As I write this, Jan 24 2020, we (the people of the world) are facing a burgeoning epidemic: respiratory disease caused by the 2019-nCoV coronavirus. My read on what’s currently known of this infection is reported in yesterday’s post, which you can find here. Here’s a question of interest to preppers that reaches beyond this particular virus: How are governments really responding when faced with a potential pandemic?
The grain of salt: It’s not really a pandemic yet.
An epidemic is when a limited geographic area has a lot of cases of a particular disease. A pandemic is when that spike in cases is widespread. So far, I’d call this an epidemic. Some regions of China have a lot of cases. Cases elsewhere (Japan, Thailand, South Korea, the U.S.) are occurring, but still rare. Still, every pandemic starts as an epidemic; so responses to this threat can tell us something of how governments respond.
Another important note is that, insofar as we can tell right now, 2019-nCoV infection is neither hugely lethal nor particularly easy to transmit person to person. Some interpersonal transmissions are happening, but so far none are known to have occurred through casual, passing contact. In fact, no interpersonal transmission is known to have happened outside of China. Yet. So far as we know. No doubt, a disease that showed higher lethality or easier transmission should be handled more aggressively.
How China is handling the epidemic at its center
We think we know where this epidemic got its human start: at a seafood market in the city of Wuhan in the Hubei district of central China. That market has been shut down, and testing to try to pinpoint the source further is ongoing.
The seafood market that sparked the first cases is now empty of anyone not wearing an isolation suit.
Today, China stopped mass transit in and out of 13 of its cities in Hubei province. (1) No trains, buses, or airplanes are going in or out…at least for normal travelers. The reports I saw didn’t say private car travel was or was not being allowed. That’s a change from two days ago, when they were just checking temperatures at the stations and not allowing travel by those with fevers.
Despite the Chinese New Year, there are no trains full of travelers departing Hubei province. (3)
How China is handling the epidemic elsewhere
Well, at least they learned something from the SARS epidemic. That epidemic (also caused by a coronavirus mutated from an animal version) they hid for as long as possible, and lied about when the fact of its existence was inescapable. For that, they both caught a lot of international heat and got to learn in hindsight how much faster they could have controlled it with international help. This time, China released the full genome of the virus as soon as they had it. That’s been a big help.
They’re also talking about being more open with information in general; but that claim is more sketchy. There are reports that social media posts talking about the problem were suppressed, for example. (2). I’d tell you how open they were really being if we knew yet.
Today is the Chinese New Year. It’s traditionally one of their biggest holidays and travel time. That’s very unfortunate from an epidemiology point of view; people moving around is the best way to make an epidemic a pandemic. Beijing and many other cities have cancelled their celebrations. Travel is being discouraged.
And the Chinese people? It’s hard to tell from news reports halfway around the world; but there are reports that people are stockpiling. (2) Grocery store shelves are emptying. Many people in the videos and pictures are wearing N-95 disease masks. (This mask wearing is not rare in Asian cultures as a move to protect oneself and others from even garden-variety respiratory infections.) I found nothing reporting more extreme responses among the Chinese at this time.
How other nations are handling the epidemic
So far, the primary international response has been to screen passengers at international airports. Yesterday (Jan 23) the U.S. announced such screening, but hadn’t said when it would be implemented.
People with fevers or reporting symptoms that may be associated with 2019-nCoV infection are not being allowed to fly around and wander off in new countries. Stopping people with the virus from moving is probably a very effective method of preventing pandemic! But the incubation time between infection and symptoms may be 1-3 weeks.The screening is likely to miss people in the gap between picking up the virus and being sick with the infection. By the time the people start to feel unwell they may be beyond detection. Also, although there’s no specific evidence on this point yet, it’s quite possible that people could have mild or no symptoms but can still spread disease.
As a result, as a control measure the airport screenings really aren’t impressing me.
The U.S. has also issued a warning against traveling to epidemic areas. It is not, at this time, a high-level warning.
Chinese stocks and the yuan are decreasing in value, but not drastically. I see the yuan has dropped about 2% in the last four days.
How international agencies are handling the epidemic
The World Health Organization is encouraging communication and supporting the travel restrictions, but it’s not declaring an emergency. Emergency declarations tend to have strong and somewhat lasting negative impacts on economic activity from the emergency areas. They don’t seem to think this infection rates those costs at this time. I can see why they might think so given the so-far-modest human to human transmission … but are they Right? Who knows?
Anyway, that’s a summary of how one emerging infection is being treated. Given that a pandemic is one of the big potential disasters facing the modern world, I thought preppers might like a look at how the early response looks.
Sources
1) https://www.yahoo.com/news/china-puts-13-cities-lockdown-053439122.html
2) https://time.com/5769323/wuhan-coronavirus-outbreak/
3) Image thanks to Enoch Leung from Canada [CC BY-SA (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)]
I followed up on a WellnessResources.Com and Mercola.Com link to (www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed) on the roles that Vitamin D3 and Quercetin (500 mg) play against viruses. I reviewed abstracts and full articles from about 50+ research studies. Here is a summary of what I learned that I copied into my personal notes, sometimes forgetting to include the source research (and the reader would have to go through a similar research study to confirm what I will report).
1. Vitamin D3 (400 IU), a 2010 review of 25 studies indicated that school children were 42% less likely to catch Influenza A flu. And a second 2010 review indicated that T-Cells require Vitamin D3 to activate against bacteria and viruses.
2. 2016 review showed Quercetin inhibited a wide spectrum of influenza strains, including H1N1, H3N2 and H5N1. Quercetin showing inhibitory activity in the early stage of influenza infection.
3. A 1985 study reported that Quercetin inhibited infectivity and replication of the following viruses: Herpes 1, Polio 1, Parainfluenza 3, Respiratory syncytial virus, adenovirus, and rhinovirus.
4. A 2016 study (with mice) showed that Quercetin inhibited hepatitus and denge viruses.
5. A 2015 study revealed that Quercetin inhibited Hepatitus B virus in human liver cells protecting cells from infection and limiting the spread of infection.
6. A 2009 study on Quercetin showed that it interfered with Hepatitus C gene signals that enabled Hepatitus C virus production.
7. A 2010 animal study showed that quercetin inhibits both Influenza A and B viruses. The viruses were unable to develop resistance to quercetin, and when used with the antiviral drugs (amantadine or oseltamivir), the effect was amplified and it prevented drug resistance from developing.
Also,
7. 2010 N-acetyl-cysteine (NAC) inhibits virus replication and expression of pro-inflammatory molecules in A549 cells infected with highly pathogenic H5N1 influenza A virus. 2010 February, Institute of Medical Virology.
8. 2009 NAC reduces Biofilm formation by 62% (Pol J Microbio) that links bacteria to attack the human host. Beneficial effects against: staph aureus, staph epidermidis, E-coli, Klebsiella pneumonia Psuedomonas aeruginosa, Proteus vulgaris.
9. 2010. N-acetyl-cysteine (NAC) inhibits virus replication and expression of pro-inflammatory molecules in A549 cells infected with highly pathogenic H5N1 influenza A virus. NAC at concentrations ranging from 5 to 15 mM reduced H5N1-induced cytopathogenic effects (CPEs), virus-induced apoptosis and infectious viral yields 24 hours post-infection. 2010 February, Institute of Medical Virology.
11. In my notes (that included the above, I found an entry:) Vitamin C and NAC significantly inhibited the spread of mice lymphoma and prostate cancer cells by preventing cancer cells from replicating.
Go online, Type into Search Bar: PUBMED (roughly a summary of 22,000,000 research studies). Do a search on Vitamins C, D3, Quercetin, and NAC (N-Acetyl Cisteine) and you will find research indicating similar results.
I do not recall a “sure cure” for anything. I do recall reading that improvements in underground water supply in USA/California coincided with the end of Polio in USA/California in the latter 1950s/60s; so it is not clear to me that the Polio Vaccination alone ended polio.
What is clear from PubMed research is that Quercetin, Vitamins D3 and C, and NAC (and maybe also anti-oxidant Astaxanthin) are plenty helpful for many viruses and possibly beneficial for all of them, and including various cancers. But i said “beneficial”, not a cure.
All of this is encouraging to me (and I take all these Health Supplements) near daily. I hope it is encouraging to the reader, and especially if you check out PUBMED (=the collection house for health research) for yourself.
Respectfully…
Just by way of orientation, quercetin and NAC are antioxidant molecules found in a variety of plants. Onions are particularly rich sources of the NAC. I personally prefer to get mine by eating lots of veggies; as the trend for similar phytonutrients is that whole food sources show greater biological effects than the supplements without overdose risk … but that’s just me. These seem to be very useful molecules and safe in reasonable doses. Thanks for sharing the research, radarphos!
Onions are particularly rich sources of quercetin not NAC as far as I know