COVID-19 Well wishes

[DestinedToDie]

I started following this COVID-19 thing on January out of curiosity, saw it becoming inevitable by Februry. Prepared myself in every way I could conceive, but I'm mostly relying on my good health. For a long time, it seemed as if I was I was doing crazy preparations and nothing was happening. Suddenly it came like lightning, borders closed and panic buying of toilet paper and long shelf life items. I had bought the cheapest stuff a month ago and I think I'm secured for about 6 months.

I even bought n95 masks and porridge for my grandmother, though she wouldn't let me fill her shelves back then. Now she's self-isolated so she wouldn't get it in the first place. I think the threat is more real for people like her. The government response has been nuts and isn't either of the 2 possibilities I imagined. I figured either they plan ahead and prepare or plan to do nothing. Instead of that, they didn't plan anything and are reacting to things as they happen. I've no idea what'll be left of our economy after this though, so it does affect everyone.

[raevol]

I'm in Santa Barbara, a ways north from raevol

I keep forgetting you're closer now, I should have bugged you about the SoCal Linux Expo a few weekends ago. Then again, with the virus, probably a better idea to not have gone...

[AnyOldName3]

Don't be silly, it's only Windows that gets viruses!

(I read something the other day saying that Malwarebytes actually had a higher number of infections per machine from their Mac customers than their Windows ones, so the meme is truly dead.)

[raevol]

Malwarebytes actually had a higher number of infections per machine from their Mac customers than their Windows ones

I was at a talk years ago where a guy had his Mac open on one screen, and was ticking the config options on and off, and had a port scan on the other screen, and was showing how the options did absolutely nothing. I'm sure they're better now, but if that gives you an idea...

[Time4Tea]

Hey, I'm US East Coast. I work as a Mechanical Engineer and am a fan/user of OpenMW. I've been working from home for the past week and a half ... in my basement ... with my OpenMW-loaded desktop PC only a short reach away ... such a shame!

Yeah, people have been panic-buying here too. There was no TP on the store shelves when I was there a few days ago. We have enough to keep us going for now though. When the TP runs out ... that's when the civil unrest really starts (I hear it was a big factor in the civil war)

I'm hold up in my apartment, haven't spent time with another human being since Friday, except if you count buying a mortar and pestle from the Asian market.

I hope you've got plenty of Ash Yam and Kagouti Hide mate (and maybe a little bit of Moon Sugar, too )

[raevol]

California got put on mandatory Stay At Home last night. It's being enforced by social pressure, not by law enforcement, but still kinda crazy. I haven't checked the news yet this morning, but it seems like it's been quiet here.

[mikeprichard]

Instead of that, they didn't plan anything and are reacting to things as they happen.

This is unfortunately human nature (amplified among politicians, who are too often blindly self-serving, incompetent, or both), and was probably the most predictable outcome all along.

I still fail to understand the herd-mentality panic-buying of ridiculous quantities of toilet paper. But then again, expecting calm, rational thought in times of perceived emergency is never... rational.

https://www.popularmechanics.com/scienc ... irus-math/

Stay safe out there, all.

[lysol]

I'm kind of surprised that it seems none of the western countries had a plan for this. I mean, every first world country has some kind of strategy for different war scenarios and defence. I really thought every state had a pandemic in consideration for crisis plans. Like "we're getting a couple of cases of this quick spreading illness to our country! Let's launch OPERATION PANDEMIC OVERLOAD!".

Some kind of plan that took in things like economy and stuff in consideration too.

But no.

[1Zero]

I am absolutely not surprised that western countries have no real plan to deal with the virus. It's the impression I already got years ago talking to some politicians. There is (was) just that kind of hope that "this will never happen/ In the end we will be lucky". Well no, that's not how the universe works. As expected it spreads exponentially. More precisely one could solve some differential equation which would give a function telling the number of infected people at any point in time taking into account:

- Physical distances between members of a population (Homo Sapiens on earth)
- Average spread rate to other people of one person
- Counter measures like travel restrictions
- Healed people

and some more factors. Even considering only the above factors, there are a non finite set of ways to model this. The more things to consider, the more complex the DGL will be to solve. Luckily, there are reasonably well working mathematical models available already.
If I think about the many possible ways to counter this, as in, find a perfect way (an algorithm) to quickly end a pandemic spread of a virus and how to formulate them in a mathematical framework, intuitively I already feel computationally undecidable problems arise, where it would not be decidable which algorithm is better to choose to quickly and a pandemic. Interesting times.

[mikeprichard]

Not only would it be impossible to rely on an algorithm to somehow reliably prevent such a pandemic from occurring, the human element (fear/panic, deceit - e.g. about recent travel/observed personal symptoms, political motivations to deflate/inflate statistics, ignorance (willful or otherwise), etc. etc. etc.) would make the exercise largely pointless. That said, political leaders (speaking in the case of the US) have made the situation much, much worse than it needed to be by sending mixed signals and having no coordinated plan whatsoever. Again, human nature. All we can do is take the reasonable personal precautions that have been recommended for similar viruses for decades, keep track of the status of our loved ones and neighbors - especially the very young, elderly, and infirm - and wait this out.