ON THE CORONAVIRUS

With the news conferences, cyberspace messages, news bulletins, and updates that seem to be happening every 10 minutes, it is hard to sort fact from myth when it comes to the coronavirus.

The medical profession is obviously not sure of itself in relation to the virus. The development of a vaccine is still very much in its infancy. Researchers however deserve bouquets for what they doing and how quickly they have moved since starting from scratch just a few short weeks ago.

In medical terms the confusion in part hangs around messages and counter messages. There is a concern that they contradict each other. For instance, I’ve read that people immunised against pneumonia have no guarantee that this immunisation will help in any way to avoid the impacts of the virus. However, advice from medical offices is for people to make sure they have the flu injection, particularly as we come into the cooler months of the year. There needs to be some sort of rationalisation or explanation to show the conjunction between these comments.

Panic buying of goods is not going to help. Panic buying only serves for a short-term purpose and this virus is about us being in for the long term haul.

Bats have a lot to answer for when it comes to this particular virus for its genesis seems to be with them. They have been responsible for a whole raft of viruses including SARS, bird flu, swine flu, the Hendra and Ebola viruses.

Hendra and Ebola aside, the starting point for viral outbreak and spread seems to be China. The coronavirus (COVIG 19) is just the latest to have its start-up pin-pointed to China. The country might be big on the front of economic development but seems to be caught short in awareness and apprehension of major disease outbreaks.

This virus (as was the case with Ebola) was offered early stimulation through the eating habits of humans.

MANAGEMENT AND CONTROL

COVIG 19 has a mind of its own. However, its spread is surely helped through the lack of ‘first base’ management by some countries into which it has spread. Iran is a case in point but the management in some other countries is questionable. Certainly it has well and truly jumped containment lines in South Korea, Iran and Italy.

The ‘Australian’ touched on a real issue when it ran an online story suggesting that selfishness of those who should be in self imposed quarantine for fourteen days. The story suggested that the unwillingness of people to commit 100% to this requirement was opening the door to the infection of others. The ‘I’ and ‘me’ belief in self entitlement puts the greater needs of society at risk if individuals fail to meet self isolation and social distancing requirements.

It is the personal entitlement syndrome that has lead to selfish hoarding of some goods and as evidenced by fights in supermarkets.

This same selfishness may lead some who should be self quarantining to ignore this isolation requirement. The upshot could have disastrous consequences for the unwary.

STOCK MARKET

Profiting through short selling from the hard earned of others is a greedy and selfish sin. Short selling should be legislated against and its practice should be criminialised. Short sellers are holding the government and our very core of existence to ransom. Their avarice and greed are determinants of the present stock market trembling.