What I wish people knew
Mar. 20th, 2020 08:18 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jackI think most people in my online bubble know all this already but right now what's helping me is writing down not the more complicated questions but the simple ones. Also, if you can, go and read the actual government advice [google search]. But here's my gut writeup as if for someone who doesn't know anything.
Don't think of it like, "it's really deadly and anyone who gets it is likely to die". Some diseases are like that, but not true here. Although even a tiny chance of not being able to breathe for weeks IS really quite scary. But the particularly scary thing is that a lot of people get infectious, but don't get sick at all, or only for a couple of days, so like a cold or flu it spreads everywhere. And then the 1% or 10% or 20% depending how you count who do get seriously ill or die, end up getting it.
Advice to susceptible people
If you're more susceptible, older, immunocompromised, or known or unknown underlying health condition, you're likely to be in the bad category. You can see the government advice [google], although you can also cross-check against other governments' advice as long as you don't make the mistake of choosing the worst prediction or the best prediction. Some of the categories are a bit unsure.
This is where I was rather panicking a week ago, because in Italy we'd already hit the point where hospitals in badly hit areas had run out of ICU and couldn't help most people who needed one. (Unless that description of Italy turned out to be false? I don't think so? But I haven't seen an update of how northern Italy is doing now.)
And at that point other governments were saying "do everything to avoid this running rampant until we figure out what to do" and our government were saying "don't worry, everyone will catch it, but we will protect the most vulnerable 20% from catching it" while not actually being realistic about the kind of steps they'd need to take to have that happen. So I was really quite worried that if that happened, 20% of people really would need to make their own plans to treat every other living human as a probable dangerous zombie. (And I know, maybe the government would have sorted everything out, but I think we shouldn't assume the government MUST be right and shouldn't assume they MUST be wrong, even if you massively love/hate them.)
We might have to go through that stage anyway, it might be unavoidable, but hopefully now the government is a BIT more prepared for it? Or it will come on more slowly.
Advice to otherwise healthy people, in a household of otherwise healthy people
Right now the plan is to slow (or ideally stop!) the spread. That means, assume you or people you know have a mild case you didn't know, and AVOID SPREADING IT. If you do everything right, hopefully you'll save millions of lives without ever knowing.
Wash your hands thoroughly, make sure to get a lather, cover the gaps between your fingers, the hollows of your palms, all your nails. When leaving the house, when entering the house, after using the bathroom, before eating, and just regularly. Moisturiser may help avoid drying your hands out and make the additional washing more comfortable. Avoid touching your face if you're out.
(If you want to wash your hands MORE OFTEN than that, hand sanitiser is a good replacement when you don't have a sink available. But it's not magically better than soap, it's better than no soap.)
You remember all those people who would open toilet doors with their elbows or feet? Because some people never washed their hands before, and they were already at risk of infection or just cautious? And most people just accepted the risk? Now, avoid the risk.
If you think you might have contracted it, really really avoid spreading it.
Probably the government should be encouraging people who get sick to trace down all contacts, get tested, and get all of THEM to quarantine themselves too, like in China and South Korea. But we don't have the capacity or have decided not to or what we're doing will become more clear as briefings go on. But in the absence of clear advice, I would say do that if you can.
At some point we may switch to accepting it will just spread. In which case accept you'll get it sooner or later and be prepared for what that looks like.
Postscript
This didn't really cover the area I wanted, I wanted something that I could share to parents and friends as an intro and I don't think it really covers the important things well enough to do that. But hopefully it helped me think of it.
Don't think of it like, "it's really deadly and anyone who gets it is likely to die". Some diseases are like that, but not true here. Although even a tiny chance of not being able to breathe for weeks IS really quite scary. But the particularly scary thing is that a lot of people get infectious, but don't get sick at all, or only for a couple of days, so like a cold or flu it spreads everywhere. And then the 1% or 10% or 20% depending how you count who do get seriously ill or die, end up getting it.
Advice to susceptible people
If you're more susceptible, older, immunocompromised, or known or unknown underlying health condition, you're likely to be in the bad category. You can see the government advice [google], although you can also cross-check against other governments' advice as long as you don't make the mistake of choosing the worst prediction or the best prediction. Some of the categories are a bit unsure.
This is where I was rather panicking a week ago, because in Italy we'd already hit the point where hospitals in badly hit areas had run out of ICU and couldn't help most people who needed one. (Unless that description of Italy turned out to be false? I don't think so? But I haven't seen an update of how northern Italy is doing now.)
And at that point other governments were saying "do everything to avoid this running rampant until we figure out what to do" and our government were saying "don't worry, everyone will catch it, but we will protect the most vulnerable 20% from catching it" while not actually being realistic about the kind of steps they'd need to take to have that happen. So I was really quite worried that if that happened, 20% of people really would need to make their own plans to treat every other living human as a probable dangerous zombie. (And I know, maybe the government would have sorted everything out, but I think we shouldn't assume the government MUST be right and shouldn't assume they MUST be wrong, even if you massively love/hate them.)
We might have to go through that stage anyway, it might be unavoidable, but hopefully now the government is a BIT more prepared for it? Or it will come on more slowly.
Advice to otherwise healthy people, in a household of otherwise healthy people
Right now the plan is to slow (or ideally stop!) the spread. That means, assume you or people you know have a mild case you didn't know, and AVOID SPREADING IT. If you do everything right, hopefully you'll save millions of lives without ever knowing.
Wash your hands thoroughly, make sure to get a lather, cover the gaps between your fingers, the hollows of your palms, all your nails. When leaving the house, when entering the house, after using the bathroom, before eating, and just regularly. Moisturiser may help avoid drying your hands out and make the additional washing more comfortable. Avoid touching your face if you're out.
(If you want to wash your hands MORE OFTEN than that, hand sanitiser is a good replacement when you don't have a sink available. But it's not magically better than soap, it's better than no soap.)
You remember all those people who would open toilet doors with their elbows or feet? Because some people never washed their hands before, and they were already at risk of infection or just cautious? And most people just accepted the risk? Now, avoid the risk.
If you think you might have contracted it, really really avoid spreading it.
Probably the government should be encouraging people who get sick to trace down all contacts, get tested, and get all of THEM to quarantine themselves too, like in China and South Korea. But we don't have the capacity or have decided not to or what we're doing will become more clear as briefings go on. But in the absence of clear advice, I would say do that if you can.
At some point we may switch to accepting it will just spread. In which case accept you'll get it sooner or later and be prepared for what that looks like.
Postscript
This didn't really cover the area I wanted, I wanted something that I could share to parents and friends as an intro and I don't think it really covers the important things well enough to do that. But hopefully it helped me think of it.
no subject
Date: 2020-03-20 05:06 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-03-21 10:01 pm (UTC)