BREAKING: 2020 AUSTRALIAN FORMULA 1 GP CANCELLED

[BrunoBæ]

But again lots of posts from people showing some brain - appreciated

Maybe I should have included the phrase "other people" instead - to make it more clear

 

[Pepper606]

I'm still relatively young, but barely working pancreatitis and spleen.
I got a bad feeling I'm going to miss out on thus years new games!
So yes, if it stops/slows this thing, cancel the race.

 

[CrimsonEminence]

Yes, a quite high risk of catching the seasonal flu. The Coronavirus not so much.

Beep Beep....

 

[muzikant]

can't find any latest news .. i think the australia gp will just keep going. if not? then they are very very.. late with a decision, it is in australia in the morning now. cannot find latest news

 

[Slowdive]

No, you are misguided. This virus cannot be compared to seasonal flu for a number of reasons. First: it spreads very easily like the flu but the mortality rate is like ten times that of seasonal flu (EDIT: I see you dispute that data, well we have to go with what we have at the moment). Second: we do not have antibodies to it. Third: there is no vaccine and no proven effective therapy. Fourth: it can cause viral pneumonia, which unlike bacterial pneumonia is much deeper and dangerous and needs intensive care. This alone means that the intensive care departments of the hospitals are being flooded with patients. In Italy we are already at saturation level after 2 weeks. If we proceed at this rate, our hospitals said, we will have to choose who to cure and who to leave to his destiny. Even if you get the virus and it does not kill you, you will easily transmit it to someone among your friends and family and maybe he'll be affected. Anyways, you will see by yourself when it comes to your country.

1. Yes. The numbers that have generated the ~3% death rate are not scientific and appear to be wildly inaccurate. The paper I posted addresses that issue. Also, remember SARS back in 2002? It had a death rate of 10% and was going to kill us all. Less than 1000 people died.

2. I feel like perhaps you have a fundamental misunderstanding of how our immune systems work. But that aside, the vast majority of humans are not immunized against the seasonal flu in any given year.

3. There are numerous vaccine prototypes that appear to be promising and should be coming to market shortly.

4. Where you are getting your information that the season flu virus cannot cause viral pneumonia. I know there's a lot of fear mongering disinformation out there, but honestly do not believe such nonsense.

5. Italy is an interesting case and an outlier. I'm certainly interested in what they are doing differently that has generated such poor results.

The seasonal flu is far nastier than most people realize and kills upwards of 600,000/yr. If you are in an at-risk group, it is the flu that you should be most concerned about, simply because it is far more widespread and you are far more likely to become infected by it. It's just simple probability. The irony is that all of these drastic measures will save a lot of lives, but they are lives that would've otherwise been lost to the flu.

Lastly, in the media frenzy to cash in on this crisis, they typically fail to provide any kind of perspective.

 

[guidofoc]

True, it's a few hours from the first session and no official declaration yet. I read somewhere that track marshals are going to the track.

 

[Smartbean]

They should let the race go ahead, at least 18 drivers will be self-isolating for about an hour and a half

/sarcasm off

On a serious note, it's unfortunate, but they should call it off tbh, there's a lot more to worry about than a race or a few races, health must come first, even in a cash is king society.

 

[dud]

Drive, you slackers!

So FP1 is ongoing? Good news. Not that I can get it in the US.

 

[GeForce06]

race is cancelled

 

[FinFan]

From where we are today I can understand both sides. But in 4 weeks, or 3 months, I'd rather look back and say "man, were we hitting the panic-button, or what ?" and have a laugh than regret that we should have done it.

 

[muzikant]

panic in the western world. africa people die of hunger every day for 50 years. and no one cares about them. and now we are all panicking

sorry but couldn't resist.

 

[rubaru]

So many news outlets are reporting the race is to be canceled, but we still lack official word from F1 or FIA. That's the only report I'm waiting for. 4.5 hrs til FP1 is supposed to start.

 

[DND]

Hey Tom Brady look up the flu pandemic of 1918 and maybe we can approach those numbers to make Covid-19 worth paying attention to?
Good to see stupid is still not cured

 

[Slowdive]

From where we are today I can understand both sides. But in 4 weeks, or 3 months, I'd rather look back and say "man, were we hitting the panic-button, or what ?" and have a laugh than regret that we should have done it.

That sounds completely reasonable, however the problem with that is that when the next virus hits that is actually worth worrying about, you have conditioned the population that the warnings are probably yet another false alarm and as a result you have a lower level of compliance. You really shouldn't hit the panic button unless it's absolutely necessary.

 

[Slowdive]

Hey Tom Brady look up the flu pandemic of 1918 and maybe we can approach those numbers to make Covid-19 worth paying attention to?
Good to see stupid is still not cured

Why stop there? Since we're being nonsensical, go for the Black Death.

Sometimes my faith in humans ability to reason is really shaken.

 

[DND]

Why stop there? Since we're being nonsensical, go for the Black Death.

Sometimes my faith in humans ability to reason is really shaken.

What's nonsensical about it. Has there been a vaccine released in the last 5 minutes I missed?

 

[guidofoc]

1. Yes. The numbers that have generated the ~3% death rate are not scientific and appear to be wildly inaccurate. The paper I posted addresses that issue. Also, remember SARS back in 2002? It had a death rate of 10% and was going to kill us all. Less than 1000 people died.

2. I feel like perhaps you have a fundamental misunderstanding of hour our immune systems work. But that aside, the vast majority of humans are not immunized against the seasonal flu in any given year.

3. There are numerous vaccine prototypes that appear to be promising and should be coming to market shortly.

4. Where you are getting your information that the season flu virus cannot cause viral pneumonia. I know there's a lot of fear mongering disinformation out there, but honestly do not believe such nonsense.

5. Italy is an interesting case and an outlier. I'm certainly interested in what they are doing differently that has generated such poor results.

I am no scientist but:
1. SARS did not spread like COVID-19, 8000 cases for SARS compared to 125000 and counting for COVID-19. We are talking about a SARS-like virus that is spreading aggressively right now. And even if as you declare the mortality rate is same as flu (which all experts deny),
2. The influenza virus mutates each year, but this does not mean we are totally not immune to it. The antibodies we develop make us resistant to the common flu strains. There are of course exceptions but this cannot be compared to COVID-19 to which all of us are not immune.
3. Can you please point me to a vaccine that is coming to the market shortly?
4. I do not have data on how many viral pneumonia cases are caused by common flu, but this is moot because there's a vaccine for flu every year and most importantly because as a matter of fact COVID-19 causes plenty of viral pneumonia, otherwise our intensive care departments in Italy would not be full of people putting our health system on the verge of collapse.
5. I really hope Italy is an outlier, but this thing is not over, so good luck.

 

[Slowdive]

Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security is now putting the death rate at between 0.1 (seasonal flu) and 0.6. Still with some degree of uncertainty. As more data becomes available that number is only going to get lower.

 

[KOGamer]

It can carry on, but it shouldn't be held under full audience on site. This is a quite high risk, tbh.

I'd appreciate it if you didn't come up with the correct answer on the first post, now we have nothing to add to the conversation.

 

[Slowdive]

I am no scientist but:
1. SARS did not spread like COVID-19, 8000 cases for SARS compared to 125000 and counting for COVID-19. We are talking about a SARS-like virus that is spreading aggressively right now. And even if as you declare the mortality rate is same as flu (which all experts deny),
2. The influenza virus mutates each year, but this does not mean we are totally not immune to it. The antibodies we develop make us resistant to the common flu strains. There are of course exceptions but this cannot be compared to COVID-19 to which all of us are not immune.
3. Can you please point me to a vaccine that is coming to the market shortly?
4. I do not have data on how many viral pneumonia cases are caused by common flu, but this is moot because there's a vaccine for flu every year and most importantly because as a matter of fact COVID-19 causes plenty of viral pneumonia, otherwise our intensive care departments in Italy would not be full of people putting our health system on the verge of collapse.
5. I really hope Italy is an outlier, but this thing is not over, so good luck.

1. My only point was that death rate isn't everything. Johns Hopkins is now saying it's between 0.1 (seasonal flu and 0.6). Following the trend line, this number will only lower with time and more data.
2. Our immune system is fairly robust even when seeing something new for the first time.
3. There are numerous trials underway that are promising. In some cases existing drugs have been used successfully to combat Covid-19. Here's a summary from a month ago: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00444-3
4. My point is that the flu primarily causes viral pneumonia. It is not unique to Coronavirus.
5. Best of luck to you as well.