Prepping for a pandemic 2

[wheresmymojo]

Second thread on prepping for a potential Coronavirus pandemic...following the latest news and information as well as prepping info.

When quoting estimates like mortality rates, replication rates, incubation periods and similar I try to stick to evidence based, scientific studies and will link to sources (unless already linked to them previously).

Generally speaking I use reputable sources of information like well regarded news outlets for other information and will provide links.

Sometimes I may post things outside of this as 'interesting' or such like. I will always caveat these as to be taken with caution.

As much as possible I am attempting not to link to fake news. It's an evolving picture so may not be 100% successful but if something is later shown to be incorrect I will post a correction.

Re vitamin D - I give DD Better Life Vitamin D spray for kids during winter months, tastes of peppermint. She also has Sambucol Vitamin C teddies as well as Kids Biotix Prebiotcs chewies to support her immune system. She's got ASD and often sticks to a restricted diet. Luckily she likes all of the above supplements, which helps!

Why VitD sprays & drops? Are they better than the tablets or just a preference to take it that way?

The liquid vitamin D absorbs so much better than the tablets

They seem to be doing a pretty good job of tracing contacts of the man who caught CV in Singapore.

It's how they found the 5 cases in France and now they are contacting others to tell them to self isolate (e.g. a pub he spent a couple of hours at one evening)

www.theargus.co.uk/news/18221558.amp/

^ Also confirmed in that article - the conference was for a company called Servomex based in Crowborough

Re the Singapore British case - he must have infected the others long before he had any symptoms and well within the 2 week incubation period, if the timings that have been published today are correct?

It’s positive to see that the teams doing the tracing are doing a thorough job; and it’s proactively identifying potential links and telling them to isolate.

Thanks for the tip about dried soya mince, @HasaDigaEebowai - I’m trying to cut down on my meat consumption anyway, and have been experimenting with meat replacements (Quorn etc). If there’s stuff out there that works well for prepping then even better!

I'm thinking about what you might put in a bag in case you had to take a child to one of the corona virus pods at hospital. In terms of a long wait whilst awaiting testing or treatment... I found a couple of spare back packs... I was thinking bottled water, calpol, books, kindle, £10 in coins for hospital parking, antibacterial wipes, hand gel, tissues and loo roll. Anything else?

People who have travelled back from China, Hong Kong, Japan, Macau, Malaysia, Republic of Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, or Thailand within the last 14 days or those who have had contact with a confirmed case, are being asked to stay indoors and avoid contact with other people as you would with the flu and call NHS 111 for advice.

Interestingly this advice seems to have changed (NHS wesbite). Now saying that those back from the listed countries should self quarantine for 14 days - no mention of them being ill before deciding to self quarantine

The pods are a separate space at hospitals - - somewhere for people to contact NHS111 for assessment of Coronavirus only. Only if NHS 111 deems it necessary will staff test people in the pod.

Ah, OK, so I thought the pods were where you went if you were very worried about (for example) a child with a flu type illness or respiratory problems which might be corona virus. Or where an adult might take themselves with the same symptoms? I thought it might be somewhere that you ended up waiting for hours to be assessed.

PHE website says that only applies for people with symptoms (although personally I’m not sure this is enough).

GothMummy for a long wait in hospital/OOO I’d also include a phone charger and maybe a card game or something that doesn’t require as much focus as a book if people are feeling rubbish etc - waiting to get seen or for tests is miserable and any way of being able to entertain yourself and the children would be definitely needed! If it got to the widespread stage you’d probably want to avoid using the hospital toys/books as they probably would be ripe for all sorts. Depending on age of children spare nappies/pull ups or pjs would probably be a good shout. I’d pack some snack-y bits as well.

Today I have had experience of 111/U.K. public health and their lack of wanting people quarantined.

Relative recently back from country with growing outbreak. Has sore throat and feels ill. Phones up and told to self isolate at home but people living in the same household are still allowed to come and go. They will be contacted by local public health about testing.

Phoned back and told them that actually they don’t meet the criteria anymore, they doesn’t need to isolate or be tested, not further input/monitoring required.

Said it sounded rather busy/chaotic and person on the phone told them that their guidance is changing every hour.

Very unlikely that they do have it/is mild, but this is how it will spread. People won’t phone up or conscientious people told bad advice. If they had tested positive surely by that time all household members will also be positive but they’ve been coming and going anyway? Before their quarantine was lifted they were going to quarantine the rest of the house anyway to protect the public despite being told not to by NHS.

There will be hundreds of people with just a cold but how do you pick up the ones that have Coronavirus?

PHE website says that only applies for people with symptoms.

Yes I've just seen that. It isn't what it says on my local NHS site but I suspect thats an error. Clearly the PHE site should be more accurate.

Didn’t want partners quarantined either, despite obvious close contact and swapping of bodily fluids.

I’m wondering if the next lot of repatriations from Wuhan will have bus drivers in hazmat suits or not/airport people shaking passengers hands. As they surely realise now that the bus drivers need to wear suit as its fully airborne, but I can see the government telling them not to wear the suits as wearing them means acknowledging they were wrong the first time.

Superspreaders are asymptomatic for a long time.

Thanks @Dyrne I have added those to my list. Especially phone/Kindle charger! I also need to track down everyone's spare inhalers and renew prescriptions.

That's a bit worrying @MyHairIsSoapy

GothMummy Great point about tracking down meds/prescriptions. I think a worry now is that frontline healthcare is going to get more and more busy now - either with genuine/suspected cases or panickers. This may make it harder or slower to get treatment or medication for unrelated issues.

MyHairIsSoapy To be fair DP and I have been ill on and off over the last couple of weeks, and trust me, we’re far too knackered for there to have been any “swapping of bodily fluids” going on for quite some time!!

I have RTFT despite technically not being a prepper but I hate running low on stuff so I guess I am in a way
People are really not understanding when it comes to illness - I am neutropenic, like if you have chemo and get neutropenic
But because I don't have cancer, and haven't had chemo, people see it as "different" and not as serious so are happy to breathe their germs all over me
I'm not overly precious, I have to work FT as there's no financial help etc but stuff like a woman sitting in the doctors then loudly announcing she had chickenpox
Telling a&e reception I am neutropenic and asking not to sit in the waiting room (I've been told not to) and because "you haven't had recent chemo and so don't have a low immune system" having to sit in the main waiting room (triage had a word after that episode...)

Stuff like that just makes me think how irresponsible some people are and I wonder how it will be if we have more cases here. On lots of previous threads about chicken pox etc, there's been comments about if you are immunocompromised you wouldn't be working/at a theme park/shouldn't be on a flight. I'm like - mine is for life! What do you expect me to do, hibernate?

Hospital bag:

Tooth brush and paste each.
Pair of pants each
Deodorant
Soap, kitchen roll pieces in plastic bag
Handgel
Ear buds
Notebook, pen, pencil, crayons, sharpener
Puzzle book
Teddy
Drinks, snacks, mints, sweets
Spare meds
Sensory toys, small toy, Eg toy cars, small figures.
Books
Cash

Pick up the charger and power bank on the way out. Small torch and batteries.
Maybe put in spare reading glasses.

Sanpro.

If parent staying with child:
Lounge wear (clothes that can be slept in eg lounge pants, loose tops)
Dry shampoo
Food
Magazines
Teabags

Totally agree and sympathise ClientQueen. Some people are alarmingly casual about sickness.