the Covid mystery: when did it start?

 

.....

My summary of the good doctor's discussion, but listen if you can.

the first official covid case was found in a Chinese tourist to Rome: so due to tourism (Mainly in the middle/Rome area). But most of the severe cases in the Italian outbreak was in Lombardy, the northern area, where there are many Chinese  OFW working in Italy (Mainly in the North where the terrible epidemic killed a lot of people there)?

The antibody tests were done on blood samples collected for another reason about that time and from people who had no obvious illness, so it makes one wonder: were these antibodies due to another covid virus these folks had in the past, or was it from more recent and mild infections brought in by Chinese migrant workers about that time?

A false positive IgG from a similar virus infection in the past is one suspicion.

But...

the positive IgM means a recent infection. And this was found in September, meaning infections arrived in August. All these patients had no symptoms.

There were anecdotal stories of infections causing severe pneumonia in Italy in the fall and winter, thought to be just normal infections due to influenza.

he goes into other evidence from saved swabs and blood tests at the time.

But what about Wuhan? Did they notice an increase in cases of viral pneumonia at that time? Well, in August and September, satellites found increase in traffic/parking in hospitals in Wuhan (usually this is a quiet time for infectious disease, making one wonder if there were infectious pneumonias in the area then). But like most information out of China, you get either lies or silence.

He goes into other possible early cases according to swabs etc.

I seem to remember a similar complaint by commenters in the Seattle/NW USA area that there was an outbreak there before January when the first official cases arrived.

and if I remember correctly, although the early Seattle outbreak was traced to links with China, the New York City outbreak was traced to Italy.

the problem is that there are a lot of viruses that can cause similar symptoms: Which is why the blood and swab tests from asymptomatic people before the epidemic was recognized are important.

For example, I had a lung infection with severe shortness of breath a couple of months ago that improved after 48 hours of prednisone and zithromax. 

I never got tested (even going to a lab for tests means you might get infected: A lot of people refuse to go to the doctor, lab, or  ER for any reason here).

Sigh. 

the epidemic is still bad in the Manila area LINK

In the meanwhile, although tourists and foreigners are banned from entering the country, the government is allowing OFW from India to come back home. Meaning of course the new varients will spread here in the near future.

So what about India?

yesterday's video was about the covid outbreak in Mumbai. 

The problem is that most of the patients arriving at the hospital are in the late stage of the disease.

Diabetes seems to be a big comorbidity here, since steroids make the blood sugar go up and get secondary fungal infections from this.

sigh.

and the second wave also is going on here, and in Europe.

how bad is the second wave out break?

It's so bad that the Pope has diverted his attention from promoting the worship of Pachimama in the Vatican gardens,  making friends with eugenics pushing elites, shutting down mass in St. Peter's, and  letting German bishops promote heresy 

He's now telling Catholics to pray the rosary to get rid of the epidemic.

Well, I'm all in favor of prayer, but it's a year and a half into the epidemic, so what took so long to have the successor of Peter to get around to telling people to ask the Big Guy to help (or specifically to ask his bossy mother to tell him to get involved)?

(/s)