Second case of community spread in California.

Mahon:

 

 

 

The issue is that any more than a handful canNOT go to hospital as we dont have enough isolation/quarantine rooms. If infected patients go to normal wards/rooms they will infect everyone they come in contact with. Be interesting to see what the Health Ministry intends to do if we get more than a handul of serious cases.

 

School gyms. Other public buildings. If it was to ever get that bad, schools and unis will likely be closing. The bigger issue IMO is equipment and staff.

Warehouse in Palmy was very busy today but the queue wasn't at all crazy despite the popularity.  Noticed a lot of people with slabs of water bottles and multiple bulk packs of toilet paper.

No rice in the supermarket when I went to Countdown in Valley Road, Mt Eden earlier today.

There are reports of people panic buying bottled water and generators. I'm pretty sure the water in the taps and the electricity is still functioning in the worst hit areas in Asia.

Given that the Covid-19 peak might be around the same time as the usual winter flu season peak, there is a good chance that we'll get at least one more opportunity to buy things before we're all in lockdown.

Rikkitic:

 

Second case of community spread in California.

 

There are also cases of community acquired disease in Oregon and Washington State.  The states have run the rRT-PCR tests that have been positive, and they've made the announcements.

Pence will be apoplectic.

Fred99:

Rikkitic:

Second case of community spread in California.

There are also cases of community acquired disease in Oregon and Washington State.  The states have run the rRT-PCR tests that have been positive, and they've made the announcements.

Pence will be apoplectic.

Went to the countdown supermarket in Newmarket on Saturday afternoon. They had scrambled extra staff, had every checkout open etc. Queues were short. Stock level was good apart from a few obvious exceptions:

• larger water bottle packs sold out, smaller packs, 6x1.5L etc still available.
• Large bags of rice sold out, 1kg bags still available
• Normal flour sold out
• 2 min noodle stock quite low
• Cheaper beech & cleaning products low (detoll brand sold out, sanitizing wipes sold out)
• Tissues nearly sold out - only expensive boxes left.
• Hand soap sold out
• Cheaper nappies low.
• Toilet paper larger packs getting low (but still some of each type, and an entire full row ends around the corner)

Was amused at the person at the checkout opposite me who brought like 20 cans of baked beans & 20 cans of spaghetti only.

Chemist warehouse - stock levels seemed normal, no queue

Warehouse - odd person with 40 pack of toilet paper, but stock level seemed normal, except for hand soap refills that were running low.

mattwnz:

 

IMO we need to be looking at restricting  visitors from at least all affected countries, if we want to try and keep it out of NZ.

 

Define "affected". Aus has 25 cases. Are you advocating banning arrivals from there? US has 68 cases. UK 23. Canada 16. India 3. Russia 2. If you're banning visitors from all those countries, about the only place we will take visitors from is the Pacific islands, and they probably won't want *us*. You might as well shut down the entire tourism indistry.

frankv:

 

Define "affected"

 

Countries with reported cases of COVID-19 (apart from NZ):

Afghanistan, Algeria, Australia, Austria
Bahrain, Belarus, Belgium, Brazil
Cambodia, Canada, China (mainland), Croatia
Denmark
Egypt, Estonia
Finland, France
Georgia, Germany, Greece
Hong Kong
India, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Italy
Japan
Kuwait
Lebanon
Macao, Malaysia
Nepal, Netherlands, Nigeria, North Macedonia, Norway
Oman
Pakistan, Philippines
Romania, Russia
San Marino, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Switzerland
Taiwan, Thailand
United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States of America
Vietnam

frankv:

mattwnz:

IMO we need to be looking at restricting  visitors from at least all affected countries, if we want to try and keep it out of NZ.

Define "affected". Aus has 25 cases. Are you advocating banning arrivals from there? US has 68 cases. UK 23. Canada 16. India 3. Russia 2. If you're banning visitors from all those countries, about the only place we will take visitors from is the Pacific islands, and they probably won't want *us*. You might as well shut down the entire tourism indistry.

 

Fred99:

 

Pence will be apoplectic.

 

Yes, he's cleverly thrown Pence a Hospital Pass there. From Trump's Wednesday live briefing:

"Because of all we've done, the risk to the American people remains very low."
"And again, when you have 15, and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero, that's a pretty good job we've done."

*puts Vice President Pence in charge of COVID-19 response - which the CDC said is almost certain to spread*

"He's very good and I think -- and he's really very expert at the field."

This is the guy, who, as Governor of Indiana in the state's 2015 health crisis used prayer - instead of needle exchanges - to stop the spread of HIV..
Who's anti-science, has said he doesn't believe smoking kills people - and voted against the FDA being able to regulate tobacco products.

Luckily he's got Trump to give him guidance:

On Thursday Trump said - it's "like a miracle, it will disappear" and that "nobody really knows."
On Friday he blamed fear of Democratic candidates for the fall in the stockmarket, and said "the Democrat policy of open borders is a direct threat to the health and wellbeing of all Americans" 

Today, in Washington State, the first person in the US died from COVID-19

The reaction here, as in supermarkets is that we got 1 case, then it was 23, then it was 89. Small country, not living in dense housing, people will now take more care with self isolation, its unlikely to spiral like Iran has. But incoming from the other infected countries need to be told, not asked to self isolate. That guy that shut his shop, even said that all you get asked is have you been to China. That's it he said. While the Govt is being good with advisories, its still all voluntary, if you can be bothered. 

tdgeek:

 

The reaction here, as in supermarkets is that we got 1 case, then it was 23, then it was 89. Small country, not living in dense housing, people will now take more care with self isolation, its unlikely to spiral like Iran has. But incoming from the other infected countries need to be told, not asked to self isolate. That guy that shut his shop, even said that all you get asked is have you been to China. That's it he said. While the Govt is being good with advisories, its still all voluntary, if you can be bothered. 

 

We cant stop it...the wave is coming just like the winter flu season. Its way too late now to try and contain it. Best use of public money is to prepare for the isolation and treatment of those who will be come seriously ill(this could become a mammoth task for NZ with so few facilities). There is just way too much people movement across borders.

The other thing we must prepare for is the financial fallout. 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/02/28/i-have-coronavirus-so-far-it-isnt-that-bad/