liveaboard

At Gloria + sylvester hardware in Portimao last week, I noticed all the paper dust masks were sold out.
None in portilaca paints either.

Maybe I'll go to town tomorrow and get some serious shopping in.
No need to panic they keep saying.

RichardHenshall

Maybe people just have big DIY jobs planned for when they're 'working from home' or self-isolating?

GeniB

There have been two cases of Coronavirus reported in Portimao in the last 12 hours. A mother and daughter who had been on holiday in Italy during carnival The mother is a teacher at the daughters school. Two schools have now been closed as a result and all public activities in Portimao suspended.These are first two cases in the South

I have taken the advice to up my intake of Vit C and drink hot liquids often to keep my body temperature up. Otherwise exercise and eat well. Keep alcohol to minimum ( avoid anything that lowers your resistance) The virus cannot survive temps above 27deg..Sit in the sun.it doesn't survive longer than 10 minutes on your hands, wash them regularly Don't touch mouth or nose with unwashed hands. To protect other people . sneeze into your elbow not your hands .avoid shaking hands or kissing cheeks.. Simple things that could help avoid contamination.

wellinever

best to stop all flights from italy, before its too late.
Portugal is similar to UK, UK is an island and Portugal only has one border or connection to another country.
That situation should be taken in advantage of now

liveaboard

Too late! It's here.
I did some panic buying so I don't have to go shopping again for a week.
Then I'll do some more panic buying I guess.

I noticed that the supermarket staff handles fresh fruit and veg bare handed.

They say not to worry, it mostly kills old people. Like us.

Be careful, everyone.

wellinever

no its not too late yet.....but it will be in 4 weeks time. Live and learn from others.
other countries have stopped all flights from Italy.
My concern is turning up at a UK airport when 5 mns before a flight from Milan came in....all in the arrivals hall mixed together...for how long........brilliant.
I was told by Stansted that they are working under WHO advice.....therfore nothing special being done.
But of course WHO is controlled by both govs and big business.
As you say maybe not a big deal to those in perfect health and under 50, but a lot of over 50s, even more over 60s and even more still aged 70+ do have other health issues, and so are more susceptible....thats why again I feel that the reporting should include children, as a probable major factor in spreading the virus.....they prob dont even know they have it
Just my thoughts.
But I now make sure I keep away from all children...

chislenko

Governments around the world must be rubbing their collective hands, if it kills off a load of us "oldies" they could save a fortune on pension payments!

liveaboard

except the governments are all oldies too.

I had a dream, someone was saying to me "Did you hear? Trump has the virus!"
Imagine my disappointment when I checked the news...

Score76

Thought this was relevant, everyone take a breath... you don’t need more toilet paper! That won’t help with the Coronavirus BUT HERES SOME INFORMATION THAT WILL! 👇

✔ 82,000 People are sick with Coronavirus at the moment, of which 77,000 are in China.
This means that if you are not in or haven't recently visited China, this should eliminate 94% of your concern.

🧪 If you do contract Coronavirus, this still is not a cause for panic because:
81% of the Cases are MILD
14% of the Cases are MODERATE
Only 5% of the Cases are CRITICAL

😉 Which means that even if you do get the virus, you are most likely to recover from it.

🙄 Some have said, “but this is worse than SARS!”. SARS had a fatality rate of 10% while COVID-19 has a fatality rate of 3.4%

👍 Moreover, looking at the ages of those who are dying of this virus, the death rate for the people UNDER 50 years of age is only 0.2%

💰 This means that if you are under 50 years of age and don't live in China - you are more likely to win the lottery (which has a 1 in 45,000,000 chance)

📚 Let’s take one of the worst days so far, the 10th of February, when 108 people in CHINA died of Coronavirus.

🗺 On the same day:
👉 26,283 people died of Cancer
👉 24,641 people died of Heart Disease
👉 4,300 people died of Diabetes
👉 Suicide took 28 times more lives than the virus did.
None were reported on.

🦟 Mosquitoes kill 2,740 people every day,
👨 HUMANS kill 1,300 fellow humans every day,
🐍 Snakes kill 137 people every day,
🦈 Sharks kill 2 people a year.

Shanorme

A sensible outlook!

Sunseeker1st

Too true ... but you can't catch these from other people nor can you pass it on.

liveaboard

This virus is spreading exponentially; the spread of infection is unknown, as most people get few symptoms and testing is expensive.
There is a lag of a few weeks before sickness and more before death occurs.
Only the dead are counted accurately.
In a few weeks, we'll have a better idea of what the infection rate was today.
If you have any respiratory condition, or are immune compromised due to disease or medication, the risk may become serious.

It has happened with previous pandemics that the virus mutated into a less deadly form. A more deadly form would kill it's host sooner and fail to spread as rapidly, while a less deadly form does the opposite, spreading rapidly and effectively through non symptomatic hosts.
And vaccinating them.
Maybe the corona virus will also go this course, maybe not.

As with those other causes of death listed above, I will do my best to safeguard myself and family from it.
Maybe a couple of months from now, I'll be branded a fool for my unnecessary caution.
How embarrassing.
Or maybe the disease will go the other way, and a lot of people will die.

I hope to be called a hysterical fool when this is over.
The alternative is that caution is justified.

Bomber Harris

It survives in the human body, and that's 37 degrees.

macliam

Before we go "facebook clever", panic solves nothing - but doing nothing is NOT an option.

Leo Varadkar has said that, given a potential infection of 40-60% of the population and a mortality rate of 1-3.4% (both "standard" estimates), the worst-case scenarion for Ireland was 28,000 deaths. From a population half the size of Portugal.

Epidemiology gives us mathematical models to predict infection across a given population. The results are stark - an unchecked growth factor of 15 gives an infected population of over 100,000,000 in two months, whereas interrupting the transmission by relatively simple means reduces the factor to 5 - resulting in an infected population of 330,000. The former figure will be untreatable and cripple society, the latter will be a stretch, but is doable.

Interruption of growth is down to 2 things - reducing contact with the virus and reducing infection as a result of contact. Therefore, restrictions on public gatherings and simply washing hands can have a huge impact, although. in truth, the spread will be somewhere between the two figures. I am in the UK at present and will not return to Portugal until we see how the land lies in a few weeks - this is not just for me, because I am relatively fit and would probably not have major issues, but I could easily be a vector of transmission. It's also not because I am unsafe where I am, but because my risk of infection will go up exponentially if I pass through 2 international airports.

This last is another point - people under 50 may be unlikely to die due to COVID-19 - but COVID-19 does kill and they will be vectors! So, unless everyone thinks it's OK to kill off the less fit, the less able to withstand the virus, I'd suggest a modicum of altruism is in order. I certainly wouldn't want to think my neighbours in Portugal are in mortal danger through my actions (or inactions).

On this - I have just finished talking to my 86-year old neighbour here in the UK. She has a nasty cough and would normally be in hospital as she lives alone, but she is being treated at home - because the local hospital don't want to use their beds for any but the most urgent cases. So, she has a nurse coming out 3 times a day - potentially leaving her alone for 8 hours at a stretch... Remember, she's 86, sick and in bed. Even if the virus doesn't reach her, she's already being impacted.

Let's be careful out there!

GeniB

I am talking about outside of the body ..on hands , etc so hot water washing is essential Interesting point though. ..why can't it survive outside ...but it can inside ?