#Breaking: In a press conference, the University of Hong Kong (HKU) Dean of Medicine Gabriel Leung said the best estimation on the infected number of the coronavirus disease from Wuhan is over 1300
— Kinling Lo 盧建靈 (@kinlinglo) January 21, 2020
CNN Q: Is the case of which 15 healthcare workers were infected from one patient, as announced last night, indicating a super spreading event?
Leung: cannot make a judgement due to incomplete info that I was able to access to and look at— Kinling Lo 盧建靈 (@kinlinglo) January 21, 2020
To quote every single article I’ve seen so far: And just in time for the mass migration during Lunar New Year, too!
(Mandatory disclosure: Yes, I am preternaturally interested in pandemics, so YMMV.)
CNN, this evening — “First US case of Wuhan coronavirus confirmed by CDC”:
The United States has its first confirmed case of a new virus that appeared in Wuhan, China, last month, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Tuesday. The coronavirus has already sickened hundreds and killed six people in Asia…
The patient, who is not being named, is in isolation at Providence Regional Medical Center in Everett, Washington. He is in his 30s and lives in Snohomish County, Washington, just north of Seattle. He had recently returned from Wuhan.
He arrived at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on January 15, before any health screenings for the Wuhan coronavirus began at US airports. He sought medical care on January 19. The CDC and Washington state are now tracing the people he was in contact with to see if he might have spread the disease to someone else…
The patient became ill four days after arriving in the United States and sought care. Based on the patient’s symptoms and travel history, doctors suspected the novel Wuhan coronavirus and sent specimens to the CDC in Atlanta, where tests Monday confirmed the virus.
The patient is faring well but is still being kept in isolation out of an abundance of caution, health officials said.
Soon, passengers from Wuhan to the United States, whether on direct or indirect flights, will only be allowed to land at one of the five US airports doing health screenings. Screenings include a temperature check and observation for symptoms such as a cough and trouble breathing.
Last weekend, the CDC started health screenings for Wuhan passengers arriving at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, Los Angeles International Airport and San Francisco International Airport. Starting this week, Wuhan passengers will also be screened at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport and Chicago O’Hare International Airport…
This is actually good news — authorities *have* learned from previous scares, and sensible precautions are being slotted into place with due speed.
The @WHO has also announced DG Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus will convene an Emergency Committee on the virus on Jan 22 in Geneva. This will determine whether the Wuhan coronavirus, which we now know spreads btwn humans, warrants an international response
— Elizabeth Law 思敏 (@lizzlaw_) January 20, 2020
Wuhan, the Chinese city where the new coronavirus was first detected, is taking new steps to contain it:
• Lunar New Year celebrations canceled
• Tour agencies banned from taking groups out of the city
• Increased screening
• Spot checks on vehicles https://t.co/Y2HJnTMJsA— CNN International (@cnni) January 21, 2020
The past 36 hours have just been an ever-escalating series of revelations about the Wuhan coronavirus in China. First we were told to expect more cases, then WAY MORE cases appeared. https://t.co/26C2Zopv6k
— Elizabeth Law 思敏 (@lizzlaw_) January 20, 2020
HKU Medicine Dean Gabriel Leung expects the current public health measures currently taken in response to the Wuhan coronavirus will be able to lower 60 – 90 % of the spreading of the disease.
— Kinling Lo 盧建靈 (@kinlinglo) January 21, 2020
This marks the 3rd #breaking in 1.5 hrs on Wuhan coronavirus: Taiwan records its first confirmed case of infection. The female patient in her 50s worked in Wuhan.
— Kinling Lo 盧建靈 (@kinlinglo) January 21, 2020
Yesterday when I was traveling from Beijing to Shanghai and reporting on the trip only 1/10 ppl were wearing masks; rn in one subway car from where I sit 1/3 are. Awareness increasing as ~300 cases being reported. #WuhanCoronavirus pic.twitter.com/BS46ulJrSC
— Fu Beimeng? (@BeimengFu) January 21, 2020
An Australian traveler has been placed in isolation following a trip to China, prompting fears that the Wuhan virus has now spread outside of Asia.https://t.co/8liEtteb5p#Queensland #WuhanPneumonia #wuhanvirus #Wuhan #WuhanSARS #WuhanCoronavirus #coronavirus #virus #SARS2
— Young Bhartiya Foundation (@YoungBhartiya) January 21, 2020
China
Drugmakers’ Shares Surge, Travel Stocks Fall as #WuhanPneumonia #ChinaPneumonia #WuhanCoronavirus Outbreak Worsens@WSJ https://t.co/olCSZmaNZr
— Paul Whiting Walker (@CellosSuits) January 21, 2020
Since the weekend, we’ve seen a significant uptick in news about the Wuhan virus outbreak. But many Chinese continue to remain cynical about veracity. Why? An attempt at making sense of it: https://t.co/qii1KyAMoU pic.twitter.com/OL2LhF61Xo
— Elizabeth Law 思敏 (@lizzlaw_) January 20, 2020
GOP defender & ambulatory cream cheese sculpture (h/t B.Cracker) finds the SILVER LINING!
"Please God send us a plague to divert attention from bad publicity for Dear Leader" is totally normal too https://t.co/Y0iK78XhEE
— Cathy Young (@CathyYoung63) January 21, 2020
Jeffro
F Hugh Hewitt
Also Pam Bondi, who just did some major Fox News poseur work right now in the impeachment trial
Villago Delenda Est
What we need is a virus that targets Rethuglicans.
hells littlest angel
Has Trump blamed this on Obama yet?
sab
Husband just TOLD me about this today. I mentioned that I had mentioned it to him last week and he was unconcerned.
It does seem that the Chinese are taking this seriously, and more importantly, reporting it to other health services. Epic change from their disgraceful non-performance during SARS outbreak.
joel hanes
Republicans have been cutting the federal and state budgets for public health administration for decades.
trollhattan
Can Trump fly from Davos to Bejing and hang with Xi for awhile? He wants to be out of town on executive time, and now seems like a great opportunity. See some countryside. Visit some cities. The usual.
Steeplejack
Huh. Just got home from Sighthound Hall a little while ago and met a little red fox crossing Threadkill Lane in front of my building. Don’t see that every day, especially in this mixed apartment/suburban neighborhood. I hope it was on its way to one of the nearby parks.
ETA: Fox did not appear to have Wuhan virus.
trollhattan
Surprised Hewitt didn’t note this is a great time to kill Obamacare forever.
Major Major Major Major
you should check out Wanderers by Chuck Wendig.
sab
My spouse is one of five surviving siblings. Two of them are in hospital with extremely seroius conditions.
If my sistrer wants to waltz in for a visit from China this week I don’t know what I will do, but it won’t be pretty or legal.
She is probably in China this week, what with New Years. She better wait through infectious disease times.
Also Happy New Year! Go rats! We had a pet rat. She was awesome. Or at least friendly and sweet. I was very fond of her. She was bred to get cancer, so of course she did. Medical bastards.
dmsilev
@Villago Delenda Est: I’ve heard of brain-eating viruses, but a brainless-eating virus is a new one.
TomatoQueen
@Steeplejack: There was a colony of red fox occasionally seen at the pond in the Mark Center complex, behind the Hilton. As it’s supposed to be a wildlife preserve in there, maybe yours was/is a refugee from there. I don’t see how they’d survive this traffic tho’.
Kent
Why am I getting a picture of Barron Trump on the “From the Web” links right above the comment box on this page? Is anyone else seeing Barron?
Anyway, I’m not yet certain what to think about this new virus. The big killers are not these epidemics, it’s things like heart disease and cancer. I think the last time we had a massively deadly epidemic was the 1918 flue which killed between 50 and 100 million or 3-5% of the earth’s population.
chopper
crazy overseas virus during a reelection year, huh. i’m sure the msm is gonna give this the same go they did with obama and EBOLA IS COMING RIGHT FOR US!
John Revolta
OMG we’re all gonna die and I haven’t seen the new James Bond yet
Major Major Major Major
Wuhan Coronavirus (typo in post title?) is also just a fantastic name for a dystopian pandemic/panic. Kudos to the writers.
Mike J
It’s ok, I don’t drink Mexican beer.
dmsilev
@Kent:
He’s an expert in the cyber, remember?
The Dangerman
@trollhattan:
Can we convince him Wuhan Women are easy (Woohoo!)?
Adam L Silverman
@hells littlest angel: Stephen Miller is drafting the Executive Order closing the country to all immigrants, tourists, business travelers, etc.
Steeplejack
@TomatoQueen:
I live near Seven Corners in Falls Church. Lake Barcroft is about a mile away, and there are a couple of parks closer than that, but my cul-de-sac is definitely not a “random wildlife” street.
Steeplejack
@Kent:
“From the Web” is an ad portal (ZergNet), not a blog feature.
Citizen Alan
@Kent: It killed 3-5% of the world population at a time when most of Europe still traveled by horse & buggy. I shudder to think how bad the Spanish Flu could have been if international air travel had been as prevalent then as it is today.
mrmoshpotato
@Mike J: I see what you did there, and it’s terrible.
jimmiraybob
Yeah yeah. Get in line.
We’re fighting the Trumpenvirus.
Ninedragonspot
Hey, you know who isn’t a member of the WHO? Taiwan, that’s who. It’s membership in the organization is blocked by you-know-who. During the 2003 SARS crisis there were 668 cases of SARS in Taiwan, of which 181 were fatal. Taiwan was frozen out of the WHO back then as well.
Taiwan has 23 million people and is an important traffic hub in the region. They have experienced scientists and doctors. Maybe we shouldn’t be letting politics get in the way of global health.
Chacal Charles Calthrop
NYC just shut down 1st Avenue “for an ambulance” for some minutes according to the policeman stopping traffic on my street. (The honking was something else so I went out to see what all the fuss was about.) I joined a small crowd on the street corner. Presently a flotilla of police cars escorted an ambulance up 1st Avenue and then it was reopened to traffic.
if you take a taxi from JFK into Manhattan one easy way is to head into the island across the Williamsburg bridge & then go up 1st Avenue. JFK is one if the airports where they are screening for the Wigan virus.
Is it irresponsible to speculate? It would be irresponsible not to….
Kent
@Steeplejack: No, I know. I’m just wondering if everyone gets the Barron or if something in my browsing history makes some ad algorithm think I am uniquely Barron-curious or something.
Because really…I’M NOT!! I don’t want to know anything about Barron. Please make him go away!
Steeplejack (phone)
@Kent:
I’ve been getting Barron today, as well as “Things Only Americans Find Attractive.”
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Major Major Major Major
@Chacal Charles Calthrop: eek
karen marie
@Villago Delenda Est: We already have – it’s known as “prion disease.”
h/t Charlie Pierce
SectionH
Well, just went to my Twitter feed, and saw this comment re Hewitt’s bilge from our old friend Soonergrunt:
When you love Trump more than you love America, you hope for things like an infectious disease outbreak to take people’s attention away from Trump’s misconduct. Since Coronavirus isn’t as bad as he hoped, Hugh will have to pin his hopes on a terrorist attack.
Mnemosyne
@Steeplejack:
Every street is a random wildlife street. You’re just not usually lucky enough to spot it.
?
Villago Delenda Est
Maybe we should hope that Rethug Senators will recall they swore an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic, which includes Donald.
Roger Moore
@Mnemosyne:
Yeah, but the quality of wildlife varies a lot from place to place. For example, I’m pretty sure most neighborhoods back east don’t get bears and mountain lions the way ones here in Southern California do.
danielx
@hells littlest angel:
Counting 3, 2, 1…..
Major Major Major Major
@Roger Moore: no mountain lions in the state, but boy do we have rats.
Ninedragonspot
@Villago Delenda Est: Not sure I’m following you. Taiwan is blocked by China from participating in the WHO.
Steeplejack
@Mnemosyne:
Thank you, Mark Trail.
smike
@Major Major Major Major: I was trying to make a link for that name, Wuhan. It inspires a most definitely great band name:
Wutang Coronavirus Pandemic.
Mary G
They are still going in the Senate? I thought MoscowMitch backed down on the 12-hour days? They are all still there voting. Everything 53-47 straight party lines. I missed Roberts telling both sides to be more civil.
Arclite
Coronavirus 2020: Better than Trump!
Mary G
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Mary G: they just started debating another amendment, with up to two hours of debate, sounds like Schiff is losing his voice
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Major Major Major Major: You have rats because you don’t have mountain lions.
Mary G
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: They are on the last motion, and the time for argument isn’t being used. Schiff just trashed the idea of having Hunter Biden testifying. His voice has recovered a bit.
Mary G
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Happy birthday (hope I’m remembering it right that it’s today.)
JWR
@Mary G: Schiff has been great throughout. Nadler, too! Also, according to The Guardian live blog, Ms. “oh so concerned and perplexed” Collins voted with the Dems to call Bolton.
JWR
Annd, it’s over. 11th and last amendment voted down 53-47. Gotta say, the Republicans have done a bang-up job (covering up) for Trump.
AxelFoley
Wu Tang Virus? WTF?
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@sab: Rats! (And sorry about your lovely rat friend.) Monsieur Colette and I were both born in a Rat year. I just read him some of the supposed rat characteristics, personality traits, and quirks, and we agree that they could hardly be more unlike the two of us if someone deliberately set out to describe our opposites.
ETA: wishing the best to your inlaws.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Mary G: Thanks, it’s today.
Amir Khalid
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:
Amazing but true: Chinese astrology doesn’t work any better than Western astrology.
WaterGirl
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I just woke up to the news that this is still going on. People can’t watch it in the middle of the night – why did the Dems push to continue rather than start again tomorrow?
I am perplexed.
WaterGirl
@Mary G: If we’re not arguing, then aren’t we
losinggiving up? I am very confused.WaterGirl
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Has anyone sung to you yet?
Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday, dear B-i-l-l, Happy birthday to you!
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@Amir Khalid: Yeeee-up. I have a couple of friends – well-educated, sophisticated, and otherwise secular – who truly, deeply believe in astrology. One is Chinese, the other Russian and a follower of western astrology. I’ve asked both of them repeatedly by what mechanism they think the stars or birth year or whatever could govern our fates, despite the fact that stars have infinitesimal gravitational or electromagnetic effects on earth, far less than (to choose a random example) your damned cell phone. The only thing either of them can say is “because everything is connected.”
I give up. It’s woo. It’s like Trumpies (which neither of them is): how can you argue rationally with an irrational belief?
JWR
@WaterGirl:
Ha ha! “Perplexed” was the word Susan Collins used to describe her consternation over why the House didn’t include the Parnas evidence in their trial, even though that trial had already concluded. She is such a frickin fraud.
bemused senior
@Roger Moore: my sister in Charlottesville gets bears in her back yard.
?BillinGlendaleCA
Well that’s a way to end my 60th b-day, a 3.6 earthquake.
WaterGirl
@JWR: If a = b, and b = c, does that make me Susan Collins?
If so, pistols at dawn!
Plus, my perplexation :-) is real, and hers is not!
piratedan
well, if the Dems do prevail in the 2020 election… I wouldn’t have an issue if they wanted Schiff for AG. It keeps our Senate roster clean and I think that he is pissed enough by what he’s seen to really clean house… Unless he’s pining for DF’s Senate slot, I think he would be an excellent choice for not only restoring pride to the office, I actually think he’s enough of a stickler to also go after Dems that do not play by the rules. I want my AG to not only enforce the law, but also to obey the spirit of the law.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@WaterGirl: That took care of the singing at Panda Inn on Sunday.
Panda Inn is owned by the same company as Panda Express, in fact the first Panda Express was in the Glendale Galleria.
WaterGirl
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Just now? Yikes?
If this was Balloon Juice After Dark, I would make some tasteless joke about birthday sex and you just thinking it was an earthquake.
Since it’s not, I will return to saying “yikes!” I have never experienced an earthquake, but I’m sure it’s disturbing at a very basic level.
WaterGirl
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Ah, so I am a day late and a dollar short?
SectionH
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Oh my… well Happy Belated anyway.
CarolDuhart2
@bemused senior: Not surprising anymore. We are building further and further out where the bears are, and with the loss of habitat, is the loss of food. So they are now looking in both their old places and not finding enough anymore, so they are ranging further and further into town.
I feel sorry for them, for barring a catastrophe that makes people abandon those homes and go back in the center city, they don’t have a chance to go back to the way of life and prey they once had.
JWR
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Yikes! A 3.6 near Granada Hills? Every time one happens out in the valley, I start to worry about whether another Northridge or Sylmar event might be in our future.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@WaterGirl: Heard some rumbling and then a quick jolt, 3.6 is a small earthquake and about 15 miles away.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@WaterGirl: Well yes, the kid paid for dinner, so don’t worry about the dollar short part.
@SectionH: Thanks.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@JWR: I think it’s around where the Sylmar quake was almost 50 years ago, 4km NNE of Granada Hills.
prostratedragon
Quiet nights in the Senate … soft music … the people sitting on their balalaikas, playing their samovars …
SectionH
@?BillinGlendaleCA: You probably don’t remember the Easter 7.something around Mexicali, but San Deigans do. Because it rocked and rolled here for a long time. 30+ seconds. Which does seem like a loooonngg time.
What was new to me (I knew from earthquakes because I was born and lived until I was 4 right around the New Madrid fault. And yes, we were used to things shaking occasionally.) – let me say again what was new to me were the aftershocks. Because the fault lines are split down here, so it’s different. I could HEAR the sound of earth moving, hear it coming, and then it hit the house like a ginormous truck BAM!!!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@SectionH: Was that 2010? That was just before I moved to this place, I was still in Glendale then.
opiejeanne
We watched Contagion today, in honor of the first case of this coronavirus in the US. The patient is just 23 miles away from us and after watching that movie, I think I’m going to stay inside for a couple of months.
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Happy Birthday, Bill. A 3.6 is just a little celebratory shake in honor of your natal day.
Hob
@Citizen Alan:
Given that the 1918-1920 epidemic managed to spread across pretty much the entire world, I’m not sure more efficient travel would’ve made as much difference as you think. Boats and trains did an adequate job of getting it to heavily populated areas.
SectionH
@?BillinGlendaleCA: It was 2010. Weirded me out, because I’d never had a rolling quake going on.
After that, the Julian fault started letting go (yes we can has multiple ways to let the earth move down here, I mean the faultline you pay attention to your way isn’t simple here). We’ve got 3 fault lines. Julian is not polite: it slams into you – BAM! But, your pictures JUMP a bit, and then you go back to sleep. I did take notes about how that bit of the fault is its thing. Otoh, it went on for months.
Srsly scary thing? You can hear it coming…
Joey Maloney
@Villago Delenda Est: Republicanism is the virus. (To be fair, noted civic health researcher Charles P. Pierce says it’s a prion disease.)
Anne Laurie
My semi-industrialized, intersection-of-two-major-highways neighborhood did get a visit from a moose, a couple years back. When animal control was summoned, it escaped between the tire sales outlet and the big-box chainstore warehouse…
Anne Laurie
See following post. Basically, McConnell wanted to cut short the Dems’ various amendments to do basic stuff like ‘present documents’ and ‘call witnesses’ — which, by the rules, he could’ve done if the chamber was dismissed overnight. The Democrats called his bluff.
(Actually, we knew this was gonna happen by Monday night; that’s when McConnell decreed the mandatory 24-hour debate would run for three 8-hour days instead of two 12-hour days.)
Anne Laurie
I feel sorry for your mountain lions, who are pretty much trapped. On the other hand, here on the East coast, naturalists say that black bears (like whitetail deer) have actually benefited from human settlement — apart from our prodigious garbage-producing capacities, we clear dense forest to provide the kind of ‘edge’ territory that bear food (deer, rabbits, carrion, berry bushes) prefers.
SectionH
@Joey Maloney: Pierce is almost right: it’s the Republican plague. Not merely a tiny disease,
EmbraceYourInnerCrone
The different types of quakes were a revelation when I moved to Long Beach in the nineties. The first one I ever felt was a small rolling quake during dinner that felt like a wave. The light fixture swayed gently. The Northridge quake was terrifying because it was 430am and it only lasted about 20 seconds but felt like forever. Fun fact the Anchorage quake lasted 4 minutes and was I think a 9.
Matt McIrvin
So we just got back from Singapore and my wife seems to have caught a nasty cold there. I was feeling paranoid but I think if it was the Wuhan virus, she’d be a LOT sicker than she is. (And Singapore seems to have only a few suspected cases, and is on top of airport screening in their typically quasi-authoritarian way.)
WaterGirl
@Anne Laurie: Late getting back to the thread, but thank you!
EmbraceYourInnerCrone
@Roger Moore: I live in suburban Connecticut and every spring and summer we have problems with backyard invading bears. The CT DEEP estimates there are about 800 bears in the state. They are always having to remind people not have backyard bird feeders and outside feeding for their dogs as it attacks bears.
We don’t have native mountain lions but one was hit and killed on the local freeway here a few years ago. It’s DNA indicated it originated in South Dakota I believe. We also have coyotes (in my neighborhood) as well as deer, turkey, possum, raccoons, skunks, woodchucks, and the occasional fisher, which by the way will scare the crap out of you the first time you hear one. Oh and the black and the white squirrel variants of the common grey squirrel.
EmbraceYourInnerCrone
@Anne Laurie: We have no moose, but we did have a runaway bull running with the local deer herd for a year!
J R in WV
@WaterGirl:
I experienced an earthquake, many years ago. I was in an old PU Truck, crossing the river into town on a bridge. At first I thought a big tow of barges had hit the bridge, but then learned it was an earthquake some 30 or 40 miles east of Charleston.
Very glad I wasn’t underground in a coal mine for that experience. No one was hurt, no collapses, but imagine the stress of being underground and having the earth move!
Villago Delenda Est
@Ninedragonspot: I’m not contesting that. I’m pointing out that wishing politics out of this is something of a pipe dream. The powerful will use whatever leverage they can to create fear to help them control the masses.
Ninedragonspot
@Villago Delenda Est: A pipe dream along the lines of “villago delenda est”?
lynno
So what will be the result of this virus in some child infected with measles?
Emma
@sab: late to the post, sorry, but the CCP is only sort of serious now that sick international travelers are getting in the news. Notice how all the public health work is being done by Hong Kong and Taiwan, rather than the PRC’s version of the CDC. Btw, there’s also an HIV/AIDS epidemic in the PRC that no one talks about, and the CCP would like it to stay that way, thanks very much.