Here are three good, credible, authoritative lists of products by brand name, as well as a list of active ingredients and their working concentrations, that will kill the coronavirus. If you are looking for a particular product on one of these three lists, and cannot find it, you can check the active ingredients on the label against the list provided here, to see if it will kill the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus.
Novel Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 This transmission electron microscope image shows SARS-CoV-2—also known as 2019-nCoV, the virus that causes COVID-19. isolated from a patient in the U.S., emerging from the surface of cells cultured in the lab. Credit: NIAID-RML
The patient is an older Ramsey County [St. Paul, Minnesota] resident who had been on a cruise ship with a known COVID-19 case. The unidentified person sought health care yesterday after developing symptoms on Feb. 25, according to the Health Department, and is currently recovering at home in isolation. All of the patient’s identified contacts will be asked to quarantine themselves for two weeks and they will be monitored by public health officials for symptoms.
The state’s testing laboratory confirmed the presumptive case today and a sample will be sent to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for final testing.
With over 100,000 cases on six continents, and many countries (including most of the U.S. West coast and New York City) reporting person-to-person spread within communities, EVERYBODY KNOWS THIS IS A PANDEMIC. We don’t need the World Health Organization to tell us.
The world is facing a situation at least as serious as the 1918/1919 Spanish flu pandemic—and many countries are quite simply unprepared. The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic will severely disrupt everyday life and society in a way that we have not seen in over a century. What is happening in mainland China, and throughout Iran, and in northern Italy, and in South Korea is no longer somebody else’s problem, on the other side of the world.
It is our problem.
It is YOUR problem.
The question is: how are you going to prepare yourself for this?
I am going to repeat this information for those of you who have not been paying attention, who still think this will all blow over (it won’t):
How to Prepare for a Potential Pandemic
Here, once again, is a reminder of what you should be doing to prepare: mentally, emotionally, and physically/logistically.
You will probably need to prepare to stay isolated in your homes for a period of several weeks, avoiding contact with as many other people as possible, as a wave of illness caused by the Wuhan coronavirus sweeps through your community, forcing schools, businesses, and public transportation and public gathering places like movie theatres and shopping malls to close (as we already seen in Wuhan and many other cities in China, as well as places such as South Korea, Iran, and northern Italy). The time to prepare for the imposition of quarantines and social distancing policies by local governments is NOW.
If you need lists of how to prepare and what to buy in order to get your household ready for a potential pandemic, here are seven suggestions to help you get started:
AT LEAST two weeks of non-perishable food and other supplies (toilet paper, first aid supplies, soap and hand sanitizer, garbage bags, etc.). There are already reports of panic buying in many places around the world, including North America. You do not want to leave it to the last minute! If you cannot find any hand sanitizer, you can make your own (see the recipe below).
Refills of all your presecription medications, plus a stock of over-the-counter medicines (talk to your doctor and pharmacist about creating an emergency supply of your prescription medication).
Power sources (flashlights, extra batteries, car chargers and adapters for your mobile devices, etc.). The power probably won’t go out, but it’s better to be prepared than sorry.
Other things that you should do:
Sign up for any local alerts from your city, state/province, or federal government (or know where to find the information on the Internet). Find out what plans your employer is making (and if they’re not making them now, they should be).
If you haven’t yet, get your seasonal flu shot. It can’t hurt, and it will help to figure out whether or not you do have SARS-CoV-2 if/when you do become sick. Many areas now give out the flu shot for free.
Train yourself NOT to touch your eyes, nose, and mouth! The SARS-CoV-2 virus can remain viable on hard surfaces anywhere from 2 hours to 9 days (scientific journal article source), and you can transfer the virus from your infected hands to your mouth, nose, and eyes by touching or rubbing them.
Watch the following videos from the World Health Organization and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control on how wash your hands properly! Yes, I know I have posted it numerous times before. You may think you already know how to wash your hands properly, but you still might learn something you didn’t know before. Proper hand hygiene will also help you avoid catching regular seasonal colds and influenza, so there’s a net benefit to society.
How to Make Your Own Hand Sanitizer
There have been reports of panic shopping in various countries around the world, including in North American. In particular, hand sanitizer is in short supply, with many stores being sold out of stock. Fortunately, if you cannot find sanitizer to buy, you can make your own. Here’s the recipe:
Ingredients: 2/3-cup rubbing alcohol (99% isopropyl alcohol) 1/3-cup aloe vera gel (GEL, not liquid)
Directions: Add the alcohol to the aloe vera gel and stir. Using a funnel, pour the mixture into a pump bottle; you can use cleaned soap bottles for instance, or you can find inexpensive pump bottles at dollar stores. If you have empty store-bought hand sanitizer bottles, you can use those.
If you wish, you can add 8-10 drops of essentials oils. Lemongrass, eucalyptus, peppermint and orange oils, which have been shown to have some antibacterial properties (source), would be a good choice.
Good Sources of Information on SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19
Here is my updated list of good, credible, authoritative resources to learn more about the Wuhan coronoavirus (formerly called 2019-nCoV and now officially called SARS-CoV-2; the disease the virus causes is now called COVID-19):
Another instructive YouTuber to watch is Dr. John Campbell, a British nurse educator who very clearly explains what you need to know
If you prefer to get your information via audio, the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) has started a weekly half-hour podcast on SoundCloud, called COVID-19: What’s Happening Now.
A brand-new, excellent podcast to follow is EPIDEMIC, with co-hosts Dr. Celine Gounder and Ronald Klain (the former United States Ebola response coordinator under President Barack Obama)
Watch the following video from the World Health Organization:
If you want a quick, up-to-date overview of the current situation, here are some good places to check:
Coronavirus COVID-19 Global Cases (by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University); sometimes this website goes down, so some other good statistics dashboards can be found here and here.
Coronavirus COVID-19 Global Cases by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University, showing global COVID-19 outbreaks in red
The head of the World Health Organization said on Tuesday that the global mortality rate for Covid-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, was 3.4 percent, a figure that primarily reflects the outbreak in China, where the vast majority of cases have been detected.
Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the organization’s director general, said in a news conference in Geneva that Covid-19 was deadlier than the seasonal flu but did not transmit as easily. “Globally, about 3.4 percent of reported Covid-19 cases have died,” Dr. Tedros said. “By comparison, seasonal flu generally kills far fewer than 1 percent of those infected.”
The estimate takes into account the growing number of infections being recorded outside China, mostly in Iran, Italy and South Korea.
…
“While many people globally have built up immunity to seasonal flu strains, Covid-19 is a new virus to which no one has immunity,” meaning more people can be infected and some will suffer severe illnesses, Dr. Tedros said. The coronavirus does not transmit as efficiently as the flu but “causes more severe disease,” he added.
This new overall case fatality rate (CFR) of 3.4% is significantly higher than regular seasonal influenza, which usually has a CFR of 0.1%. As I have written before, about the broadest research study of clinical outcomes published to date, the actual CFR varies by the infected person’s age, weight, and the presence of any underlying health conditions:
Some sobering statistics from that study of 72,314 cases, the largest conducted to date, are:
– 81% of cases are mild, 14% are severe, and 5% are critical (the case fatality rate for critical cases was 49.0%; in other words, half of the critical patients died) – the case fatality rates were 8.0% in patients aged 70-79 years and 14.8% in patients aged ≥80 years (I worry for my parents) – the case fatality rates were 10.5% for people with cardiovascular disease, 7.3% for diabetes, 6.3% for chronic respiratory disease, 6.0% for hypertension, and 5.6% for cancer
How to Prepare for a Potential Pandemic
Here, once again, is a reminder of what you should be doing to prepare: mentally, emotionally, and physically/logistically.
You will probably need to prepare to stay isolated in your homes for a period of several weeks, avoiding contact with as many other people as possible, as a wave of illness caused by the Wuhan coronavirus sweeps through your community, forcing schools, businesses, and public transportation and public gathering places like movie theatres and shopping malls to close (as we already seen in Wuhan and many other cities in China, as well as places such as South Korean, Iran, and Italy). The time to prepare for the imposition of quarantines and social distancing policies by local governments is NOW.
If you need lists of how to prepare and what to buy in order to get your household ready for a potential pandemic, here are six suggestions to help you get started:
At least two weeks of food and other supplies (toilet paper, first aid supplies, soap and hand sanitizer, garbage bags, etc.). There are already reports of panic buying in many places around the world, including North America. You do not want to leave it to the last minute! If you cannot find any hand sanitizer, you can make your own (see recipe below).
Refills of all your presecription medications, plus a stock of over-the-counter medicines (talk to your doctor and pharmacist about creating an emergency supply of your prescription medication).
Power sources (flashlights, extra batteries, car chargers and adapters for your mobile devices, etc.).
Other things that you should do:
Sign up for any local alerts from your city, state/province, or federal government (or know where to find the information on the Internet). Find out what plans your employer is making (and if they’re not making them now, they should be).
If you haven’t yet, get your seasonal flu shot. It can’t hurt, and it will help to figure out whether or not you do have SARS-CoV-2 if/when you do become sick. Many areas now give out the flu shot for free.
Train yourself NOT to touch your eyes, nose, and mouth! The SARS-CoV-2 virus can remain viable on hard surfaces anywhere from 2 hours to 9 days (scientific journal article source), and you can transfer the virus from your infected hands to your mouth, nose, and eyes by touching or rubbing them.
Watch the following video from the World Health Organization on how wash your hands! Yes, I know I have posted it before. You may think you already know how to wash your hands properly, but you still might learn something you didn’t know before. Proper hand hygiene will also help you avoid catching regular seasonal colds and influenza, so there’s a net benefit to society.
How to Make Your Own Hand Sanitizer
There have been reports of panic shopping in various countries around the world, including in North American. In particular, hand sanitizer is in short supply, with many stores being sold out of stock. Fortunately, if you cannot find sanitizer to buy, you can make your own. Here’s the recipe:
Ingredients: 2/3-cup rubbing alcohol (99% isopropyl alcohol) 1/3-cup aloe vera gel (GEL, not liquid)
Directions: Add the alcohol to the aloe vera gel and stir. Using a funnel, pour the mixture into a pump bottle; you can use cleaned soap bottles for instance, or you can find inexpensive pump bottles at dollar stores. If you have empty store-bought hand sanitizer bottles, you can use those.
If you wish, you can add 8-10 drops of essentials oils. Lemongrass, eucalyptus, peppermint and orange oils, which have been shown to have some antibacterial properties (source), would be a good choice.
My local drug store had aloe vera gel in stock, but they were sold out of isopropyl rubbing alcohol, but I was able to order some on Amazon last night, and it should arrive next week sometime. I have enough regular hand sanitizer to last me until then.
Good Sources of Information on SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19
Here is my updated list of good, credible, authoritative resources to learn more about the Wuhan coronoavirus (formerly called 2019-nCoV and now officially called SARS-CoV-2; the disease the virus causes is now called COVID-19):
Another instructive YouTuber to watch is Dr. John Campbell, a British nurse educator who very clearly explains what you need to know
If you prefer to get your informtion via audio, the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) has started a weekly half-hour podcast on SoundCloud, called COVID-19: What’s Happening Now.
A brand-new, excellent podcast to follow is EPIDEMIC, with co-hosts Dr. Celine Gounder and Ronald Klain (the former United States Ebola response coordinator under President Barack Obama)
Watch the following video from the World Health Organization:
If you want a quick, up-to-date overview of the current situation, here are three good places to check:
2019-nCoV Global Cases (by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University); other good statistics dashboards can be found here and here.
Novel Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 This transmission electron microscope image shows SARS-CoV-2—also known as 2019-nCoV, the virus that causes COVID-19. isolated from a patient in the U.S., emerging from the surface of cells cultured in the lab. Credit: NIAID-RML
As you know, since late January, I have been following all the newsfeeds and discussion groups that I can, scouring them for information on the SARS-CoV-2 virus and the disease it causes, COVID-19.
At times I have completely stressed myself out, but at this point I feel as if I am as prepared as I am going to be, in order to deal with whatever happens now, and all that preparation greatly helps alleviate my anxiety. (One of the last steps I did this morning was to meet with my financial planner at my bank, asking him to sharply reduce my exposure to the stock market in my retirement investments. Why? Because I am convinced that a potential coronavirus pandemic will have a severe, negative impact on global financial markets, as we have already seen so far this week.)
I realize that I am, still, trying to write about a potential pandemic situation on a blog I originally created to cover social VR, virtual worlds, and the metaverse! I feel for my readers who might be somewhat confused and upset at this tangent I am following. All I can say at present is that I will endeavour to continue my coverage of social VR, virtual worlds, and the metaverse, but that I will also cover SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19 from time to time as well. It’s going to be a mighty juggling act, and I might just drop a few balls! So, please bear with me. Thanks.
Today, I wanted to share with you an extensive excerpt from a website I recently discovered, called ThePrepared.com, which specializes in “emergency preparedness and prepping checklists for everyone”. The reader-supported website is up-front about its using affiliate marketing links as a means of generating income, but they state:
The Prepared is more like a curated wiki than a blog. And you may have noticed the lack of ads and other junk. The Prepared is supported by readers, and when you buy something we recommend, we may get an affiliate commission — but it never affects your price or what we pick.
(The above link goes to their Mission and Values statement, which you might want to read through completely if you are curious and/or suspicious of their motives. If you do not like their approach, there are certainly other places you can go to get advice on how best to prepare, which I will link to below.)
The excerpt I do want to share with you comes from ThePrepared.com’s comprehensive document titled One-page laypersons’s guide to the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19), which offers a calm, rational, well-organized overview of what priorities you should be focusing on as you prepare for a potential SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19 pandemic.
The part I want to highlight, which I have not really seen covered anywhere else in my admitted obsessive reading, is titled “What the next weeks might look like”, and it outlines two possible scenarios: a baseline scenario and a severe disruption scenario:
What the next weeks might look like
The range of realistic scenarios laid out below are not predictions. They’re planning tools to help you prepare based on what you might face.
Even in pessimistic models, experts aren’t planning for doomsday. We don’t think a really bad situation where food stocks are low and critical infrastructure is iffy is even worth talking about at this point.
We’ll update this page if expert predictions get worse.
Scenario A. Baseline scenario
Our baseline scenario — what we feel is most likely to unfold — is that the virus will spread person-to-person in a sustained way globally, not only in Asia, the Middle East, and North Africa, but also in the U.S. or Europe. We’re expecting disruption to daily life at some point here in the U.S., and in most places worldwide.
This scenario envisions a rising case count in one or more major U.S. cities, possibly to the point that a city has hundreds of cases before serious lockdown measures are taken to halt the spread.
We’re assuming in this scenario that we can, in fact, keep really bad outbreaks more or less geographically contained with Chinese-style quarantines, lockdowns, and travel restrictions in some cities and counties. We’re also assuming in this scenario that the fatality ratio is low, at about one or two percent at the most, but possibly below one percent.
What to prepare for:
– International travel restrictions that extend well beyond China, including the rest of Asia, Africa, and LatAm.
– Some pressure on US healthcare systems as hoarding of supplies results in shortages for healthcare workers. Health systems in the most affected cities will likely be overloaded.
– Possible disruptions in domestic air travel, due to the following: 1) pilots and airline staff refuse to fly in and out of affected cities, 2) fear and infection control measures like temperature checkpoints make air travel too inconvenient and people stop flying, which translates into lots of canceled flights.
– Cancellations of large gatherings or events (eg. concerts), especially in affected cities.
– Some significant amount of voluntary home quarantine by people whose work and/or lifestyle makes this possible (eg. remote workers, parents who homeschool).
– Isolated examples of voluntary relocation within your own network, as friends, family, or coworkers opt to move out of an affected zone until things calm down.
– Isolated but high-profile instances of xenophobic/racist violence, which causes widespread worries about physical safety among targeted groups.
Scenario B. Severe disruption
As with our baseline scenario, our severe scenario assumes the virus goes pandemic and spreads domestically, but the situation is worse because we’re not able to keep it constrained in any way.
If America has uncontrolled community transmission in most cities and counties, then the big questions that determine how severely our lives are disrupted are the following:
1. What is the fatality rate here in the US, with our advanced healthcare system?
2. What percentage of non-fatal cases have severe symptoms that require hospitalization, or even just a doctor visit and treatment?
These are big unknowns, so for the sake of planning we’re currently assuming the following general outlines for a severe scenario: the fatality rate in the US is on the order of about 2-4 percent, and the percentage of severe cases that require treatment is about 15 percent. With less than ten percent of our population infected, this latter number (15 percent requiring a hospital bed) is more than enough to overload the capacity of our hospitals and clinics.
What to prepare for:
– Long waits at hospitals and clinics, and more deaths from unrelated illnesses because of overall reduced access to healthcare.
– Widespread voluntary lockdown in homes for severely affected regions.
– Dedicated quarantine areas set up by FEMA, the military, the Red Cross, and other groups.
– Serious restrictions on domestic air travel, either from official order or because pilots and crew refuse to show up.
– Widespread school and daycare closures.
– Widespread closures of local businesses.
– Large companies pushing employees into remote work, halting all air travel, and moving meetings to video chat.
– Extended delivery times from carriers like USPS, UPS, and FedEx, as they cope with a combination of increased load (everyone’s ordering from home), reduced staff, and travel restrictions.
– Internet slowdowns in some neighborhoods, since everyone is home and streaming (or remote working) at the same time.
– Sealing off an area of a home or apartment in order to quarantine an ill family member.
– Temporary relocation to a safer area with much lower case count and less chaos and disruption.
– More instances of xenophobic/racist violence, along with some inter-ethnic conflicts in urban areas, as scared people begin to group up and turn on one another.
My advice to you is to read through each the potential events listed under both scenarios, A and B, and think about how you would respond to them, and what steps you would have to take to accommodate the event. For example, if your children’s school closes, will you, a friend, a relative, or a babysitter be available to care for them at home?
Good Sources of Information on SARS-CoV-2 and COVID-19
Here is my newly-updated list of good, credible, authoritative resources to learn more about the Wuhan coronoavirus (formerly called 2019-nCoV and now officially called SARS-CoV-2; the disease the virus causes is now called COVID-19):
Another instructive YouTuber to watch is Dr. John Campbell, a British nurse educator who very clearly explains what you need to know
If you prefer to get your informtion via audio, the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) has started a weekly half-hour podcast on SoundCloud, called COVID-19: What’s Happening Now.
If you want a quick, up-to-date overview of the current situation, here are three good places to check:
2019-nCoV Global Cases (by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University); other good statistics dashboards can be found here and here.
