Wuhan Coronavirus: This is serious. Also: Fear is the mind killer.

7,783 confirmed. 170 deaths. 133 recovered. (source)

My wife and I enjoyed a run in the open air this morning. No masks, no fear, no concern at all about our wellbeing, enjoying the beauty of Puerto Rico. Millions of people in China right now don't have that luxury. The rationing of masks, the 100-person lines to obtain them, the complete lockdown, the people fighting over rice in the market (I've seen videos that are not pleasant) all create a level fear I can barely comprehend.

First of all, be grateful.

Be thankful.

You are alive. Though we will all die someday, that is inevitable, and we cannot control when it happens, living in fear will kill our soul while still breathing, walking, talking, and existing. This virus is very, very serious. There are rational reasons to take serious precautions. That said, fear does not serve you.

Fear: an unpleasant emotion caused by the belief that someone or something is dangerous, likely to cause pain, or a threat.

To quote Frank Herbert of Dune:

"I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain."

This is not a time for negative emotion. This is a time for facts, data, and reasoned logic. This is a time to help each other and protect ourselves.

Please, don't give in to fear. We are a species of miracles. We go to the moon with less technology than my phone. We navigate the globe using wind and sails and oars. We are exploring the infinite cosmos from our little blue dot along with the fractally connected infinitely small quantum realm.

We got this.

You got this.

Previous post on Wuhan Coronavirus: Wuhan Coronavirus: Can you separate fact from fiction?

Sites I'm using to track things:

Sharing a Facebook post from my friend @sean-king:

Despite what has been described as “draconian” and “unprecedented” interventions, spread of the novel Wuhan coronavirus STILL remains on its exponential growth trend (slightly ahead of the exponential “prediction” in the chart below). India and the Philippines have now reported their first cases, bringing the total number of countries with infections to 22.

Multiple sources, even some medical journals, have now confirmed with some certainty that the virus can be spread even before symptoms appear, and the most reliable estimates are that each new carrier appears to infect between 2 and 3 others.

Given those things, and with nearly 8000 confirmed cases and likely 10 to 20 times more unconfirmed, this thing is now, baring a miracle cure or mutation, unstoppable. Multiple airlines have now cancelled all commercial flights to China; Russia, Hong Kong and other places have close their borders with China; China has placed entire regions (holding nearly 1 percent of the world’s population0 on lockdown), etc. But, the cat is out of the bag already and there’s no getting it back in.

The great uncertainty for me is still the actual mortality rate. Based only on confirmed cases that have been fully resolved, that number would appear to be greater than 50%. But, that’s almost certainly too high for reasons explained in previous posts. Likewise, the so-called “case mortality rate” (the number of deaths divided by total number of known cases, active and resolved), which is about 2.5%, is almost certainly way too low for reasons also previously explained (it will always be understated when cases are spreading exponentially but deaths tend to happen may days or even a couple weeks after exposure).

My best guess at this point is that actual mortality is somewhere between 5% and 15%, but only time will tell. SARS was about 10%. The ordinary flu is less than 0.1%. So, if the 10% figure is correct, then this thing is 100 times more deadly than the common flu.

Don’t listen to anyone who tells you that you should fear the ordinary flu as much or more than this novel virus. They are either ignorant or misleading you.

Baring a miracle, this thing is going to be the gravest health crisis of the last few generations and will remake entire economies and nations.