It is concerning and I do have a considerable amount of sympathy for your personal concerns. My BIL works in a & e. My SIL is also a doctor. I spent last night wondering what they'd do in a big outbreak, as they have two young daughters. If they were both seconded, would we risk looking after the girls so their parents could work full time if the schools were closed. Or would that put our 5 year old at risk? Or would the girls go to their grandparents who have preexisting conditions? Would my BIL and SIL be in real danger? Its a dilemma which I hope doesn't come to pass and I don't have to think about.
Having seen that data today though, my feeling is that there could be a massive distortion of figures going on, if the first place after the sea food market that was affected was the hospitals, and this has had a significant impact on how the crisis has played out.
Poor infection control between wards meant the very sickest in the community were infected first, both blocking beds and through being just so ill, were more infectious than the general population. The net result being that hospitals effectively became not just places full of infectious people but places full of what has been termed 'superspreaders', which somehow acted to super conduct the spread of the disease as the hospital was the centre of the community in a health crisis. And to the most vulnerable visiting the hospital in a subsequent second wave of cases.
A perfect storm of failings and maximum impact incidents which overwhelmed the health care system very early rendering it not just useless but also a significant contributer to the problem. Particularly when panic started to set in through fear in the media.
One doctor made a point of saying that face masks were not enough and that the disease could be transmitted through the eyes because no one was wearing googled on wards. So we know there was poor infection control even when they started to identify what they were potentially dealing with because they'd made incorrect assumptions.
Interestingly enough WHO making an announcement about a shortage of medical productive equipment worldwide does seem to link up with this concern.
If there was some kind of perfect storm which can be identified it does mean those on the front line will be at considerable risk. This knowledge has to be a good thing, even if its concerning. I do think that measures could be put in place to prevent hospitals becoming 'super conductors' in the same way and to ensure better precautions from the word go even in your 'bread and butter' cases. The fact that all hospitals have already been told they need coronavirus isolation pods for potential cases is a start. I guess you'd be looking at lots of restrictions of movement and access on and to hospital premises as well.
Overall the drip, drip of little bits of information today I've found reassuring rather than completely alarming for this reason. There are more straws to clutch at than I felt at this time yesterday.
The fact the early death rate seems higher in Wuhan than elsewhere outside Hubai even if there is a lag in infections now has something of a plausible explanation and could have distorted creating an artificially high rate rate of death and serious complication than if it had spread via different locations more evenly throughout the general population over a longer time frame. It's not a uniform pattern which necessarily reflects what would happen in an outbreak on a larger geographical context.
The clusters outside China seem to be being well traced and identified. Although it's still a waiting game on how much its outside China. The next few days will be a lot more telling I suspect.
There's also stuff being suggested about how standard logic of using steroids which you'd use in similar circumstances potentially are actively harmful to some coronavirus patients. Again if you don't know what you are dealing with, early patients become live guinea pigs which is a risk later patients don't have.
I know that might not be enough for you given your personal circumstances but this is the closest to soothing noises I think I can get for the moment.
I really wouldn't like to be on that cruise ship though.