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yanpa wrote:I'm off with the family to Blighty,
Taro Toporific wrote:Fucking Chinese!Thanatos' embalmed botfly wrote:Maybe someone should check in on Taro.
The WuFlu just killed my beloved* brother-in-law, grrrr.
The official/fake "Japanese" statistics will say he, "died of heart-lung 'complications'", sheesh.*"Beloved" in part because at age 52 my brother-in-law was
my home-care/retirement safety net in case my 12 years-younger wife died early.
Also, my wife and I were planning to retire on the brother-in-law's rice ranch.
Wage Slave wrote:Bizzare. Just popped into my local supermarket to get a few random items (at 5% off as well) and everyone was totally calm, free hand sanitiser on offer at the entrances, everything in normal stock except for masks and toilet paper. Listening to Radio 5 there was a nurse on who had just finished a 14 hour shift and then gone to her local supermarket to find there weren't even any fresh fruit or vegetables left. She was in tears. Just in time supply also implies no "just in case" reserves and very limited ability to increase supply in response to a short term spike in demand.
Most people here already have a little strategic reserve for earthquakes in place and credit where it is due - they don't panic at the drop of a natural disaster hat. And if doctors say it is a really good idea for everyone to wash their hands many times a day they (well 99%) just do it whether someone is watching or not.
Wangta, I'm afraid you are well over the top. From what I hear from my sister in Oz, things are far from as sorted as they imperfectly are here. And I don't agree that your polemic is general misanthropy. If it were, I would be fine with it. But it isn't. It's racist. And that is intensely regrettable.
wagyl wrote:yanpa wrote:I'm off with the family to Blighty,
Here in East Pretoria, I was just speaking to some German tourists who have a scheduled flight to Frankfurt in 10 days. Well, they did, anyway. At this stage, the flight from East Pretoria to Singapore is not cancelled*, but there are no flights scheduled at all from Singapore to Frankfurt, until eternity.
Just be ready for the chance that it may be a very long visit to the Sunlit Uplands.™
* not cancelled, but not guaranteed if the date is more than 72 hours in advance. Which it is.
Wage Slave wrote: Wangta, I'm afraid you are well over the top. From what I hear from my sister in Oz, things are far from as sorted as they imperfectly are here. And I don't agree that your polemic is general misanthropy. If it were, I would be fine with it. But it isn't. It's racist. And that is intensely regrettable.
matsuki wrote:
I still believe there are far more infected without symptoms than we realize. Talk of 2 strains now, second wave starting in China...while a massive wave of Chinese fly back to China because the C-gov is pushing a "China defeated the virus! Safest place evaR!!" narrative. All the while the CCP officials are keeping their children out of "errtingzu fine! we most safe!" China.
The lack of testing means lack of data, meaning we're sill guessing....no bueno senor Abe. I was at the local mall yesterday and today (pet vaccinations) and while not as crowded as usual, plenty of people there, shops are all open, fewer mask wearing people.
The China virus? The Wu-Flu? Kung Flu?
How about CCP Virus?
Russell wrote:Wangta, I sometimes wonder how you get through the day without spilling coffee on the carpet...
wagyl wrote:That last one is easy. When you have two huge chips, there is one for each shoulder and you can manage quite a load as long as you balance it out between each side.
yanpa wrote:Ah but what you are missing is that somebody's uncle or first cousin twice removed on the internet is the ultimate authoritative source on all things covid-19 related.
wangta wrote:yanpa wrote:Ah but what you are missing is that somebody's uncle or first cousin twice removed on the internet is the ultimate authoritative source on all things covid-19 related.
He's my dad's older brother's son. His father is my uncle. He's not a GP - General Practitioner - but specializes in Virology.
He knows what he's talking about but as he said anybody in the health profession knows which countries govs are withholding info from their own people and deciding risk is better than honesty.
I'm just waiting now for somebody to say he doesn't know shit.
wangta wrote:I can state there have been cases in Ota Ward including at a hospital, Nakano Higashi and Shinjuku but thanks to secrecy and bullshit here I don't know where exactly to avoid.
wagyl wrote:wangta wrote:I can state there have been cases in Ota Ward including at a hospital, Nakano Higashi and Shinjuku but thanks to secrecy and bullshit here I don't know where exactly to avoid.
I would suggest that the most prudent thing to do is to assume that everyone is a potential carrier. There is so much movement within Tokyo that I don't think avoiding any particular part of it will make you any safer. You will be exposed to this eventually, wherever you are. In some countries, they are trying to train the citizens to act to slow -- not prevent, but slow -- transmission so that the medical services are not overwhelmed. You are young and healthy, and if you take a positive attitude to your environment your chances of coming out the other side without suffering major symptoms improves.
Russell wrote:wagyl wrote:wangta wrote:I can state there have been cases in Ota Ward including at a hospital, Nakano Higashi and Shinjuku but thanks to secrecy and bullshit here I don't know where exactly to avoid.
I would suggest that the most prudent thing to do is to assume that everyone is a potential carrier. There is so much movement within Tokyo that I don't think avoiding any particular part of it will make you any safer. You will be exposed to this eventually, wherever you are. In some countries, they are trying to train the citizens to act to slow -- not prevent, but slow -- transmission so that the medical services are not overwhelmed. You are young and healthy, and if you take a positive attitude to your environment your chances of coming out the other side without suffering major symptoms improves.
Good advice, Wagyl.
In addition to assuming that everyone has the virus, it is also better to assume that oneself has the virus.
That gives some guidelines on how to behave so that other people will not be affected.
These two principles will definitely slow the virus down, so that the medical system can appropriately deal with the problem.
Wage Slave wrote:Absolute bedlam out there. People fighting for the toilet paper.
Scipio wrote:'Absolute bedlam out there. People fighting for the toilet paper.'
Your recent posts on this thread remind me of Chernobyl and before you ask whether I'm comparing this crisis with Chernobyl, no I'm not; this is a much bigger crises of international health, than Chernobyl. Also, we all know how this will eventually play out in Japan. The Japan political elites fuck up (The economic bubble bursting in the 1980s, 1990s Asian financial crises, the 2008 financial crises), those elites blame 'Johnny Foreigner' (Plaza Accord, Korean/Thai over-borrowing, the Lehman's Shock) and the Japanese public will believe this version, broadcast daily by NHK, hook line and sinker. Here in Tokyo, there's definitely something wrong with the way the Japanese government is handling this situation. Today in my local park, it was hanami parties as usual with hundreds, of all ages, getting sloshed beneath the cherry blossom. I'm sure quite a few of them are soon to find out how fleeting life can be, thanks to the present Japanese government policy on Covid, rather than the cherry blossom.
Scipio wrote:'Absolute bedlam out there. People fighting for the toilet paper.'
Your recent posts on this thread remind me of Chernobyl and before you ask whether I'm comparing this crisis with Chernobyl, no I'm not; this is a much bigger crises of international health, than Chernobyl. Also, we all know how this will eventually play out in Japan. The Japan political elites fuck up (The economic bubble bursting in the 1980s, 1990s Asian financial crises, the 2008 financial crises), those elites blame 'Johnny Foreigner' (Plaza Accord, Korean/Thai over-borrowing, the Lehman's Shock) and the Japanese public will believe this version, broadcast daily by NHK, hook line and sinker. Here in Tokyo, there's definitely something wrong with the way the Japanese government is handling this situation. Today in my local park, it was hanami parties as usual with hundreds, of all ages, getting sloshed beneath the cherry blossom. I'm sure quite a few of them are soon to find out how fleeting life can be, thanks to the present Japanese government policy on Covid, rather than the cherry blossom.
wangta wrote:It seems time for Japan to adopt what Australian supermarkets mostly have done off their own bat - put limits on essentials including toilet paper that everybody needs.
wangta wrote:The gov has also identified certain groups - both organized crime and others organizing themselves into selfish bastard squads - that have cleaned out the supermarkets in order to shift the products for profit, in many cases overseas. They will be hammered.
wagyl wrote:wangta wrote:It seems time for Japan to adopt what Australian supermarkets mostly have done off their own bat - put limits on essentials including toilet paper that everybody needs.
From what my spies tell me, even though the supermarkets may be imposing limits, and setting "seniors only hour" to help the vulnerable shop, the shelves are still empty. So limits per customer mean nothing in practice when nobody has any.
At the time of writing, Japan has just over 900 confirmed cases of coronavirus. That’s 900 cases recorded over a two-month period since the first person — a man who had traveled to Wuhan — was confirmed to have the disease while in a Japanese hospital between Jan. 10 and 15.
In Italy, the first case was recorded two weeks later than in Japan, on Jan. 23. Shortly after, 50,000 people were quarantined in a handful of towns in the Lombardy region. Then, it was the entire north. Now, the entire country is in quarantine, with over 40,000 confirmed cases and 3,600 dead.
In the U.S., New York has closed its bars and restaurants and California has imposed similarly wide-scale “shelter in place” restrictions on the movement of its people and the activities of its citizens.
Look around Tokyo now, and you’ll see no such scene has unfolded. Despite the cancellation of sports events, the closure of schools, and the shutting down of some, but not all, larger entertainment venues, much of Japan continues as normal. There is no quarantine and no enforced closures of bars or restaurants. Even clubs (easy places to get sick at the best of times) remain open.
If you want to eat ramen at 4 a.m., fine. If you get on the subway, you’ll see it slightly emptier, but still heaving. If you want to rent a car and drive from one end of the country and back again, do it — there’s nothing stopping you. Which means there’s very little stopping the spread of the disease either.
So why the difference? How has Japan seemingly escaped the spread of the coronavirus when other countries have suffered so badly?
When you look at the factors that have made the virus spread quickly and easily elsewhere, Japan meets all of the same criteria. It has close contact with China, where the disease originated. Its cities are vast and dense, people are crammed into small apartments and squeezed together on trains (more so than many other cities), and despite requests for people to stagger their commutes and attempt to telework, Tokyo, with its population of 38 million people, remains busy.
One reason that Italy has been hit so badly, according to the World Health Organization, is the age of its population: The country has the oldest average age in Europe, the second oldest in the world, and coronavirus disproportionately affects the elderly, whose immune systems may not be strong enough to stave off the pneumonia the virus causes. Here, Japan one-ups Italy, its population is the world’s oldest and is just as vulnerable.
A common factor behind the deaths recorded in China was smoking — those with already damaged lungs are more likely to succumb pneumonia. Here again, Japan triumphs in its vulnerability — the government still owns 33 percent of Japan Tobacco and legislation toward smoking here is extremely lax. In 2017, Japan had the highest rate of male smoking among the G7 nations.
And it’s not like Japan has placed strict measures on its citizens to keep the disease under control. It has neither imposed the level of quarantine we saw in China to curb the outbreak, nor has it been strict with its travel restrictions. Most travelers can still visit Japan, and those from restricted countries aren’t banned entirely, they are just asked to voluntarily self-isolate for 14 days.
So again you have to ask why the difference? How is Japan reporting such low numbers?
The cynical answer points to the country’s low testing rates, that Japan has recorded such a low number of cases precisely because it isn’t testing. Of course, a question mark hangs over the Olympics and whether the government is attempting to keep confirmed cases low so that the games proceed as planned.
Unlike South Korea, where we are seeing rigorous testing, and despite World Health Organization advice to “test, test, test,” Japan has stuck to a policy of testing only those with extended visible symptoms or a history of direct contact with those who have tested positive, attempting to isolate small clusters before they grow. New tests that produce produce results in 10-15 minutes are becoming available, but even with the improved tech, under the current policy a test will only be administered in the most extreme circumstances, when people have had a fever for four days or more.
But if the government’s testing regime is a failure, surely we’d see evidence of the disease’s spread in other ways. Its presence would appear not as positive test results but in the guise of an overwhelmed health care system and overcrowded mortuaries. We have seen no such evidence.
Three trains of thought lead from here: conspiracy, good fortune and efficacy.
Conspiracy would suggest that there is a widespread cover up, that people are dying in their homes, untested and untreated, or being given false death records in hospital. It is, however, hard to believe that a nation’s worth of doctors would be, or could be, silent if the number of deaths we are seeing in Italy were occurring here. While an authoritarian government might dream of being able to control its population to that extent, the reality is unattainable; doctors would speak out to prevent deaths — we saw them speaking out in China, we’d see it here.
It is equally hard to get onboard the second train of thought: that Japan is simply fortunate. That the disease here just hasn’t spread in the way it has elsewhere due to a number of pre-existing conditions: relatively less social intimacy (bowing vs. shaking hands), an inclination to wear masks when sick that has existed since long before this coronavirus, already high rates of isolation amongst the elderly, and what little voluntary self-isolation and social distancing there is has meant that Japan is flattening its curve without a truly active attempt to.
Then there is the third option, that Japan’s “just enough” efforts, built upon those pre-existing conditions have simply worked. That targeted testing where needed has contained the disease where it has emerged; that early closure of mass events did do enough to prevent widespread contact of the infected with the healthy; and that decentralized efforts stemming from individuals and corporations (zero contact pizzas, everyone) have halted its spread without heavy-handed government directive. But “just enough” feels like an awfully precarious position to be in and without the coordinated efforts that have forced other populations to limit the spread of the virus, you have to ask: How long will the situation last?
The “critical” two-to-three week containment period proclaimed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at the end of February has now come to an end and some schools are set to reopen. If you head out to places like Tokyo’s Shinjuku Station or Shibuya Crossing, you’ll see them packed.
We’re now enjoying a three-day weekend, and it is the start of hanami (cherry blossoms viewing) season, which is typically marked by large picnics and parties beneath the trees. Already Shinjuku Gyoen, one of the capital’s largest parks, is busy with people taking pictures and swarming close between the nascent blossoms.
While official hanami events have been banned, the practice is so ingrained in the culture that it is hard to imagine people showing such restraint as to cancel picnics in their entirety.
If Japan’s not yet seen the worst of the disease, and studies suggest that it is yet to, will this be the catalyst?
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Wage Slave wrote:wagyl wrote:wangta wrote:It seems time for Japan to adopt what Australian supermarkets mostly have done off their own bat - put limits on essentials including toilet paper that everybody needs.
From what my spies tell me, even though the supermarkets may be imposing limits, and setting "seniors only hour" to help the vulnerable shop, the shelves are still empty. So limits per customer mean nothing in practice when nobody has any.
Dumb as they are, they actually have thought of this. Amazingly, there are restrictions on toilet paper, masks and such. And even more amazingly things like masks are still almost always sold out. From what I hear though, if you are prepared to wait outside drugstores at 10:00 it is possible to buy limited quantities of masks, sanitiser etc.
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