Today the people of San Francisco were ordered to shelter in place, New York was essentially shut down, and Italy saw more deaths in a day than the deadliest day in Wuhan.

Currently there are 181,580 confirmed cases of COVID-19 globally, and 7,138 deaths recorded.

For over a month I’ve been seeing people shame those who are taking precautions, and calling their actions “panic”. From what I’ve seen, almost all of those being accused of “feeding the fear propaganda” aren’t running around with their arms in the air screaming, they are simply advocating taking small steps to limit spread. They are encouraging people to be prepared in advance so that they aren’t out last minute with hordes of others stocking up for social distancing.

These actions were called “panic” a month ago, but now those who had shamed others are the ones taking these precautions. And they’re calling the next level of preparedness “panic”.

And if we get through this because enough people practice social distancing, these shamers will say “see, I told you so, it wasn’t that bad after all”.

But these people are freeriders. As a colleague put in, “Being the last person to finally pick up a bucket and start bailing out the boat isn't something to be proud of, nor is admonishing those who are doing the bailing and then patting yourself on the back when you step ashore well rested unlike the rest.”

The most effective way to fight this so that the rest of the world doesn’t end up like Italy is by avoiding other people as much as possible.

There are about 135000 ventilators in the US, and if we predict 55% of Americans catching COVID, 10 million of them will need ventilators, which could mean 3 million on a single day if all these cases are spread out across the rest of the year. Old people and young people are being hospitalized, and there aren’t enough beds for everyone.

http://www.centerforhealthsecurity.org/our-work/events/2018_clade_x_exercise/pdfs/Clade-X-ventilator-availability-fact-sheet.pdf

https://medium.com/@joschabach/flattening-the-curve-is-a-deadly-delusion-eea324fe9727

What can you do?

Stay home – not everyone has this luxury, so if you can then you should. Protect yourself with social distancing and leave the respirators and beds for those people who don’t have a choice.

If you have to go out, wear a mask and gloves. Yes masks help

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2440799/

Stop making fun of people who are wearing masks or self-isolating. Start doing your part to normalize this activity. You may inspire others to make decisions that could save their lives.

Order things online rather than going out (be aware that the virus survives for days on surfaces depending on the material)

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.09.20033217v1.full.pdf

Find some way to make the most of staying in. Self quarantining doesn’t have to be worse, it can just be different. Remember, Isaac Newton invented calculus when he was quarantined from the plague

Check out these websites for helpful info:

Up-to-date charts: https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

Tips for friends:

staythefuckhome.com

wearafuckingmask.com

Italians giving warnings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_cImRzKXOs

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