Coronavirus: Thread

[jamesd at echeque.com]

On 2020-03-06 22:46, grarpamp wrote:
> today: 100k cases, 3.4k dead another 2.3k to go

The disease is increasing by a factor of ten every two weeks or so.

At the time of your post, 248 dead in Italy.  Yesterday, sixteen days 
later, six thousand, which is probably a massive undercount because the 
hospital system has collapsed and people who die at home without having 
been tested are not being counted as China virus deaths.

It will stop when it has burned through most of the population, or when 
effective detection and treatment is applied.

South Korea instituted drive by testing with no appointment necessary, 
so that getting tested was as easy as picking up fast food, and brought 
the epidemic to a screaming halt.

The way it should work is that after the drive by, you get your test 
results, accompanied, if the test is positive, you get a stern message 
to self isolate, backed by the threat of punitive involuntary isolation, 
and a packet of medicine and the instruction to only show up at hospital 
if you have difficulty breathing.

The experience of South Korea shows that that works.

Note that people sometimes die within a few days of having difficulty 
breathing.