Thread by @CarlMinzner

(1/x) Many friends & family in U.S. now seem to be entering the freakout stage of the epidemic I remember from late January/early February in China, when case # starting spiking, and people suddenly saw their day-to-day lives change dramatically.

FWIW, here's what I tell them:

(2/x) Yes, case # will dramatically rise over coming weeks. That does *not* indicate current responses are failing.

It is because:
a) Many undetected cases
b) Testing getting better
c) Because as of 3 days ago, people still doing stupid stuff like packing into bars & beaches.

(3/x) In other words, the surging numbers of cases right now is the result of things that happened 1-2 weeks ago – *BEFORE* your local authorities and all the people around you started behaving dramatically differently.

(4/x) If EVERYONE sticks to the current measures – particularly extreme social distancing, staying at home even if you feel fine (remember, you could be asymptomatic), new cases will eventually start to slow down in most of the United States and elsewhere. But it will take time.

(5/x) The payoff from current measures *today* doesn’t show up tomorrow. It shows up weeks in the future.

(6/x) If YOU do stupid stuff like move those dinner parties, social events, or religious services you once conducted in public to your homes, YOU are going to be responsible for fueling the next wave of epidemic spread in your community. Don’t do that.

(7/x) Don't even think about "just" dropping by your high school friend's home to share a drink.

(8/x) Note that there’s almost certain to be a secondary wave of infections coming from people returning back to their parents homes from events like this.
nbcnews.com/news/us-news/c…

(9/x) Kids, pro tip: if you were on the beach this weekend, don’t go home to your parents right away.

Get a hotel room. Shack up with your roommates in someone's empty house. Self-isolate for 14 days. Then consider what to do next.

(10/x) This is controllable. Look at new case #s in South Korea. That’s what a society looks like once it comes out on the other side. Can happen to the U.S. too.

But it will require *everyone* to pull together to make this happen.

worldometers.info/coronavirus/co…