
Ask HN: Based on your personal experience, how bad is the Covid-19 pandemic? - bryanwb
The asian country I live in has very few cases due to lockdowns plus quarantines for visitors. Watching the news in Europe and the US, it is hard for me to get a sense of how bad it is. Do you know many people who have died? Who have gotten seriously ill? Are you afraid? Do you think the response in your own location is too little or too much?
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three_legs
I believe it's a manufactured event. The unprecedented actions taken were not
warranted for the situation. Many tests false positive due to covid being
related to other common viruses. A few people have become even wealthier while
many have become even poorer.

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mikewarot
I have Schrodinger's Covid... it's possible I had it, or not... and may never
know. I tested negative once, but those tests are only sensitive to ongoing
infection.

I had co-workers who definitely had it. I've been short of breath ever since.
I stayed upstairs by myself for a month, and then had a boatload of tests.
Never had a fever, and things only tasted weird for a day.

I've had a f*ckton of tests, including a probe in my heart... so I'm not
likely to just drop dead. I'm left with "it might be asthma" or
reconditioning.

By the time all the testing and resting was done... after 12 weeks I was
finally clear to go back to work... and laid off 1 hour later, over the phone.

The last few days, has been worse than the new normal. Right now I'm a bit
dizzy just sitting and typing. My pulse and oxygen levels are normal, though.
It hurts to breath in deeply.

I have a close friend with an almost identical symptoms and history. It really
sucks not to be able to even go to the store without coming home and needing
to rest for an hour or two. I feel like I've aged 10 years in the past 6
months.

All the focus on the dead ignores the side effects, which are going to hit
this country like a hammer because leadership failed to contain it, and now
we've got almost 1/4 of all the cases in the world.

Stay home, wash your hands, and wear a mask.

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giantg2
I'm from Pennsylvania (US). I don't personally know anyone who has been
hospitalized or died from Covid-19.

We are now remote, but the very beginning of this my work notified us that
some people tested positive (you had to have the symptom at that time to get a
test, so probably accurate), including someone from my building. No one was
wearing masks at that time. Around this time, I caught something that felt
like the flu. I never got tested, so I have no idea what I had. I had a friend
who had a similar experience and thinks it was Covid-19.

Some of the restrictions in my state made sense, but some where an
overreaction. Most of the overbearing restrictions have been lifted. The
legislature here has passed a resolution to end the state of emergency and the
accompanying restrictions that the governor is supposed to follow. The
governor hasn't followed the law and will draw this out in court. The court
and many other government systems are a mess right now because they were
closed for, I think, a couple months. Now theh have to catch up.

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LUmBULtERA
Two members of my extended family recently passed away from "community
acquired pneumonia" and complications from pneumonia, including sepsis and
cardiac arrest, within 1.5 weeks of each other in something of a hotspot.
Neither as far as I know was declared covid, but it is suspicious to me.

Regardless, I think there are some activities that are high risk and some that
are low risk given the information we have on contact tracing at this point.
Generally I do not think the response is too much in my location, and I'd
rather there be a few additional restrictions, but it's an okay balance
currently, given that Covid is already widespread here so a harder lockdown at
this point may not be very effective. I'm not afraid, though I think of myself
as pragmatically cautious.

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MaxHoppersGhost
I live in Texas. I know a few coworkers who have had it but don’t know anyone
who has died and I don’t know anyone who knows someone who has died. Don’t
know anyone who has been hospitalized either.

I think we reacted appropriately at the beginning given the lack of knowledge
about it but now that we have flattened the curve we are overreacting in a big
way.

I’m a bit afraid of covid as there could be long term health effects we don’t
fully understand but I know I won’t die from it. At the same time we have to
live our lives and repair all the livelihoods we destroyed with the lockdown.
We need to wear masks and be cautious but try to get back to normal.

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smcphile
> Do you know many people who have died? Who have gotten seriously ill? Are
> you afraid? Do you think the response in your own location is too little or
> too much?

I live in France. I know of three people who have died and of many people
who’ve been ill. I’m not afraid myself, I avoid crowded areas and getting
physically too close to anyone (other than my wife). I think the response by
the government here in France has been acceptable, other than that for a long
time there was a shortage of both masks and tests. (It would have been better
to have had both a stockpile of masks available and the capacity to
manufacture them here locally.)

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the__alchemist
How old were the victims who died?

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smcphile
They were all over 60: a man (a doctor) in his early 60’s with no apparent
previous health problems; a woman in her early 70’s with a major previous
problem, a cancer; and a woman in her early 90’s with no life threatening
problems, but mobility issues, who was living in a retirement home (some other
people in her retirement home also died from COVID-19).

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Foober223
USA medium town here. Day to day you wouldn't know anything is wrong beyond
everyone wearing masks.

I believe I caught it myself several months ago. I had what felt like
bronchitis in the lungs. A slight burning or tickle feeling in the lungs.
Occasionally I still feel this, months afterwards. I've suffered no ill
effects though. No fatigue.

I don't mean to downplay the real danger. Even some young healthy people are
dying from this. But it's not like the medieval plague with bodies piling up
in the streets.

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jimkleiber
Michigan here but friends in many places around the world.

In the first few weeks after it hit the US in March, I knew at least three
friends of friends who died—one in 70s probably, one I think in 40s, and in
one early 30s.

I know at least three friends who got it and said it was really rough,
including one in his 20s who is a pretty elite athlete.

My mom started chemo at the end of February and just had her last one a week
ago, so I am personally very grateful that the Michigan took it quite
seriously. I believe strongly the problem with something like this is if we
take the necessary precautions and cases don't happen, people will say we
overreacted.

I'm scared to get it as I think we have little understanding about the mid to
long term effects. I also fear I will spread it to my parents who are in their
60s.

I believe we shut down well to stop the spread but then didn't have a
comprehensive national plan to test and trace so that we could reopen and
monitor the situation. So I think the testing and tracing didn't receive
enough united national push to have a large-scale coordination and then the
"team" started to fall apart.

Overall, I have been quite impressed with just how much American citizens have
helped each other, implemented social distancing, worn masks, and generally
took care of ourselves and each other. Sure, there are cases where people
don't, but I think those are strongly exaggerated—the people who are loudest
on the internet are not typically the most representative of society.

I believe one of the biggest failures of the US national government was to not
see this as a huge opportunity for the US to lead the world. To dedicate so
much of our time and resources to figure this out for Americans so we can
figure it out for others. Seems we overlooked how much this is a global
problem and covid-19 anywhere is currently a threat everywhere.

Also, giving ourselves a little bit of grace compared to Asia, as many Asian
countries have had recent practice with a respiratory epidemic, whereas we
haven't. That being said, I believe we still dropped the ball in terms of
coming together as a country to solve it, and I strongly blame the leaders in
Congress and the White House for not galvanizing the country behind the advice
of the epidemiological experts.

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rafamvc
South Nj, usa. I do not personally know anyone who got it. Friends of friends
only. Only one fatal, and only one seriously ill. Both had other health issues
that combined with Covid made it hard.

I am not afraid, but I am cautious. I feel comfortable being out but avoid
most indoor situations if I can. I already worked from home prior, and would
not accept going back to an office. Specialty now.

Hard to say if it was overkill. But it was at least appropriate, if not too
much.

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notahacker
I've had it (and highly recommend not getting it!) but know surprisingly few
other people who have considering I was in London at the time. Response in the
UK has been overcompensating for reacting too slowly and doing the wrong
things at the beginning. Friends in Asia say in many respects measures are
more relaxed there, but they didn't get a huge spike from cheerfully carrying
on as normal at the peak.

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caseyscottmckay
I live in downtown D.C. and I do not know one single person who has has tested
positive for Covid. I don't think I even know anyone who knows someone who has
tested positive.

Everything is shutdown and everyone is wearing mask, so socially it sucks, but
no ill health effects.

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austincheney
I am on an army base in Kuwait. Masks are required indoors, civilian employees
are only recently coming back on base, and there is a required two week
quarantine to get here. When you get sick here you relocate to an isolation
compound.

Covid is extremely rare here and well controlled.

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SeniorSenior
How would we know? A friend in hospital with blood clots in both lungs is
tested for everything EXCEPT Covid-19. Having eliminated everything they can
test for, they shrug their shoulders and send her home. EDIT: I live in small-
town, western USA.

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bryanwb
I ask b/c it is hard to tell how bad it is just by case counts and deaths.
Hard to tell how many of those cases actually lead to illness (most or only a
few?). Further hard to tell if people are dying from Covid or with Covid. For
that reason I am asking for personal experiences.

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the__alchemist
I know no one who has it, or had had it. One of the spouses of someone in my
organization had it.

North Carolina, USA

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luckman212
Live in NYC. I know of a few people who have sadly died. No direct friends or
relatives, but heard of relatives of coworkers who passed. Brother in law got
it and was very sick for 4+ weeks and had to isolate.

Mar/Apr was a very scary time to be in NYC, it felt like you could catch it
from just opening your window or touching the wrong elevator button. Now it
feels less scary and less "real" here—even though I know it's dangerous to let
your guard down. I am glad to see most people wearing masks diligently. Also
happy to see people come up with ways to still patronize restaurants (they
have all built makeshift outdoor dining areas).

I am shocked at how many people I overhear touting conspiracy theories about
this or that [country/rich person/religious group] creating the virus, or that
it will magically disappear after the US elections in Nov.

I don't think we'll get anywhere close to normalcy until we have a proven,
safe vaccine being distributed widely. But I hope we've seen the worst as far
as peaks, outbreaks and deaths.

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gnusty_gnurc
> or that it will magically disappear after the US elections in Nov

I don't think it will magically disappear, but I think people will get more
comfortable with the idea of "approaching normalcy" whether we have a vaccine
or not if Biden wins.

There is a political profit to being as censorious as possible with covid
reporting wrt Trump.

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bjourne
Sweden. My grandmother had it and I worried. But she survived and didn't even
get any symptoms. I think it's a sham. I don't wear a mask but I'm careful
with my hands and wash them a lot. I avoid crowds too.

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BjoernKW
I'm in Germany. Given the circumstances, I'd say the situation looks pretty
good over here. Overall, up until now the pandemic has been managed quite
well. So far, I personally don't know anyone who got COVID-19. I'm not afraid
but I try to follow precautions diligently.

The response during the onset of pandemic (which amounts to roughly the end of
February over here) and the first few months that followed in my opinion was
appropriate and the outcome to some extent proved this as the infection
numbers went down rapidly by mid-April.

Some of that was due to decisive action and a rather well-organised public
health service but a fair bit of luck certainly was involved as well.

I'm more ambivalent regarding the mid- to long-term development, though. In
general, I think that Germany, and Western Europe, for that matter, will
weather this situation quite well and will mostly do fine. However, the wider
economic repercussions still seem to be largely ignored. By autumn this year
this is going to become interesting because that's when many SMBs eventually
will have to declare bankruptcy.

At this point, during this phase of the pandemic, from my point of view
there's also too much focus on the mere infection numbers. While those numbers
have been increasing again lately - not the least because of massively
expanded testing, which is a unanimously good thing - both the hospitalisation
rate and the mortality rate remain remarkably low or are even declining.
Hence, easing some measures, such as strict social distancing and the allowed
attendance numbers for public events, and the consequences those entail for
many businesses, might be justified.

This is going to be an interesting political discussion, to say the least,
because while we now might indeed move into territory where COVID-19 in some
places isn't any more dangerous anymore than the flu (due to better medical
procedures and treatments, measures such as wearing masks, and indeed the
virus apparently becoming less dangerous but more infectious over time), the
narrative might shift from justifiably trying to prevent a healthcare disaster
with potentially dire consequences to attempting to eliminate any remaining
risk. Politicians might be tempted to argue that measures should remain in
place until a sufficient part of the population is vaccinated.

Another aspect I find both encouraging and worrying for Germany specifically
is innovation in general and digital transformation in particular. I was
amazed at how quickly businesses adapted to new ways of working (which
actually of course can't really be considered 'new' anymore) such as remote
work, which they have been very reluctant towards before. How the federal
government organised efforts such as the #WirVsVirus hackathon in March and
the successful development of the local COVID-19 tracing app as open source
software was no less amazing.

This transformation is still happening way too slowly, though.

Local health authorities for example often are still woefully stuck in the 80s
and 90s in terms of processes and technologies used. Just recently, there have
been several cases of thousands of COVID-19 test results being lost because
authorities processed that data on paper and transmitted information via fax.

So, while the vast majority of people do their share and many businesses are
struggling, some authorities still can't be arsed to update their processes.
This is especially aggravating because the federal government provided ample
funds specifically for that purpose.

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7174n6
From a major urban center in Pennsylvania. I don't know a single person (by
name) that has had it. Talk to friends and they don't know anyone either. The
numbers the government puts out don't add up. The restrictions are senseless.
I try not put too much thought into conspiracies but I'm really starting to
think this is being perpetuated to influence the election.

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three_legs
Yes, it's an artificial event, is what I believe

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replwoacause
You are obviously trolling. Nothing about this pandemic seems artificial. It’s
impossible for me to comprehend how any rational and informed person could
arrive at such a baseless conclusion. But then again we do have people who
still think the earth is flat.

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three_legs
No, I'm not trolling, and I do NOT believe the earth is flat. Everything about
this "pandemic" seems artificial. It's been driven by media creating fear and
hysteria, compromised scientists driven by control and fame, and politicians
driven by further power. If you're curious for more perspective on
understanding the false narrative, check out coronacircus.com or
r/LockdownSkepticism — even if you think I'm crazy, maybe you'll have better
insight into how I am crazy.

