Thank you op. I have read the entire post and most of your responses. You are quite correct in pointing out that China has taken the actions (draconian or not) that the situation required and no other country appears to have done so. In that absence we might be looking at the rest of the world having the worst of it - we just don't know but we do know in the absence of a halt to travel we have very greatly magnified our statistic risk with all other factors equal.
I have read Tham Khao and his detailed understanding is profound. I have also found professor Gabriel Leung to be very illuminating in educating me.
Your point about the Diamond Princess of how testing is only able to confirm cases not safely identify those without the virus is also illuminating adding to the reality of our vulnerability outside China.
Thank you again!
Quoting: piratedon Much appreciated.
As I previously stated in one of my replies, I expect this week to be FULL of news...and already A LOT happened. And it's just Wednesday...
We got Japan telling us that they don't have enough testing kits for 3,700 people. That was yesterday.
Also yesterday, 2 buildings evacuated in HK, plus 9 more cases.
Today, Singapore news are basically "SHTF in Singapore imminent".
Also today, from Japan : "As low as 9.2% of the cases are actually confirmed". A quick number crunch : if only 10% of the cases are confirmed, this means that there are at least 10 times more infected people...WITH SYMPTOMS, outside China.
Excluding the cruise ship cases,
we are left with 344 confirmed cases, so there are 10 times more, at least, which is 3,444 symptomatic cases outside China.Why do I say "at least"? Because there is a SEVERE lack of testing kits all over the world, and for every symptomatic case there are roughly 80-100 asymptomatic cases (IF the incubation period is 10 days or shorter...)
which means that outside China there are roughly 275,500 to 344,400 infected people.If we use a 14 days incubation period, there are roughly 120-140 asymptomatic cases for 1 symptomatic case, we have between
413,280 and 482,160 infected people outside China.
And all of the above numbers are for an R0 = 2.0If the above number is the REAL ONE, my model is off by 6 to 7 days.But what if the R0 is higher, let's say 2.5? Well, in this case, my model if off by 2-3 days.As I said multiple times, my model have ONE REASON TO EXIST : to determine WHEN the epidemic will hit the critical numbers to start pressuring the health systems.
My model is a MATHEMATICAL one, and it was posted on January 28th. A LOT of things happened since.
I predicted, based on my model, that Feb.16th-18th is when the number or people needing medical care will be big enough to start pressuring the health systems, starting with HK, Singapore, followed by SK and Japan, and so on.
Is my model off? Most likely. But by how much?
Well, it looks like 2-3 days off if R0=2.5 or higher, or 6-7 days if R0=2.0 or slightly lower.
I hope everyone understand that my model, or ANY model, is not a 100% sure thing. All models have errors. But the more time passes and adjustments are made, the models start to get less on the side of error and more on the side of reality.
This week, as I stated multiple times, IS CRUCIAL. The week just started, and already a number of critical information that were speculations or unknown until now, have come to light.
Have patience, there is much more to come this week.
