Support System During CoVid -19

Thanks very much for the note Shilpi, you just beat me to it. Yes, I have been following this since early in the new year (the luxury of retirement) but now it has moved from: 1) It is happening in China, to 2) It is happening in other countries, to 3) It is happening in Canada, to 4) It is happening in our community, to 5) I know someone who may have it, to 6) I know someone who is in trouble, to . . . I have been talking to the head of infectious disease control in London for some time. He, like many civil servants in the know, is under a gag-order but he did send me a link to the data they are using as a baseline: 30% infection, 1-5% mortality depending on how well authorities and the public handles it. As he said to me in February, you do the math. Thirdly, Vancouver will be one of the major outbreak hubs in Canada, this is not a BC-wide problem, greater Vancouver needs to control this on behalf of the province. Finally, we are moving from the issues stemming directly from the disease itself, to issues with supply-chain/economy, and next, not to be under-estimated, to social unrest. Your note and our combined community support is essential in handling all three effects. In full transparency. We have a student, Karen, with us for her work term who was silly enough to travel to Seattle a couple of weeks ago. She is now very sick. She went to the clinic right away and they turned her away and said call 811. The advice when you call 881 is: if you are fainting or having severe problems breathing go to a hospital, otherwise self-isolate. In short, in BC you cannot be tested on request (my sister works in the lab in NB, she was the one who handled the sample for the first patient diagnosed in that province, is also now sick and cannot get tested either - so this is a North-American-wide problem). Anyway, Karen still has the symptoms, however, it has been over a week now, thus we hope her infectious stage is almost passed, moreover her boyfriend Roman, Gail and I are just fine. Sorry for the sober message, but just want to make sure people understand this will get far worse before it gets better. In the meantime, yes, if Gail or I can be of any assistance do not hesitate to ask. Cheers Cliff