy that a few weeks ago said there was no need to do anything as it was not much?

[WaveHunter]

1 minute ago, tifino said:

you believe the numbers?

Openness needs to be practiced by all parties

Still not sure what you are saying.  Can you expand your thoughts a little?  What numbers???

[WaveHunter]

1 minute ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Isn't he the guy that a few weeks ago said there was no need to do anything as it was not much?

Hard to follow who you are talking about or what you are even attempting to say.

[tifino]

4 minutes ago, WaveHunter said:

Still not sure what you are saying.  Can you expand your thoughts a little?  What numbers???

there was that 22% Serious Complications number they plucked from somewhere; but compare that to the Numbers Chart earlier on in this Topic  

 

where are the correlations?  The numbers of Serious Cases are there as a Column in the Chart, and in China, they are huge

Are they comparing the numbers of Pneumonia outcomes versus sniffles and making some sort of fluffy report, that ends up takes attention away from China?

[WaveHunter]

4 minutes ago, tifino said:

there was that 22% Serious Complications number they plucked from somewhere; but compare that to the Numbers Chart earlier on in this Topic  

 

where are the correlations?  The numbers of Serious Cases are there as a Column in the Chart, and in China, they are huge

Are they comparing the numbers of Pneumonia outcomes versus sniffles and making some sort of fluffy report, that ends up takes attention away from China?

Serious Complication Rate (SCR) is a public health statistic derived by dividing the number of critically serious cases requiring ICU care (i.e.: Pneumonia or ARDS) by the total number of confirmed cases.  If you do the math from the numbers shown in the chart, you will see they are correct; 22% for Italy vs 15% for China.

Edited February 23, 2020 by WaveHunter

[tifino]

1 minute ago, WaveHunter said:

Serious Complication Rate (SCR) is a public health statistic derived by dividing the number of serous cases requiring ICU care (i.e.: Pneumonia or ARDS) by the total number of confirmed cases.  If you do the m on the honesty of the Chinese...he numbers are relyingath from the numbers shown in the chart, you will see they are correct; 22% for Italy vs 15% for China.

okay, so we are on the same page 

 

 

still the Numbers are still relying upon the honesty? of the Chinese 

 

meanwhile, Italy is trying to look after their people, by no cover up.

[WaveHunter]

8 minutes ago, tifino said:

okay, so we are on the same page 

 

 

still the Numbers are still relying upon the honesty? of the Chinese 

 

meanwhile, Italy is trying to look after their people, by no cover up.

Well you make a very good point and I totally agree.  That's why I think it's so important to start placing more emphasis on numbers coming from non-China sources.  South Korea, Italy, and most notably Singapore are being very transparent and forthwith in sharing reliable data.

 

I didn't mean to say that the situation was much worse in Italy than anywhere else with respect to SCR; I meant that the SCR for Italy is probably a good benchmark for everywhere else.

 

In fact, most epidemiological computer modeling studies are using 20% as an SCR, so many experts seem to think that is what it really is in China, not the 15% you get from the chart I posted.

Edited February 23, 2020 by WaveHunter

[URMySunshine]

38 minutes ago, WaveHunter said:

Well you make a very good point and I totally agree.  That's why I think it's so important to start placing more emphasis on numbers coming from non-China sources.  South Korea, Italy, and most notably Singapore are being very transparent and forthwith in sharing reliable data.

 

I didn't mean to say that the situation was much worse in Italy than anywhere else with respect to SCR; I meant that the SCR for Italy is probably a good benchmark for everywhere else.

 

In fact, most epidemiological computer modeling studies are using 20% as an SCR, so many experts seem to think that is what it really is in China, not the 15% you get from the chart I posted.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

 

 I think it is likely we will see a global pandemic. If a pandemic happens, 40% to 70% of people world-wide are likely to be infected in the coming year. What proportion is asymptomatic, I can't give a good number

Prof. Marc Lipsitch

Prof. of Epidemiology, Harvard School of Public Health
Head, Harvard Ctr. Communicable Disease Dynamics
Feb. 14, 2020

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-expert-opinions/#lipsitch-021720

Edited February 23, 2020 by URMySunshine

[FarFlungFalang]

1 hour ago, WaveHunter said:

Hard to follow who you are talking about or what you are even attempting to say.

A few weeks ago Tedros said it was wrong to impose travel and trade restrictions on China and now he has changed his tune by about 180 degrees in a round about way.He seems more focused on financial implications and upsetting China rather than health orientated ones.

[URMySunshine]

1 hour ago, DrTuner said:

They probably only woke up to testing people after some started getting critical. Thailand will only start to react when the body piles are so high it's impossible to hide them.

That said they don't appear to be. Given the fact that massive numbers of  Chinese tourists that have visited , of which many were from Wuhan were not currently seeing a massive effect. It's a nasty virus to be sure and there's no denying that, but maybe , just maybe the hot tropical climate is taking the sting out of Thailand infections and couple that with underreporting / laissez fair attitudes and a reluctance to go down the hysteria route what is being reported  and we are anecdotally not seeing ,is in fact the truth.

 

If that hypothesis holds up It is a cause for concern for certain groups but not the apocalypse some are fearing (including myself) or at least not here. Of course if it isn't then we will see pdq. 

[WaveHunter]

39 minutes ago, FarFlungFalang said:

A few weeks ago Tedros said it was wrong to impose travel and trade restrictions on China and now he has changed his tune by about 180 degrees in a round about way.He seems more focused on financial implications and upsetting China rather than health orientated ones.

Yes, I agree with you 100%.  I would get censored here on the forum if I really expressed my feeling about him personally and his leadership of the WHO; let's just say I think he is a despicable character with a very real agenda that has very little to do with public health and much more to do with the economic well-being of China.  In my consded opinion, he and teh WHO is doing much more harm than good in the present situation...but that's just my opinion.

 

Others should explore the facts on their own and decide for themselves.  Google is a wonderful tool for those who want to explore the truth for themselves and not just buy into mass-media rhetoric and political propaganda ????

 

If you want some real insight into this "bad actor" and how he is acting on China's behalf, hear what Gordon Chang, a noted expert on China has to say in the linked interview below.  Note that Gordon Chang is far from being a "tin foil hat" conspiracy theorist.  rather he is well respected by international affairs experts in government and industry, and what he has to say, he backs up with very sound facts and reasoning.

 

For his assessment of Dr. Ghebreyesus and the World health Organization in general, go to 12 minutes 24 seconds (12:24) in this video clip:  

 

I want to add though; the entire interview is well worth listening to.  IMHO, Chang provides real objective insight into this whole mess and how it got started, and the real workings of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in general.

 

https://youtu.be/IBXJULe-9a0

 

 

Edited February 23, 2020 by WaveHunter

[WaveHunter]

Another really objective report that seriously questions how the World Health Organization is handling the outbreak just appeared on Al Jazeera, and absolutely worth watching:

https://youtu.be/Fha0m7Wo3F0

 

[FarFlungFalang]

37 minutes ago, WaveHunter said:

 

I want to add though; the entire interview is well worth listening to.  IMHO, Chang provides real objective insight into this whole mess and how it got started, and the real workings of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in general.

I enjoyed the Gordon Chang video.I also equate trying to stop this virus spreading is like running around with a bucket in a thunder storm trying to catch all the rain drops before they hit the ground with both feet tied together.

[WaveHunter]

BTW, just an interesting tidbit of information.  The word quarantine comes from a seventeenth-century Venetian variant of the Italian quaranta giorni, meaning forty days, the period that all ships were required to be isolated before passengers and crew could go ashore during the Black Death plague epidemic. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quarantine

 

Currently, with COVID-19 the quarantine period is 14 days but there is increasing consensus that this is not long enough.  At least 2 studies of coronavirus patients suggest the disease's incubation period could be longer, according to a BusinessInsider report

 

Of course, these studies are not conclusive proof but this is a brand new infectious agent so many things are really not conclusive, but are still very important to consider until more is really known.

Edited February 23, 2020 by WaveHunter