Covid-19.

[cee-dee]

Reading and listening to the news reports about the spread of the virus, the common denominator seems to be travel?

Surely if travel was halted until the incidences of the virus have "died down", the spread to other countries wouldn't happen?

[suzieseaside]

On a personal level I was interested to read that the virus was here in January. On the 25th January I was looking after some friends' dogs in their house and became very ill with flu like symptoms ( I had the flu jab but I know that it doesn't protect against all strains).

I assumed that it was just a weIrd strain of flu not covered by the jab. I could barely get out of bed or shuffle around, wanted to sleep all the time, no way could I walk the dogs, headache, shivering (which had strangely come in waves occasionally during the 10 days before and I don't feel the cold much) then a temperature and a cough.
.
I didn't eat for 4 days and thought it was because I was too tired to cook (and there was not a tin or anything instant in their house) but when I eventually called a friend to fetch me a tin of soup and some medication I couldn't even eat the soup. One of the symptoms of Covid 19 can be a loss of smell and taste although I can't remember if that was the case or whether I just couldn't face food.

In hindsight these symptoms sound very familiar to those reported for Covid19, at least the milder ones, although I did feel very ill.

What puzzles me is that I live on my own, not in a city, I don't think I had been in any crowded places and I hadn't knowingly met anyone who had been in China. So if I've had it I can't think how I could have got it if there were very few infected people in the UK in January.

If I'm fortunate enough not to catch it in the near future before antibody testing is available, I might well pay for a home testing kit when it is. I am very curious to know if I might have had it back in January when in this country it wasn't high on the radar.

Has anyone else here had similar symptoms before it was in our consciousness 24/7?

For flu type illnesses I can recommend Day and Night Nurse capsules. I'm convinced they work better than anything else to relieve flu symptoms, at least they do for me.

[suzieseaside]

Curiouser and curiouser .....

The first recorded case in the UK was on January 31st and the earliest documented transmission within Britain was on February 28th. ..

But, was it ..?

A man returning from an Austrian ski resort had similar symptoms on 20 January which then was passed to his family and others in the neighbourhood. The family have not been officially tested. They should be.

The Austrian ski resort is under investigation for allegedly covering up the early outbreak and allowing it to spread across Europe undetected.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/global-health/science-and-disease/uk-patient-zero-east-sussex-family-may...

Seems like Covid19 may well have been in Britain for longer than is assumed. Unless of course it was just another flu virus with similar symptoms. Hard to know since the level and exact nature of symptoms even with confirmed Covid19 cases vary between individuals, their age and underlying health condition. Plus the virus has probably undergone mutations.

Important to know so come on UK (and elsewhere) get your act together for antibody testing. Not just to track the virus progression and implement the best strategy but for future risk - to find out if having had it confers immunity or whether reinfection is common.

[cee-dee]

Well now, we know that South Wales seems to be a sort of hot-spot but do people remember Saturday 1st February?

Rugby, Wales versus...... Italy? Loads of spectators all mixing before, during and after the match?

[astrologica]

Yes CeeDee, my OH mentioned that yesterday! Half of the Coronavirus deaths in Wales have occurred at the Royal Gwent Hospital, just a 15 min drive down the road from us. The first one was a chap that had been on holiday to Austria. The hospital is really struggling. The furthest I am going is my garden!

[upthecreekyetagain]

Wonder where Boris caught it

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52060791

[suzieseaside]

Parliament bar or toilets 😉

Who knows but he has to meet a lot of people.
He has been looking exhausted over the last couple of weeks. I wish him well, it's a tough time to be PM.

[upthecreekyetagain]

I wouldn't want the job!

I wonder if he'd have stood for leader if he'd seen this coming?

[suzieseaside]

I despair ......

https://youtu.be/D615glDDueY

Chinese wet markets reopening. There are guards but only to stop people taking photos of the blood, uncleanliness, stressed and tortured animals..

After they were closed 'TO PROTECT PUBLIC HEALTH AND ECOLOGICAL SECURITY
( excuse the shouty Capitals - no other way to emphasize on my phone)'
Meaningless carp from Chinese officials

After both SARS and Covid19 coming from bats and intermittent hosts, and from these markets, WHEN WILL THEY LEARN ?

Surely there will be an outcry from other world leaders about this?

I don't believe that the Chinese government has been honest either about the level of infections and deaths currently over there. I also wonder if the virus had made itself known there before the time of the first official reports.

[l111da]

I totally agree that alot of this live animal selling is appalling! But I'm trying to play devils advocate here, you have to ask what is true, what is sensationalist and what is just poor journalism.

I watched the series of stills on youtube, it's not a film, just a series of stills. You can't be sure what was taken before or after the beginning of the crisis.  Lots of pics of men in suits, then a photo of a bat - that could be absolutely anywhere, then some photos of dead bats on a stall that could be before the virus. A photo of meat being sold, chicken, cauliflowers and nothing that showed me anything to prove this is happening today?

As I said in another post - the supermarkets of the world are all different and sometimes even what we eat appears disgusting to the rest of the world.

I think the more concerning thing for me is the issue of when this started in this country - time they told us the truth!

Secondly I worry when I'm told first, it lives on surfaces for 1 day, then 3 days, then 9 days then I read that the virus was alive 17 days after the passengers left the Diamond Princess - this was then denied and they said 24 hours - Time to make their minds up.

Today - having previously been told there was no point wearing a mask - they are changing their minds... we should wear masks!

The loss of life is terrible, BUT how many people died with Covid 19 and how many died because of it?

Also how many people died that DID NOT KNOW THEY HAD UNDERLYING HEALTH CONCERNS?

I'm guessing that post mortems are not being done at the moment - so can you really take it as accurate what we are being told?

I also read that ONS said that during January-February 2019 MORE people died than have died this year - so what do we make of that?

What worries me is I don't think they have a clue.... or do they??

[fallen-archie]

Even the Chinese admit that this started in a wet market, so what is there not too believe?
As for mixed messages concerning the virus, we have so many trying to score points and catch people out, Peston being a prime example, there is bound to be confusion! The bottom line is that any new pandemic with no vaccine available, is bound to be a learning curve, there is no shortage of armchair experts ready to offer advice along with a queue of people queuing up to elicit funding for research projects!
I believe that the biggest fallout from this catastrophe will be economic, but that is another story.

[suzieseaside]

I111da.....
No it's not a film but there are plenty of links that report that the wet markets are re-opening and NO announcement by the Chinese Government that the dangerous, unsanitary and sometimes illegal practices have changed.

https://www.blackenterprise.com/china-declares-victory-over-coronavirus-reopens-wet-markets/

https://www.theweek.in/news/world/2020/04/01/china-reopens-wet-markets-watchful-guards-ensure-that-n...

Whether what they eat is disgusting to us or not is completely irrelevant to the point in my post.

What is relevant is that 2 dangerous epidemics have come from wild animals in these markets, the latest will kill many hundreds of thousands worldwide by the time it's over, economies destroyed, massive job losses, businesses going to the wall and a whole lot of suffering. So IMO there is NO excuse for re-opening these disease ridden places.

As to your criticism of not being told everything, not knowing if it is accurate, that it is time that our Government made their minds up, that they don't have a clue etc......
What do you expect? This is a new virus, a new pandemic and on a scale not seen in our lifetimes. Scientists are doing their best to learn about it as it progresses.

[suzieseaside]

And what Archie said in-between too!

[l111da]

"As to your criticism of not being told everything, not knowing if it is accurate, that it is time that our Government made their minds up, that they don't have a clue etc......
What do you expect? This is a new virus, a new pandemic and on a scale not seen in our lifetimes. Scientists are doing their best to learn about it as it progresses".

What we should expect is a sensible concensus of opinion - better to say nothing than to guess or change your mind almost daily. If you tell people something you must speak with consistency not jump from from one opinion to another, changing your mind - or no one will ever believe (or have confidence) in what you say! 

This is why Boris is now coming in for criticism - 25,000 tests a day suddenly became 2,000 - major disparity, better if he'd not said anything!

"NO announcement by the Chinese Government that the dangerous, unsanitary and sometimes illegal practices have changed".

Did you really expect them to acknowledge something they have never admitted in the first place?

and finally archie 

"I believe that the biggest fallout from this catastrophe will be economic, but that is another story".

I think everyone is fully aware that this is going to cause the biggest recession in the history of the world since time began, it will change the world in ways we have yet to imagine...

[fallen-archie]

Well worth a read:-

https://swprs.org/a-swiss-doctor-on-covid-19/

[upthecreekyetagain]

China has banned the sale and consumption of wild animals with penalties of up to 5 years - banning something and enforcing the ban in a country as vast as China are two different things.

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/03/05/asia/china-coronavirus-wildlife-consumption-ban-intl-hnk/index.ht...

[suzieseaside]

And yet they see fit to open those busy markets, knowing that SARs and Covid19 have come from them, and knowing that the new rules cannot easily be reinforced.

[l111da]

"And yet they see fit to open those busy markets, knowing that SARs and Covid19 have come from them, and knowing that the new rules cannot easily be reinforced".

You keep quoting Sars has having come from the market and there is no evidence to support that - unless you can point me to it? If you check out both WHO and even the NHS it has never been confirmed that it came from a market, neither has it been confirmed which animal it came from.  'Perhaps bats' is the strongest link you will find on the WHO. 

It is also now being said (New Scientist) Growing evidence suggests the covid-19 outbreak may not have started at Wuhan’s Huanan Seafood Market in December after all.

Read more: https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24532764-000-the-hunt-for-patient-zero-where-did-the-coronavi...

However the interesting thing about 'Coronavirus SARS' are the similarities with Covid 19 - it killed people mainly over the age of 65, the symptoms are the same, fever, headaches, shortness of breath due to lack of oxygen - at this point it usually became fatal. It was an airborne disease caught by inhaling water droplets from someone who was already infected - and 10 years later there is no cure... and from what I can see no one is looking!

[mikes*corvettes]

You do know that WHO is controlled by the CCP don't you.

[l111da]

They must control the NHS, New Scientist and the web as well then.

..and there was me thought the drug companies controlled WHO

[mikes*corvettes]

Nope..the CCP.