Turn it round, why are the people most hysterical about leaving the EU (and stockpiling for a no deal brexit) the ones most complacent about a potentially devastating pandemic?

It's important to understand how this could go if it goes badly. Most viral outbreaks, even most pandemics, do not turn out to be orders of magnitude worse than seasonal flu. But every so often one comes along which is much much worse. And you can never tell without the benefit of hindsight how this will turn out. Although you can say that COVID-19 is one of the best candidates in a while to be in that later group.

We have people comparing this to drowning, i.e constant risk events. A virual outbreak grows exponentially, so it is a nonsensical comparison.

One thing we can predict is the responses.

I mean inevitably if this thing does fizzle there will be an absolute gloatfest with people completely ignoring the 'low risk' part of the 'low risk high impact' event. And if it does turn out to be high impact across the world people will be like 'we could never have seen this coming' or 'broken clocks' e.c.t.

I would do neither.

On the topic of the WHO, as with all UN agencies, the concern is corruption:

https://www.globalresearch.ca/politics-corruption-who/5702045

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/jan/18/senior-world-health-organization-official-accused-of-using-ebola-cash-to-pay-for-girlfriends-flight-corruption-racism-sexism

https://fortune.com/2019/01/18/united-nations-world-health-organization-misconduct-discrimination/

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-02-17/coronavirus-who-underfunded-internal-corruption-allegations/11970382

"Spanish Influenza - A new name for an old disease"

"very low percentage of fatalities - not over one death out of every four hundred"

Perhaps it's an acceptance amongst moderates/Remainers that Covid-19 is a natural disease that we can take measures against but ultimately nature will do as nature will do.

Brexit is a human-driven piece of idiocy whereby rights, protections & jobs will be/have been lost for the sake of dogma-laden right-wing ideology.

The first one accuses the WHO of being alarmist and exaggerating the risk of pandemics in order to get more funding from national governments (LOL!)

The 2nd one is mostly about racism in the WHO against blacks.

The 3rd one I cannot read.

The 4th one says that the WHO is chronically underfunded.

I assume you just did a quick google search about WHO corruption, but still the links you provided don't add anything to your 'argument'.

Saint has admited he wanted brexit to go badly wrong so that he can enjoy watching people be ironically punished.

Don't project that pathalogical attitude onto other people though. I have alot of elderly relatives with underlying health problems. If I catch this I have a very good chance of being fine, if they catch it I'd be very worried it would finish them off. I'm desperately hoping this does not turn out to be a pandemic and we can still stop this.

I also happen to think that alarm is not currently the main issue. Panic is seriously counterproductive but so is complacency, and I see little of the former and alot of the later.

Yes, that's a proper concern. We are not there yet though.

But the thing to enphasise is this could take off any day. What happened in Italy could happen here. And the thing to keep in mind is, that if it takes off tommorow in the UK then the 'seed' would have been planted potentially weeks ago.

They are in Italy however - a fifth elderly person has died in Italy. In any contagion, it is going to be those who are already infirm or elderly who are most at risk (usually - Spanish flu was slightly different in that respect).

Even in Italy the vast majority of people is still not infected and people and the authorities can now take the appropriate measures. Most people here could take appropriate measures if something similar starts happening, while doing what you did a month ago for no good reason would have resulted in far more harm.

Also there have been people in their twenties who have died. Mostly health workers (higher viral load?), but the mortality rate amongst the young/middle aged healthy adult population is much much higher than regular flu.

Oh, Q, you'd no doubt be freaking out if you worked in my school - one of the teachers has come back from a week in Japan and he's teaching as usual today. I predict absolutely nothing will happen.

What harm came of my actions?

Any harm from my actions was minimal and puts me in a better position if/when it kicks off here.

You are being irritatingly combative today.

Nobody is being complacent. You are misunderstanding people's position, and probably just so you can score more debating points.

At this stage there is nothing sensible anyone in the UK can do about Covid-19 apart from weighing up future travel plans based on a best guess about how this outbreak will develop.  Nothing else makes any sense unless you want to stock up on tinned food and basics, just in case.  I will keep listening to and reading the WHO bulletins and wait for the NHS to issue guidelines as and when they deem it necessary. In the background the NHS is very aware of the threat and is preparing, as you'd expect.

We are in our sixties and therefore theoretically at greater risk but what's the point in worrying about it?  

Are you serious? If most people followed your example and stopped social activity a month ago, there would have been a big impact on the economy with people losing their jobs etc.

And to follow up: you are a maths guy, say Monday next week the UK is where Italy is today. What would be the chance you were infected (symptom free)?

Someone once said that the behaviours of the stock market tell us that there are people buying and selling and both believing they're doing the right thing when in most cases only one of them is, but which one....

🙂

Comparing the mortality with drowning or describing it as 'just like the flu' is complacency.

Today?

In terms of economic activity my actions have had minimal impact. The idea was to minimize human contact while keeping everything else as much the same as possible. Yes more luxury type purchases have decreased, but in terms of essentials not much has changed at all.

I doubt I was being so simplistic.

You have said explicitly, multiple times, that you want the 'gammons' who voted for brexit to suffer financially for what they did. Others will be able to confirm that you have on many occasions expressed an almost sadistic desire to see brexiters ironically punished for their vote.

No, it was providing a useful reference point.

For most people it seems to be less of an issue than flu; more akin to the common cold.  We don't know enough yet about the risks to be making predictions of doom and gloom.  

Given the behaviour of Covid-19 it seems probable that it is here to stay. If that's the outcome then you're going to have to adjust your response to the threat: you can't spend your life trying to create a little protective bubble around yourself, so what are you going to do?  Answering that might give you a more balanced perspective on the threat.