Prepping for a pandemic...4

[wheresmymojo]

Third thread on prepping for a pandemic and following the risk of a COVID pandemic.

General COVID Info

The estimated replication rate is R= 2 to 4.8 based on latest expert estimates. This means each infected person spreads the virus to between 2 and 4.8 people. Experts estimate that, unchecked, it could infect 60% of the population.

Around 15-20% of cases are thought to be severe - that is resulting in the need for hospitalisation. Around 3-5% requiring ventilation.

The estimated mortality rate is around 1-2% at the moment (compared to 0.01-0.1% for flu). This may change as it is very difficult to estimate mortality.

Children tend to have milder symptoms. Those over 60 with underlying health issues and a history of smoking are more likely to be severe (although not exclusively this type of person).

Spread of COVID

It is estimated that the average incubation period is 3-5 days but can be as long as 24 days.

It can be spread with no symptoms.

It can be spread via droplet (cough/sneeze), aerosol (breathing same air in very close quarters), bodily fluids, fecal/oral route and formites (via surfaces, up to 28 days in the right circumstances but up to 3-5 days in more typical circumstances).

Updates

As this is a novel virus and knowledge is constantly being updated - I will post updates as they become available with links to source.

I am not a medical expert so any opinions or conjecture of my own should be taken with a pinch of salt!

The brexit stashers freeze eggs, but break the yolk. Check out those threads for more ideas. There are lots.

Paper in The Lancet showing what a reasonably mild case of COVID is like - details the 1st Vietnamese case.

Basically high fever, dry cough, some chest pain and then recovery.

www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(20)30111-0/fulltext

I mean, obviously I'll have to cancel that one week 18-30 holiday I had planned in Tehran. Tsk.

No, I'm not under 30 in real life either

The idea that the second infection is much worse is very worrying. I have very limited medical knowledge. I am just wondering if this is the case for any other virus

You can get chicken pox a second time and it's shingles which is much worse.

And dengue fever

Pre-print paper modelling how an epidemic would spread across the UK (not peer reviewed)

Basically, it doesn't really matter where it starts it will move across the whole population.

If H2H transmission is shown to continue in Feb they predict a peak in June with no controls in place. Controls would move the peak to Winter 20/21 but wouldn't reduce the total number of people that get infected in the end - question whether it would really be better to have a peak in Winter when NHS already under strain.

www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.02.12.20022566v1.full.pdf

Shingles isn't catching chickenpox again, it's the same infection re-emerging.

I just watched an odd video on twitter called 'how to make your own mask'. You use kitchen towel, tissues and elastic bands. If all else fails I might try that with my scuba mask over my eyes.

I've planned on using the ski goggles!

I saw a tutorial as well that uses kitchen roll with an antibacterial wipe sandwiched inside but surely
that would make the kitchen roll soggy?!

Recommend getting a stash of TCP in for your medicine cabinet. Great for sore throats, colds, mouth ulcers, cuts and other wounds and bites and lasts for ages

Fabric isn't really enough to a remove virus particles. Seen a suggestion for using the innards of spare cooker hood filters as a kind of bodge job for a mask.
But, as always, the fanciest mask in tbe world is useless against poor hand hygiene including poor handling techniques for using masks.
Better to have good hand hygiene.

Dengue fever does appear to have the same mechanism that is being suggested applies to COVID-19 with the second infection being far worse than the first.

If this is the case COVID-19 will just keep going round and round and round until we are all dead or it has mutated. This would explain why the whistle blower doctor died - reckon he could have had it at least twice if not 3+ times.

If that's the case, I just don't see the point in anything - by careful handwashing and good protocols we can buy ourselves a few more months in a world where a decent percentage of everyone we know is continually dying. Apologies that is very morbid but if this is how the virus will operate I can't see an end point.

Looks like it is in the wild in Taiwan too.

"One more confirmed case is confirmed in Taiwan, now total of 24 cases in the country.

A 60+ years old woman, no travel history in past 2 years, she starting had symptoms of fever and coughing, she went to 4 local clinics for help from 1/22-1/29, but her condition worsen and starting had dyspnea, she went to hospital and diagnosed pneumonia on 1/29, she transferred to ICU on 2/10, and confirmed to be COIVD-19 today(2/19)

We didn't know much about the wuhan virus that early, China only shut down Wuhan on 1/23, it seems the virus has already spreading way before January"

That modelling is interesting.

It doesn't take into account that you would hope that huge advances re treatment and possibly even vaccination would be made between now and the winter. Surely delaying it via controls makes more sense regardless? Also some have suggested it will be a seasonal thing like flu in which case we'll be stuffed come winter either way.

I can't see any vaccine being ready before winter...

Me either but who knows. I don't like the idea of not bothering to try and control the spread when time means more knowledge and experience.

I think people have hoped it might be seasonal - so that it would die down from Spring and we'd get more time to work on a vaccine.

It does seem to only be 'hope' though - I haven't seen any evidence to suggest that it would be the case.

Tokyo and Hong Kong are now at our sort of spring / cooler summer temperatures of 15-21c and it's not doing too badly there.

Taiwan & Singapore are 21-31c and not doing badly there either.

Apparently Sanofi is now entering the race to develop a vaccine, but they say that realistically it'll be 3-4 years before a licensed vaccine can be ready. That's depressing

They won't want to rush a vaccine through after what happened over pandemrix.

Yes the worry that even if you manage to have mild symptoms first time it will just get worse every time you are infected is the most scary of all. It will just go round and round until nobody left. I can’t say these things in real life. People don’t want to hear it

@YoursTunbridgeWells that is indeed a terrifying proposition but I'm not sure that there is any hard evidence for it.

We don't know why the young doctor died or whether he had pre-existing conditions (or simply just huge exposure).

The paper shared in here on the subject isn't about Covid19 specifically, it was written prior.

The main evidence for 'killer reinfection' seems to have come from one or two Chinese doctors who were reported in a Taiwanese newspaper- not exactly guaranteed to be the gospel truth.

I said this upthread but it probably got lost in all the chat. There's already a vaccine, developed by the team at Imperial. But there's no chance of it going through all the trials before next spring/summer. It's in the animal testing stage atm.

Imperial have also launched an 'online course' about Covid-19 starting today if you're interested: www.coursera.org/learn/covid-19.

I didn't think it will just do the rounds until we all die. That's not in a viruses interest. There will be those in the population who handle it better. It's like Cjd, they think / though that some people could resist the prions. Dengue is quite nasty but theres plenty of humans still happily living in that part of the world.

There will be a vaccine at some point, it's just the time taken to pass human clinical trials. That takes time

I think there will be people left. There will be some very isolated communities that will survive when there are not enough connections for it to spread.

Hmmm, maybe one should consider buying an old house in the middle of nowhere in Sweden and aim to live 'of the fat of the land' for a couple of years?