
Ask HN: Should I ignore government advice on coronavirus? - throwaway98790
Seems to me that the best advice governments can give is essentially &quot;don&#x27;t panic, keep going as normal until faced with nearby exposure to the virus&quot;.<p>This sort of advice prevents major unwarranted disruption to society.<p>The downside of such advice though is that <i>some people will be exposed to the virus</i>.<p>Statistically it seems that the government advice makes sense - &quot;some people might be exposed&#x2F;die, but that&#x27;s a reasonable cost for avoiding panic&quot;.<p>So I got to thinking that maybe it&#x27;s not in the interests of individual people to follow government advice.  Maybe the wisest thing is to stay home for a month or so and see what happens.  Sure this is more cautious than the government advises, but it&#x27;s also the best possible way to avoid infection.<p>What do others think?
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bitxbitxbitcoin
I think this highly depends on which government you're asking about.
Especially if you're talking about the Wuhan coronavirus - are you in China?

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jerome-jh
Definitely. In case you are not in China: would you expect your government to
stop everything for a handful of cases?

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duxup
I'm not sure how you measure this for any given situation.

You don't really even know how effective "stay home for a month or so" will
be.

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iagovar
I'm not an expert, but I studied epidemiology once (semester, long time ago)
so here is my take:

IMO governments are taking too much time to give people advice on basic
measures against this (or really, any) virus.

The basics are: Wear a mask and wash your hands properly as often as you can.
If it's possible, sanitize with 70% alcohol solutions (better than 90%), and
surfaces with bleach. Be aware when you're touching your eyes, nose, penis and
butthole (yes, I had to say this).

The problems are: Wearing a mask works as vaccines. They are useful when most
people wear it, as it's mostly protection for other people. A typical light
mask is a weak method of protection because you can still breathe the virus if
someone sneezes in front of you. The air has to come from somewhere, and it's
not a filter mask, so every aperture is a chance. Not to mention that you
aren't wearing goggles.

Now, even if we were as disciplined in the west, which I highly doubt because
I don't see people giving a fuck about this, some people is going to transmit
to others no matter what, for a variety of reasons. So it's mostly buying time
so we get an effective vaccine.

If you're young and healthy, think about your parents or grandparents. Or
maybe your children.

We don't really know how much we should trust the current data, but as today:

The mortality rate is about ~50%

The letality rate is about ~3%

Now, when people is debating about this virus they are referring to one of
those two figures. I won't give any of you more information that you can get
on wikipedia on what those rates mean, but maybe you should know that those
two rates exist and people is confusing them.

Also, I'd watch closely the rates of confirmed cases and deaths, because
previously it looked like an exponential function by both, but it's true that
there isn't enough data yet to know if we should freak out about this, and it
could plateau depending on several factors. Current efforts in China should
have some impact in this numbers, at least for now.

