To be worried about coronavirus in Brighton?

[Utohutoh]

Just seen it is breaking news on the BBC

www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-51447761

Is there any advice on what we should be doing? Staying inside? Do we actually need to worry?! Live in Brighton with 3 small children and that is our GP surgery, although we haven't been in the last month. How worried should we actually be? My rational brain says we will be fine, my irrational brain sees the death toll rising....

As far as I have heard so far, this is still only dangerous if you have other health problems, like any flu/respiratory illness is. For everyone else, it's bad cold that passes in a couple of weeks.

I am concerned about something I heard in the lunchtime news through. That the man from the ski chalet seems to have passed it on despite not showing symptoms, which suggests it's not passed by cough droplets. Not an issue in itself but that means we don't know how it is passed?

Go on the practice website. Obviously it's unsettling but I would follow official advice.

I live in Brighton. I'm concerned, but not out of my mind with worry.
I'm using good hygiene measures and so is everyone at my workplace.

YANBU to be worried but try to keep things in perspective. The man and his family have been isolated. The people who came in to contact with him are self isolating and taking precautions.

The "normal" flu is apparently worse than the coronavirus.

Also a little unnerved. Work in central Brighton and commute in by train. Asthmatic so more antsy about impact if I was in the situation where i came into contact with it

www.healthline.com/health-news/dont-freak-out-about-the-coronavirus-just-yet

I've got a slight cough and a sore throat and live approx 10-12 miles away from that health centre and the pub that the carrier in France went to.

I'm wondering if I should stay home from work tomorrow, just in case it's coronavirus.

It says they are trying to contact patients who have been at the surgery recently does that count you? I'd just follow the advice and if you have been there recently then ask them what to do. And ask what arrangements are being made if you need to see a GP as well, (as in a different practice or the usual one after cleaning) and go from there.

I think it is concerning, yes. If your children are small, I would think you're better off than someone with school age children (aka perfect disease vectors) and in your shoes I would be minimising social contact for a while if you can.

One of the problems is that the desire not to cause panic is causing the DoH to massively downplay concerns, but the truth is that there is so much uncertainty about the details of this virus that they can't possibly be in a position to give the reassurance they'd like to be able to give. For example, it's being said that only people with 'close and sustained' contact with the patient who carried the virus from Singapore to Chamonix to Hove are at risk. Yet the bar staff at the pub he went to on the evening before his diagnosis have been advised they need to 'self-isolate'. At the same time, anyone who was drinking in the pub at the same time has been told they'll probably be fine. But it can't be both and the truth really is that no one knows.

I think the advice so far has been a bit too casual considering the potential for catastrophe and - to answer the OP directly - I think as individuals we should take responsibility for ourselves and our families by being as cautious as possible, even if that means ignoring the official advice to just carry on as normal. By the time they are telling us that panic is justified it will be too late.

I have asthmatic children and will be very much more circumspect on their behalf than I imagine Matt Hancock will be. Don't forget John Gummer and that burger.

You need some perspective here: the virus is not airborne, the death rate is 2% and children are generally not affected in a severe way.
Some people who panic about the CV never has the flu jab, a virus for which we may have a protection.
(Not assuming its your care OP)

I meant: it's your case

Considering how many people in Brighton don't vaccinate against diseases we KNOW kill people, I wouldn't worry about something that has killed only 2 people outside mainland China; in HK and the Philippines.

Flu is more likely to kill you than corona virus. Don’t get the risk out of proportion!

Flu is more likely to kill you than corona virus.

No, that's just not true. Seasonal flu has a death rate of about 0.1%. nCOV is more like 2% outside China, where detection rates are good so far and treatment comprehensive. In Hubei (not that that need be OP's concern) it's now estimated to be about 18%. And you can vaccinate against seasonal flu and most vulnerable people do, whereas there's very little you can do about nCOV so far except try to avoid it.

But flu is more widespread so PP is unlikely just to be talking about the death rathe if you get it, but also the chances of getting it in the first place.

Rate

Comtesse and Tin My rational brain agrees with you - statistically flu kills far more individuals each year..

HOWEVER..

Why are the governments behaving the way they are? To impose draconian compulsory quarantine measures seems a little of an overreaction if its less harmful than flu? Evacuating British Citizens.. that's not common practice? We don't close schools or medical centres when there is a breakout of flu - will we be closing public transport next? It doesn't make any sense to me.

I agree that if you have no complicated health conditions or immune system issues, then its unlikely to have a significant personal impact. (Economic is another matter.) But I feel for those who do have these concerns. My sense is we are shutting the door after the horse has bolted..

how can we all just stay inside? we have to go to work, go to the shops and get food etc - I'm getting on a plane to Japan next week and have zero concerns - you can't live your life like that - Planet's dying anyway so were all fecked - if this doesn't get you, something else will soon!

They are saying NCov is airborn though?

Is it or isn’t it? That makes a huge difference

I live in Brighton with two young children and I’m starting to feel a bit nervous. I’m not sure what I should be doing though, they aren’t at school yet so do we stay home for a while? Should I avoid play groups? Or is that an overreaction, I just don’t know!

I'm pretty concerned at the way it's being handled so far and echo what EagleVision so eloquently said. Was dismayed a new baby in Wuhan was born with the virus. Seeing people welded into their homes there is frankly terrifying. If we have so little knowledge of what the infection actually is, how long it's incubated for prior to symptoms then I don't really trust the advice. I read a virologist saying the incubation period could be 21 days, not 14, which would negate the current advice if correct.

Why are the governments behaving the way they are? To impose draconian compulsory quarantine measures seems a little of an overreaction if its less harmful than flu?

Just my opinion here. The main issue is that if a lot of people get ill requiring hospital treatment all at the same time, it’s a major problem. The system will be totally overwhelmed (as we’ve seen in China).

Evacuating British Citizens.. that's not common practice

Again just my thoughts: the main problem there wasn’t the flu but the lockdown (and again the overloaded system). Countries’ citizens were stranded abroad in a place where there was potential future difficulty obtaining food, and great difficulty obtaining proper medical treatment. That’s why they got them out.

800 deaths in China so far (total population 1.3 billion). Average flu deaths in the uk 17,000 for the last 5 years (total population 66 million). Don’t get it out of proportion!

I think evacuating British citizens was largely a political move. There would have been outcry and campaigns at home if they had left British citizens in a "closed" city.

"To impose draconian compulsory quarantine measures seems a little of an overreaction". I'm sure I heard on the lunchtime news that the British government has now done the same - someone on one of the evacuation plans objected to being "held" so they've introduced an emergency measure, but maybe I wasn't listening properly because I can't find anything online?

I'm not sure I'm completely comfortable with compulsory quarantine for people not displaying symptoms, especially as we're being told "coughs and sneezes spread diseases" in this case, so if there is no cough, there's no risk of contagion.

It is a mild cold/flu.

Most of the posts on social media are from posters with no qualifications in this field and they are not research scientists.

Social media is best avoided completely as a definitive information source.

Found it now, a small part of a bigger item n the BBC

"Elsewehere, the Department of Health has introduced new measures in England that mean those in quarantine will not be free to leave, and can be forcibly sent into isolation if they pose a threat.

The move comes after a passenger on the first UK flight from Wuhan, who is being held in quarantine on the Wirral, had been "threatening to abscond", according to the BBC's political correspondent Iain Watson."