
The workers who supply the world’s food are starting to get sick - hhs
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-27/food-workers-getting-sick-is-the-latest-threat-to-world-supply
======
appleiigs
Fear-mongering article. The food industry has a high standard of safety and
has dealt with e-coli, salmonella, and the list goes on. The have dealt with
sick workers before too.

EDIT: As an example, many many years ago i got a tour of a bakery that
supplied Starbucks. Lab coat, booties, hair net, washed hands... for a bakery.
Those same things that keep food safe will keep workers safe... and the
workers are relatively lower skilled therefore can be replaced easily (unlike
health-care).

~~~
Noumenon72
It's not mongering fear about contamination in the _food_ , which should be
fine. Every industry has had sick workers before, but many have shuttered.
Rather than just helicopter dropping $2 trillion and going home, Congress
should have been thinking about how to make sure that key industries can pay
for safety measures and replacement workers. The price system could do that,
but people call it "profiteering".

~~~
appleiigs
As I said, the same safety measures are already in place for food are good
safety measures for the workers. And the workers are readily available. Many
are already seasonal and temporary. On my friend's blueberry farm, workers are
so temporary they'll start in the morning and quit by noon.

Toilet paper buying was a media driven event. The media needs to be more
responsible with fear driven click-bait.

~~~
core-questions
> The media needs to be more responsible with fear driven click-bait.

Concur. They've been clamouring for ages for laws to control what's "real
news" and what's "fake news"; if they want regulation so badly, they can have
some regulation to get them to consider the end impact of their articles, and
whether the level of alarm they're extolling for clicks is truly warranted.

------
taxicabjesus
People are getting sick, but most people less than 70 years old recover fully.
The odds of people >70yo who have a symptomatic case of this virus for
recovery aren't so great, but we don't know how many asymptomatic cases there
actually are among the older portions of the population.

Tom Hanks says he's survived his infection with the super-virus [0]. Wikipedia
says he's 63 years old. If there was no test for this specific virus, Tom
Hanks would have attributed his symptoms to a common cold (Covid-18, maybe)
and done just fine.

[0]
[https://twitter.com/tomhanks/status/1241919151829954566](https://twitter.com/tomhanks/status/1241919151829954566)

The only advice I notice about this particular virus is that we must "flatten
the curve" by wearing invisible bubble suits. There is nothing about how to be
proactive in becoming more resilient against this virus and all viruses.

The experts could give us _something_ to do (presuming Science has learned
something about viruses in the 100+ years since the great outbreaks), but all
the media says is to make an effort to prevent your own infection by washing
your hands, not touching your face, keeping your distance from everyone else,
and "shelter in place". Various other websites say it's important to flatten
the curve by preventing your own infection, so that you won't pass the virus
on to some already-old/sick person who certainly wouldn't survive.

I am using this year's cold season to adjust my health model slightly. The
media is using it to stoke fear/panic: good lemmings know there's nothing you
can do for your own health without a doctor's permission.

Is this helplessness training?

~~~
perl4ever
Chinese experts (or at least one in an article I read due to it being on HN)
say that the major mistake so far in the West is not wearing masks. Not that
there currently are enough for everyone, but still...

~~~
yostrovs
Our experts said not to use face masks. There's a debate of whether to listen
to the experts.

~~~
borplk
I think that's because they are worried about the supply limit.

They are pushing that advice as a matter of prioritising the supply.

~~~
drewbug
is that their stated reason?

~~~
gowld
No, but that is wartime propagate for you. After a decade of failure to
restock emergency supplies after 2005 swine flu, whatever they do now
regarding mask distribution is just rearranging Titanic deck chairs.

~~~
perl4ever
I don't mean to suggest it's wrong to discourage people, that would depend on
what the best thing to do with the limited supply is.

And I think some quotes I've seen have been fairly transparent about the
motivation for telling people not to wear masks.

