Coronavirus in Ireland/N Ireland

[beanaseireann]

The first case of Coronavirus has been confirmed in Northern Ireland.
A passenger travelled from Italy to the North via Dublin.
I don't know how we will cope in the Republic if we have large numbers ill with the virus as our health service is already at breaking point.

I don’t think the North’s nhs is too far behind bean

It's hard to believe we don't have a case here already really. My friends Dd was skiing with her school in Italy last week, they are all back at school carrying on as usual. That doesn't seem very sensible to me 😬

Local school (class) to us was sent home this week to self isolate then told go go back in. Now several have been sent home today with flu symptoms & have been told attend for testing. It’s a joke, I can see this going crazy in such a small country.

No bleach, no anti bacterial wipes, no hand sanitizer, no tins of beans and very few tins of tomatoes in my local (big) Tesco.

No hand sanitizer in mine this morning either- shopping centre has Boots, Tesco, and Penneys.
But since I was in Penneys anyway I may have had a quick look around......

DH works in the city centre and on Thursday and Friday he saw ambulances arriving to buildings with paramedics in hazmat suits. One to an office building and one to an apartment block with lots of Airbnb lettings.

Obviously both were false alarms as we would have heard by now, but I guess this must be happening a lot. Must be very stressful for the medical personnel involved.

I have a relative who spent 48 hours sitting upright on chair in a&e after his gp sent him to Beaumont in an ambulance (heart condition) before he was upgraded to a trolley. When he was finally seen by a doctor, she had to lean across another patient to examine him because the trolleys were stacked 5 deep in the corridor.
That was during the annual, completely-foreseeable flu outbreak and it wasn’t even a Saturday night.

I dread to think how bad it could get here.

Oh dear. A confirmed case in the east of the country.

It was only a matter of time before it arrived here.

I managed to get hold of some hand sanitiser today, in a Lloyd's pharmacy in Limerick. Over €18 for a 500ml bottle!

It's very unnerving. I think the next week will be crucial. People who went away over the mid term and are potentially incubating now will start to get sick in the next week, assuming a 14 day incubation period. I hope the government has good contingency plans.

I hope so too. It's certainly unnerving.

chartreuse
The government..... good contingency plans.
I doubt it.
Where will they put more sick people ?

@beanaseireann from what I'm reading most cases are mild to moderate so don't need hospitalisation. They have isolation units in all hospitals.

Given the size of the population here, and being an island, if we did a Chinese style lockdown, closing schools and colleges, no mass gatherings, testing at airports, etc we could really contain it. But there seems to be a reluctance to do that.

I think this is one occasion where the Irish 'ah sure it'll be grand' attitude might come back to bite us.

As I mentioned earlier my friends dd and all her classmates have been at school, on public transport, out shopping, in cinemas and restaurants, etc for the last week. All potentially incubating and spreading. I think that's negligent and should not have been allowed to happen.

According to the Indo health service officials "are 'attempting ' to trace those who may have been in contact with the man..."
Why all the secrecy ?
Surely the quickest way to trace the people would be to ask via the media : were you on x flight, bus, train
Working in y airport,
Driving z taxi or whatever.
The secrecy delays vital information gathering.

There was a mumps outbreak in South Dublin around Christmas (most of the children and teens we know who got it were vaccinated, apparently the mumps element of the MMR is very weak).

I could see the pattern of spreading, a teacher in DDs school, then to pupils, including dd, then she unknowingly spread it to friends when she had a sleepover here the day before her symptoms appeared, then they spread it to siblings who introduced it to their schools when they went back after the holidays.

DS' girlfriend is in university in France, about a week after she went back, she got mumps so was obviously incubating since she was at home, GP over there sent her to hospital when she was symptomatic, how many people did she spread her south Dublin germs to then and before she even knew she was sick?

Brought it home to me how easily viruses are spread.

I agree @beanaseireann
and I think the idea they can trace everyone is ridiculous

Kids supposed to go to science blast in RDS this week. I'm hoping it's called off. It probably won't be.

Pointless tracing all the people from the bus or whatever the person travelled on, then you’d have to go and trace everyone who all those people were in contact with - where would that end! l😂

Don’t panic about hand sanitiser - just wash your hands regularly that’s all you can do!

And it turns out our first case is someone who returned from a school skiing trip. School closed for 2 weeks. How many people have been unnecessarily exposed in the week since they returned. So frustrating

It's worrying.

Why did the primary school in Athboy close ?

4 cases announced in the West.
Rumour mill says 1 in Castlebar and 1 in Sligo.
A family of 4 back from Italy.

13 cases now, I think this is becoming a case of when not if now

Hi so now we know theres cases in Clare, not far from and childs school, so worrying!

I find the way this is being handled incredibly frustrating. All but one of our cases originated in N Italy. Once it was known it was widely circulating in that area, 2 full weeks ago, everyone coming back to Ireland should have been told to self isolate, if they didn't have the common sense and decency to do it themselves. Rather than going back to work in a hospital, how could an intelligent person think that was a good idea?

The government needs to get a grip now, I don't know why they're still tip toeing around. Close all schools, everyone that can work from home does so. Avoid public transport if you can. Avoid using cash, use contactless payments. Just radically decreasing people circulating will limit the opportunities for it to spread.

And for gods sake cancel Paddy's day. Does anyone remember the foot and mouth crisis when Paddy's day was postponed? It was so much nicer going to the parade in May, we weren't al frozen.