How are you preparing for the Corona Virus?

[mia]

Hi everyone! I'm getting concerned about this Corona Virus because we've never experienced anything like it in our lifetimes. It's difficult to think about how to prepare when there's no true way of knowing what to expect. There are so many variables that could play out that it's overwhelming to think about. 

I've been following Dr. Dena Grayson on Twitter and her tweets are quite informative. Last evening she posted a video answering many questions concerning the virus. Here's her twitter: twitter.com/DrDenaGrayson.


In our home it's just my husband and me. He's had lung cancer that required a lobectomy in late 2016. Every three months he has a PET scan to see if the cancer has returned. We hold our breaths everytime until the results come in. He has severe emphysema that requires oxygen 24/7. Don't smoke, people. He smoked for 42 years. 

Even though I've never smoked and have been an avid runner all of my life, I too have COPD. I suppose it's from the second hand smoke. This leaves us both vulnerable as we have compromised immune systems. Also, our ages aren't in the "You'll probably be okay if you get the virus" category. He's 66 and I'm 64. Personally, I am not afraid of getting sick and dying. That may sound strange, but I'm more concerned about our family. I want them to live long and happy lives.

My husband and I have both been sidelined from the workforce, and we live a modest life on Social Security. We don't leave the house often. We pick up our groceries after placing our order online. We visit our family across town and they visit us as well. Our great grandson's 2nd birthday party is coming up at the end of this month. I'm so excited about that! I've already purchased lots of little gifts for him. He loves to unwrap things. But, I'm worried that the virus will hit our city hard and the party will have to be canceled. I'm covering my family with prayer. 

We live in the tourist filled city of Las Vegas. I wouldn't be surprised if we woke up tomorrow and heard that the virus is here.

To stock up and try to prepare for a pandemic is challenging. I try to think of things that we might need should the stores run low on inventory. 

Don't laugh, but the first thing I purchased was 80 rolls of Scott Toilet paper.   My husband is  more security minded and has ordered more ammo. He was in the Air Force and was stationed at Mather Air Force Base from 1975-1979. We lived in Rancho Cordova when Joseph James DeAngelo began to terrorize our city. 

Back to what we're stocking up on:

Crackers
Peanut Butter
Chocolate flavored small tea biscuits 
Water
Coffee
Tea Bags
Sugar
Dry Pinto Beans
Dry Lima Beans
Dry Anasazi Beans
Rice
Spaghetti
Tomato Sauce
Tomato Paste
McCormick Spaghetti Spices
Grated Parmesan Cheese
Cereal--lots of cereal
Canned Corn
Canned Green Beans
Canned Pork n Beans
Canned Fruit
Just lots of canned goods
Ramen Noodles
Canned Soups
Flour
Brownie Mix
Hard Candy--My husband now has a lifesaver addiction.
Fig Newton Individually Wrapped Soft Cookie Bars
Hand Soap
Laundry Detergent
Bleach
Clorox Disinfecting Wipes
Alcohol Prep Pads--70% alcohol ones (I think these are far more handy than hand sanitizer, and cheaper too.)
Batteries
Candles
Matches
Flashlights
Over the Counter Meds...Generic Tylenol, Aspirin, Alka-Seltzer, Unisom, Tums, Melatonin, Dramamine
Shampoo
Toothpaste
Dental Floss
Salt
Pepper
And I can't think of anything else at the moment.

My husband wants to purchase a small outdoor grill tomorrow. He hopes to still be able to have steaks and hamburgers. ( I don't care much for these things.)

I'm concerned about our medications. The FDA has announced that there is a shortage of one medication but they haven't informed the public as to which one it is. They're very concerned about this shortage though. Hopefully, it's something like Viagra,   and not something  that is absolutely needed by diabetics, such as insulin, or an EpiPen.

My husband is on many medications. Me, not so many. It's worrisome to know that most of our medications in this country are manufactured in China. Since the Corona Virus has hit China so hard, they have not been able to manufacture and ship goods to our country. It's going to impact us greatly, I fear. They have now missed the second shipment cycle of goods to us. And their country is still being ravaged by this Virus. 

What are you all doing to prepare? Do you have a list of items that you are trying to stock up on? It looks as if the Preppers were correct all along. They've been ready for a while now. That's a good thing. I envy them for being so prepared.

The motto seems to be: Prepare for the worst, Hope for the best.

I'm sorry this turned out to be such a long post. I'd love to hear how everyone is preparing. Thank you to anyone who has taken the time to read this. I pray that each and every one of you stays well and safe.

[almagata]

I've been watching this unfold since late January.

I think COVID19 has been in the US since at least January and since we were not testing for it, people were just diagnosed with colds or the flu by doctors and treated symptomatically. Now that we can test for it and are testing, we are confirming cases in the US where people had not traveled to China or had contact with someone who had traveled to China.

I know locally in California, people in my area have been reporting a very severe flu for weeks and I have suspected it was COVID19.

I don't have any plans to do much other than minimize my activities in public and when I do, wash my hands well and not touch my face. I usually grocery shop during off hours so I already avoid one of the main places that I might be around lots of people.

It is not a bad idea to stock up on essential items. You never know what could happen.

With your and your husband's health histories, you should stay out of the public and especially medical facilitates is you can.

Panic likely will cause more disruption than the virus will.

[saturnrising]

During the 2014 Ebola scare, I did the stocking up on supplies thing.  I bought all kinds of non-perishable stuff, full of sodium and chemicals.  Most of it is stuff I don't usually eat.  90% of it is still stuffed in the backs of my cupboards, and a great deal of it is expired.  So I won't be doing that again.

Because I live in the northeast where the power goes out for days during storms, it is just habit to have extra TP and some non-perishables, plus batteries, candles and other emergency supplies.  Other than that, I will just live my life as usual, lavas my manos and hope for the best.  This too shall pass.

[otis1]

Mar 2, 2020 17:51:22 GMT saturnrising said:

Because I live in the northeast where the power goes out for days during storms, it is just habit to have extra TP and some non-perishables, plus batteries, candles and other emergency supplies.  Other than that, I will just live my life as usual, lavas my manos and hope for the best.  This too shall pass.

 Indeed it shall ... but yea, always keep a full supply of TP around.

[elir]

I have expertise in infectious diseases ,including HIV and was a volunteer clinician in West Africa during the Ebola epidemic, training health workers and checking out rural health facilities to be assured that they were maintaining infection control .

Here are the current facts on the corona virus:

The case fatality rate at this point is about 2% , meaning if 100 people get sick , perhaps 2 might die. The majority of deaths to date have been in the elderly or people with ore-existing health problems that can compromise one’s immune system.


The vast majority of those people that have had the disease have experienced either flu like symptoms, mild cold symptoms, or even no symptoms at all., which leads us to believe that he case fatality rate is likely far lower than 2% as the majority of identified cases are those with symptoms, and the asymptomatic cases are being found while looking at possible transmission chains .

In other words the majority of people that get the disease will be no sicker than with influenza , however the problem is that those with less severe illness can easily transmit it to people that may be vulnerable.

The deaths we are hearing about in the US now tend to support the case that covid may be widely distributed in certain areas .

Also keep in mind that between 10,000-50,000 people die of the flu each year in the US alone, vs a only a few thousand deaths attributed to Covid worldwide.

If you are a healthy person having covid is not likely to cause severe disease but the risk is that you transmit it to an elderly person or someone with other health issues that can’t fight off the disease.

As we get more info on viral strains involved in transmission chains we will learn if or how the virus may change as it moves though more and more people. Some of these diseases can become worse but many more become less virulent over time,


I know there is an a lot of alarmist information out there, hope this info has helped somewhat.

[elroacho]

Coronavirus COVID-19 Global Cases by Johns Hopkins CSSE

Worried about the panic more than the virus.

[sylliec]

I think that there is something way more serious about corona virus than the normal flu. When health officials are spending time tracking down people who may have been in contact with an infected person you have to wonder why go through the effort. They wouldn’t do that just to be alarmist. They don’t do that for the regular flu. Anyways I stocked ip on toilet paper and jello mixes (if you get sick jello is a life-saver). Good luck everybody!

[Agent99 aka Sandia]

Mar 2, 2020 20:08:08 GMT elir said:

I have expertise in infectious diseases ,including HIV and was a volunteer clinician in West Africa during the Ebola epidemic, training health workers and checking out rural health facilities to be assured that they were maintaining infection control .

Here are the current facts on the corona virus:

The case fatality rate at this point is about 2% , meaning if 100 people get sick , perhaps 2 might die. The majority of deaths to date have been in the elderly or people with ore-existing health problems that can compromise one’s immune system.


The vast majority of those people that have had the disease have experienced either flu like symptoms, mild cold symptoms, or even no symptoms at all., which leads us to believe that he case fatality rate is likely far lower than 2% as the majority of identified cases are those with symptoms, and the asymptomatic cases are being found while looking at possible transmission chains .

In other words the majority of people that get the disease will be no sicker than with influenza , however the problem is that those with less severe illness can easily transmit it to people that may be vulnerable.

The deaths we are hearing about in the US now tend to support the case that covid may be widely distributed in certain areas .

Also keep in mind that between 10,000-50,000 people die of the flu each year in the US alone, vs a only a few thousand deaths attributed to Covid worldwide.

If you are a healthy person having covid is not likely to cause severe disease but the risk is that you transmit it to an elderly person or someone with other health issues that can’t fight off the disease.

As we get more info on viral strains involved in transmission chains we will learn if or how the virus may change as it moves though more and more people. Some of these diseases can become worse but many more become less virulent over time,


I know there is an a lot of alarmist information out there, hope this info has helped somewhat.

THANK YOU! Elir.  

[Agent99 aka Sandia]

mia, I'm so sorry you and your husband have health issues, especially your husband. It is wise of youto stock up so you can minimize going out. I hope and pray this pandemic will be short lived. I heard an expert say that there is every indication it will be one of those seasonal things like colds and the flu.
edit:  I don't know why I said especially your husband, thinking more about it, COPD is especially concerning for this virus.

[thrax]

Mar 3, 2020 4:09:56 GMT sylliec said:

I think that there is something way more serious about corona virus than the normal flu. 

Indeed.  The mortality rate of the average seasonal influenza is about 0.1 percent.  COVID-19 is currently (Mar. 2) tracking about 35 times higher than that, though a lot of this probably represents issues with overloaded healthcare systems in the parts of China most seriously affected. As well, the r₀ value seems to be significantly higher than influenza, with preliminary estimates saying it's around 2 - 3.5 based on Chinese data.  There's no reason for panic, but there's even less reason for complacency, because this does bear the hallmarks of a very serious pandemic if it's not contained quickly.

[Agent99 aka Sandia]

Mar 3, 2020 4:09:56 GMT sylliec said:

I think that there is something way more serious about corona virus than the normal flu. When health officials are spending time tracking down people who may have been in contact with an infected person you have to wonder why go through the effort. They wouldn’t do that just to be alarmist. They don’t do that for the regular flu. Anyways I stocked ip on toilet paper and jello mixes (if you get sick jello is a life-saver). Good luck everybody!

Good thinking, stock up on foods you can tolerate if you or a family member does get sick.  It is worrisome, but elir was very reassuring.  

[elir]

Mar 3, 2020 4:45:06 GMT thrax said:

Mar 3, 2020 4:09:56 GMT sylliec said:

I think that there is something way more serious about corona virus than the normal flu. 

Indeed.  The mortality rate of the average seasonal influenza is about 0.1 percent.  COVID-19 is currently (Mar. 2) tracking about 35 times higher than that, though a lot of this probably represents issues with overloaded healthcare systems in the parts of China most seriously affected. As well, the r₀ value seems to be significantly higher than influenza, with preliminary estimates saying it's around 2 - 3.5 based on Chinese data.  There's no reason for panic, but there's even less reason for complacency, because this does bear the hallmarks of a very serious pandemic if it's not contained quickly.

It appears to have higher mortality than the flu , however this could be related to how we estimate cases.
The currebnt case fatality rate is based on deaths within known cases , however we are finding that there are likely numerous people with the disease that don’t meet the case definition. These people contribute to the spread since they aren’t severely ill . If we added in estimates of asymptomatic cases or of very mild disease that don’t meet case definition , we suspect that the fatality rate could be substantially lower than current estimates.

With other influenza like illnesses we have robust surveillance systems that allow us to better extrapolate data to estimate cases in the community , right now we dont have that for Covid-19.

People with chronic illnesses such a COPD ,conditions that impair one’s immune system like diabetes or HIV , or getting treatments that impair one’s immune system for example those that are currently getting radiation treatment for cancer , will be at higher risk for complications .


While we have some drugs which can be used to avert influenza at the onset ( Tamiflu) but were aren’t certain if any existing drugs can do the same for covid, There are initiatives to look at treatments that might mitigate the severity of cases.

Saying this could be a yearly event is really scare mongering. Yes it could be , and if it is there will likely be a yearly vaccine that will greatly reduce cases and complications in the population.

[elir]

FYI the budget proposed by the president aims for massive cuts to CDC , an institution that US and many other countries rely on for guidance and assistance during epidemics, if these cuts go through it could devastate or defenses as we could losses the capacity to anticipate and response to outbreaks.

[otis1]

Mar 3, 2020 13:41:45 GMT elir said:

FYI the budget proposed by the president aims for massive cuts to CDC , an institution that US and many other countries rely on for guidance and assistance during epidemics, if these cuts go through it could devastate or defenses as we could losses the capacity to anticipate and response to outbreaks.

Whoa.

Attempting to use the corona virus for political propaganda purposes is grossly inappropriate. Spewing forth bumper-sticker style, partisan, out of context slogans to attack our president and his administration is not the purpose of the cafe, isn't that correct?

Each and every agency and department of the federal government is bloated with wasteful spending, unneeded, unused property and surplus employees being paid huge salaries and receiving massive pensions. The issues concerning controlling federal spending are well known and deeply complex.

But thank you for sharing your version of 'orange-man bad' derangement syndrome.

Our President and this administration deserve the thanks and gratitude of each and every United States citizen for the prescient, bold and life saving action taken at the earliest opportunity to close our boarders to un-screened individuals from affected nations. A decision that was called racist by partisan frauds and liars.

The racism lie didn't work so the new partisan lie is that the CDC will be eviscerated and people will die. One usually needs to watch CNN or VOX to be exposed to this gas-lighting. But you have brought it here.

smh

Who will moderate the moderator elir?

smh

[elir]

It’s an FYI.

I’m not commenting on any other part of the budget or why the decisions are made. If you want me to balance it out with a positive,the current administration is doing a good job supporting domestic HIV care.

The decision to cut CDC’s budget was made before the outbreak, if anything good comes from this situation it might reinforce the value of such institutions.

But I do take your point , Otis and won’t mention it again.