2019 novel coronavirus: Facts and hysteria
Credit to Author: NEW WORLDS| Date: Sat, 01 Feb 2020 17:54:22 +0000
The best remedy for outbreaks and a possible calamity is a calm study, practical decisions and quick execution. Hysteria needs to be managed or the medical issues will take longer to control and resolve, with much greater economic and social damage than necessary.
While everyone should take precautions, the current virus outbreak already shows several points that allow us to calibrate our responses:
The 2019 novel coronavirus acute respiratory disease (2019-nCoV ARD) has a low mortality compared to tuberculosis, the flu, the human immunodeficiency virus-acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV-AIDS), etc….Over 1.5 million a year die from tuberculosis; the flu killed an estimated 80,000 in the United States alone in 2017 and 2018 (Center for Disease Control); and more than 1.5 million are newly infected with HIV-AIDS each year, with some over 600 thousand dying each year. The 2019-nCoV trajectory of mortality is much lower, with less than 5 percent mortality so far out of some 20 percent of people who are susceptible when exposed, usually those with weakened immune systems. (The Chinese researchers themselves warned though that this data may not yet be at stabilized levels, and could still mutate.)
China’s disease management has been advancing rapidly. Once the disease was defined, China restricted travel and activity in the virus’ epicenter, Wuhan, a city of 11 million, much larger than Chicago of 5 million or New York of some 9 million. It also restricted activities in several nearby cities despite the most important festivity of the Chinese New Year, compare this with the occurrence of the H1N1 (swine flu), which started in the United States, but did not or could not restrict movement, eventually with a mortality of over 250,000. China also showed the infrastructure capabilities by building a 1,000-bed hospital within a week and another ongoing this second week.
Chinese strengthened disease control. The World Health Organization (WHO) praised the current open and fast communications with and from China allowing quick establishment of “global prevention and control systems.” WHO leaders commended China’s response to this outbreak as model for other epidemics. China is openly working with other countries, contacted the lab in Germany to tell them they had a return positive case. WHO Health Emergencies Program Michael Ryan reported that China actively reached out to WHO and other countries to help them respond in more effective ways, and has agreed to welcome an international experts mission. They also shared research efforts, information in virus gene sequencing. A China Wuxi-based tech company has also developed by last week, a rapid nucleic test diagnostic kit that can determine in half an hour if you have the disease, and has started mass production to several thousand kits a day. There are critics though that at the outset of the disease, the signals of an unusual outbreak were not immediately acted upon.
Large scale travel restrictions not recommended by WHO representative Gauden Galea, who reiterated WHO’s confidence in the ability of China to contain the outbreak. But it is up to each country and local to consider its decision framework as there is no certainty as to the behavior of the disease. Economists and analysts point out the restrictions so far have far outsized effects on the economies of both China and the world, primarily the tourism industry, already hurting both sides in the billions of dollars in the last month alone.
Other countries are pitching in. Germany, Japan, Israel and others have been sending medical supplies, masks, which are in shortage, and even their researchers to help in the efforts to tame this outbreak.
Be calm and verify news, get perspective. Local news released by a TV station reported of a boy “infected by coronavirus,” not understanding that the coronavirus is a fairly common illness category, and the boy recovered within three days and tested negative, where the current concern is over the 2019-nCoV or Wuhan variety. But not before creating panic. Few Philippine media report that over a hundred patients of the disease have already recovered, while reporting other cases that have died of other illnesses as somehow linked to this category. Many Filipinos in Wuhan have shared videos on social media showing that while there are many inconveniences, overall life is normal and plead with Pinoys back home to avoid overreaction and Sinophobia.
Ambeth Ocampo laments that fanning anti-Chinese resentment and connecting it to the 2019-nCoV might lead to events going out of hand as in a cholera epidemic in Manila in 1820 that saw a mob of some 3,000 go on a rampage on the speculations that it was due to a poisoning of the river by foreigners, which turned out untrue.
Manage priorities, calibrate our responses, and base decisions on facts and logic. We should treat this outbreak seriously and contain risk areas, but like a business, we cannot shut down everything because of possible recessions or competitors or political situations. We cannot leave our relations because of any various disagreements, but we need to calibrate our responses. Tuberculosis and HIV are currently creating infections in alarming rates in the Philippines for years, on top of the periodic dengue outbreaks (United Nations’ Joint United Nations Program on HIV and AIDS reported in October 2019: the Philippines had the fastest growing number of HIV cases in the world).
We need a response and management system for all types of outbreaks, calamities, economic and other crises — which should arise from facts and logic, discipline, good execution, and not the emotions, hysteria, unverified news and advice of people who have more opinions than record of success or experience.
Globalization’s challenges will no longer be solved by a “you-against-me attitude,” but “a we-against-real threats to humanity”!
George Siy is a Wharton-educated industrialist, international trade practitioner and negotiator, serving as director of the Integrated Development Studies Institute (IDSI). He has advised the Philippines and various organizations in trade negotiations with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Japan and the United States.
New Worlds by IDSI aims to present frameworks based on a balance of economic theory, historical realities, ground success in real business and communities, and attempt for common good, culture, and spirituality. We welcome logical feedback and possibly working together with compatible frameworks (idsicenter@gmail.com).