outbreak! (ebola, sars, coronavirus, etc)

everyone should have a thermometer handy.

as cost-effective as it may seem at first, resist the urge to share a "group thermometer" with your friends and neighbors.

yeah, i have no clue why we don't have one. We have been going by the "do I look sweaty" test.

Lol. I did buy a digital thermometer, purely for the fever reason I said upthread

not sure whether to be reassured by "no symptoms, just fever" articles since I had a (probably purely hypochondria-induced psychosomatic) mildly scratchy throat and slightly weird head-feeling when I visited my mum; wanted to take my temperature before leaving to be sure since that seems to be the main method of diagnosis short of a swab, but no thermometer and all body temperature thermometers under like £80 have been panic-bought

(I got a cheap forehead strip thermometer off Amazon last week; it does not work. I held the weather station thermometer probe in my armpit - yes, I wiped it down a lot before and afterwards - and it told me I was 34 degrees, so that didn't help much either)

my org now has a 4 (or was it 5?) stage Plan but nobody's told us anything about working from home. the official word is we are on stage 1 which appears to be "don't do very much" even though we actually appear to have passed all the milestones to put us in stage 3, which was, like, "probably we will start shutting buildings down around here but we haven't thought about it yet"

There's never any reason to be without one. The rectum is nature's thermometer scabbard, iirc.

Anytime I am in a group of people I touch each and every one of their foreheads with the back of my hand.

fwiw I don't think anybody or anything has said fever but no symptoms is a thing. fever just seems to be the most universal symptom.

xp I did not think inserting the weather station thermometer there would be universally appreciated, for some reason

“But you look flushed—as though you had fever.” She never stopped trying to fix him with her gaze, and always the eyes glided off to one side. “Have you measured?” He answered in the negative.
“Why not?” she asked, and her protruding lower lip hung in the air after she spoke.
He made no answer. The poor youth was still young; he had never got over his schoolboy shyness. He sat, so to speak, on his bench, did not know the answer and took refuge in dumbness.
“Perhaps you never do take your temperature?”
“Oh, yes, Frau Director, when I have fever.”
“My dear child, one takes it in the first instance to see whether one has fever. According to you, you have none now?”
“I can’t tell, Frau Director. I cannot really tell the difference. Ever since I came up here, I have been a little hot and shivery.”
“Aha! And where is your thermometer?”
“I haven’t one with me, Frau Director. Why should I, I am not ill; I am only up here on a visit.”
“Rubbish! Did you send for me because you weren’t ill?”
“No,” he laughed politely, “it was because I caught a little—”

have bumped a bunch of elbows today, could get used to this greeting
trains have seemed as busy as usual today but apparently the RATP has a crisis plan ready if we need it

I have an instant read digital cooking thermometer, is there any reason that wouldn't be accurate?

And this is how not-quite-at-the-peak Italy looks like, from her perspective pic.twitter.com/Vrn5xusB6u

— Dimi Reider (@reider) March 10, 2020

back to business as usual

Xp It’s probably well calibrated to +/- 3 degrees in the range 200-500F. You want something good to 0.5 degrees down at 100.

digital thermometers are also used to make sure cold food is cold in restaurants and whatnot. i don't understand your calibration in one direction theory.

is bumping elbows an actual thing? xps

would have thought just a hello and nod of the head would do

Hoping to see this one take off

https://media2.giphy.com/media/3GUk2a7ndN2wg/giphy.gif

tokyo flights now rerouted through frankfurt but seemingly going ahead, with a few hours added on, so hurrah etc

josh i am sorry to be so nosey and pesky, but you've been delivering food to homebound seniors? you've posted even more in this thread than i have so i know you're aware of the risks...that's nice of you but be careful! that's like...direct vector transmission to by far the most vulnerable group of people.

i can't imagine working in the retirement community or senior home assistance fields right now, must be really tense.

also tapping feet TikTok-style

xposts

xpost I haven't gone anywhere and have no reason to believe I have anything, and they haven't gone anywhere and are not going anywhere. It's not like we're coughing all over each other or anything.

I think senior homes and the like must be more stressful. These people live alone, so to ignore or avoid them would do more harm than good.

oh for sure, i know. i guess i'm just thinking of what home-delivery measures/precautions other countries are taking. i see that home delivery companies (and some countries like china) are pushing for "no-contact" deliveries (https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/6/21168699/postmates-coronavirus-no-contact-deliveries)

my mom is 91 and (thank god in this situation) lives alone in a non-seniors-only cul de sac condo in the outer suburbs of the twin cities. She is not taking this danger very seriously but her habitual hermity lifestyle is already just about ideal I think/hope.

digital thermometers are also used to make sure cold food is cold in restaurants and whatnot. i don't understand your calibration in one direction theory.

^^^

So the woman who sits across from me is now out because she and her husband are self-isolating while they await his test results. He’s been sick ever since he returned from Milan 3 weeks ago. She kept on cracking jokes about him having it last week and it struck me as insanely irresponsible of him not to have been tested so I said something to my boss who in turn said something to her and he was tested over the weekend. Kind of feel like a bitch but come on. Also, insert this is fine dog here.

Like, that's as red flag as it gets!

Why has it hit so hard in northern Italy?

He’s been sick for three weeks and they didn’t think of doing anything til you said so?!

I’m not entirely sure but I think it’s at least partly because they have a large population of older and therefore more susceptible people.

X-post - I know!!

The first case of Corona in Congo is introduced by a Belgian. There is so much to unpack here, on different levels. We Belgians causing problems in Congo since over a 100 years... https://t.co/W78SlL1kjN

— Gillian Mathys (@GMathys) March 10, 2020

And yes. She was so flippant about it. Finally last Friday she had to go get cough medicine at lunch because he kept her up all night and I was like uh yeah this is not cool lady.

The Associated Press reports:

A commercial flight from Colorado ski country to Newark, New Jersey made an unscheduled stop in Denver after several passengers became disruptive because they were seated next to someone who they thought was sick, officials said.

Three passengers failed to follow crewmember instructions after growing upset about being seated next to the supposedly sick passenger.

The “sick” passenger in question was apparently suffering from allergy symptoms, and was screened for a fever onboard which came back negative. The three unruly passengers were removed by police in Denver, while the remaining passengers and crew continued on to Newark.

xp I mean me, I would be upset if my husband was sick for three weeks, but obviously not everyone takes that kind of thing seriously!

xpost ugh. I hope your building management had her desk and the shared spaces completely sanitized.

we don't have that many cases yet, but a 2 year old and 14 year old tested positive.

flights, and maybe trains, are gonna get like Invasion of the Body Snatchers

*sneeze*

YOU'RE ONE OF THEM

A 2-year old? That seems like a new development.

am assuming it's probably because they ended up testing them because they were part of the family where someone had symptoms and tested positive.

Why has it hit so hard in northern Italy?

Have read that it's a combination of older population plus social culture that is very tactile with lots of cheek kissing etc

I've read something different - that the only difference is that it started spreading there earlier. Caveat lector obviously.

Yerac as of this week we have had automatic hand sanitizers installed and wipes etc but she hasn’t been in since Thursday so if he has it I presume at least some of us are fucked.

Why has it hit so hard in northern Italy?

Have read that it's a combination of older population plus social culture that is very tactile with lots of cheek kissing etc

― groovypanda, Tuesday, March 10, 2020 9:51 AM (six minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

all the finger kissing can't help

She said it hadn’t really occurred to them to have him tested since he was right on the cusp of when it supposedly became dangerous there but there’s so much we don’t know about this and with those symptoms and even a change that he or she could pass it on to a person in a vulnerable group? If it had been me I would have sought testing immediately.

Anyway hopefully it’s just a coincidence!

I would think they would know the test results by now?

No apparently not yet. I think there’s a big backlog.

Cuomo dispatches Natl Guard to New Rochelle

https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/nyc-adds-5-new-covid-19-cases-tri-state-total-more-than-triples-in-days/2319688/

Feels like cases starting popping up earlier in the UK and a few other places but those people (like the guy who came back from the ski lodge) were immediately put into quarantine upon return. I think a lot of people in Italy were spreading it completely unawares for some time.

If the number of cases is going to balloon in Britain then it's surely going to happen within the next fortnight or so?

Yep if you look at the graphs we are all headed for Italy, we are just lagging. And they have a lot of trade links with China, which might explain why they were earliest.