Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Only the apps you allow.

Meet the Other Phone.
Only the apps you allow.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to ask you if you are worried about the new Coronavirus?

999 replies

IvyBush123 · 04/02/2020 06:41

I am not sure if there is reason to worry about the new Coronavirus. I am not a medical expert but to be honest feel a bit scared because we know so little and some experts seem worried. How do you think?

OP posts:
Thread gallery
7
woodchuck99 · 10/02/2020 13:28

Woodchuck of course it's worrying for those people but do you know their medical history already?

I don't know their history but I do know that proportion of people with flu do not normally end up in intensive care. I'm not suggesting that you personally should do anything but that doesn't mean you shouldn't be worried!. There is a difference between worry/concern and panic. Whilst the latter isn't helpful I think the former would be a lot of help if it changes behaviour.

ploughingthrough · 10/02/2020 13:28

Perhaps I'm wrong but I'm pretty sure you don't get the sex, age, location and level of medical care for every flu patient printed in the national news.

ploughingthrough · 10/02/2020 13:28

I disagree wholeheartedly. Worry achieves nothing. Sensible hygiene and social responsibility achieves a lot.

woodchuck99 · 10/02/2020 13:29

If Dh's factory in China send machinery over to Europe how do they ensure its safe? From a European manager who is no way racist . Pause to think .

It will be safe couple of weeks from transit. Maybe a lot sooner than that but I don't think we know yet.

FourTeaFallOut · 10/02/2020 13:30

Case by case wouldn't be statistics. But the phe do publish the flu stats every week because they need to plan and access effectiveness of vaccines.

woodchuck99 · 10/02/2020 13:31

I disagree wholeheartedly. Worry achieves nothing. Sensible hygiene and social responsibility achieves a lot.

The point is that many people do not practice sensible hygiene and they are unlikely to they worry a bit about this virus. I notice this all the time. Some people including my co-workers are really hygienic whereas others cough and sneeze everywhere. If they continue to think this is something that only affect others they will probably carry on.

NemophilistRebel · 10/02/2020 13:32

@woodchuck99

the doctor on the radio 5 podcast tried to explain why this new virus was appearing more deadly to begin with than seasonal flu.

i wrote down as closely as possible what he said:

new viruses can trigger the immune system to give such a powerful response that it takes you down in the process.

evidence from 1918 flu epidemic was that the virus wasn't naturally a human virus (being from birds), it actually wasn't very good at growing in human cells and so to begin with it made lots of mistakes that trigger human cells to create a more violent immune response. this led to people with a strong immune system being affected even more as their immune system was attacked and destroyed. The immune system kills good tissue and causes major inflammation which then compromises lung function, and you asphyxiate.

The virus then gets less deadly as it mutates and becomes less animal virus and more human virus

ploughingthrough · 10/02/2020 13:33

Understood. Flu stats don't breed panic though. The way the news reports coronaviruses cases does - especially here in Singapore. It is hard to live here not because of the virus - you do what you can to be safe, hygienic, and responsible , but because of the way the public have reacted despite government advice.
I hope things don't go the same way in the UK.

NemophilistRebel · 10/02/2020 13:35

If anything this is a best cast scenario, as we dont know if this will mutate in the same way, although the doc on the program seemed quite confident of it and the figures today released by imperial college back it up some way

kirinm · 10/02/2020 13:47

Oh dear GP surgery in Brighton closed as staff member tests positive. No doubt it is here now.

PotholeParadise · 10/02/2020 13:47

NemophilistRebel

One theory with the 1918 virus was that the usual course of mutation (towards being a less severe virus) was inverted by WWI.

During the normal course of things, with diseases that are contagious after symptoms start, the less severe the virus symptoms, the more it spreads, because people go out and about. So there is a selective pressure against anything that makes its host feel like they're dying. You don't go to the theatre when you feel like death warmed over, you stay at home and you naturally limit the spread.

The problem in 1918 may have been that for the people who felt well enough to stumble through daily life and their job feeling a bit awful, that meant staying where they were, at the battle fronts of WWI, with limited opportunity to give it to anyone who didn't already have it. Meanwhile, those who were worst afflicted got shipped out (by train, even) to the field hospitals, and from there, the worst strain of the virus went everywhere.

Random18 · 10/02/2020 13:48

I am getting a wee bit more concerned than I was.

I see a GP's practice has now closed in Brighton as staff member has been diagnosed.

That is worrying

woodchuck99 · 10/02/2020 13:49

Understood. Flu stats don't breed panic though.

They would do if such a high proportion of people ended up in intensive care!

NemophilistRebel · 10/02/2020 13:50

he wasn't commenting on how fast its spreading, but on the severity and reasons why its attacking fit 30-40 year old men more so than any other demographic at the moment.

woodchuck99 · 10/02/2020 13:51

Oh dear GP surgery in Brighton closed as staff member tests positive. No doubt it is here now.

Hopefully the doctor has been in quarantine and will not have infected anyone at the surgery. They're just closing in case he or she has.

kirinm · 10/02/2020 13:53

Have they ruled out being contagious during incubation period because otherwise, quite a few people will already have been exposed?

Delatron · 10/02/2020 13:56

Nope you are contagious during the incubation period.

PotholeParadise · 10/02/2020 13:57

I know. I'm talking about severity, too. Viruses mutations that make them less severe favour their spread, and so generally viruses become less severe.

Stumpedasatree · 10/02/2020 13:58

The number of victims and severity of this virus is obviously very sad and alarming.

I know this is a total first world problem, but personally I am concerned in terms of what to do about an Easter holiday booked for Vietnam where as a family we are travelling around. We had literally just finalised it before the virus news hit.

woodchuck99 · 10/02/2020 13:59

Have they ruled out being contagious during incubation period because otherwise, quite a few people will already have been exposed?

Assuming he didn't have symptoms he must have been contagious for a long time during incubation. Clearly checking people's temperatures before letting them travel etc is not going to work.

furrytoebean · 10/02/2020 14:00

Hopefully the doctor has been in quarantine and will not have infected anyone at the surgery. They're just closing in case he or she has.

I'm getting a headache trying to work out which infection came from where.
Why would this man have been in quarantine? I thought they only started looking for people linked to Brighton man a few days ago so they'd have been going about their daily life until then.

woodchuck99 · 10/02/2020 14:01

It's hard to know whether he was really symptomless though. In the German case they thought the person from China didn't have symptoms when she infected people but it turns out she did have some symptoms. This could be the case with the person from Brighton too. Maybe they just thought they had a cold as I think the symptoms are initially quite mild.

kirinm · 10/02/2020 14:02

I've read that this is the surgery the 'super spreader' went to. If he did go to a surgery, presumably they'd have taken immediate action rather than waiting until now?

woodchuck99 · 10/02/2020 14:03

Why would this man have been in quarantine? I thought they only started looking for people linked to Brighton man a few days ago so they'd have been going about their daily life until then

I think that the doctor got it from France so would have quarantined themselves as soon as the man from Brighton was found to be positive.

CustardySergeant · 10/02/2020 14:05

I'm worried for my daughter who lives and works in Brighton. Sad