There is already a lockdown in place in Italy and other European countries will follow suit if required.

Well, at least there is good news for rare species like the pangolin:

"China's top legislative committee has begun deliberating a proposal to ban all trade and consumption of wild animals, a practice believed responsible for the country's deadly coronavirus outbreak.

The official Xinhua news agency said the proposal was submitted to the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC), which is currently set to start its session next month, but is expected to postpone."

So much online shopping these days means so many delivery drivers around and people ordering uber eats etc. Cab drivers would also be a perfect way to spread it, and care workers. 

Closing schools may be necessary, but then what happens to the children and parents who work? Potentially so many issues that we are seeing in Italy now. I don't think Boris is up to it. He wont want to make unpopular decisions. He is a narcissist and wants to be loved. 

That's why he hasn't gone to see the floods again, after getting heckled last time. He's so thin skinned like Trump

That is good news! The Chinese have learned the hard way. Treat nature with respect

Of course, they have now infected their economic rivals, whilst they recover. Perhaps that was the plan all along

Every cloud.....

That’s encouraging; of course altering entrenched behaviour and effective enforcement are different and harder challenges.

Such a ridiculous thing to say. Drowning is not contagious, if you don't want to drown don't go in the water.

I wish people would stop these specious comparisons, and start taking this seriously.

That would be a sensible course of action in my view.

A sign that situation in China is a lot worse than we think

A sad day for the foreign press corps in China. @WSJ reporters @PhilipWen11 & @joshchin walk through Beijing Capital Airport before their departure on February 24, 2020. pic.twitter.com/y65VM8VPJP

— Jerome Taylor (@JeromeTaylor) February 24, 2020

My gym has just banned people who've been to an affected area or been in direct contact with people who have. The facility is shared with the school which has lots of international boarders hence the higher risk. 

"We need to seek the same assurances from visitors to our sites and this includes external events at weekends and during the school holidays. If you or any of your attendees has travelled to/from, or been in direct contact with anyone from, a Novel Coronavirus affected area, particularly China and the Wuhan region, since 31st December and the time of your event then regrettably we cannot allow them to visit the School."

With which countries?

Or did you mean "international boarders"?

 Ooops. Corrected to hide ignorance. 

Latest - another death in Italy today and first acknowledged case in Afghanistan - Pakistan won't be far behind.

Iran is exporting the virus around the region:

"A staggering 50 people have died in the Iranian city of Qom from the new coronavirus this month, a member of parliament from the city of Qom has said, according thesemiofficial ILNA news agency.

"He is accusing the health ministry of not being transparent with the official death toll, he claims that more than 50 people have already died from the virus in Qom," Al Jazeera's Dorsa Jabbari, reporting from Tehran, said."Now this is something the health ministry has not confirmed yet.""

Deaths in Iran now up to 50.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2020/feb/24/coronavirus-live-updates-china-wuhan-hubei-latest-news-italy-lombardy-south-korea-iran-japan-cases-infections-death-toll-outbreak-xi-jinping-update

I've just done a quick calculation. There appear to be about 15 Covid-19 cases per million of population in Korea, and 55 per million in China. 

I think the number of cases per million in China was probably nearer the 15 mark when the FCO changed travel advice to avoid travel there, so will they shortly give the same advice for Korea?

We are taking this seriously. But there's a difference between taking it seriously and overreacting.

The concerning aspect of the outbreak in Italy is that the authorities haven't managed to trace 'patient zero', which makes complete tracing of all contacts impossible.

There is a view that Covid-19 may become established just like flu and the common cold and that we will have to learn to deal with it. If that's the outcome then a vaccine will be necessary for the vulnerable and elderly, as has become the norm for flu.  That in turn should bring the mortality rate down to levels similar to flu; but we need to get through 2020 and hope the outbreak dies down through the northern hemisphere summer.

By any normally accepted definition, we do now have a pandemic of COVID-19. All that means is that it is a widely spread contagion across more than one continent (which it is). Apparently, the WHO is reluctant to use the word for some reason.

Dictionary definition:

"A pandemic means that a disease is widespread, over several countries or continents, usually affecting a large number of people. The disease must also be infectious. Cancer affects many people around the world but is not infectious so cannot be called a pandemic"

It's all technicalities, but you could at least have bothered to check the WHO definition:

A pandemic is the worldwide spread of a new disease.

I think it was Saint who had said it, but sometimes it does feel like some people might be secretly disappointed if we don't get a proper pandemic. It must be a combination of subconsciously wanting to see dramatic news or worst case scenarios developing (because they had read all about them) or just an aspect of the human condition i guess.

Out of interest why do you seem to have this dislike of the WHO? You seem to be unduly quick to criticise it, generally without justification - as in this case.

Amongst other objectives the WHO exists to coordinate efforts internationally to respond to these type of health threats. Their role is advisory.

Globalist elites, academic intelligentsia, so called experts, Soros, the devil.

Who knows really what goes deep down?

I wonder if it's just a quirk of TWO, or if it's repeated amongst the general population, but we're seeing the greatest levels of hysteria amongst the right-wingers and Brexit cultists, whilst the more moderate/pro-EU people are generally more sanguine.