China went through three main changes to stem the spread of the Coronavirus:

• Quarantine
• Lockdown
• Rationing

In the ‘West’, we’ve added ‘Self-quarantine’ first, in some countries. Others are in the delusional phase of ‘Delay’, because, apparently, they are worried that ‘people will get bored and break out of self-isolation if it last too long’. In fairness, there is a logical reason to delay because as China and Italy will find out, the economic costs of going through those stages above are enormous. That reason is that scientists could be able to find vaccine in time. That is a very dangerous bet for the infections grow exponentially, and if a vaccine does not come soon enough, the health care system of the country will be overwhelmed (and no, the coming warm weather in the Northern Hemisphere is unlikely to slow down the infections, like in the normal flu, because this is not the normal flu, and infections have shown to grow also in hot weather like Singapore or Iran). Then, not only the economic costs but also the societal costs will be unspeakable.

Finally, one other country’s leader still thinks this virus could be ‘fake’…

WHO went on a fact-finding mission to China and released a report on February 28. The report is unequivocal:

“China’s bold approach to contain the rapid spread of this new respiratory pathogen has changed the course of a rapidly escalating and deadly epidemic.”

There are also stories about two different strains of the virus, apparently stemming from the desire to explain higher number of infections/deaths in some countries and lower in others. I don’t know. To me this is simply a function of testing more people and proper reporting. It also makes sense to run with that story in countries which have chosen to be in the ‘Delay’ stage. Occam’s razor: even if there were two strains, I don’t see how they can be country-specific.

“Everywhere you went, anyone you spoke to, there was a sense of responsibility and collective action, and there’s war footing to get things done”

~Bruce Aylward, the epidemiologist who led the WHO mission to China 

There is no doubt that even in the best cases in the ‘West’, the ones which added ‘Self-quarantine’, it will take longer to get through this also because of culture, different societal structure and more liberal thinking. For example, the talk in Italy is that if things don’t start improving in a couple of weeks the country might have to go to the next stage, ‘Rationing’ (only one person per household can leave the house to replenish supplies).

After decades of general peace, no major natural disasters in the ‘West’, and used to thinking only in financial terms, we cannot comprehend what is happening to us and are unable to quickly make the right decision how to proceed forward. For almost everybody, understandably, limiting our movement is at minimum uncomfortable and for a lot of people, unacceptable. To go through rationing is unimaginable (even though for some of us, who grew up behind the Iron Curtain, this was a feature of daily life). But seriously, it’s not like we have been asked to go to war, like our grandparents; we are just told to sit on the couch at home and play video games!

It can’t be that bad, can it?