kungfoodude

That sounds good in theory.

Quarantine will be absolutely ruinous to this country, especially if it is extended. The problem is that people's fears are getting in the way of being logical. People get emotional because they see the death tolls(and ignore the demographics and death rates) and they don't consider the impact of putting 10-25% of the population(my estimate) at the edge of survival/homelessness. That will be disaster of epic proportions. Remember during our last crash with a "liberal" leadership, it was corporate America that received a bailout, not the general population/homeowners. Do you think regular citizens will receive a bailout for the sin of being poor this go around? I think not.

I disagree. If you lock everything down, that will be a much bigger event than the spread of this virus could ever hope to create. How do you propose to take proper economic interventions when the food supply is interrupted? The shelves are bare now, how do you propose to continue to manufacture and feed the public without employees? How will they be delivered? All those logistics trains to our stores will be interrupted, how will that be remedied? If people are worried about the homeless problem now....watch what 4+ weeks of almost no economic activity will create. Roughly 25% of US citizens live within 50% of the poverty line. How well do you think they will weather this storm? To quote a previous post in this thread, if you are talking about the impact of 1.5 million deaths from the virus, how do you account for potentially over 80 million people being in financial ruin? This is exactly what I am talking about. A national quarantine beyond a couple of weeks will be an unbelievably devastating blow to small businesses and regular people. Something that should be of a far greater concern than this virus simply spreading, as it will anyway.

I think that is a big mistake to assume it will take a long time. It is not going to take an extended shutdown to torpedo the economy. It is merely going to take 2-4 weeks before serious chaos starts in earnest and is difficult to recover from. That's where this will differ from the 2008 crash. That was the financial institutions hanging by a thread and the effects of that being relatively delayed to the general public. Quarantine will have immediate impacts on the public.

Bob Evans BEFORE taking a long distance family trip?? Man, that's coma food. I'd be sleeping behind the wheel.

The longer they keep up quarantine measures, the further down this hole it will end up. An extended quarantine with no safety net measures will basically torpedo not only the economy but it will wreck the American public, who largely lives paycheck to paycheck. Quarantine is probably literally the last thing the American public needs and I know that sounds cold but it is also very true. Right now the market plummeting has limited impacts on the general public(in the short term) because so few Americans actually have substantial funds in it and those that do are going to be working for companies that are much more likely to offer paid leave. But once you starting breaking the lower classes(who also don't have the ability to stock up on weeks worth of groceries at a time) that is when you are really going to see a quick acceleration of this whole thing. Aside from the arguments I have made regarding the quarantine statistically, this one should seriously scare people. If you are going to close all the stores, all the restaurants, all the businesses make that next logical leap to what is going to happen when food is scarce and people are not getting paid.

Bob Evans? Only old people go to Bob Evans......oh poo....he's trying to get rid of their olds. Damn.

You just said you probably had coronavirus previously! What are you, the Angel of Death???

Yep. The olds are at a high risk. They need to be staying at home, flat out.

And this is how it begins...........

Well the data from the Chinese CDC(take that for what it's worth) indicated that 20-29 had a mortality rate of 0.2%. That kind of fits with the "won't happen to me" mentality that exists with that age range anyway. So does selfish and dumb behavior.

Not to mention we have 5.4 times the population that Italy does so that is going to skew that graphic. Italy's rate of infection would be considerably higher based on that data.

That's a lot of "what ifs" in that paragraph. We will see what happens. Also, high death rates don't seem to slow down other viruses. There are more factors that play into the spread than simply killing off the hosts. That's a little bit of an oversimplification but I get what you are trying to say.

Well I just spent a week in Tampa sharing glasses, cans and bottles of beer with hundreds of beer nerds quite a few of which flew to the area, so I will let you know....

I literally never go in the Tinderbox and almost always avoid any sort of political discussions on here because they are completely pointless. Almost no minds have ever been changed arguing on the internet. I've seen people's minds/opinions be changed by constructive discourse in person or just simply access to people of different mindsets. That tends to break down common misconceptions and creates a much more conducive environment to actually have some sort of middle ground. No matter what your place on the political spectrum is, the most harm that is possible to due to your cause(aside from engaging in RL extremist acts) is to engage in arguing on the internet. It is the most toxic possible breeding ground for extreme behavior and ideology. It is not the fault of any sort of forum or format but it is the simple fact of having anonymous or semi-anonymous places in which there is no context, no visual cues, no space for empathy and a complete lack of the simplest of human filters, don't be an asshole to people. I will argue sports all day long because it doesn't have real world consequences(yet). People rarely get so entrenched in their fanhood that they are inflamed and/or coerced into actual violent acts. Unfortunately political and religious ideology have that actual real world consequence. Although it is a small minority, it is very noticeable the toxic manner in which people react being in these "feedback loops." I see it in normally reasonable people that immerse themselves in this sort of thing. And that is why I no longer(or try very hard to avoid) argue politics and religion on the internet.

Wait....what?? When have I ever engaged in either of those discussions? You sure you don't have me mixed up with someone else?

Yes, it is a real risk. But that is why I continue to spread the statistics that I do and try and reason with people(moreso in person). We can't overload this already stressed healthcare system with people panicking about this virus. Additionally, we need to be taking the proactive measures that other countries are and setting up testing basically EVERYWHERE. That will keep a lot of BS out of the hospitals and it will put people's minds at ease. You are correct that this could spiral out of control very easily.

And this is why I keep harping on the statistics and keep saying to be calm and reasonable. I absolutely DESPISE to agree with anything our current leader said but when he relayed that message from the grocery industry about not hoarding, he was 100% correct. If you freak out and act like it's the end of the world, that panic spreads much faster than this disease does. Reference other panic incidents recently(gas shortages due to Katrina come to mind). Logically there is not a reason to panic at the moment. There are ample reasons to be aware, be cautious and use common sense.

Catastrophic in what way? In the largest single loss of life in the US due to an epidemic(roughly 500k in 1918 to Spanish flu). That was roughly 0.4% of the US population(which the math works roughly out the same at the 1.5 mil deaths @ a population of 327.2 mil). We didn't collapse as a country. It would be horrible, without question. But it only will destroy the country if we DO panic and lose our minds. If we tank the economy and start acting like animals, it will get far worse. And no, the death rate is higher in Italy because of the demographics. Italy has a very large older population and that is the overwhelming majority of the deaths. Again, this is why I keep saying look at the statistics from these countries. The statistics are going to give you an idea of what to expect here.

I'll just add him to the ignore list. I only kept him around because I like to see him freak out and defend UNC without using any logic. I won't engage further.

1% of 150 million people is not significant to me. There are roughly 8 billion people on this planet. Anything shy of about 10-15% mortality rate I do not find PERSONALLY significant(this is my personal opinion and I am very sure not shared by many). Especially when that rate does not happen in my demographic. People are also flocking to ICU's because they are very scared about this pandemic. Even people without this virus at all are because they are SCARED. Why do you think I am preaching to be reasonable? I have a stuffed up nose and a little bit of a scratchy throat, should I book it down to the ER to get tested because it's coronavirus or maybe look at the vehicle outside covered in pollen and just take an educated guess which is more likely the cause? I am also hoping that I am right, I personally BELIEVE I will be correct and I don't want to see spikes in mortality rates. I don't believe our healthcare system is on the verge of collapsing, although it could be if undue panic spreads(and why in the world would people flock to one of the highest risk areas for infection like THE HOSPITAL??). Why do you think I keep preaching the need for being levelheaded? If panic spreads rapidly then you really are going to see widespread issues with the healthcare system. As it turns out(yet most Americans refuse to believe), we DON'T have a great healthcare system in this country. Again, be CAUTIOUS, don't be STUPID, but don't PANIC either. Neither of those two is going to be helpful.

As were SARS and MERS. As are new flu strains. This isn't supernatural, it happens and it will happen again.

Well we could discuss UNC's last place ACC finish. At least you should have some insight into that.

I don't have to have a medical degree to literally read the information from the CDC and WHO. I am guessing you need that degree to make sense of simple instructions/information? Why doesn't that surprise me.

It just started? You mean like.....when it was discovered roughly 2.5 months ago? SARS lasted about 7 months. MERS lasted about 7 months. Already trucking towards the halfway point if those are anything similar(which SARS appears to be). It is more transmissible than SARS or MERS(based on initial information from China) but FAR less deadly. Take the time to look at the mortality rates of all of these diseases. COV19, SARS, MERS, influenza(pick your variety) they all tend to have SIMILAR spikes in mortality to the SAME general demographics(which some obvious variations). So, if you are in a high risk demographic, you should be very worried. If you are NOT in a high risk demographic, you should be very CAUTIOUS. See the difference?