Is Coronavirus affecting your travel plans?

[RamblingMad]

Have you guys watched the Canadian show Regenesis on Amazon Prime? If not, check it out. It’s definitely related to this discussion.

 

[lifesavacation]

We are planning to travel to NYC for the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show next weekend-I do not know of any of the competitors who have changed their plans. I have a Christmas Markets river cruise booked in December and I certainly would not cancel it at this time. After having my husband and many many friends who were deployed to the middle east multiple times in the last 20 years and seeing some of them come home and then die in a car accident 5 miles from home I have arrived at the conclusion that if its your day to go-your going regardless of where you are or what disease you have or don't.

I was saying something similar to my husband last night.

In the next 2 months, we have trips to Las Vegas, Denver, and Hawaii. I don't anticipate making any changes.

 

[minnie56]

Nope. I'm in Toronto , flying to Marco island , Fla on Feb 16 for a week then a 12 night Caribbean cruise. Will use common sense but - It is what it is.

 

[bcla]

The State Department has changed their travel advisory to Level 4.

https://travel.state.gov/content/tr...s/traveladvisories/china-travel-advisory.html​

Do not travel to China due to novel coronavirus first identified in Wuhan, China. On January 30, the World Health Organization has determined the rapidly spreading outbreak constitutes a Public Health Emergency of International Concern. Travelers should be prepared for travel restrictions to be put into effect with little or no advance notice. Commercial carriers have reduced or suspended routes to and from China.​

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Those currently in China should consider departing using commercial means. The Department of State has requested that all non-essential U.S. government personnel defer travel to China in light of the novel coronavirus.​

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In an effort to contain the novel coronavirus, the Chinese authorities have suspended air, road, and rail travel in the area around Wuhan and placed restrictions on travel and other activities throughout the country. On January 23, 2020, the Department of State ordered the departure of all non-emergency U.S. personnel and their family members from Wuhan. The U.S. government has limited ability to provide emergency services to U.S. citizens in Hubei province.​

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The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has issued a Warning for all of China.​

Also - the State Department chartered flight from Wuhan arrived at March Reserve Air Base (the former March Air Force Base) in Southern California. All the passengers are now in quarantine on the base. This article says that one person with a fever was denied boarding and they had stopped over in Anchorage where the passengers were tested. A few people didn't have their travel documents and weren't allowed to board.

https://apnews.com/e3f13d6f778eae1dd6a062499ed889e7

 

[minnie56]

I feel very sad for those in China .. poor people.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

I wouldn't worry about catching the virus, I would be more worried that if someone was sick on the ship that the whole thing would be quarantined and I'd be stuck on it.

Anyone know what the protocol would have been if those 2 people on that cruise came up positive?

I will take a stab at it being familiar with hospitalized quarantine patients and with norovirus containment on cruise ships.

If the two people on the ship came up positive (or even if there was a strong suspicion they had it) I would guess they'd be removed from the ship in a haz-mat sort of way, perhaps by regular hospital personnel (MDs and RNs specifically trained and prepared to deal with this particular disease) along with an ambulance or flight crew (depending on where they were bringing them, I'd guess a major medical center), and hospitalized, since pneumonia is the deadly issue with it, and they would not have facilities, medications or supplies, etc, on that type of ship to treat any (let alone two) people with that serious of an illness since it involves far more than a ship's medical crew would ever be expected to handle.

Certainly they'd need expert and sophisticated care, and it is very possible the patients would need to be intubated and ventilated for a time (I even saw in some cases they were putting affected people on heart-lung machines to bypass the lungs and allow them time to heal), and there would be many specialists involved in overseeing their care, as well as other staff directly caregiving that are specifically (and hurriedly) trained in coronavirus. (Hopefully the hospital would have all the supplies needed for staff safety, if anyone remembers that a caregiver in 2014 caught Ebola when the hospital did not have the proper equipment and enough wasn't known about protection from the disease at that time - see article below.) The patient would also be kept in a negative air flow room that has two sets of doors and helps contain an airborne illness. Extraordinary precaution would be taken, and I'm sure governmental health officials would even be involved due to all the publicity, as well as press outside the doors hounding staff for info (and staff would be instructed not to say anything). These rooms have negative air flow capability just for this purpose. (Since there aren't too many patients that require rooms like this, regular patients can go in them, but if the negative air flow feature is needed it only takes a flip of a switch.)

After they leave the ship's room would be closed off completely until specialists could come in to clean it, perhaps by order of the government the ship would be taken out of service, and same with the ambulance or med flight, etc.

Then I'd imagine all the other people on the cruise ship would be fairly strictly quarantined to their rooms and probably checked daily or more for symptoms. They would have food delivered to their rooms and such, but not be allowed out, nor anything from the room like dirty sheets, maybe even trash, taken out, etc. This is somewhat what happens even with suspected noro cases, though this, of course, is much more serious and likely to involve an overabundance of extra caution.

Once time had passed and people were allowed to leave the ship, it would undergo a tremendous cleaning. I'm not sure I'd want to be the occupants of the coronavirus room, though, even after a "thorough" cleaning. They'd hopefully just close it off. Bookings might be down on the ship, too.

BTW did anyone see yesterday that caregivers of a coronavirus patient (I believe in China) were attacked, had their hazmat suits ripped off, were scratched, etc., when their family member died? People are risking their lives caring for these patients, not getting much sleep, and doing their best. They are probably devastated with every death, as well. I'm sure emotions are running very high, naturally, but come on.

This talks about the complexities of caring for such patients, this example being about the nurse who caught Ebola during the course of her work:

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-did-a-dallas-nurse-catch-ebola/

 

[mousefan73]

I was actually thining now would be the perfect time to visit Disney Tokyo or Hong Kong.. many of therir guests are Chinese and Chinese groups.. China Groups which travel worldwide are now stopped and that makes a significant crowd and financial impact for many places around the world.

 

[Disneylover99]

I was actually thining now would be the perfect time to visit Disney Tokyo or Hong Kong.. many of therir guests are Chinese and Chinese groups.. China Groups which travel worldwide are now stopped and that makes a significant crowd and financial impact for many places around the world.

Hong Kong Disneyland closed on Sunday.

 

[mousefan73]

Hong Kong Disneyland closed on Sunday.

thanks! glad I didnt get on that plane... lol. Tokyo is actually what I have my eyes on.. I work for an airline so the thoughts are growing.

 

[Canadian Girl]

Someone mentioned that China had not confirmed it was those who were medically compromised who were the fatalities. I believe it has been confirmed that most fatalities were male, older and had coexisting health or immune related issues. Sounds very similar to the flu.

 

[RamblingMad]

9723 cases in China. 9836 overall.

 

[ChrisFL]

Sadly, I do expect the death toll to be higher than is being reported from China, only because of what we know of how they're handling it....millions of people on lockdown without adequate medical care to go around to everyone, though those deaths may not be found or even reported as being related to this.

Beyond that, it seems the rest of the world's numbers aren't going up by much at all so far, and that is a good sign for difficulty of spreading through "normal" means.

 

[Searc]

I think this has the potential to turn into a bigger crisis than the sickness. People are already reporting food shortages in the locked down areas. Is there a plan for shipments to get in so people have food and other daily necessities?

 

[bcla]

Sadly, I do expect the death toll to be higher than is being reported from China, only because of what we know of how they're handling it....millions of people on lockdown without adequate medical care to go around to everyone, though those deaths may not be found or even reported as being related to this.

Beyond that, it seems the rest of the world's numbers aren't going up by much at all so far, and that is a good sign for difficulty of spreading through "normal" means.

China has a lot of doctors trained in what they would call "Western medicine". I have a friend whose parents were both doctors. However, their educational requirements are different with a specialized 5 year education rather than the American system of a 4 year undergraduate degree followed by 4 years of graduate level medical school. They can certainly churn out lots of doctors with a more accelerated program. They've been sending out lots of medical personnel to Wuhan, but it may not be enough.

However, I sometimes wonder about their training as they hand out antibiotics like it's candy. I knew one doctor who was educated in China but got a US medical license. When the subject came to prescribing antibiotics for cold symptoms (which is extremely common in China) she told me that during her US residency that she was repeatedly reminded that it was an inappropriate treatment.

 

[Heather07438]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51245156
Quite impressive.

 

[AndreaDM]

China has a lot of doctors trained in what they would call "Western medicine". I have a friend whose parents were both doctors. However, their educational requirements are different with a specialized 5 year education rather than the American system of a 4 year undergraduate degree followed by 4 years of graduate level medical school. They can certainly churn out lots of doctors with a more accelerated program. They've been sending out lots of medical personnel to Wuhan, but it may not be enough.

However, I sometimes wonder about their training as they hand out antibiotics like it's candy. I knew one doctor who was educated in China but got a US medical license. When the subject came to prescribing antibiotics for cold symptoms (which is extremely common in China) she told me that during her US residency that she was repeatedly reminded that it was an inappropriate treatment.

I was in China for 2 weeks last year. It is EXTREMELY difficult to get any kind of medications, especially antibiotics, they just don't have them. I came down with a bad cough and sinus infection, ran through my stash of ibuprofen quickly and I couldn't find ANY otc pain/cold/cough meds, nothing. Our tour guide had some kind of powder to mix with water for those of us who were sick but I passed on it. I drank probably 10 cups of tea those days and tons of water and sucked it up. The only thing I found was a pack of Halls in a convenience store, but they were more like candy than medicinal, just fruit flavored, no menthol. Our guide told us most people use herbal and alternative medications when sick, so I highly doubt antibiotics are being handed out like candy over there. They don't have a CVS or Walgreens on every corner like we do here.

 

[RamblingMad]

I think this has the potential to turn into a bigger crisis than the sickness. People are already reporting food shortages in the locked down areas. Is there a plan for shipments to get in so people have food and other daily necessities?

The lock down makes me think this is worse than being reported.

 

[SaintsManiac]

Flying to Dallas in April. Have not even considered canceling. We could always switch to driving if this situation gets worse.

 

[piglet1979]

Sadly, I do expect the death toll to be higher than is being reported from China, only because of what we know of how they're handling it....millions of people on lockdown without adequate medical care to go around to everyone, though those deaths may not be found or even reported as being related to this.

Beyond that, it seems the rest of the world's numbers aren't going up by much at all so far, and that is a good sign for difficulty of spreading through "normal" means.

We may never know the true death count because of the cover up in the beginning and people who have died without going to the hospital.

The worlds numbers are going up rapidly. Yesterday, if I remember the number correctly, there were only 68 confirmed outside of China. There is now 140. All the numbers seemed to have jumped a considerable amount last night.

 

[RamblingMad]

We may never know the true death count because of the cover up in the beginning and people who have died without going to the hospital.

The worlds numbers are going up rapidly. Yesterday, if I remember the number correctly, there were only 68 confirmed outside of China. There is now 140. All the numbers seemed to have jumped a considerable amount last night.

It should be exponential. That’s how the math works.