Wild guess: First US patient with coronavirus who has now recovered (Snohomish County, Washington man) is East Asian

The Snohomish County man went to an urgent care clinic on Jan. 19 with a cough and fever. He told the staff he had seen a health alert about the outbreak in China – that he had returned four days earlier from a trip to visit family in Wuhan.

Story.

China didn't restrict travel soon enough: Between Jan 10-24 trips by rail jumped 17.2% year over year

There were already seven cases of untreatable viral pneumonia on Dec 30, 2019 at the Wuhan Central Hospital, according to now deceased Dr. Li Wenliang.

By Jan 23, 2020 830 confirmed cases and an unknown number of clinically diagnosable cases had piled up, at which time Wuhan in Hubei province was locked down.

Much too late.

From the CNBC update:

China’s railway operator said 210 million trips were taken in the 40 days of the Lunar New Year travel period from Jan. 10 to Feb. 18, state news agency Xinhua reported. That number marked a 48% decline from last year.

During roughly the first two weeks of the travel period, through Jan. 24 (Lunar New Year eve), 168 million trips were taken, an increase of 17.2% from the corresponding holiday travel season last year, the report said. For the remainder of the time period, rail trips fell 83.9%, the article said. The report noted the number of average daily trips during the latter period fell to 1.7 million from 11.2 million. — Cheng

Absence of non-East Asian coronavirus fatalities so far makes some wonder if there ever will be any

Time will tell.

There are considerations other than genetic racial predisposition or vulnerability to infection, however.

As the Chinese are now reporting, the coronavirus infection affects older men much more than women. In the initial phase of infection in Wuhan, for example, 68% of patients were men. Strikingly, as recently as 2015, 68% of Chinese men were said to smoke cigarettes, making them predisposed to infection because of impaired lung health.

Still, no death so far has involved someone without East Asian ancestry, which may indicate, as with the SARS coronavirus epidemic in 2002-2004, that fear of a global pandemic resulting in millions of deaths may not be reasonable and that this may remain an East Asian epidemic. It could be that just as sub-Saharan Africa is responsible for 80% of genetic sickle cell disease China may be prone to respiratory disease for some as yet unknown genetic reason.

Claim emerges China protected military university in Wuhan with lockdown Jan 2, 18 days before admitting to epidemic

In 2 weeks we've gone from 100 dead from Wuhan flu to 1,016 according to official China reports

Coronavirus live updates: China death toll tops 1,000

"The current hysteria about coronavirus is irrational"

I thought all hysterias were irrational, but OK.

From the story:

In contrast, other flu viruses in circulation in the U.S. last year took over 34,000 lives, and they are taking a similar toll this year. Yet unlike coronavirus and SARS, these flu viruses have had zero impact on the stock market. This suggests the current hysteria developing about coronavirus is irrational.

Smdh over "impact on the stock market" as a barometer, but let's move on.

34k deaths from flu last year in the US, which would aggregate at the peaks in February, December, March and January in that order on average, would mean average deaths per day over those 121 days of about 280 per day, but only at the extreme. Obviously, not everyone who died of flu that season died in those peak months.

The worst flu season in decades in the US was 2017-18 with roughly 80,000 deaths, according to WaPo. The worst of it lasted 19 weeks. All the deaths obviously didn't occur in those 19 weeks either, but had they the rate would have been 600 per day.

The extreme being claimed in Wuhan is about 700 per day due to coronavirus.

With 200 per day being normal non-epidemic-related-deaths for any given day in Wuhan, there's anecdotal "evidence" of an extra 500 per day.

Such claims may seem hysterical or irrational to some, but they are not.

They are only extreme.

  

New Zealand Herald Jan 30: Wuhan crematory employees say bodies come directly from hospitals without being identified or added to the official record

Coronavirus: China accused of 'burning bodies in secret':

Chinese-language news outlet Initium interviewed people working at local cremation centres in Wuhan, who said bodies were being sent directly from hospitals without being properly identified and added to the official record.

Coronavirus in Wuhan is like unemployment in the US

If you're not counted, you're not dead.

Estimate based on cremation statistics indicates 600-800 extra deaths PER DAY in Wuhan due to coronavirus

Go here for link to video.

Wuhan doctor in LA Times: Official China tally of coronavirus infection cases is "definitely not reliable"

From the story, Jan 31:

Wei Peng, a doctor in his 40s at a community hospital in Wuhan’s Qiaokou district, about two hours from Gao’s family home, said in a phone interview that at least 12 out of 59 doctors at his hospital, himself included, were working despite being sick with fevers, coughs and lung infections — symptoms of the coronavirus.

“We don’t have the test kit, and we don’t have time for tests either,” Wei said.

Wei suspects he became infected while treating a patient on Jan. 19, when Chinese authorities were insisting the disease, which is suspected to have started in a live animal market, was not transmissible between humans. Wei was wearing only a disposable surgical mask and no goggles when the patient coughed in his face.

“As long as you’re not diagnosed, you must go to work,” said Wei. He and other doctors spend their nights at the hospital because of transportation shutdowns. “We know that we are causing risk of contagion to the patients. But if you don’t work, then what? There’s no one to replace you. Your colleagues must bear more, and they’re also infected.”

The official tally of infection cases was “definitely not reliable,” Wei said. He noted: Too many patients are not being counted. There are not enough test kits. Not enough doctors. Not enough hospital beds. Not enough medicine. Not enough masks. Not enough cars to take patients to the hospital.

“There are a lot of patients and they are anxious,” said Wei, who fashioned his own goggles out of plastic sheets. “Many are calling here and you can hear them shouting on the phone, ‘Save me, save me,’ and they are crying, and there’s nothing we can do.”

Chinese welder Gao Fei warned family members in Hubei province of the impending coronavirus threat. When he criticized the government for its handling of the outbreak, he was arrested.

( Gao Fei )

Unless the gay mafia committed sexual assault on the products in the Chinese seafood market, the coronavirus escaped from the secret Wuhan bio-weapons lab

It's stupid to let coronavirus victims come to America when risk of human to human transmission is so high

Japanese bus driver gets coronavirus infection weeks after driving Chinese tourists from Wuhan

Kyodo News has the story.

Yet there is no human to human transmission according to a US health authority.

Brain dead Dr. Dena sources story from The Grauniad instead of Reuters, which says parents from Wuhan visited daughter in Shanghai, not the other way around

Shanghai woman visited by parents from Wuhan flies to Germany Jan 19, infects co-worker Jan 21, flies back to Shanghai Jan 23 and only then becomes ill on plane from coronavirus

Reuters has the story.

This thing will be global shortly.