I’m sure they can track where travelers have been to based on visas and other data embedded in the document. However, a customs/passport officer cannot hold anyone under quarantine. So even if someone came in from China, if there is no rule for quarantine ( for US citizens) then the disease would spread once the person walks around the airport. Let’s face it, self-quarantine? People will do what is in their best interest and not those of the community at large.
And I think it’s realistic that UPS/FedEx and other pilots who fly freight carriers are likely going to be rethinking their work plans. So much comes in these days from China. Mainly by boat, but also by air.
Honestly, it’s tough. There are no easy answers but having a plan is better than not having a plan and realizing after the fact that you should have made better decisions.
"The testing process to confirm coronavirus infection is speeding up in Hubei province, leading to a drop in the number of suspected cases in recent days but a marked increase in the number of confirmed patients with severe conditions…The number of patients with severe conditions increased by more than 400 cases each day for the past two days, most of them in Hubei province, data from the National Health Commission shows. These patients’ conditions usually worsen in the ninth to 12 days of their illness…
The National Health Commission eased the diagnosis criteria for coronavirus, designating patients with either fever or respiratory symptoms for diagnosis as suspected cases. The previous criteria also included pulmonary imaging showing infection symptoms… removing the pulmonary imaging requirement aims to increase the diagnosis ability of lower-tier hospitals that do not have CT imaging equipment." (Caixin Global)
"As of Tuesday, 74% of the 425 deaths caused by the virus in China were in Wuhan, the epicenter of the outbreak. The city, which has been under quarantine since Jan. 23, has recorded a fatality rate among those sickened by the fast-spreading disease of 4.9%, according to Jiao Yahui, an official with the National Health Commission. The broader Hubei region accounted for 97% of the national death toll with a fatality rate of 3.1%.
Nationwide, the death rate for the viral pneumonia is 2.1%. Excluding Hubei, the fatality rate of the disease in the rest of China was 0.16%, Jiao said Tuesday at a press briefing" (Caixin Global)
Article on vaccine creation - the gist is don’t get your hopes up for quick results.
I wonder how much of the low death rate outside of Hubei has to do with the amount of time it takes for a patient to worsen. IOW, not enough patients outside the original epicenter have gotten to the critical 9-12 day mark-the point at which a lot of patients take a serious turn for the worse-for people who eventually won’t make it to die. The recovery rate on the JHU counter has pretty consistently been running two recoveries for every death. This (in my totally uneducated in this stuff estimation) wouldn’t mean a fatality rate of 1/3 because dire cases are more likely to be included in the official count than mild cases, but also because I would imagine it takes a lot longer, on average, to declare patients recovered than for them, again on average, to succumb to the virus.
That said, I don’t think you can simply divide the number of cases by the number of fatalities to arrive at fatality statistics because so many people included in the diagnosed case are newly diagnosed.
Then again, I would expect that supportive medical care in places like the US is better than what the first patients in China received, particularly as the medical community has been learning about the progression of the disease.
73 new deaths which is a new daily record. That is 563 total deaths in China and 565 worldwide.
3,694 new cases in China which is down a few hundred from yesterday’s daily record. That’s a total of 28,018 confirmed cases throughout China and 28,261 worldwide.
Outside of China, 12 new cases in Japan (10 from the cruise ship) brings Japan’s count to 45, the most outside of China.
@Sue22 I think the JHU counter seems a little off. Like a lot of people are sick and many have not yet recovered. IF I lived in Wuhan, I would only go to the hospital as a last resort. So the sick count might be off as well. It is great that they have a counter at all, however.
I think we’ll know more in a couple of weeks. A small tweak in one direction can change the number enormously.
There’s an article I saw today that said that children appear to only get a mild form of the virus with symptoms no worse than a cold. This will probably will reduce the panic that would likely have ensued if children were hit hard. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/05/health/coronavirus-children.html
The scariest scenario I’ve seen is the people on that Princess Cruise in Japan who are quarantined in their cabins for two weeks. Many cabins don’t even have a window!
Taiwan bans all international cruise ships from docking on the island. It had earlier turned away the liner that is now docked in Hong Kong harbor with 3 confirmed cases.
"A Korean Air flight headed to Las Vegas from the South Korean capital, was diverted to Los Angeles on Wednesday over concerns that some of the passengers might have been exposed to a new virus, the airline said…after it was determined that the three passengers had been in China within 14 days of their departure from Incheon International Airport in Seoul. The three passengers, all US passport holders, were allowed back on the flight after showing no symptoms during a screening at Los Angeles International Airport, the airline said in statement. Officials didn’t say if the three had been to Wuhan. (Aljazeera)
10 additional passengers on the Diamond Princess cruise ship tested positive on Thursday, Japan time (in addition to the 10 on Wednesday). Sounds like the cruise from hell. Passengers are being told to stay in their rooms.
Nationalities: 4 Japanese, 2 each from the US and Canada, and 1 each from New Zealand and Taiwan. Five people in their 70s, four in their 60s and one in his or her 50s. Health officials now have the results of 102 tests conducted on 273 passengers. A total of twenty were positive. Wow, that is a high rate!
Schools in Shanghai ordered to remain closed through the end of February.
I have two things to add and I hope people don’t mind that they are both late in this fast moving thread!
First of all, I posted way back that there was a boy in our town with the virus. My source for that info was a board member of the hospital where the boy was seen. The board was told that he had Wuhan Coronavirus. (Why they would tell board members, I do not know.) It turned out that the sample had not been sent to the CDC yet. People just made assumptions based on travel to Wuhan, timing, and failure to find another cause for illness. The sample came back negative. I am sorry that I spread what turned out to basically be gossip! Will discount hospital board members info in future (they are not MD’s but business people so it could have been a misunderstanding).
The second thing is that I’ve been thinking about what happens when someone has multiple viruses.
I asked DH who said that wouldn’t be uncommon. Many cases of Wuhan Coronavirus are likely going undiagnosed because the protocol is to check for other diseases first and only go through the process for sending a sample to the CDC if there is no other explanation for illness. If it’s influenza, it gets chalked up to that. If a person has viral pneumonia, the specific virus is seldom discovered. I wonder if all patients with viral pneumonia will be more closely scrutinized now, or only if they have traveled to China . . .
Example of the far reaching economic impacts in a global economy:
“Chile has managed to avoid cases of the killer virus that’s disrupting business and industry 12,000 miles away in China. But the South American nation’s food exporters are certainly feeling the effects. Chinese purchases of Chilean food items have slumped 50% to 60% since the outbreak of coronavirus, according to government export promotion agency, ProChile. Cherries, wine and seafood are among the most affected items. About a third of all Chilean exports go to China.” (Bloomberg)
“If you go on a cruise, there is always a not insignificant chance that there will be a quarantine. Norovirus, anyone?”
Not for 2 weeks. Not after the cruise was scheduled to end. Not when there is very limited food on board because every other person is also in quarantine.
“They are in harbor so new food can be brought in.”
Yes. But still limited… understandably so. They are making sure no one starves but it’s pretty basic. If you happen to be quarantined after Norovirus but are feeling a bit better you are free to order a wide range range of food and drink as much as you want…your spouse can go get you treats etc…My point was this quarantine is in no way shape or form like the one people have experienced before.
My point was why would anyone ever want to go on a cruise? Environmentally unfriendly, germ filled, gluttonous activity… Sorry, but I don’t feel sorry for those pax stranded on the ship. I feel sorry for the US China plane evacuees now being held on military bases and those poor Wuhan residents who must stay indoors or cannot get back to their families and pets.
(And if you think norovirus is a cakewalk, think twice. According to the cited article, it is super contagious, so people fall ill in droves.