Chat about Novel Coronavirus - 2019-nCoV - COVID-19

They do also like pizza but that was less important to mention.

Other than the personal space which should clearly be taken with a pinch of salt (but nevertheless true), there's not much cultural stereotyping going on. It's simply what I notice compared to living in another European country.

Vis. Italy/China-there's also a lot of skilled Chinese workers working in the North of Italy in stone quarries-to the extent that Chinese names now top local census records-as the demand from China and Middle east for marble and luxury stone is enormous.

There could be a couple;..

All of these are base on stereotype and as @Ramsaye said we still don’t know fully to why it’s predominate in Italy.

Vee should consider selecting a nucleus of human specimens now. It could be accomplished vit a simple computer model, I believe Herr Sabisky has a zootable von already.

Stereotype or not, it's simply what I see happening here.

I'd say it was unbelievable, but people are fucking idiots so I guess it's extremely believeable. The mind still boggles as to how you could be so calamitously unable to grasp the basics of prioitisation that you would think a work meeting would rank as more important than speaking to a medical professional and staying the fuck away from other people in the meantime.

The rumour I heard was that it was just a very early case in Italy, before anyone had thought it was much of a problem outside of Wuhan. The patient was elderly and sick, and no-one thought it could be coronavirus, but was visited by lots of friends relatives, died and then there was a large funeral where many of the people who were infected from visiting the patient passed it on to others.

Again, it's just a rumour but it doesn't seem to contradict anything.

In other words, there was nothing specific about it being in Italy, it just happened to be there and happened before people were more aware of it being a highly contagious illness.

found this an interesting article

https://www.globalresearch.ca/china-coronavirus-shocking-update/5705196

That site is disreputable

https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Globalresearch

what is the thinking of the uk government in relation to measures aiming to stop the spread & impact of the virus?
From what i can gather / infer the thinking seems to be that the spread of the virus is inevitable - that containment has / will fail - so the best result can be to spread out the virus' effect by implementing slowing measures (social distancing) gradually to relieve peak stress on the health services?
is the argument against massive, immediate concentrated efforts to lock down the virus a la Wuhan / northern Italy that it will unlikely work and that the impact of it would be so calamitous to society / the economy that it is the greater evil compared to the position whereby more limited measures are introduced gradually to simply slow the process of spread down?

If thats right the reality looks to be that the shit sandwich will be big, we will all have to take a bite, and that the process is going to be stretched out for a while so that we don't all puke at once.

I hope thats the rationale, as opposed to let's wait until it's really bad until we do anything because we can't face making brave decisions now.

The poorer people and most vulnerable cant afford and/ or aren't able to stockpile.

Government thinking is short-termism and what looks best. Optics of a big shutdown vs current relatively few cases are obviously bad. I'm pretty sure they will continue to take the least aggressive path, and try to avoid as much blame as possible.
I also imagine there are some thoughts that while it's bad, it does have the side effect of being a convenient scapegoat for post-Brexit economic performance.

Waitrose Bayswater has been hit

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Although they do keep reiterating that decisions will be made using scientific advice.

BBC docu-podcast on Spanish Flu,
with bonus interview with Pte. Godfrey!

and that seems to be that large scale closures don't work...that message seems to come out fairly consistently. the problem is that the only good news being reported is that cases in china falling now, including in wuhan, as a result of massive shut down efforts...
people are going to look at that and think wtf aren't we doing the only thing that appears to have helped curtail the virus...
it's difficult to avid thinking we are just behind the curve of china / italy and that acting as they did later rather than sooner we are simply repeating their mistakes..

does anyone remember the 90's french classic "la haine"
from a paranoid / fatalistic perspective the comment at the outset seems apt perhaps...

C'est l'histoire d'un homme qui tombe d'un immeuble de 50 étages. Le mec, au fur et à mesure de sa chute, il se répète sans cesse pour se rassurer : " Jusqu'ici tout va bien... Jusqu'ici tout va bien... Jusqu'ici tout va bien. " Mais l'important, c'est pas la chute. C'est l'atterrissage.

In other news, my local Tesco and Lidl have been gutted of toilet paper and pasta over the weekend. Everything else fine. Had been quite encouraged last week that there was no sign of hoarding/panick but here we are.

My local Tescos - Brixton - was sold out of dried pasta, with the exception of packets of an Italian brand with only Italian text on it. Either fear of infection because it was from Italy, or unable to work out what was in the packet...

Scientists can advise, but the decisions are political. On a continuum of lives lost / restrictions <> economic cost / personal freedoms you'd expect scientists to be at the left-hand end, but the government somewhere in the middle.

Le Monde est poo

Brand recognition probs.

Big Tesco in Wembley was the same.

Did you go to the place i told you to?

Priest in Washington DC positive. Did communion and shook hands with 500 people at the weekend. Yikes.

I was in Italy over the weekend and now having to wfh home for the next two weeks. I feel fine and wasn't in the North, so I'm ok to go about my normal life right? The decision to have me not come in to work is my employers.