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Episode-2611- Feeling Exposed due to CoVid-19 – Good Here is What to do About It — 30 Comments

  1. As an addendum, because I also wanted to be a voice of calm amidst the Covi panic; selenium has been shown to be an effective supplement for fighting viral infection by RNA-coated viruses. They’re using it to treat HIV, and Coronavirus is such a virus. Airborne has selenium in it and you can buy the supplement on Amazon, and it’s not sold out yet because it’s not a widely known infection fighting supplement. I’ve read three separate academic articles on selenium and one general medical article on its utility against Coronavirus officially. It’s worth checking out, as it is a general prophylactic and toxicity doses are very high, meaning taking too much would take some determined doing.

    • Do you happen to have a link to that article about selenium and coronavirus?  I’ve been taking selenium daily for years.  I didn’t realize it had any antiviral properties. But, I have somehow completely avoided any hint of a cold, flu or anything else these last 2 years.  (I don’t know if it is the selenium or something else… I also take D3.)

       

  2. Balanced vitmins and minerals is important for general good health. That should be common sense. If I was to add one to your list that is vitally important that boosts immune (and so many other systems) would be Vitamin D. A high majority of Americans are low in it as well.

  3. Thanks for keeping people calm Jack. You could easily capitalize on this, but you’re above that. It’s why you have such a loyal following.

  4. The US media is irritating me too. First was their “it’s nothing more than the regular flu” nonsense, ignoring the indicators showing much higher transmission rate and higher rate of severe cases. Not a reason to panic, but it’s dumb to dismiss it. Now that the media is freaking out and going all the way to the other extreme, I’m having to take the position of “calm the f*** down and take a breath”. Everything’s got to be an extreme angle with them.

    So what is the real health threat? Seems to me that because of its isolation, large sample size, and environment, the Diamond Princess cruise ship might be a good baseline to use for what we may expect to see in wealthy, developed world countries: currently 705 infected, 599 active cases, 100 recovered, 36 serious/critical, 7 dead… so we have roughly ~1% fatality rate, ~5% in serious/critical condition which one would assume are getting hospitalization-level care. Statista also had a figure of 392 showing no symptoms on the ship, which would be about 56% of total cases. So would it be too much of a leap to take that and guess the number of real cases in places that are doing regular (but not universal) testing would be a little more than twice the official numbers? Maybe 200,000 or so total cases in China then?

    By comparison, we can look at the 2017-2018 flu season (a pretty bad one they say) in the US from the CDC:
    44,802,629 known cases, 808,129 hospitalized, 61,099 deaths; so that seems to have a 0.13% fatality rate, and 1.8% hospitalization rate.

    So this easily has the potential to be a lot more serious than the flu if allowed to spread, and if it infects the same number as 2017-2018 flu then from the Diamond Princess stats maybe we could expect ~448,000 US deaths and ~2,240,000 hospitalizations. That’s bad, but it pales vs. the Spanish Flu. The biggest health danger would appear to be in overwhelming the hospital system with the number of cases requiring hospitalizations, which in turn could increase the fatality rate. This may be the difficulty Iran is experiencing now and why their death rate so far is a lot higher. Might also be why Mongolia’s gov’t has been so quick and strict (some might say paranoid) with their measures… they know our system here can be swamped easily. Maybe not as badly as Iran or the unfortunately-labeled “s***hole countries”, but badly enough.

    So… perhaps the biggest coronavirus challenges are not on the individual level, but rather for governments and communities in balancing the need to contain the infection and keep the hospitals from being swamped with severe cases, but still keep the economy operating without too much disruption. On that note, at some point this spring or summer I half expect China and many other countries to declare “victory” (while secretly thinking “ah, screw it, let’s ride it out”) and prioritize their economy, moving from their very strict isolation/containment strategy to one emphasizing mitigation, selective containment, and surveillance measures on a level creepy even for China (they now have a quarantine app using the very widely used Alipay system).

    • Your numbers make sense with a few caveats.

      1. In general the population on a cruise ship is skewed to a higher number of elderly.

      2. While you are in close proximity on a ship it isn’t like a closed cabin airplane. Soon as the problem was evident people were quarantined to their rooms. Spread was contained to a degree.

      I think your number for additional asymptotic people or mildly symptomatic people is a good minimum. But that is what it is, a minimum.

      The other side is how fast response is moving, we have multiple new drugs in trials, all seem to be doing very well. If the dot gov will totally get out of the way we can have a vaccine ready to roll out in 6 months. The Israelis are way ahead already, https://www.pharmaceutical-technology.com/news/israel-migal-covid-19-vaccine/

      Been saying they had one for dogs since this all started but seems like the avian one is a better starting point.

      The conspiracy talk is starting already, “see they made cornavirus in a lab, no way it could be this fast”, etc. This shows an ignorance to the situation and an ignorance to the fact that corona virus is a FAMILY of viruses. What the TV keeps calling corona virus is really a new version called Novel Corona Virus 2019, aka CoVid-2019

      They make a new vaccine every year with the flu but the base is already approved for humans so they don’t do trials. They just change the base clade of the virus used to make the vaccine. They do this based on a guess of what new or old clade or several clades will be most prominent. When you hear say the flu vaccine this year is only 40% effective it is because multiple clades hit every year and it mutates quickly.

      Up till now we have not made a corona virus vaccine for humans. Most human corona virus have been so mild there was no need, or so swift to take people out (Like SARs) it was not practical.

      The process of using an existing virus for poultry in this case or canines (which I thought they’d do) and modifying it for human use is not much different then making a new clade vaccine for the flu, but again you have to get though human trials.

      The good news is Corona viruses like CoVid-2019 do not tend to rapidly mutate into new clades like influenza does. Meaning if they hit a home run on the vaccine it should be good to go for a lot longer then a flu shot and a lot more effective.

      • Perfectly valid caveats. Even counting the crew on the Diamond Princess who tend to be on the young side (especially those doing the cleaning, serving, etc.) the average age would still lean to the older side. On that note, that might make it a better comparison case for Japan and other aging countries in Asia & Europe. Might explain why Italy is getting hit rather hard. Putting another factor into the mix, after listening to the Scott Adams video for today I looked up some articles stating the air quality on cruise ships (at least on the deck) is pretty awful.

        Also, after thinking about it I have to agree about the asymptotic ratio on the cruise ship being a good minimum case. Younger people are more likely to show fewer or no symptoms, so you could expect that percentage of asymptomatic people to be higher in nations with a younger demographic. That might make another good argument for closing the gov’t schools sooner than later to stem the spread. On that note, hey teachers out there… get ahead of the curve and start preparing some online class videos & activities NOW. My friend’s wife here is already doing that with Youtube English classes for Mongolian kids and is making a healthy bit of side income from it.

        • Here is the latest, remember early on when I said things like this tend to mutate to become less not more lethal. Well the big news out yesterday was that there are now two strains. Of course the media instantly ran with “it muted to become more aggressive and lethal”, small problem there though.

          The more aggressive form is responsible for about 70% of cases in China or Chiner if you are Bernie Sanders. Wait, what? So if that is the case the original form is the more aggressive form and it is now becoming less aggressive, which makes PERFECT sense and follows historical norms.

          So while media is hyping the mutation it is a good thing. Expect to see the death rate continue to decrease for four primary reasons….

          1. More testing = more confirmed cases = lower death rate.

          2. The virus will become less lethal over time if history is any indicator, no guarantee of course but the odds favor this outcome.

          3. As I have said the most at risk get the thing first not only because they have greater reaction to infection but greater risk of it in the first place.

          4. General awareness meaning docs know what they are treating, how to treat it and more things to treat it with are being discovered.

          Comparing this to the Spanish Flu may be the most irresponsible thing media (alternative and MSM both) have done so far. In 1920 our solution was to stack sick people in a gym on cots five feet apart. No one understood what a virus really even was, we had no modern medicine, no antibiotics, no anti virals, etc. No way to instantly communicate across the globe and as previously stated that flu killed mostly those with very healthy immune systems. Also half the damn US was malnourished as had just been discovered by the powers that be due to the WWI draft and how many were not even fit for duty.

  5. Mass media didn’t* warn me that my 18 month old would pick up Hand Foot and Mouth Disease at daycare last Friday. Would have taken a day off work and kept her home if only I had known!

    Now my wife and I are alternating days off while our daughter recovers.

     

    Google/CDC says there are 10-15 million symptomatic cases of HFMD in the US per year. It’s a virus with no vaccine. I’m not up to the minute on Corona stats, but pretty sure I’d have heard something* if it was more common than HFMD.

     

    Mentioning all this to hopefully illustrate the point Jack frequently makes about the likelihood/probability of a particular event happening to a given individual/family.

     

    *Full disclosure, mass media didn’t warn me because I haven’t paid attention to them since 4-6 months into starting to listen to TSP back in 2014.

     

     

    • Replying to my own comment…

      HFMD came and went without much issue. But now we’ve been in the hospital for several days with a heavy duty “common cold” virus.

      Poor daughter’s immune system got worn down by HFMD and allowed some rhinovirus to settle in. We caught it early. Convenient care misdiagnosed as pneumonia and sent us home. She started to get worse after getting home so we came back to the hospital, went through emergency dept, then regular pediatrics, then into pediatric intensive care.

      Some oxygen and some breathing treatments have knocked it back faster than initially expected so we are now waiting on a bed to open in regular pediatrics so we can go off oxygen and wait to make sure she’s doing well on her own before we can go home.

      Still not worried about corona despite all the cancellations around the country. And we’ve been sitting in a hospital intensive care department  since 7am Wednesday (it’s now 3pm Friday).

      Sucks to be here for this long, but we’ve had a hospital bag packed and ready since a few days after she was born, so it hasn’t been unbearable.

      Preparing for the events that are more statistically likely is something Jack has taught for years. Financial preparedness has allowed my wife and me to be with our daughter this entire time with only some short breaks to step outside and get some fresh air for a few moments.

      Thanks Jack.

       

  6. I’m not in a panic about this virus for myself or wife; I’m 50 and in fairly good health, and I took this opportunity to top off preps in case of grocery store runs.  We mostly eat paleo/keto so I tend not to buy much that keeps a while as you would get in boxes and cans, thus the diminished supply of such stuff.  I do have 5 gallon buckets of rice and beans plus a dozen or so #10 cans of stuff, but I prefer not to break them open if the grocery stores are disrupted for just a few days.  Hence, topping off with canned goods and such that I’ll mostly eat, eventually, even if nothing happens.  I do hope economy does well enough though that I keep job (software engineer), which I really like and works out great for me.

    My main concerns are my elderly mother, and my wife’s side of the family in the Philippines.  My mother doesn’t work anymore and is in a nice 55+ mobile home community.  I think she has little exposure, but I do want to make sure I don’t catch the virus and be asymptomatic then give it to Mom on one of our visits every couple of weeks.  She’s not healthy enough to have good odds surviving a difficult illness.  In Philippines, they’re poor, and have no concept of prepping.  And medical care is there although not always the best.  3 of my family are medical professionals too, so I don’t want them catching this.  We’re building a new house for them (80% done) but it’s taking every cent we have to do it so there’s no money to buy lots of food for 20+ people.

    I do realize these details are uncertain and need more science behind them, but there’s a lot of talk out there about being able to get reinfected, with second infection much worse, with cytokline storm, ADE / ARDS, type of thing.  Plus, talk about the old SARS vaccine making things worse by causing this reaction and killing the test animal; how feasible is a vaccine for this really?  I’m also concerned about what happens for that possibly 20% or so “severe/critical” cases when hospitals can’t possibly handle that many at once.

    But, grocery store panic, self quarantine, that kind of stuff I’m all set.

     

  7. All I can say jack is thanks. I know I’m not alone.

  8. My 12 year old spent 3 weeks out of school last December with an unknown illness.

    First they thought it was bronchitis, so they treated it with antibiotics and steroids. With no help

    Then they felt it developed into a sinus infection – so different antibiotics

    Then they thought she might have a heart condition — seriously

    Then they landed on “must have gotten some secondary respiratory infection”

    Basically — she coughed for 3 straight weeks and the only relief was albuterol treatments.

    I am getting a T-Shirt made that says “I survived Corona 2019” for her to wear to school.

  9. Something to ponder…

    … how much of the ‘panic’ is due to excessive media hype versus too many people simply having ‘untrained brains’ that keep them from being able to calmly analyze a situation or risk?

    Certainly the media is certainly milking this for ratings and/or political reasons, but I think the embarrassingly high percentage of untrained brains is making the economic and supply chain effects substantially worse than it otherwise would be.

    (though naturally, it’s more often the untrained brains that watch a lot of TV & cable news in the FIRST place…)

  10. Thanks Jack!

    Great show, very helpful for the real estate between my ears!  My biggest concerns at this point are economic-just can’t see how 2020 doesn’t turn into a s**t show with carona and the election. I’m in manufacturing and construction and we are already seeing supply chain disruptions and slow business. Can’t imagine what effect this has on travel industry?  I’d love to hear more thoughts from you and John P on the economics of all this.

  11. I suspect most in the media are highly motivated to exaggerate the panic every chance they get.  They’re praying it might just help kickstart a recession before November or at least provide a great reason to blame the orange man in chief for his failure to “contain” the danger.

    My tactical response is get more sleep, take my vitamins and grow more food at home so I can avoid the true public health threat…

    Waiting in line behind Caring Karen at the Chic-fil-A!

     

  12. JAck,

     

    I worked for the FL Dept of Health.  We did a lot of Disaster Preparedness work.  I routinely sat on information calls from the CDC regarding Pan-Avian Influenza, the odd Ebola notice, and H1N1 etc.  You have been spot on in my opinion with your advice.  I am not an MD, but sat in the room with an Infectious Disease MD and Epidemiology people and listened to the conversations.  They were boring to say the least.  Those bugs were all more serious than this from what I can tell.  I would go home and see the news though, and wonder what they were talking about.  If it were not for the media, this might come and go and we wouldn’t even know it.

  13. One of your best, wake lessons you’ve given.  Definitely made me reevaluate where I am in my prep and time to update my plans. Thanks.

  14. Jack, thanks for the quote from Jack Welch!   And for this wonderfully sensible podcast.

  15. Can someone remind me which supplements were suggested in the audio without me having to go through it all again?  Quercetin, and what was the other… B6?  Quercetin makes sense but B6 is a new one to me in the context of antiviral.  Why B6 (if I got that right… it wasn’t B12 right?)

     

     

    • The Immunity Boosting Supplements I Recommend

      Chewable Vitamin C
      Vitamin B6
      Vitamin E
      Selenium
      Quecertin

      But they are in the notes above with links you may need to chose other brands at this point.

  16. This virus can permanently damage your lungs and possibly your heart if you survive a severe case of it.