I'm thinking that this whole thing is being blown out of proportion. I mean, I'm about to drink some vitamin C right now, and I live in New York City surrounded by all sorts of foreigners who all have their own unique biological systems, but I think this is being a little exxagerated, no?
I plan to travel to Asia again next year, so hopefully this will all be figured out by then.
there’s a great chance it should be stabilised by then.
thing is, it is an aerosol transmissible disease making it extremely easy to spread. I could have it, and live in the same building as you and under the right conditions it’s opportunistic enough for you to catch without ever coming into contact with any of my infectious droplets.. just becuz the virus exists in the air.
if it’s on the lower end of the most recent estimated case mortality projections of 0.25-4.0% , that wouldn’t be to crazy .. let’s say .5% (that’s still 5 times higher than influenzas roughly 0.095% rate) that wouldnt be catastrophic. Still 1 in 200 would die, primarily but not exclusively the elderly and those with comorbidity (hypertension, COPD etc.)
the issue that it causes is when in a situation like Hubei, where the cases outpace what a medical system can handle. If you have 10s of thousands of cases and 10-15% develop some degree of viral pneumonia from the initial infection and then subsequent secondary bacterial pneumonia.. it makes it extremely difficult to provide oxygen for and treat that many serious and critically ill patients.
not to mention, medical staff have to be on point because of the possibility of aerosol transmission. Over 1,700 medical workers in China have been infected, at least 6 have died, including the Director of the hospital in Wuhan.
If effective quarantines are used and diligent tracking of contacts from suspected and confirmed cases is implemented, we should be able to mitigate the pandemic but at this point, it’s pretty undeniable that it will be a pandemic and will effect a lot of people, both medically and the economically.
Keep taking vitamin C, D.. keep healthy overall, practice meticulous hygiene (hand-washing, minimise touching of the face) and stay hopeful that it doesn’t explode in a community near you. We will all be str8