Wuhan Coronavirus: Megathread - Got too big

[Tempesta]

2 more people got infected in Indonesia

I though Indonesia was invulnerable to Corona

 

[EmuWarsVeteran]

Its successful because it works on everything, if it heats it to kill it or rinses it away to be murdered by chemicals in a water treatment plant then you're unlikely to infect people or be infected yourself. Campaigns like this are hilariously effective in the UK and have been since WW2. Simple, easy messages like the "Wash your hands to Happy Birthday twice" or "To the (UK) national anthem." will work because it's not that much more than most people wash their hands anyway.

Oh, meanwhile the newspapers are starting to act out as around half of the 115 infected have been sent home with self isolation notices from their respective NHS Trusts, and some panicky twat of a Doctor in a London Hospital is saying how badly prepared the UK is. Being as that's over in the bug-people run Failing New York Times it makes me wonder which Labour Party advisor he secretly is and is never introduced as such on the BBC.

However, in the past 24 hours UK cases have gone from 115.... to 116.

Wait. So the BBC. The PUBLICLY FUNDED, GUVERNMENTALLY CONTROLLED tv station... instead of explaining the situation rationally and contextually. Just went full "YEHR ALL GUNNA DAAAYYY! PROTECT THE TEAAAA!"? ... corona cane for my guts, international politics keeps coming for my sides. Ouch.

 

[Borax Bozo]

You’re right, but in the end, Corona-Chan is the great equalizer. Nobody is completely safe from Corona-Chan.

As much as we wish it, we can't just roll tanks through Corona-chou whilst Coronabaasan blows her brains out in a bunker somewhere.

 

[ducktales4gameboy]

Da fuq? I've been having some mild difficulty breathing along with chest tightness and a dry cough the last couple of days. Did you guys have weird itchy bumps on your hands prior to this? I thought I was having an alergic reaction or something.

This sounds like the weird cold that’s been circulating Northern California since last year, especially with the eczema. If the other symptom is a persistent mild running nose to the point where it seems like a saturday morning cartoon satire of what a cold is supposed to be like, it may be that. It takes a week or so to clear up but never really seems to get worse than the initial symptoms.

The fact that almost everyone I know has had the stupid thing given its incredibly visible primary symptom really makes me worried for how fast corona is going to spread once it gets going. I’m not even in an urban area and that shit still managed to catch everyone.

 

[Super-Chevy454]

South Africa got its first case of Coronavirus. How long before Corona-chan meet Ebola-chan? https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/05/africa/south-africa-first-coronavirus-case/index.html ( http://archive.ph/mZfRf )

Johannesburg (CNN)The first case of the novel coronavirus in South Africa has been diagnosed, the country's health minister announced Thursday.

The patient, a 38-year-old man, is part of a group of 10 people, including the man's wife, that returned March 1 to South Africa from Italy, Dr. Zweli Mkhize said in a statement.
The patient went to a general practitioner on March 3 with fever, headache, malaise, sore throat and cough, Mkhize said. A nurse took a swab, and it was delivered to a lab.
The patient has self-isolated since March 3, Mkhize said. The couple have two children.

The doctor who treated the patient is also self-isolating, and health authorities have sent a tracer team with epidemiologists to KwaZulu-Natal province for contact tracing. he said.
Africa has recorded fewer cases of coronavirus than on other continents. Those affected mostly have traveled recently to Europe.

South Africans will head back from Japan and Wuhan
Two South Africans who were aboard the coronavirus-hit Diamond Princess cruise ship in Japan have tested negative for the coronavirus and will soon return to their country, the government said in a separate statement.
South African officials also have secured an aircraft to evacuate South African citizens in Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak that has killed more than 3,000 people, mostly in mainland China.

 

[EmuWarsVeteran]

HOLY SHIT TOP KEK NEWS BOYEOS! The Besapies just got canned! So. Context. One specific christ statue is El Cristo de Medinaceli. The first friday of march this statue is the center of a rite called El Besapies. Which as the name implies, involves the believers kissing the feet of the statue. More concretely, they make a waiting line, and one by one kiss the foot of the statue, as a cleric cleans it with a silk cloth inbetween kisses. Take into account the people going to this rite are the really fucking creepily obsessed believers, which as you might imagine, are nearly universaly 70+ in age. As you can imagine every year we get a spike of retired deaths after this shit. So... yeah I forgot to warn you about that kekistany joy, but I was planning to laugh my ass off at the fallout.

Well as it turns out ISCIII got in contact with both low lever clerics and the bishopry at the start of this mess to convince them to "use alternstive rutes", 'cause as I explained before trying to tell the catholics to behave in spain is like trying to tell the muslims to stop being cunts in Mecca.

Now let me put this in context: the spanish bishopry proclaimed the civil war an official crusade and aided the nationalist, as recompense catholithism was returned to spain as the official religion, which is why so many of their rites are still officially financed. Further while now technically we're officially areligious, they do take a big chunk of our taxes every month, are the biggest private land owner, and have a ton of priviledges. So the spanish church is... creepy. How creepy? At one point our prior bishop after learning of the new pope considered peoclaiming spain an independent papacy because the vatican wasn't pure enough anymore in his eyes. They also critizised the vatican during ww2 for not giving enough support to the axis. Yeah we got some fucking looneys there, the spanish church is an unhinged beast of an organization.

So imagine my surprise it turns out after multiple hour long personal calls by Fernando Simon himself (who again at this point deserves sainthood holy shit he really is the best damned person for the chief of alarm position spain could've hoped for) the bishopry actually listened to reason, and while the waiting lineshaven't been avoided churches have taken out the holy water, give comunion only to the hand, have installed hand sanitizer and the besapies has been altered so they only bow or make a gesture from a distance instead of kissing the foot.

HOLY MOTHER OF GOD HOW?! I want to see those damned calls. This motherfucker just pulled a bloody miracle. I mean... the waiting line will probably still result in a buncha dead boomers. But this could've been so much worse.

Schools btw have also been doing internet classes in some areas and installing hand sanitizer and hand cleaning protocols in others. And all football matches against italians are now online with closed doors (no fans on the stadium) for obvious reasons.

And there's the toppest of keks for the day. Manolo el del Bombo, a spanish autistic legend of a guy that got famous for going to the matches with a bombo (a very large, very noisy percussion instrument) and being on almost every single damn match of every important league 'cause he has no job and has money from his family so what else would he do I guess. Has appeared on TV bitching about the football cancelation and the football fans have been the angriest bunch of the previously mentioned groups, while the catholics have been surprisingly reasonable, the inchas have gone apeshit. So of course now we got a buncha "fuck christ praise football" memes as people compare their reactions. F on chat for my sides.

 

[pull over dat ass too fat]

we did it folks!

remember, there's no "I" in team.

in other news, the EU is prepared to rope itself

 

[EmuWarsVeteran]

we did it folks!
View attachment 1175857

remember, there's no "I" in team.

in other news, the EU is prepared to rope itself
View attachment 1175858

Hmmm... it looks like every country with strong globalist ties that makes ample commerce with asia has been blobbed while the eastern block with stronger nationalist ties that protected its borders only have minor outbreaks so far. Must be my imagination though, there's no way globalism can be bad, ever, obviously. Our chink overlords said so!

 

[Shaved Kiwis]

Six new cases in Russia. All got infected in Italy...

Coronavirus in Russia: The Latest News | July 18 - The Moscow Times

Russia opens up. Travel restrictions. Vaccine race.

www.themoscowtimes.com

Anybody else find it really fucking interesting how we had all these sick Chinese flying around after Lunar New Year yet all these detected cases springing up seem to trace back to Italy? Either it mutated there or something fucky is going on.

 

[Reverend]

local Walmart restocked their rubbing alcohol
I picked up an extra 70% because I use a lot anyway

Amazon had a 12 pack of 99% rubbing alcohol for $25 bought 2 cases. Going to give them out as 'gifts' and tell people 'remember I did this favor to you'.

Emotional Blackmail, the best kind of blackmail.

I should find a pallet of TP and setup on a streetcorner selling it for $20/case. Is this how Thunderdome was formed?

 

[formershroomeryuser]

Oh yeah also

First coronavirus vaccine trial in the US is recruiting volunteers | Live Science

Forty-five people will be enrolled in the preliminary safety trial of the new vaccine.

www.livescience.com

If you really want they have a vaccine for those who want to catch this thing in an attempt to gain an immunity and be a human guinea pig. You may be cured forever. You may just catch this horrible thing for no reason in an attempt for further your paranoid idea you can be two steps ahead of humanity's doom. I suppose if you already have it why not be a test trial pig for the cure because at that point, how much worst can it get?

Of course why do I believe probably only people who are well enough to not be quarantined can volunteer to be tested? Well, who knows I don't. Worth a shot if you value......
..... Whatever you'd value to go incubate yourself for science. Just FYI

 

[remiem]

Canada's newest case had returned from Las Vegas. They're being quiet on details which concerns me. No age, no gender, no travel history besides returned from Vegas. If they can't backtrack the person to another country or in contact with someone from there that means it was community spread there.

Mack Trucks and Volvo have now pulled out of conexpo. That dosen't help the people who're there already to help do setup, tho.

 

[eternal dog mongler]

I had to take a family member to Urgent Care tonight. While waiting for them to come out, was talking with the receptionists. They mentioned it's been hard for their office to get supplies and people have been stealing their hand sanitizers and face masks. I don't live in the ghetto. I live in pretty nice suburban america. I didn't expect shit like that.

Yeah this is becoming a problem. Respirators are selling for quite a bit on ebay and craigslist, so it's not only patients that are doing it.

A hospital near me had boxes of N95s mysteriously go missing from central supply and that door is locked with a keypad. Only nurses and EVS know the code, so...

 

[pull over dat ass too fat]

What's Happening: Cruise ship tests, Prisons sanitized

In California, the first tests of people on a cruise ship found 21 have the new coronavirus

abcnews.go.com

At least one person at the Vatican has tested positive for the virus. It doesn't seem clear whether said person is a tourist or a higher-up clergy member. Given that Vatican City is sort of its own independent governing body w/ the pope as a monarch, I wonder how much control Italy has over it in terms of enforcing public health protocols. Because I'm almost completely confident that many, many people there have contracted it (perhaps it's even where it started), and here's why:

If you've ever been to Vatican City (or Rome in general tbf) you'd know that it's a shithole, packed with sweaty tourists from around the world and mafia scam artists in close quarters preying on them. You also get weird Catholic traditions of touching certain statues. I wouldn't be surprised if some similar stupid touristy thing like that is what caused the outbreak to begin with. I remember kissing a statue of St. Peter's foot when I was kid, in a never-ending line of other people kissing it. The foot has gone under the process of erosion by all the people kissing/touching it continuously all day, for years on end.

Things may have changed over the years since this was under a different pope, but when we went to mass at St. Peter's Basilika, the priest urged everyone to receive the Eucharist by tongue (the dude's wrinkly thumb touched my tongue), and of course everyone drinks wine from like 3 cups shared w the entire community. Granted, the priest ended up angrily telling people off after communion because there were apparently a lot of people who didn't understand German and tried to take the Eucharist by hand lol.

Elsewhere in Rome, where many people who travel for the Vatican also sightsee around, there's also this "mouth of truth" statue thing that tourists put their hands in one by one for pictures. Not as high traffic as the sacred foot, but it still builds up a line.

And ofc the Trevi fountain is filled with pickup artists. Across the city, homeless people are absolutely fucking everywhere begging for money & picking pockets. Crazy how Vatican City was until now by some "miracle" () spared from infection.

Oh yeah, and old news, but Pope Francis has a cold
I wonder how many hands he shakes/babies he kisses on an avg day.

Hmmm... it looks like every country with strong globalist ties that makes ample commerce with asia has been blobbed while the eastern block with stronger nationalist ties that protected its borders only have minor outbreaks so far. Must be my imagination though, there's no way globalism can be bad, ever, obviously. Our chink overlords said so!

The reported numbers are probably not correct imo, given f/e Russia's relationship with China (it's their largest trading partner by far) and then Russia's relationship with Eastern Europe. And some slavic countries even have a large population of Chinese people and have many different cultures existing together, perhaps not even speaking the same language. Given the timing to Chinese New Year, the delayed response to recognize the virus from China and the fact that the epicenter of the outbreak in China was a major transport hub, you can pretty much guarantee they've got the WuFlu. But Eastern Europe is interesting in that unlike authoritarian Asian countries, the people know they're constantly lied to and sort of resign themselves to it. So the people and the government have a very weird relationship with each other where they manufacture their own reality, all the while being ever-aware of the fact that it's manufactured. This is a topic that's super interesting to me but I've written walls of text about it on this site already in the past, so at risk of sperging out on a tangent, if you want to know more I recommend starting by reading a bit about Vladislav Surkov. From what we've seen so far, trying to hide outbreaks doesn't appear to be an effective strategy, but given that people know that they're frequently lied to, hopefully they take precautions regardless of what leaders are saying.

 

[formershroomeryuser]

Yeah this is becoming a problem. Respirators are selling for quite a bit on ebay and craigslist, so it's not only patients that are doing it.

A hospital near me had boxes of N95s mysteriously go missing from central supply and that door is locked with a keypad. Only nurses and EVS know the code, so...

Wow, people are stealing breathing apparatus. This virus is reminding me of whatever was creating those zombies on The Walking Dead. You would need someone to operate the breathing apparatus for you if you could not breathe yourself realistically speaking. But yeah why not loot that what you need that cannot be provided since it is going out of stock.

 

[Aqua Panda]

I find the run on hand sanitizers kinda hilarious in its own way.

Washing your hands with soap and water has empirically been shown to be more effective at removing germs/viruses and keeping your hands clean, yet most people bitch it takes too long and want hand sanitizer instead. Literal laziness.

Also, I completely believe that hospital staff are stealing masks and other supplies. Only Attendings and other higher level Doctors/staff make the big bucks. A LOT of residents and nurses barely keep the lights on sometimes.

 

[JosephStalin]

Got this from a pal, dated 2 March. Have a link but for some reason doesn't get to this. Nevertheless, has some interesting info.

About Joel Ross

JOEL ROSS PRINCIPAL CITADEL REALTY ADVISORS Mr. Ross began his career in Wall St as an investment banker in 1965, where he handled public offerings, mergers & acquisitions, leveraged buyouts, a…

rossrant.wordpress.com

It seems clear from the experts that everyone has panicked for no good reason, and the press and Dems have stirred fear when only caution was needed. It is also clear that if you are healthy, you are not going to get very sick, and in 2 weeks you will be fine if you do get sick, and thereafter immune. As soon as soon as someone presents as having symptoms, they are isolated in the US, so containment is happening at the local level on an emergency basis which will materially help contain it. The problem is you can have the virus and it does not show for a few days during which time you infect others. Not different than the flu. This is not 1918 flu, nor the bubonic plague. The administration did the exact right thing blocking anyone from China, and isolating anyone from the rescue flights and the cruise ship. You are vastly more at risk from the flu than from Corona. If you now have a serious heart condition, or some other serious health issue, you are at risk to other health problems being fatal, Corona being just one. Bottom line, life goes on as usual. The Fed will drop rates in two weeks, or less, by 50 BP likely, just for psychological reasons, not for any economic reason. It will make no difference to borrowing rates since the ten year is already below 1.1% or thereabout, and the ten year swap is the main index rate used by most lenders. The ten year might drop further, but we will just have to see what happens with foreign cash fleeing here for safety, driving rates down further. What the Fed can, and likely will do, is step up QE to make sure there is plenty of liquidity in the system now. Treasury is also likely to tell banks to go easy on struggling companies for a while. The SEC is possibly going to try to reinstate the uptick rule to stop the wild swings caused by algo traders.

The announcement by Apple that it is fully back in production in China was not coincidental. I am sure Cook and Trump coordinated that, and it is meant to reassure the markets that supply chains will be restarting in China, and economic life is getting back to normal. It was a key announcement. We just need a few more major companies to announce that their factories in China are back in full operation to reassure the markets about supply chains. Then you will see a V recovery in stocks. Keep in mind that Mexico is a bigger supplier of parts and products than is China, and with USMCA, that supply line is now in much better shape. Boeing has had a far worse impact on GDP (.5%) than the virus, and it is likely getting recertified by May or at worst, June, or maybe sooner. That alone will be a big boost to the economy and the market. For every 1% decline in Chinese GDP, world GDP declines .5%.One of the interesting outcomes in China is that all sorts of school classes at all levels are now online and are being used by students. It might become the way class is taught in many areas going forward but it shows how people and institutions find ways to respond to a crisis.

It is clear we have a top expert team working on this, and they are all non-partisan professionals who are not going to lie nor alter their medical advice for Trump or anyone. The number of cases is still miniscule and one assumes they will figure out how the cases with no travel or other connection happened. The virus did not just fall from the sky. There will be some more cases. One just showed up here in Sarasota. One from the cruise liner who is still in isolation was on TV and said it is nothing at all, and if he was not confined he would be going to work as usual. In addition, spring is almost here, and these infections apparently die off in spring according to the experts. By next year they will have a vaccine most likely, and shortly they will have treatments. We should all take comfort in having the top experts in the world totally involved, and dealing with this every day. In short-relax. Get on with your life and invest. We are at or near the bottom unless Bernie sweeps on Tuesday, which now seems unlikely, except in CA of course where even highly intelligent young people will vote for him. They are imbued with social justice doctrinaire from college, and seem to have zero understanding of what Bernie’s policies mean to the economy and the people they claim to concerned about. If you never had a history or econ course, you would not understand any of the reality of Bernie. It now looks like the establishment is lining up behind Biden. He has no chance against Trump. If it looks like a brokered convention, Bernie will not be the nominee, and then his people will revolt and not vote. If he is the nominee, he gets trounced, as do down ballot Dems.

China still refuses to give the WHO or our CDC all the information needed about the virus. They want to show the world they managed the crisis on their own , and did not need the CDC or WHO. In fact Dr Fauchi, our top expert in infectious disease who is helping to manage the problem here, was the one who set up China’s CDC many years ago, but they will not give him any data now which would help the US design programs to fight the problem. They want to be the ones who say they are the preeminent country. Classic China. China is also the source of a majority of drug components. How scary is that. The US DOD is also partially dependent for certain components to weapons. Trump has been working hard to stop that.

January personal income was up .6%. Very strong. Spending was up .2%, good, but not great, which means savings are up. Good in case of a slowdown. Low income worker wages are up 6%. A very good number. Core inflation was only up .1%.. A new research study by two top economists shows what I have been saying for a while. Inflation is overstated. The overall PCE index has risen by 1.5% annually since 2008. The revised number in the research paper is 1.1%. Between 1988 and 2018 the numbers were originally 2.1%, but is revised by the researchers to 1.9%. They sight mobile phones as an example. They used hours used for talk and data download as the way to measure. Use rose five fold. Consider that now you can download and watch a movie on your phone which you could not do until recently. Between 2007 and 2018 prices for the phones measured by hours used therefore dropped by 50% per year. Data used per dollar spent doubled annually. A broader measure of smart phone prices dropped 42% per year. Phones were just one of the indexes used to develop the new measure of inflation, but they are a very good example of what is happening. It clearly demonstrates what I and many economists have been saying- inflation is over stated and does not account for value creation of many products adequately due to major technology enhancements. This study means interest rates will likely remain low for several years. It also means that as technology continues to bring much greater value improvements to a variety of products, and as logistics continues to make shipping far more efficient and lower cost, inflation in the US will probably remain low for many years. That means personal savings and consumption should continue to grow as a dollar will buy more value than any price increase. Online shopping will grow, and that will increase price transparency, and that means prices are hard to be raised much beyond production cost increases. However, the entire policy of holding fixed income securities for retirement is bogus. You will make nil return for the next several years, at least if you are in quality bonds. Back to my belief that you are much better to own very good stocks that pay good dividends-i.e. JP Morgan or Home Depot, which pay as much as some good quality bonds, and much more than Treasuries, but over time have very good long term upside cap gains. If the 30 year stays under 2%, for much longer, then fixed income makes no sense and holds a lot of risk that rates will rise even a little later this year, which will mean capital losses. The key for the US is how much demand slows over the next few weeks. Hard to know yet.

One of the benefits of a slowdown in China is commodity prices have collapsed, so manufacturing costs in the US will remain lower than they otherwise would have been. Very good for manufacturing profits. Oil prices at the mid forties is also a major help to corporate profit margins, and to consumer cash flow. This along with historic low mortgage rates and a now booming housing market, all spell good mitigation for any US slowdown. This is the opposite of 2008. However, there is so much uncertainty now, nobody can make any credible forecast of how this will play out. My view is optimistic, but I could be very wrong.

The risk is if the economy slows too much due to a lack of demand from consumers, which could result in financial issues. There are too many companies that are over levered and could be in trouble if a slowdown is material, or lasts long. Not probable, but possible. The number of BBB rated companies, and others with even lower ratings, is where to look for problems. The good news is that with the ten year and two year are at record lows so a modification of these loans will be at much lower rates and that will mitigate the problem to some degree. This will help frackers survive. The Fed will very likely keep their modified QE of buying short term Treasuries and pumping liquidity into the market to keep things from becoming a serious issue. If you hold junk bonds, you could have losses soon as the economy slows over the next couple of months. Bottom line, there are still many major unknowns making it very hard to make a solid forecast, but the good news is the Fed and the administration are ahead of the wave this time, and are doing all they can to mitigate the slowdown and the virus impact. My assumption is things will be materially improved in a month or so as the virus does not become a crisis in the US, China gets back to work and supply chains are back full time. Once that happens the stock market will recover solidly. In the meantime we are likely seeing the bottom as investors realize the world has not ended and the economy is not going to go into recession. Q1 will be slow, but by May the virus will be going away and life will return to normal. The forecasts of no growth in earnings this year seems to me to be based on no reliable data, and another case of a pundit getting out over his skis. If Bernie is the nominee then capex will be slower until the election, but the general economy driven by consumers will recover by spring and will grow. Now is the time to be invested in equities.

Do not overlook the Afghan peace deal and the election. Trump has done what nobody else was able to do. While nobody trusts the Taliban to comply, at least this is a chance to end the war and bring an end to the US involvement, and an end to the financial expenditure. We tried, but the Afghans and Taliban seem to want to remain goat herders and warriors, and so let them kill each other. There is little more that we can do for them. They need to do for themselves, or keep killing each other. Similarly, let the Turks and Syrians kill each other. This is going to be a real mess now. They seem to be doing a good job of killing each other with no American troops involved. It is the same in Palestine and Gaza. They have a chance to stop the killing and poverty, or to keep their people in desperate conditions and a low standard of living. Their choice. They likely will choose wrong again. It does seem that the Saudis and UAE and other Arabs get it, but the Palestinian leaders are so corrupt they will never want to reverse how they act. It is no different than other corrupt governments like Mexico and Venezuela, where the entrenched elite steal the money and everyone else remains in poverty. It never changes

By May you will look back and say...why didn’t I stay in or go back into the market back in early March.

 

[roxitp0w3rwuzdabest420]

I get toilet paper is a

What's Happening: Cruise ship tests, Prisons sanitized

In California, the first tests of people on a cruise ship found 21 have the new coronavirus

abcnews.go.com

At least one person at the Vatican has tested positive for the virus. It doesn't seem clear whether said person is a tourist or a higher-up clergy member. Given that Vatican City is sort of its own independent governing body w/ the pope as a monarch, I wonder how much control Italy has over it in terms of enforcing public health protocols. Because I'm almost completely confident that many, many people there have contracted it (perhaps it's even where it started), and here's why:

If you've ever been to Vatican City (or Rome in general tbf) you'd know that it's a shithole, packed with sweaty tourists from around the world and mafia scam artists in close quarters preying on them. You also get weird Catholic traditions of touching certain statues. I wouldn't be surprised if some similar stupid touristy thing like that is what caused the outbreak to begin with. I remember kissing a statue of St. Peter's foot when I was kid, in a never-ending line of other people kissing it. The foot has gone under the process of erosion by all the people kissing/touching it continuously all day, for years on end.
View attachment 1175905
Things may have changed over the years since this was under a different pope, but when we went to mass at St. Peter's Basilika, the priest urged everyone to receive the Eucharist by tongue (the dude's wrinkly thumb touched my tongue), and of course everyone drinks wine from like 3 cups shared w the entire community. Granted, the priest ended up angrily telling people off after communion because there were apparently a lot of people who didn't understand German and tried to take the Eucharist by hand lol.

Elsewhere in Rome, where many people who travel for the Vatican also sightsee around, there's also this "mouth of truth" statue thing that tourists put their hands in one by one for pictures. Not as high traffic as the sacred foot, but it still builds up a line.
View attachment 1175987
And ofc the Trevi fountain is filled with pickup artists. Across the city, homeless people are absolutely fucking everywhere begging for money & picking pockets. Crazy how Vatican City was until now by some "miracle" () spared from infection.

View attachment 1175864
Oh yeah, and old news, but Pope Francis has a cold
I wonder how many hands he shakes/babies he kisses on an avg day.


The reported numbers are probably not correct imo, given f/e Russia's relationship with China (it's their largest trading partner by far) and then Russia's relationship with Eastern Europe. And some slavic countries even have a large population of Chinese people and have many different cultures existing together, perhaps not even speaking the same language. Given the timing to Chinese New Year, the delayed response to recognize the virus from China and the fact that the epicenter of the outbreak in China was a major transport hub, you can pretty much guarantee they've got the WuFlu. But Eastern Europe is interesting in that unlike authoritarian Asian countries, the people know they're constantly lied to and sort of resign themselves to it. So the people and the government have a very weird relationship with each other where they manufacture their own reality, all the while being ever-aware of the fact that it's manufactured. This is a topic that's super interesting to me but I've written walls of text about it on this site already in the past, so at risk of sperging out on a tangent, if you want to know more I recommend starting by reading a bit about Vladislav Surkov. From what we've seen so far, trying to hide outbreaks doesn't appear to be an effective strategy, but given that people know that they're frequently lied to, hopefully they take precautions regardless of what leaders are saying.

WTF is wrong with Catholics? Everytime someone on my Italian side of my family dies, it's a bunch of goofy traditions. Stand up, sit down, kneel. Spin 2 time face cardinal north. I'm glad I was raised Methodist, god loves you now get out. Don't have to worry about the plague if you're protestant

 

[Reverend]

A hospital near me had boxes of N95s mysteriously go missing from central supply and that door is locked with a keypad. Only nurses and EVS know the code, so...

Its the Mafia obviously.

 

[Brain Power]

5th chilean case, again, related to one of the previous cases. What's with the couples returning from Italy anyway?

Confirman quinto caso de Coronavirus Covid-19 en Chile: es la pareja de una de las contagiadas

El Ministerio de Salud (Minsal) confirmó un quinto caso de Coronavirus Covid-19 en Chile, el tercero en la región Metropolitana. Se...

www.biobiochile.cl