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  #1  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 7:06 PM
austlar1 austlar1 is offline
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How Is Covid-19 Impacting Life in Your City?

I am starting this thread here in City Discussions because I think it would be interesting and informative to learn about the impact of the corona-virus threat on a local level as the disease makes its way across the globe. How are folks reacting on a local level? What is the impact on daily life where you live?

Here in Austin there have been no reported cases yet. Two days ago it was announced that one possible case was being investigated, but there has been media silence since those initial reports.

The big news is that as of today the SXSW tech conferences, film, and music festival is still likely to happen. Major corporate sponsors and participants, including several tech giants, have pulled out, and a petition with over 30,000 signatures has been circulating asking the festival management to cancel the event, which draws in tens of thousands of attendees (overall attendance including music events is in the hundreds of thousands over 10 days) from around the country and the world in a normal year. Several newspapers, including the Houston Chronicle, have also editorialized in favor cancelling. The economic hit to Austin would be huge with a revenue loss of at least a third of a billion dollars estimated. SXSW officials and local politicians are cautiously optimistic and say the show will go on.

Meanwhile, life around here is happening as usual. A few germaphobes (mostly seniors like me) are taking precautions, but most people seem pretty convinced that they won't be impacted. I suspect that is likely to change a bit once we get our first few local cases. I was planning an April trip to NYC. Now I am not so sure that I want to go.

Anyway, hopefully others will jump in and post about what's going on in their neck of the woods as we head into uncharged territory with this scary bug. What are the medical, social, and economic implications in your home town?
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  #2  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 7:59 PM
dave8721 dave8721 is offline
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The Ultra electronic music fest was just cancelled.
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  #3  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:22 PM
park123 park123 is offline
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Restaurants in Manhattan are definitely slowing down. It’s not a collapse (yet), but it’s visibly less busy than 2 weeks ago, even though the weather is beautiful now. You hardly see any face masks, but whereas a week ago I would go the whole day without seeing even one mask, or maybe just a few, these last few days I definitely see people wearing masks here and there.
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  #4  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:27 PM
Obadno Obadno is offline
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For now the biggest impacts are in big convention center area

Orlando, Vegas etc. I would guess Seattle is looking pretty dead out there right now as the cases there keep ballooning.

Luckily the spread in the USA is quite limited still but I'd guess it will go up significantly in coming weeks.

Phoenix was one of the first cities to get a case but it was a Chinese national and we dont appear to have gotten any transmissions from him so there was no panic here.

yet.
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  #5  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:31 PM
iheartthed iheartthed is offline
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Originally Posted by park123 View Post
Restaurants in Manhattan are definitely slowing down. It’s not a collapse (yet), but it’s visibly less busy than 2 weeks ago, even though the weather is beautiful now. You hardly see any face masks, but whereas a week ago I would go the whole day without seeing even one mask, or maybe just a few, these last few days I definitely see people wearing masks here and there.
There aren't any face masks because you can't find them anywhere, lol.

Considering that the CDC has barely tested anyone, I have a feeling we've already been living with this virus in the U.S. for a while. All of these quarantines might be a futile effort.
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Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:47 PM
park123 park123 is offline
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Originally Posted by iheartthed View Post
There aren't any face masks because you can't find them anywhere, lol.

Considering that the CDC has barely tested anyone, I have a feeling we've already been living with this virus in the U.S. for a while. All of these quarantines might be a futile effort.
There have been videos of Asians being assaulted or cursed at for wearing masks in NYC, circulating in the various Asian communities here. You actually saw a lot of masks right after that lady in the CDC said we should all panic (this was about 1 week ago? Or maybe 2? I forgot). Then the masks came off. And now you see some people wearing them. Lots of Asian people for example keep masks. If you work in a hospital you can get them too I guess.
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  #7  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:49 PM
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On the transit side for the tristate area, NJ Transit along with MTA and Amtrak lines are encouraging cleaning protocols. Sanitizing the trains, NYC is cleaning the subway. Even buses as well, every 3 days.
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  #8  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:54 PM
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423 cases and 7 deaths here in France so far.

It makes much more noise than it should do all over the place, like some wimps get paranoid out here.
They're talking about canceling any event that would gather over 5k people indoor, things along these lines.

Bon, it's easy to be careless when you're healthy and you know it wouldn't kill you. You'd recover from it if you were healthy anyway.
In most cases, you wouldn't even realize whether you were infected or not. Your antibodies and whole immune system would just do the job for yourself, then you wouldn't even be aware.

That said, we are concerned about elders, 'cause that nasty thing that is likely to have come from a bat in Wuhan, China would likely be to kill a lot of them.
Who the hell eats bats by the way? I'm wondering. Especially when actually cooking it would've most definitely killed the virus messing up the world right now.

The very first person to be infected would have eaten a bat that wasn't even cooked enough!
Good Lord, that's disgusting! It is unbearable just to think about it.

Who wants some uncooked bat for dinner on here? Hey, uncooked bat for sale in my French luxury restaurant! Want some?
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  #9  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:58 PM
jd3189 jd3189 is offline
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California has a lot of cases, but it’s not affecting my daily activities.
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  #10  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:29 PM
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People are buying hand sanitizer and people who aren't buying hand sanitizer are joking about buying hand sanitizer. The director of the county health department, and the food writer for the local newspaper both recommended stocking up on a couple weeks' worth of food, and the paper published a handy guide.

Otherwise, rumors. The hospital is putting new screening procedures in place for all visitors, but rumors were going around yesterday that it had been confirmed there. Because the hospital was recently bought by a for-profit corporation that is busily driving it into the ground, people are genuinely scared to go there for treatment and are talking about going to Greenville, SC for care. The flu is still rampant here, and allergy season is getting ready to explode when the pollen does so I expect a lot more chaos within a month.

But it's fairly calm at the moment.
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  #11  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:37 PM
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We had our first case this week but the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo is going on as planned and not sure if less people are going. It usually draws in a couple million people.
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  #12  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:38 PM
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SXSW will only go on so they dont have to pay anybody back their money, next to nobody is going to show up though.

Seattle seems like it's being hit hard.
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  #13  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 8:59 PM
austin242 austin242 is offline
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I think you'd have to be irrational to cancel your travel plans because of this virus at the moment. The chances of you contracting it at the moment in the US
(considering 100 cases and the US pop) are 1:3,270,000. Death 1:32,700,000
At least in 2014 the likelihood of dying with HIV was 1:50,000
As well there is a 1:2,672,000 Chance of getting mauled to death by an animal.
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  #14  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 9:19 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by austin242 View Post
I think you'd have to be irrational to cancel your travel plans because of this virus at the moment. The chances of you contracting it at the moment in the US
(considering 100 cases and the US pop) are 1:3,270,000. Death 1:32,700,000
At least in 2014 the likelihood of dying with HIV was 1:50,000
As well there is a 1:2,672,000 Chance of getting mauled to death by an animal.
You're basing your math on the reported numbers. The actual numbers are many many many times more. No one is being tested.

In LA, you notice things are a bit quieter, more people wearing masks, but life going on. Just got to Vegas and it's the quietest I've seen it in a long time
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  #15  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 9:21 PM
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It hasn't had much effect here yet, though I am eating a lot fewer raw bats these days.
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  #16  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 9:23 PM
Gantz Gantz is offline
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Originally Posted by austin242 View Post
I think you'd have to be irrational to cancel your travel plans because of this virus at the moment. The chances of you contracting it at the moment in the US
(considering 100 cases and the US pop) are 1:3,270,000. Death 1:32,700,000
At least in 2014 the likelihood of dying with HIV was 1:50,000
As well there is a 1:2,672,000 Chance of getting mauled to death by an animal.
Well, the number of cases in the US is off by at least a factor of 20 if not more. The reason for the low number is simply because they are not testing, not because people are not getting sick. Even as we speak, there are people currently in hospitals, who exhibit all of the symptoms, who tested negative for flu and strep, and they are STILL not getting tested. This is the case in NYC. The number of deaths is also underestimated, as they just put "cause of death: pneumonia" without testing for covid-19 for 99.99% of cases. For people who can recover on their own, the doctors flat out say it to your face "We have ruled out everything else, I am 99% sure you have it, but we can't test you, so just self-quarantine yourself for a couple of weeks in your own house".
Also, I don't know about you, but if HIV spread via air I'd be freaking out....
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  #17  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 9:29 PM
austlar1 austlar1 is offline
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Originally Posted by Gantz View Post
Well, the number of cases in the US is off by at least a factor of 20 if not more. The reason for the low number is simply because they are not testing, not because people are not getting sick. Even as we speak, there are people currently in hospitals, who exhibit all of the symptoms, who tested negative for flu and strep, and they are STILL not getting tested. This is the case in NYC. The number of deaths is also underestimated, as they just put "cause of death: pneumonia" without testing for covid-19 for 99.99% of cases.
Also, I don't know about you, but if HIV spread via air I'd be freaking out....
^^^^This!! Thank you, Gantz. I don't want to start a flame over the severity of Covid 19, but the research out of China suggests that 20% of the known cases are considered "severe" enough to require hospitalization. Probably 10% of the hospitalized patients die. Most of the deaths are patients over 50 with additional health factors, but other hospitalized patients are often gravely ill for a period of two to four weeks. Even the less severe cases that don't require hospitalization can be quite incapacitating with high fever and severe bronchial symptoms that last around two weeks. Keep in mind that even "low risk" infected persons such as children require a minimum 14 day quarantine (usually at home) with minimal exposure to other persons. People that want to compare this to a flu epidemic are whistling in the dark.
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  #18  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 9:46 PM
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Originally Posted by austlar1 View Post
^^^^This!! Thank you, Gantz. I don't want to start a flame over the severity of Covid 19, but the research out of China suggests that 20% of the known cases are considered "severe" enough to require hospitalization. Probably 10% of the hospitalized patients die. Most of the deaths are patients over 50 with additional health factors, but other hospitalized patients are often gravely ill for a period of two to four weeks. Even the less severe cases that don't require hospitalization can be quite incapacitating with high fever and severe bronchial symptoms that last around two weeks. Keep in mind that even "low risk" infected persons such as children require a minimum 14 day quarantine (usually at home) with minimal exposure to other persons. People that want to compare this to a flu epidemic are whistling in the dark.
And even if you are young and fit, odds are you interact with people who aren't. Do you want to kill them with your virus? My in-laws who generally watch my kids a lot are over 70 and one has a compromised immune system due to cancer treatments. They would be pretty much goners if I brought that virus around them.
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  #19  
Old Posted Mar 6, 2020, 8:12 AM
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Originally Posted by austlar1 View Post
^^^^This!! Thank you, Gantz. I don't want to start a flame over the severity of Covid 19, but the research out of China suggests that 20% of the known cases are considered "severe" enough to require hospitalization. Probably 10% of the hospitalized patients die. Most of the deaths are patients over 50 with additional health factors, but other hospitalized patients are often gravely ill for a period of two to four weeks. Even the less severe cases that don't require hospitalization can be quite incapacitating with high fever and severe bronchial symptoms that last around two weeks. Keep in mind that even "low risk" infected persons such as children require a minimum 14 day quarantine (usually at home) with minimal exposure to other persons. People that want to compare this to a flu epidemic are whistling in the dark.
One virologist was on TV today saying he thought most Americans--in fact most people around the world--would eventually be exposed. In the US, with an overall mortality rate of even 1% (less than half what we are seeing in China which takes into account a large number of undiagnosed cases there and here and better average medical care here) and a population of 327 million, that's over 3 million deaths.

I am 74. I don't mind admitting I am pretty worried (and I'm a doctor--I am realistic about these things). At least one participant here has posted he is not bothered by the likelihood of millions of older people dying--we are an expense for social benefit systems. But the prospect isn't alluring.
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  #20  
Old Posted Mar 5, 2020, 10:17 PM
iheartthed iheartthed is offline
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Originally Posted by Gantz View Post
Well, the number of cases in the US is off by at least a factor of 20 if not more. The reason for the low number is simply because they are not testing, not because people are not getting sick. Even as we speak, there are people currently in hospitals, who exhibit all of the symptoms, who tested negative for flu and strep, and they are STILL not getting tested. This is the case in NYC. The number of deaths is also underestimated, as they just put "cause of death: pneumonia" without testing for covid-19 for 99.99% of cases. For people who can recover on their own, the doctors flat out say it to your face "We have ruled out everything else, I am 99% sure you have it, but we can't test you, so just self-quarantine yourself for a couple of weeks in your own house".
Also, I don't know about you, but if HIV spread via air I'd be freaking out....
There are absolutely way more people infected than is officially being reported. They had to retroactively update someone's cause of death in either Oregon or Washington because they realized it was COVID-19 after the fact. But the person died before they even suspected that there were people in the country who were infected other than those people evacuated from China and Japan.

Someone also posted a story on NYC Reddit about having flu-like symptoms after coming back from Japan in February, but the hospital was not authorized to test him for it by the CDC since Japan wasn't considered an outbreak zone at the time. They did rule out the flu and some other stuff, then released him. He said the hospital told him he could use public transit to go home, even though covid-19 was still a possibility. The day after he went to the hospital, Japan because one of the outbreak countries. His story was verified by the local news media.

And in early February I had a cough for about a week that I think was a mild case of bronchitis, which I've never had before. But the other day I was reading a summary of a mild covid-19 case that was observed on the Japanese cruise ship, and the symptoms were extremely similar to what I experienced. My symptoms were extremely mild so I didn't think much of it at the time. But, considering I've never had bronchitis before, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that I had a mild case of it.
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