Wuhan coronavirus

I completely agree FSM19. I think a 14yo school kid would do as good job as from what I can gather is is simply comparing numbers! Looking back at the Italy infection rate I pretty much deduced that the UK is following a similar pattern. The only difference so far is that it hasn't exploded in any given area, like has happened in Italy.

All my opinion here; The Daily Mail, Sun, Star, Mirror, Sky news and the BBC are all crappy news media. They have been seen way too often to make stories from nothing, leave out facts that distort the truth and take parts of stories and spin them into massive stories, along with fearmongering. The Guardian and Independant are a little better, but my feelings are that the whole MSM in the UK is completely corrupt and will do anything for those clicks and shares.

Everyone should use discernment when reading UK MSM stories.

While we would all like to be in a scientific situation where we have the time to pour over figures, write models to check other published models etc and have them all peer reviewed, this epidemic is moving faster than scientists can publish.

The MSM is utterly shit, I accept that. But when shit hits the fan, they are good at getting the facts from the ground. e.g. everyone bashes the DM for hype and lies and whatever else then can think of. But, in a terror attack, they are the first place I go to for information. They are always there, first, and communicate important information quickly. I would never go to the Guardian for information on an ongoing terror attack.

People often choose certain MSM outlets because it feels right. This is often just a feedback loop keeping them within their bubble. The opinion in the paper keeps them nicely wrapped up in fluff and rainbows.

I now know to use every source I can and judge on a case by case basis. This allows getting to important events across the world quickly and without the ideological filters that prevent the important stuff from being talked about or discovered.

Sometimes this means using information from sources considered insane. I have no problem with this. Sometimes insane is on the money.

This whole disaster is a great case in point. Many people would have argued with the validity of the sources I have used in this thread. But we are where we are, in a pretty disastrous place. But we know more about it. If we had discounted a lot of this information, we would still be saying 'it's just a flu'. And we wouldn't know what is about to hit us.

I know there are many that are still struggling with the change in situation.

We have gone from normal to biological war against an invisible enemy in a few short weeks.

Even without those graphs to compare, a few weeks to widespread quarantine is a significant possibility. I do not doubt the logic behind the claims.

I have knocked together a quick and dirty spreadsheet to graph/monitor the UK infections per day. I did this mainly because there seems to be no source (that I have found) that shows the infections per day per country or area. I have come to the mind this is probably the metric to follow when trying to work out if the infections are on the rise or fall as opposed to the total infected. The total infected metric is a good indicator but is hard to distinguish the movement from day to day, or on any specific day, without the use of a calculator!

This is a screen grab of what I have so far:

You can download the spreadsheet here (xlsx) if you want to use it for your country. You will have to punch in the numbers etc. and copy the formulas for each new date but shouldn't be hard for anyone with spreadsheet experience. Give me a shout if you need help with it.

I do plan on keeping this up to date. Hopefully this will be every day at some point. No guarantees though as to what time of day or even if I do everyday, but I will try. You will be able to see an (hopefully!) up to date image of the data here: http://www.dreamtechnologies.co.uk/covid-19/uk-infected.png

Grrrr. Wrote a whole reply but hit wrong button and lost it. No matter, here is a chopped down version.

Dan, I agree with you too. The MSM have been by far the fastest at getting data out to us. My usual independant media has been slow by comparison. So far I have seen little, if anything, in the way of wrong data from the MSM with regards to COVID-19. But, the MSM are the culprits that photograph a couple of empty shelves in a store, throw some big headlines over it and cause panic. Just remember the MSM are in it for the money and clicks. As soon as COVID-19 starts to loose viewer time and clicks they will hype it up. It just so happens right now they don't need to!
As I said, discernment is the key.

The answer to why people are buying up all the bog roll!

"I think toilet paper is a necessity, and it's hard to imagine living without it … that's a psychological driver," says Jana Bowden, an associate professor of marketing at Macquarie University.

"Another aspect is just the level of fear that has been perpetuated by stories in the media of what is happening in other countries.

"So we have situations in Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan, and there's been news and reports on toilet paper shortages there.

"It's been a topic of media conversation, and consumers are watching what is happening around the world with the coronavirus, and we are taking psychological cues and signals from these other international markets."

In a nutshell; They got low in China and the MSM scared everyone into buying it all up!

On a more serious note though in that story there is this line: "But you don't need to worry about supply. There's nothing to suggest we're about to run out of toilet paper."
I can not agree with that at all.
If one person in the supermarket tested positive for coronavirus the store would shut instantly. It would re-open........at some point.
If one person at the warehouse tested positive for coronavirus the warehouse would close. It would re-open........at some point.
If one person at the gas station where trucks are filled tested positive.... You can see where I am going with this.
If you are quarantined at home because someone in your household tested positive you aren't going anywhere. You could get the supermarket to deliver for you, if they will deliver to an infected area, or if they are still open.
A friend could help out, right?
Hopefully it won't come to this. Looking at the latest UK daily infected rate it is looking better for the UK than I had assumed. But if it goes widespread in a particular area, it will be locked down.
Proper planning and preperation prevents piss poor peformance. If it is going to happen in the UK, it is going to happen fast. The UK has a large population to land mass ratio so the only option would be a lock down to try and contain it, or at least minimise further spread. We are really living on the knife edge of unchartered territories.