It’s interesting to read the snippets of data below the list of affected countries and their data at Worldometers.info. Most recent at the top. It has descriptions of hundreds of cases and deaths in dozens of countries, age, preexisting conditions, nationality, who they caught it from, etc. Many of them were healthy and young, though most of them were elderly to start with. We need to wait for tables by country to show rates of mortality by age. Italy can assure one that those dying with coronavirus are in nearly every case dying as a direct result of having coronavirus. The doctors dying in their thirties of coronavirus in Italy may have died because of the high viral load they were exposed to, but that might mean that mortality in the young would skyrocket if large numbers of people incubating the disease infect those around them. We don’t have enough data yet to know. Many countries and smaller entities have no incentive to be transparent. The UAE suspended all flights from Korea and Thailand. Why? Korea you can see, but Thailand is not supposed to have a big problem with it. But why would a sophisticated country like the UAE put it in the same category as Korea unless it had information indicating that it was a wise measure?

We don’t get a redo on this. If we just take all reports at face value, we may be sorry, but at that time it would no longer be possible to control it as well as if we go all Singapore now. Italy was very advanced and civilized: now it’s shut down: over a thousand new cases today. It has passed a law saying that anyone who breaks quarantine and that results in a death, will be charged with murder and receive a minimum 21 year sentence. Singapore imposes a jail term and the equivalent of a hundred thousand dollar fine for breaking quarantine. Singapore went strict immediately and had had great success in controlling both cases and deaths. Italy started off humane and calm, but has had to do an about-face because of the tragically-changed circumstances. We need to pay attention and act accordingly. I am not willing to write off anyone’s death as no great loss. And for the little it’s worth, I was incorrect when I said MIssouri only had two cases. Now we have four.

On "Any Questions" Radio 4 BBC last night, it was stated that some younger people in Italy were ignoring the lock-down and going out. They calculated that they were unlikely to suffer badly from the virus. Someone on the panel said young people should consider the dangers to old people created by their actions. My thinking is, why should the younger generation have their education and other needs of growing up disrupted in order to give us oldies another few years of dementia? Is this what most of the older generation expect from their grandchildren? I do think the world is now upside-down.

I am glad AofA is posting a more important story instead of far right fear mongering in opposition to vaccines. Special education students especially from those in poor families who are missing school is a serious issue that needs a resolution. Low income kids will not have their school lunch during the school closures in may states and even foreign countries another issue that needs resolving.

Pft,

You seem to be saying that currently undiagnosed cases, mild or subclinical, if identified, would dilute the impact of the serious and fatal cases. It would, but with so many contracting, suffering, and dying from it, you’d have to say it depended on your point of view.

According to the latest figures at Worldometer.info, as of today there have been 134,511 diagnosed cases; 4,970 deaths; 68,915 have recovered; 60,626 have active cases now; of these, 54,632, or 90%, are mild, and this percentage is rising every day; 5,994, or 10%, have serious or critical cases, again, going down, it was 18% just last week, 73,885 cases have had an outcome; 68,915, 93%, have recovered or been discharged from the hospital; 4,970, or seven percent, have died.

You can say that the vast majority of the cases so far are still active and maybe enough will recover that it will change the seven percent mortality in cases with an outcome. But it is a horrifyingly high mortality regardless of its possibly coming down somewhat when more cases have reached a final outcome.

Bob,

I think we need to cooperate in handling this new situation. No one knows how long it will last. Even tropical countries are being hit. But not adapting will cost lives. There was a graph this morning at the Twitter account of either Luz Sprecht or Helen Branswell with lines showing the increase in coronavirus cases and deaths: four colored lines, the top one showing the numbers with no use of protective equipment, cancellations, quarantine, travel bans and so on. It was high. The others showed the increase when containment measures were 25, 50, and 75 percent implemented, and the differences were dramatic. Very low incidence with 75 percent implementation.

The Atlantic today had an article about people’s resistance to cooperate based on a dismissal of coronavirus as only killing the elderly. Where does this come from? Just on the face of it, it is shameful to be willing to throw older people overboard to die a painful and terrifying death. But aside from the immorality and lack of compassion and human decency of this attitude, a large percentage of critical and fatal cases are occurring in much younger people, many healthy young adults in their thirties and some in their twenties.

Are there not parallels in this to our indignation at how many of the autistic are marginalized and written off for the “greater good”? Should we not accept with good humor the cancellation of classes and programs for our autistic children while this crisis lasts? Every human being is capable of contracting and transmitting the virus.

After writing to Cecily’s buddy this morning saying I didn’t think it was safe for her to attend the trivia night because of the large number of people congregating, I got an email from the group leader saying it had been cancelled, which was very wise. I think the girl forwarded my email to him, and he realized that not only would he not want to enable people getting the virus, but he may have thought he or the group might be legally liable at this point in the global pandemic.

Here in Missouri, even though the federal laws are theoretically applicable here, in practice they are not and no special ed student gets anything from the public schools after twelfth grade. They go to Voc Rehab, the ACT pre-employment program which my daughter is finishing now, or, if they are unlikely to get a job, a sheltered workshop or a day program with activities and outings.

I am apprehensive about letting her continue going, even though it’s just for a few hours three times a week. As I said, she’s been wearing mask and gloves when she goes. She would be extremely unhappy if she didn’t have that outlet.

However, we’ve got to flatten the curve and control the bulge of new infections and deaths. This is another Home Front and it’s vitally important that everyone do their part in flattening the curve, which is all we can do now. It’s hard to think of things my daughter could do. She can’t or won’t read books independently, can’t follow the story lines of books, movies, or videos. We started to play checkers the other day, but after ten minutes we were both bored and we stopped. She doesn’t like any board or card games. Sometimes she works puzzles and she is a very good artist. She likes the online games at the public television website. She likes crafts and we have a lot of Annie’s Girls Club kits she hasn’t done yet. We’ve been doing old Jane Fonda exercise videos together. She’s an excellent cook and makes nearly all our suppers now. I give her a recipe and two hours later, voila, a meticulously prepared and beautifully presented final dish. I recently ordered a subscription to Ladybug magazine for her, for children three to six. We got it when she was that age and now we’re getting it again and she loves it. I also ordered their science magazine Click for the same age range. If we are quarantined, we’ll cope with it.

I saw a video last night on YouTube by a doctor in Italy who said that it’s increasingly young people who are affected, that he had seen a twenty year old go into respiratory collapse.

While the bishop gave the instructions last week that I mentioned for making Mass safer, the Newman Center, our university church, still had a lot on its schedule. Last night Father Rich sent an email saying that the Lenten Day of Reflection had been cancelled due to coronavirus concerns. My daughter has been participating in Best Buddies, a group with programs and partners for the autistic. My daughter’s buddy was looking forward to going to Puerto Rico for spring break in a service trip sponsored by her Methodist church. Best Buddies is having a trivia night tonight. Yesterday the girl asked if Cecily was going and said yes, she was still going to PR. I emailed saying I didn’t think C should go to the trivia night, that that would be a lot of people at the event, a contagion vector, and there are undoubtedly a lot of people here who have and could transmit the virus, but have no symptoms yet. She wrote back late last night while I was reading about the pandemic in bed on my cell phone. She said classes at the university had all been changed to online classes because of coronavirus and she would be going home to be with her family at this time. She said the trip to PR had been cancelled.

I talked to my Panamanian friend in St. Louis Tuesday evening, who told me about the first cases in Panama that day, one death. She said there were empty shelves in St. Louis stores, which hasn’t happened here (yet).

We need to make the adjustment to pandemic mode. It would be inappropriate for anyone to say it’s silly and resist implementing behaviors which will save lives by slowing down transmission, flattening the curve. People should stay home as much as possible, going out only for their jobs, food, and things from the drug store. Wearing personal protection equipment. Everyone has to do it now. Sort of like Loose lips sink ships, the vital importance of behaviors at an individual level, the modern meme for which is Stay the f- home.