2020-March-18. Honolulu , Hawaii. Neel@Neels-Nirvana
The world wide pandemic of 2020 - Corona Virus - COVID-19 and SARS Cov-2 - a question !
The year 2020 started with some rumors and occasional news items about the new virus spreading in China specifically in a city of Wuhan and its surrounding areas.
By the end of January, this was a regular news item but it still was a regional issue in China and the Chinese government was dealing with it.
In February this became a matter of concern. Most news agencies were daily reporting this threat and the virus was spreading worldwide and became a concern. China had more than 100,000 tested positive and the number of deaths rose to more than a thousand.
By early March, the disease had spread to most of the world and the major countries. The WHO declared this disease as a global pandemic. The stock market started tanking. There were drops of 1000+ points to the DOW Jones industrials index. The fastest decline in the market ever recorded in history and faster than the great depression of 1929.
Currently the whole country is in a shut down state. In California for example in the Bay Area there is a directive of "shelter in place" which means all schools and colleges and establishments are closed , all employees have been asked to work from home and no one is supposed to travel or even roam around unless with the purpose of going to a grocery store or pharmacy. This is now extending to all states in the country. Hawaii also implemented this starting last night.
The leaders and administrators are saying the school shutdown can continue till August when the next school year starts. The 'work from home' policy is still in effect for 3 weeks but can be extended depending on the situation.
The purpose of this mandatory isolation is due to the concept of "Social distancing" which means that if you maintain distance from other people and maintain a sort of "self-Quarantine" then the chances of the disease spreading is less.
The effect of this slowing down of the disease spread is also being called "flattening the curve" which means instead of the "normal" statistical curve we want to reduce the height of the peak of this graph, and hence even if the same number of people get infected overall in the long term we would spread it across a longer period of time.
Here is the question, actually many questions - in terms of 'social distancing' or 'self quarantine' or 'travel lock down' etc- how long are all these measures for? How do we know the time frame ? Can we even predict ... if there is a method? How do we know that the population is safe, when we have a worldwide free flow of humans as there can be a person infected in Africa or India or South America who brings the virus back to the other countries which had cleaned up before ? Is that possible unless we have a cure and a vaccine ? How long would developing the vaccine take ?
The world wide pandemic of 2020 - Corona Virus - COVID-19 and SARS Cov-2 - a question !
The year 2020 started with some rumors and occasional news items about the new virus spreading in China specifically in a city of Wuhan and its surrounding areas.
By the end of January, this was a regular news item but it still was a regional issue in China and the Chinese government was dealing with it.
In February this became a matter of concern. Most news agencies were daily reporting this threat and the virus was spreading worldwide and became a concern. China had more than 100,000 tested positive and the number of deaths rose to more than a thousand.
By early March, the disease had spread to most of the world and the major countries. The WHO declared this disease as a global pandemic. The stock market started tanking. There were drops of 1000+ points to the DOW Jones industrials index. The fastest decline in the market ever recorded in history and faster than the great depression of 1929.
Currently the whole country is in a shut down state. In California for example in the Bay Area there is a directive of "shelter in place" which means all schools and colleges and establishments are closed , all employees have been asked to work from home and no one is supposed to travel or even roam around unless with the purpose of going to a grocery store or pharmacy. This is now extending to all states in the country. Hawaii also implemented this starting last night.
The leaders and administrators are saying the school shutdown can continue till August when the next school year starts. The 'work from home' policy is still in effect for 3 weeks but can be extended depending on the situation.
The purpose of this mandatory isolation is due to the concept of "Social distancing" which means that if you maintain distance from other people and maintain a sort of "self-Quarantine" then the chances of the disease spreading is less.
The effect of this slowing down of the disease spread is also being called "flattening the curve" which means instead of the "normal" statistical curve we want to reduce the height of the peak of this graph, and hence even if the same number of people get infected overall in the long term we would spread it across a longer period of time.
Here is the question, actually many questions - in terms of 'social distancing' or 'self quarantine' or 'travel lock down' etc- how long are all these measures for? How do we know the time frame ? Can we even predict ... if there is a method? How do we know that the population is safe, when we have a worldwide free flow of humans as there can be a person infected in Africa or India or South America who brings the virus back to the other countries which had cleaned up before ? Is that possible unless we have a cure and a vaccine ? How long would developing the vaccine take ?
Namaste !
-Neel
March 18, 2020
Honolulu, Hawaii
-Neel
March 18, 2020
Honolulu, Hawaii