Coronavirus

[Dominator83]

Dude I was at the Costco in Casula yesterday and they ran out of toilet paper. That's unheard of for Costco to run out. Ppl fighting in line at the checkout, its just stupid.

We were nearly out of toilet paper all together, and I was able to order some from samsclub.com today in our normal brand. I have contributed to the problem by buying 2 packs instead of my normal 1 when I run out just so I don't have to deal with this later.

Same issue with disinfecting wipes and kitchen cleaner, but I was able to eventually find some of those too. It's just a pain in the butt though.

I may end up stocking up on some frozen items we go through regularly just in case someone makes a run on those next, but unlike toilet paper and bottled water I suppose that is less likely because people have very limited freezer space.

Yea it's effing nuts. Luckily, about 2 weeks ago I loaded up om TP not even thinking this would happen! The regular Scotts was on sale for $15 for 24. And I at times have that "grandparents " mentality of loading up on the essentials when they're on a good sale that doesn't happen a lot (same for when I see the big 32 oz bottles of H&S shampoo on sale for $8 a bottle). My TP load up was just dumb luck. At the time just 2 short weeks ago nobody was doing it yet. And with this type of insane demand, good luck finding a good sale anytime soon too

[TallDude]

In Finland all the games and also practises have been cancelled. Even amateur sports. So i can not do any of my sports Not even practice. I must go..... jogging in forest. Gyms are closed. Well couple of weeks just go Sauna everyday and read front of fireplace. I don`t care economics. It will be ok after this. Trump chance his mind pretty fast. Monday he was still laughing at this

Hopefully you get decent next president. Somebody else might (with brains) would probably do better job. Obama was a president, Bush was a president, Reagan was a president. Trump is something like watch 3 year old fat kid.

[Nikola]

Since 2008 most people have been more conservative with spending and saving. Also it is a catch 22 in that if we saved 20% of our income the economy would contract massively and then there would be widespread loss of jobs.

This just speaks to the house of cards a consumer based economy is built on. There's no easy fix, I certainly don't have one. This is going to wake people up a bit hopefully. UBI should absolutely be on the table if we are going the way things seem to be going where 1% of Americans own 90% of the assets.

I fear that UBI would further incentivize a consumer based economy.

So true. We need to tax finite resources.

[rtblues]

Here for the comments...

[dougthonus]

Exactly. We push and push and leverage everything for the highest ostensible material quality of life at the expense of readiness to withstand hardship. It's definitely possible through monetary and policy reform but of course has it's own risks, especially in transition.

I really see no practical implementation of what you are suggesting that wouldn't leave us with a lower standard of living 100% of the time than we do in hardship time right now, and you have not remotely offered anything whatsoever towards supplying a vision of that.

The closest implementation to what you've described is communism which wasn't stable at all and completely failed.

[dougthonus]

Doug, it's not the flu. It's much more infectious, has a higher mortality rate and most important has no vaccine or resistance like the flu. Comparing it to the flu is like sticking your head in the sand.

Why doesn't china have 100 million people infected by now? Why has their infection rate gone down after the initial rise? Why is it that you feel it's impossible for the best case in the US to have a similar situation?

Either you aren't reading what I'm writing or you're panic has you saying completely irrational things. Another country with a billion people has effectively stemmed the infection rate tide. I've suggested the _best_ case scenario is the same could happen in the US, but apparently, several people think that is impossible despite the fact that is has actually been evidenced to be quite possible.

I didn't claim this couldn't end up much worse, I just said the best case scenario is better than 25% infection rate.

[dougthonus]

People get flu shots - there is no vaccine for CV.
CV seems to be more infectious.
We don't yet know whether it will slow down during warmer weather like the flu does.

We have major health experts all across the globe projecting high infection rates. I hope you're right. I hope we hear people saying "meh, it wasn't that bad, we overreacted," though if we hear that, it may well be because of the social distancing measures that are being undertaken now rather than evidence of the seriousness of the virus.

I made no prediction.

I said the best case scenario is not as bad as 1/4th of the country getting corona virus. I didn't say we will have the best case scenario.

The post I responded to said that the infection rate in the US will have a range of 75m to 150m with the best case being 75m. I'm only stating an opinion that I don't think the best case is that bad. I think the best case is much lower. I made no comment about the worst case or where we would land between those things.

[Susan]

If you can afford it, please buy your essentials ONLINE.

Amazon, Boxed, and a few other websites rely on just their warehouse and just a postal company to deliver. Places like Amazon Fresh, Instacart and Peapod rely on systems that are breaking down/can't handle this volume.

There are some people who can only buy in the stores, by pushing your habits online, you help alleviate what is going to a be a pretty big mess here.

[DuckIII]

I hope we hear people saying "meh, it wasn't that bad, we overreacted," though if we hear that, it may well be because of the social distancing measures that are being undertaken now rather than evidence of the seriousness of the virus.

This is a very important point that I hope people keep in mind. The whole darn goal of taking steps towards social isolation is to mitigate the spread of the virus. It’s social responsibility to not only protect ourselves but to protect each other. So if the virus doesn’t spread as dramatically as we feared, it doesn’t mean we were wrong to fear it. It probably means we took the right steps to address the situation. It’s the whole point.

[Ccwatercraft]

If you can afford it, please buy your essentials ONLINE.

Amazon, Boxed, and a few other websites rely on just their warehouse and just a postal company to deliver. Places like Amazon Fresh, Instacart and Peapod rely on systems that are breaking down/can't handle this volume.

There are some people who can only buy in the stores, by pushing your habits online, you help alleviate what is going to a be a pretty big mess here.

FWIW, I think people have already begun to make a bit of a run on the delivery sites, I ran into issues with Walmart.com with most of my regular purchase items, (not just TP, I expected that to be out) and i'm a regular buyer there and about 80% of my reorder items were out of stock, also at least specifically with them if you deviate from your normal stuff they tend to only deliver larger sizes that can be quite ridiculous in a small household, for example I really don't want a 2 pack of giant peanut butter jars when I can get more manageable sizes at the local store. With that said, I've had a walmart box or prime package on the front porch every day this week as I'm doing just what you suggested for the items that I could find in stock like toothpaste, softener, etc but food items have been in short supply.

But in general I agree, I've been doing it for a couple years now getting things like detergent and similar items that i'd normally make a trip to walmart for, I figured it saved time & fuel, its darn convenient it made sense then and it makes even more sense now.

I'm trying to get my parents and inlaws (mid 70's) on board since all 4 of them were out running errands yesterday, going to the gym, lunch at a restaurant, my dad went golfing then hit the bar afterwards so they haven't gotten on board with just being a recluse for a couple weeks and my comments are bouncing right off them, its a tad frustrating that they are refusing to break their routines, but perhaps by the weekend they will see the light. But seriously if you are retired and in the high risk brackets, it just seems like common sense to hunker down.

ps, washing hands for 20 seconds feels like an eternity!

[Habs72]

I do agree that eventually you will move towards a system where there is a UBI standard of living. Some level of housing/food/basic things guaranteed for free and jobs can supplement that amount up until the point where there really are no jobs and all work is managed by AI.

There's no easy way to transition from where we are too that, nor was there really a way to have lived that way prior to this point that would have been more effective than what we actually did, but I agree that there will be fundamental changes in everything over the next 100 years (assuming we don't have some type of apocalyptic event by that point which is also ever more likely).

My biggest fear is that you need something like a Great Depression in order to implement something as sweeping as Social Security (to give an historical example). This event won't likely be the type of catalyst for something like Medicare-for-all or UBI.

But, maybe we can use this type of health crisis as an argument for paid sick leave, paid parental leave and a Medicare public option. Those are things that would improve our society (in my opinion).

You just described the things we have in Finland and pretty much take them for granted....and then your country among most other countries just dream of those things. You are a country that is supposed to be a spearhead of everything or at least many of your citizens think so. Yet the difference being a poor or wealthy is getting bigger and bigger .

[chitowndish]

It's seemed like it's pretty easy to get around what people are bulk buying they are buying up all of the wipes but there were big jugs of cleaning supplies so I was able to get bleach, ammonia, vinegar and 2 big jugs of the Clorox cleaning solution and a spray bottle. With the jug of cleaning solution you could wet a rag, put it in the spray bottle or mop your floor with it so it's kind of like why bother with the wipes? I just kind of look for ways around what people are bulk buying, same with TP everyone was buying TP but there was cleenex and paper towels there. I'd use either if I needed to and cleenex would have the benefit of being useful if you did get sick and paper towels with some Clorox spray = wipe. It is a real problem though regardless of how dumb it seems there flat out isn't going to be a lot of TP for a while so if you don't have some that's going to kind of suck. So on that level it does make sense to pick some up if you can but I am just trying to keep a reasonable amount of things.

[SimonFish]

Some Hongkongers have made a 3-ish minutes video in 18 languages on how to prevent coronavirus. Those who are interested may go to take a look:

https://2019ncov.health/info/


Sent from my [device_name] using [url]RealGM mobile app[/url]

Bump, because just don't want this to get buried while somebody else says i am "not providing any useful information" (just because he or she missed it) other than bringing up China.

For the record, Doug has left a message for me, and I reluctantly agreed that it is best not to bring up China in this thread anymore.

And I won't break my promise here.

[Susan]

TP = just buy a bidet.

[Susan]

Read on Twitter

No comment.

[FriedRise]

We stocked up on non-perishable foods and groceries yesterday. We did it through Shipt (a local Meijer), trying not to contribute to the mess and expose ourselves to the crowd as these professional shoppers are doing god's work. Between the stuff we bought, a big bag of rice, a few cans of Spam, and a full box of ramen noodles, we should be good to go for the next month if we need to hole up for a while. We plan to get whatever else we need through Amazon Prime / Target.com as needed.

I have no concerns for TP. If we ever run out, I can always just jump in the shower and clean up quickly there . That or install a bidet, which I've been looking into and seems super sanitary and a really good idea anyway.

[Habs72]

Read on Twitter

No comment.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cnn.com/cnn/2020/03/12/americas/brazil-bolsonaro-coronavirus-aide-scli-intl/index.html

[TheSuzerain]

Doug, it's not the flu. It's much more infectious, has a higher mortality rate and most important has no vaccine or resistance like the flu. Comparing it to the flu is like sticking your head in the sand.

Why doesn't china have 100 million people infected by now? Why has their infection rate gone down after the initial rise? Why is it that you feel it's impossible for the best case in the US to have a similar situation?

Either you aren't reading what I'm writing or you're panic has you saying completely irrational things. Another country with a billion people has effectively stemmed the infection rate tide. I've suggested the _best_ case scenario is the same could happen in the US, but apparently, several people think that is impossible despite the fact that is has actually been evidenced to be quite possible.

I didn't claim this couldn't end up much worse, I just said the best case scenario is better than 25% infection rate.

China is far better equipped to handle this scenario than we are. They have the resources, the will, and the government to take immediate and drastic action.

[dougthonus]

You just described the things we have in Finland and pretty much take them for granted....and then your country among most other countries just dream of those things. You are a country that is supposed to be a spearhead of everything or at least many of your citizens think so. Yet the difference being a poor or wealthy is getting bigger and bigger .

Your country is the size of a major US city and has a drastically more homogeneous population. I don't mean that in an offensive way, it's just not an apples and oranges comparison at all. The U.S. absolutely has a lot of problems it hasn't figured out a way to solve, but the root of those problems generally doesn't exist in many countries.

[Ccwatercraft]

We stocked up on non-perishable foods and groceries yesterday. We did it through Shipt (a local Meijer), trying not to contribute to the mess and expose ourselves to the crowd as these professional shoppers are doing god's work. Between the stuff we bought, a big bag of rice, a few cans of Spam, and a full box of ramen noodles, we should be good to go for the next month if we need to hole up for a while. We plan to get whatever else we need through Amazon Prime / Target.com as needed.

I have no concerns for TP. If we ever run out, I can always just jump in the shower and clean up quickly there . That or install a bidet, which I've been looking into and seems super sanitary and a really good idea anyway.

spam eh? I haven't tried that stuff, but I would like to think that in my household a can of spam would be right next to the lima beans in the bottom corner of the pantry for when things get really really desperate.

I went heavy on the tuna myself along with some chunk chicken, I can imagine that when things die down here that i'll be hearing complaints along the lines of "tuna cassarole again?"

One thing I remember from reading a number of WWII books that those hunkered down were desperate for meat of any kind.

If crap really hits the fan, I was thinking this morning that IF I still own a manual can opener that its been years and years since i've used it, and i'm sure those have been completely sold out. Not that i'm expecting power or water to be an issue, but at this point i'm not sure of anything. My left brain says that by April this will be a nothingburger and that i'll own more cruise line stocks than I ever imagined, but right brain says get the can opener.