I think this question is a little premature. It's pretty unlikely most people, randomly selected, know someone who's a confirmed case at this point. Give it a little longer and that may well change.

As of my writing this, from what I can find, there are 111,405 confirmed cases and the world population is 7.53 billion.
That's a 0.00148% proportion of the world population. Obviously in hotspots it's massively higher than that, but it's still a stretch you'll get any, or many, responses just yet.

I know several who have/had it, they just dont know it yet, and probably never will..

Or to think of it another way, 1 in about 67,500 people have a confirmed case. That's about 1 person in a full NFL stadium.

If you are in the US and Canada, there are about 700 cases. Which means that about 1 in 528,000 people have it.

I think we should all just chill out a little bit.

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Strava

You can't possibly know this without a clinical test result. In which case they would know.

What trail said.

I don't. No need for panic, but plenty need for caution.
It's not about how many have it, it's about how many will, and how serious it may be for many of those.

The rate of dispersion is pretty high so far, and the lack of solid data on incubation periods, infection rates, mortality rates, etc, are all rather concerning. Those who think it's nothing to be too concerned about are just as far off the point as those who think the world is ending, if you ask me. Sure, it may, if we're lucky, end up fizzling out relatively quickly without doing massively more damage, but that's not looking like the most likely scenario at the moment. Until we know more, it's too soon to tell, and it's sensible not to assume the best case.

The only reason to be worried at this stage is because we don't know much about the virus itself.
The CDC is doing a very good job keeping the information up to date, and explaining what the issues here.
The media are doing a total shit job from a people's perspective, because bad news sell more.

that was exactly his point.

I would argue that what we know is worth a little worry. We've seen what it can do to a long-term care facility.

How does he know? Or was that bit just sarcasm?

The estimated R0 is a worry. And mortality is about 30 times that of the typical flu.

Zero

Giving that the virus effects are worse in the elderly and most endurance athletes are not old you probably will not see many athletes with it. Also its not affecting kids that much either.

But for some perspective here........32 Million cases of the flu in the US this year. 310k put in the hospital and 18k dead.

The flu so far is much worse.

I’ll be the first to actually answer your question. None.

You mean "probably will not see many athletes with significant symptoms" They're going to get it just like anyone else. Maybe more since athletics tends to be a social activity.

The media is not a monolithic entity. What is the most common thing "the media" is inaccurately reporting that you think is a total shit job from a people's perspective? Thanks.

I don't follow. It sounds like you're saying there's not much to be concerned about except for the main thing everyone is concerned about?

I don't know what the US media are saying, I'm in Ireland. But when I've encountered US mainstream media always seem to go hyperbolic about everything. To be fair the mainstream media worldwide are tending further and further in that direction in recent years. Nevertheless, aside from huge amounts of coverage, the media here are not scaremongering in my opinion.

Look at the figures, the WHO and other health organisation info on the virus, the results of attempts to contain the spread so far, and you can decide for yourself how serious it is. My partner is Italian, her family are all in lock down in northern Italy. Several of my colleagues were on a flight sitting a couple of seats away from a confirmed case and are in self-isolation for 2 weeks on direction of the health service executive. All of these are at real risk of infection. The efforts in Italy have so far failed to stop the spread of the virus. Testing has not been widespread enough from what I can see, and the same relatively sparse testing appears to be the norm in Ireland, the US and elsewhere.

The main positive I see going by the figures alone, is that South Korea, who are doing a lot of testing, have found a lot of cases, but they have much lower mortality figures and critical cases. That seems to indicate that there may be a much larger cohort infected worldwide, who are not detected, but the official figures are composed largely of the more serious cases potentially inflating the apparent mortality rate. So maybe it's already spread further than we anticipate but is less lethal. That would be both good and bad news, but the worst case scenario is much less severe if that's the case.

Efforts in Italy failed because they announced they were going to lock down areas before doing so. So everyone left. That was just poor implementation.

This is exactly what I think, but the problem is someone like my dad will most likely die if he gets it because he's really weak and old. That's my concern. People dying unnecessarily.

It wasn't an announcement, it was a leak as far as I'm aware, and that's just the latest development. They're escalating their attempts to control it because their existing measures aren't working. It's been going on a lot longer than that the last 2 days.

Besides, what's your point? Will no other errors occur? Will other governments not make mistakes? Is the US government a model of impeccable decision making and execution?

I think you have two fundamental errors in this post.

1. Infection has more severe consequences for the elderly, especially with underlying cardiac and respiratory issues. that doesn't mean they get it more easily. I suspect children and workers are likely to get infected more easily than the elderly since they are typically the most socially active. The question was about infection, not severity of symptoms.
2. All of the evidence to date appears to show this is far worse than the seasonal flu. Sure the flu has hospitalised and killed more this year, but that's a known entity and has infected millions. If Covid-19 infects the same number, which is looking very possible, the number of casualties looks like being considerably higher. Possibly by an order of magnitude. And we don't know if it may mutate, or may become endemic like the flu, re-emerging every year to claim thousands or millions more. Hopefully not, but neither you nor I know that yet.

So, just to spell it out. You've said 32 million cases of the flu in the US this year. If that's correct, and IF Covid-19, which appears more contagious reaches the same figure, and IF the mortality rate is 3% that's just under 1 million dead and I don't know, maybe 4 to 6 million needing hospitalisation? Sounds pretty catastrophic to me.

How are you reaching the conclusion that the flu is worse? Which of my figures or assumptions is wrong?
And by the way, i don't think those are worst case figures. Population penetration could easily be higher, although I would hope mortality is lower.

what i find interesting about COVID-19 is the sociology of it. how many people reading here even know what i'm talking about when i mention the H1N1 pandemic of 2009? how many of us back in 2009 knew there was a pandemic? i mean, honestly?

and yet 1 in 5 of everyone, worldwide, caught it; 1 in every 6 americans; and 12,500 americans died out of a total of maybe a half-million people who died worldwide. it was also rare in that it spread during the late spring and summer. a second wave broke out in the fall and peaked in october.

no sporting events were canceled. no conferences. that i know of. schools were closed here and there. this flu had a specific mortality risk to kids, up thru their teenage years, but did not adversely affect old people.

so, as bad as this is, it seems to me the response today is a lot more ardent, urgent, than it was back in 2009. i'm not prepared to say whether we're under or over or appropriately reacting now. i just find it interesting to note the difference in the approach to this flu versus the H1N1 in 2009.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

I think that's everyone's concern. If myself, my partner or my son get this, chances seem to be that we'll recover. Although I'm not clear whether there's any long term effects. However, our parents who are all in their 70s would be at much higher risk and one, who is already in bad shape with heart issues would be very lucky to survive.

The death rate of covid 19 is about 30 times that of the standard flu (excluding the 1918 H1N1 strain).
And contagion is about twice as much. That’s the concern.

THANK YOU for bringing the sensible, relative numbers into this. Important to remember that even in Wuhan, a metro of ~19 Million people, that there were less than 68k cases (that's the number for Hubei province, quickest number I could find which means a smaller number in Wuhan itself) which is <0.4% of their population. I'd be willing to bet that the crossover of runners in Wuhan barely touches the circle of cases...

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808 > NYC > PDX > YVR
2024 Races: Taupo