Coronavirus

[orkneycadian]

The Chinese don't hang about when they set their minds to it;

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ital-WEEK.html

Hundreds of heavy-duty vehicles and armies of workers are gathered overnight as China vows to build a 1,000-bed coronavirus hospital from scratch in ONE WEEK

How long have they been at the Sick Kids Hospital in Edinburgh, and when does it open?

[mi16]

Another SNP clusterf...

[Alrock]

On the bright side, with any luck this is natures way of fixing the global overpopulation crisis.

[orkneycadian]

Without a crystal ball, I doubt that anyone can make any kind of predictions. But lets, just for a minute, imagine the suggestion in the following link were to play out;

https://metro.co.uk/2020/01/24/coron...emic-12116616/

This is how the coronavirus could spread across the world and become a pandemic



and specifically the text;

Last year, one study about a fictional coronavirus pandemic claimed 65 million people could die within 18 months.

Horrendous as it may sound, losing 65 million people in 18 months is still not enough to stem worldwide population growth. Without any pandemics, the population will rise by about 121 million in 18 months. Subtract the 65 million and there will still be a population rise of 56 million. OK, might not be as simple as that if the pandemic claims people of reproductive age, but its in that ball park.

[orkneycadian]

And for some perspective to date, if the outbreak is considered to have started on the 31st of December, when it was notified to the WHO, then in that time, 41 people have died from it, whilst the worlds population has increased by about 5.625 million

So as yet, its not going to be the end of us.

As an aside, the latter number above is greater than the population of Scotland. So for anyone trying to imagine the scale of the "population emergency", another Scotland has been added to the world since New Years Day.

[orkneycadian]

Just happened upon a debate on Radio Scotland where they are discussing a programme on population, that must have been on in the last few days;

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000dl6q

Chris Packham: 7.7 Billion People and Counting

Not seen it, but sounds like interesting viewing if I can figure out how to get it played back again.....

[Gronnuck]

Mibbies its time to get Greta Thunberg to switch her attention to the global population crisis.....

[Alrock]

Chris Packham: 7.7 Billion People and Counting.....

Interesting programme, explained the situation quite well but shied away from any real solutions.

[orkneycadian]

Mibbies its time to get Greta Thunberg to switch her attention to the global population crisis.....

She might as well. All she seems able to do is rant at anyone older than her about how bad they have been, whilst tweeting away to all and sundry on her tech gadgets, contributing to the rise in energy demand of the internet.

[orkneycadian]

Interesting programme, explained the situation quite well but shied away from any real solutions.

Just like everyone else then? "Oh yes, we must (we = the Government) must do something about the increase in CO2 emissions caused by mankind, but oh no, we could't even dream of limiting the explosion in numbers of mankind - Lets have a School Strike - That will make all the difference"

[orkneycadian]

Interesting graphic;



Suggests that the number of cases approximately doubles every 2 days. Oh well, the entire global population will have it within 3 weeks. But with only a 2% mortality rate, its not going to do anything lasting to the population emergency.

[Gronnuck]

So for anyone trying to imagine the scale of the "population emergency", another Scotland has been added to the world since New Years Day.

Mibbies its time for the grubbiement to give notice that they will stop Child Benefit for all new-born children from one year hence. People might then reevaluate the planning of their families. Unfortunately this will do very little to change familial practices in many other areas of the world.

[Goodfellers]

What I find interesting is the way the virus has spread throughout the world. Useful information for the WHO for when a serious virus occurs.

Anyone remember Survivors tv series in the 70's about such a spread. I always thought I had the skills to survive if I was one of the lucky ones.

[orkneycadian]

BBC reporting that the number of cases today standing at about 12,000. So the approximation of the number of cases roughly doubling every 2 days still stands. Friday the 21st of February and the whole planet will have caught it! But then again, there was a Chinese nurse on some news sites about a week ago saying there was 90,000 cases. Who to believe.....

[Bill Fernie]

I googled - "will the virus change" and got this - https://www.sciencenewsforstudents.o...virus-outbreak

[orkneycadian]

Though the BBC are reporting officially 14000 cases today on https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-51345855 the same webpage suggests that the University of Hong Kong are estimating 75,000 in Wuhan alone. If so, then the doubling every 2 days is a day or 2 behind....

[988]

So, here's the thing. All of the deaths have been amongst heavy smokers developing complications such as Pneumonia etc, China is a country of very very heavy smoking. Good job Caithness folk do not partake in this disgusting habit ?

[orkneycadian]

So the one week China hospital is open for business and admitting patients. Now why can't Scotland do that? That's not a political question. I don't believe any political party, if in charge, could do that. We can learn a lot from the Chinese, when it comes to productivity.

[orkneycadian]

So one thing that it's puzzling me about the reporting of this coronavirus.

The mortality rate is being reported as being about 2%, that being the number if deaths divided by the number of reported cases. With the latest figures, that's about 700/34000

Given that the time between symptoms and death is on average 14 days (source = worldometers) although there were 41 days between the first reported case and the first reported death, should the true death rate not be total number of deaths to date divided by total number of cases 14 (or 41) days ago?

So 700 divided by, lets see, 2000. So a more realistic death rate of 35%?

According to worldometers, only 2,034 folk have actually recovered from it.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

Hang on, someone at the door asking me to open up. Saying they are delivering a Chinese takeaway? I never ordered a Chinese takeaway.........

[orkneycadian]

Seems that folk are cottoning on that deaths to date divided by cases to date is not an accurate measure. Worrldometers now report the death rate as being deaths to date divided by (deaths plus recoverees). Presently gives a mortality rate of 19%