The thing is that pretty much everybody was downplaying this. News about what was happening in China were running around for months now, but all governments did not decide to shut down their borders until the virus was already in their lands (and until they saw that the numbers of deaths in China was actually huge), which obviously was late.

U.S. coronavirus testing fell again today. Safe to say it's no longer on an upward trend, despite a rising number of cases.

This is not going to get it done, folks. We're back in the danger zone as far as testing is concerned.https://t.co/aIgWCudPbx pic.twitter.com/oPNnkX6Z9q

— Noah Smith 🐇 (@Noahpinion) March 31, 2020

Edit: Less than 100k test done and 23k came in positive.

Ah no sweat, over 50 million people a year die of old age, this is nothing :p

https://ourworldindata.org/what-does-the-world-die-from

Terrorism and Natural disasters are at the bottom, 0.05% and 0.02% of total yearly deaths, yet get the most attention!

Traffic deaths are actually 3700 a day globally, and covid19 is now beating that. That's 1.35 million traffic deaths a year! For the US traffic deaths are on par with the flu, but covid19 is almost 7x worse already, and it's still in the beginning phase. The big difference with dangerous driving is that you at most kill one or two other drivers. Being irresponsible with the spread of this virus, and you could be (partly) responsible for thousands of deaths.

In the Northern Hemisphere, 90% of Flu cases typically occur during a 14-week span between late December and mid March, so it's more like 370 deaths a day with peaks around perhaps 740 - 1,110 or so for an average season.

Accordingly, if 70% of the population was infected with the Flu in a few months, instead of some 10%, that'd be 2,590 and 5,600 - 7,000 deaths a day respectively, and some ~ 2.5 million hospitalizations.

You probably meant NYS (state) instead of NYC (city)

Whats really concerning is that the number of cases today was much higher than the last two previous days while testing a fewer amount of people. Could mean that the virus is spreading more than previously thought especially in states like Florida (1st day with over 1k cases) that don't have a stay at home order. 

I kinda still stand by what I said because it was based on solid data. Also I never suggested to not take measures against it, that was just inferred by my lack of care. I applaud governments who took steps against it and shaking my head at those who didn't. The fact is, by that time the world actually listened to me because they had the same numbers to look at. And looks like it still turned out better than all the doom sayers were preaching. We're still far away from the worst case scenario that I imagined and we'll never reach it at this point be cause the virus simply isn't strong enough.

What I do admit is that I definitely overestimated the health systems of other countries. Thinking that other developed countries had a similarly well prepared health system as Germany was a mistake. I should've known better since I'm always the one saying that Germany is the best place in the world to live a healthy and safe life. Thanks to the virus I actually got that confirmation now.

I'm still not scared about the virus and I do not expect any significant lasting effects from it long term. I have a robust trust in my country and the world as a whole to recover quickly from this special inconvenience. I would consider myself a realist, but in a time where everyone is a pessimist I guess I'll take on the role of the unshakable optimist.

Preventable deaths aren't a good thing, but it would be a bold faced lie if I said I really care. Every year millions of people die from preventable deaths and I didn't care then either and neither did anyone who cares now. I'm probably also gonna die some day of a preventable cause and it's gonna suck. But if I went that way looking at my life I might as well kill myself now because that is no way of living.

When I look at the death numbers I don't think of the lives lost or the pain of their loved ones. It's impossible to take all of that in. Instead I think of freed up ICUs to save more people and I think of a slightly lower death rate in the coming years. On a global levels those "scary" numbers are still not scary to me because they dwarf against the people who are unaffected. You might say that I'm cold or a sociopath and that is probably true, but I know that me being sad or scared in this situation is helping exactly no one. I'm just doing my job and so should everyone else.

And you know what's gonna be the real fun? After all of this is over, people like you will just go back to not caring again and we'll still have preventable diseases spread like wildfires. People will look at influenza deaths and laugh about them, refusing to wear face masks, not wash their hands and go sick to work. And people whose lives were saved by vaccines will do campaigns about not trusting vaccines. And people will continue to smoke and drink and kill other people in the process. And you won't care and neither will anyone else. But at least for once in your life you can have the moral high ground over some random guy on the internet because of a temporary global pandemic. Now go and pad yourself on the back, you sure showed me. 

It's hilarious to see people focus their anger on China right now. Ignoring the fact that each country could've prevented their own epidemic it's comical to see people suddenly care about that China may not be the coolest country to deal with and that their countless human rights abuses might not be a great thing. China has been a shithole for decades and has grown more dangerous not only to their own people but everyone else on earth every year. But now that they brought the sniffles to the world it's suddenly too much.

I would say it's a great thing that people finally start to notice China if I wasn't so god damn sure that everything will go back to status quo after each country dealt with their own problem.

But what if someone already recognized the Chinese ruling party for what it was well before the outbreak? Would they have your permission to show indignance towards the Chinese government for their role in being the catalyst in the Tik Tok black death? Asking for friend.

That's a photo from my personal collection of Dallas trading cards, of JR physically asserting himself with his wife Sue Ellen. Internet exclusive. You can't buy trading cards like this anymore.

Yes. But the outrage shan't be virus specific. That I will allow.

True. The real madness here is how the West put their economies in China's hands. But hey, gotta keep the economy going, so we're ready to close our eyes and pretend we don't see what happens there.

This whole crisis may have originated in China and China may have hidden the real danger of this virus to protect its economy, but all countries are responsible for the current situation, especially those countries that where still downplaying the issue when hundreds were dying in Italy and even Italy was too slow and only acted when it was obvious that this thing has the potential to kill hundreds of thousands of people if left unchecked.