The wife and I are here in Seattle, at ground zero for the U.S. experience.
There is definitely something different going on here.
Observations:
U of W and Fred Hutchinson Immunologists using computer models calculate it ( covid 19) was active locally a month before public officials announced the first case, probably patient 0 was here the 3rd week in January. Also some models show the possibility of 50% to 100% higher infections than currently diagnosed.
Downtown Seattle is very quiet. My friends in retail are really worried. Obviously, the stock market is worried.
Our legendary freeway rush hour traffic is currently like Sunday afternoon. The Seattle area is home to Amazon, Boeing commercial Airplanes, Starbucks, Costco, Microsoft, Expedia, Weyerhaeuser, Nordstrom, REI, Alaska Airlines and hundreds of supporting business large and small. Big economic impact that will reverberate for months, at the very least seems possible.
All public schools are closed, as are libraries, many restaurants, churches and in fact all public gatherings of 250 people are prohibited by order of the governor in the all larger western Washington counties, for at least a month, maybe longer.
My Doctor and hospital staff friends are hopping that quarantine measures will reduce resource overwhelming spikes in infections and help for to flattened the infection curve so that it won’t overwhelm medical resources.
Now most people will experience nothing more severe than the flu, maybe a bad flu, but 3-5% infected people will succumb (about 34 times more fatal than common flu) and this will be serious indeed for these people and families.
What exactly will happen is uncertain, but it has the potential to sweep across the country and the world. The social, economic and political consequences will be interesting to say the least.
I can live for a few months on coffee and toilet paper soup.
?
