I could be infected and asymptomatic, but I’m confident that, if this it true, I haven’t spread it to anyone. And that’s without the benefit of any closures or lockdowns. Quarantine ensures you dont spread it, but it isn’t required.
The problem is the idiots acting reckless, and not respecting the possibility they might be infected (or that someone around them might be).
Come on scripta, you can’t really be taking that seriously…
From an email sent by UPS - “UPS is also taking steps to minimize exposure to our customers by adjusting how we handle signature required packages. Now, your UPS Driver will confirm the recipient has taken possession of these packages without asking anyone to sign manually.”
If they mean “delivered” or “attempted to deliver” without ever attempting or delivering anything, then they have been running that scam for years. So you can still pay extra for signature confirmation but now you get nothing.
LoL, these days… you just don’t know. POE’s law and all.
How can you be so sure that you haven’t spread it to anyone? Do you live alone? Do you gown up (like all medical workers do when dealing with highly contagious patients at a hospital) before leaving your home, and toss or decontaminate your gown before coming back in?
All the guidance put out by WHO, CDC, etc, regarding washing hands and keeping your distance are to limit the spread. These measures do not eliminate the spread, only reduce it. At this point they’re not trying to contain the virus in the US (seems like only China and South Korea managed that), but to pretty much let almost everyone get sick a little slower.
I think the only way to be sure you haven’t spread it is to either never leave your home, test yourself every time before leaving your home, or be a bubble boy.
I’m pretty confident I havent given anyone a full medical exam, either…
I’m not sure if you’re just trying to be argumentative, or what. Point is, if you are being respectful and conscientious, and those around you are being respectful and conscientious, the risk of a virus being spread is minimal.
I’m not trying to be argumentative, I’m trying to explain that your point of view does not match up with science.
Science says that under certain conditions (low humidity), the virus can be suspended in the air for up to 3 hours. It doesn’t land immediately. You could pick it up by walking through someone else’s snot, created hours before you were there. It can also stay on metal or plastic for up to 3 days. Even if you don’t touch any surfaces but use your sleeves or gloves or whatever, you can still spread the virus around unless you are extremely careful. That might require tossing your outside clothes into laundry (or at least dryer) or not touching them again for 3 days.
It’s not enough to just be respectful and conscientious. Minimal is more than nil, and minimal risk multiplied by large crowds is still a big risk.
But they didn’t know they were bitten…
Everyone should watch “Kingdom” on Netflix. Awesome K-drama show. It is subtitled but well worth the watch if you’re into Zombies and/or the current pandemic. Even if you’re not.
Suspended as in it is exempted from the effects of gravity? Or suspended like a leaf can blow around for quite a while before finally falling to the ground? Ever tried to catch such a leaf?
There will always be a “more than nil” risk of being infected, at least until there is a vaccine. And even then, you really have no way of knowing the vaccine took. Swine flu was making a pretty significant appearance this flu season, until Corona created headlines. Unless you’re willing to permanently reside in that fore-mentioned bubble, there’s simply no getting away from it. So yeah, minimal is the best we’re going to get.
Perhaps I should also elaborate a bit - I’m not talking about running all over town “being careful”. Part of being careful is minimizing unessential contact. I’m talking about going to a couple of stores over a week’s time, during off hours or when they otherwise arent crowded. The opposite of packing into a shoulder-to-shoulder crowded bar with random strangers for an entire night. The point still being, a lot of people are being careful without the need of closings and lockdowns (We ain’t going to Chuck-e-Cheese whether they’re open or not). It’s those who are not restraining themselves that are forcing such shutdowns to be mandated.
They’re so light that even the lightest motion of air is sufficient to counteract gravity. I’m not an expert on airborne diseases or the physics behind this, but the explanation is that particles < 5 µm in diameter (like dust) hang in the air longer than wet droplets, which are > 5 µm. SARS-CoV-2 (the virus) measures in nm. Initial reports claimed that this could only be transmitted if someone’s liquid gets directly on you, but that appears to no longer be the case – here’s a recent article.
You don’t need to catch it like a leaf or a trash bag floating around in the wind, you just need to breathe it in.
You just blinded Thomas Dolby. 
Well, I still have to shop but story like this one just makes me scared:
Aerosolized virus showed a median half-life of about 1.1-1.2 hours, similar to the related coronavirus that causes SARS, the authors noted.
Yeah, things like this and the above article about Skagit WA where over 2/3 of nearly 60 people at a single meeting got sick make me really think it’s a lot more contagious than the “just droplets” model suggests. I’m not sure if this meeting involved everyone licking the same cup or something, but it seems like that much transmission is really high for a causal contact meeting.
At present, medical experts believe the risk of contact transmission is higher than that of direct droplet transmission.
I was just in the hospital speaking to doctors and nurses and the advice is for everyday interactions is not touching yourself and washing your hands frequently after touching things others touched. (If you do want to use gloves, you should wash the gloves just like your hands).
On the other hand, how does a single person fly on a full plane from Italy and not infected anyone else on board?
There’s no way of knowing that only one person went to that meeting infected. And while “half” (not 2/3) seems significant, it still is only 30 people. Sitting elbow-to-elbow, material might’ve been passed around, there could’ve been a donut buffet, etc etc - without specific context, it’s easily explainable. To use only what’s included in this report as evidence it’s airborne would be a huge leap into baseless speculation.
But unless it’s under a specific directional force (like being expelled by a cough), natural air currents are going to steer the particles around objects, not into them. You’d need to be quite unlucky, or in a very high concentration of particles, for it to be a significant threat. yes, I am well aware that this is not an absolute - but no matter how hard we insist on trying to make it so, there isnt much in life that is absolute.
Thank you, scripta. I’m not about to inject myself into your ongoing . . er . . “discussion”. But I want to offer an on-topic comment related to what you wrote, quoted above:
Oftentimes in life we cannot optimize a situation fully. We cannot, for example, reduce virus exposure risk to zero. My approach, instead, is to do as best I’m able. Believing scripta, as quoted above, is correct, my plan is to do any upcoming grocery shopping as early as possible in the day, just after the store opens being the best option. Plan also is to limit shopping to humid, preferably rainy, days . . . and also warm days.
Stores work overnight to re-stock and to sanitize their premises. I don’t want to be there later in the day when tens of other customers have had opportunity to walk about in those aisles spreading . . . . . whatever.
The early bird gets the worm . . . . but with luck not the virus. 
CBSN in New York has gone dark as several workers there, following testing, have been found to have the coronavirus.
The channel is now operating out of Los Angeles.
THe stores here are starting to set aside the first hour of their open business hours exclusively for senior citizens so they can shop alone.