South Korea virus cases spike, as Italy and Iran take drastic steps

Would be prudent to have on hand enough food and other essentials to last you for 30 days. Especially if the virus pops up in your state or city.

Rice, beans, flour, pasta and canned goods along with some meat in the freezer isn't a huge monetary risk for most to take. Plus you can always eat them down over time after the virus crisis ends. 

While it is important for the current focus to be on containing and treating the 2019-nCoV, Asian countries need to commit more long-term resources to eliminating wild animal poaching and selling, and either eliminating or cleaning up animal markets. I hope the conversation moves in that direction very soon.

The AvengerToday  03:42 pm JST

While it is important for the current focus to be on containing and treating the 2019-nCoV, Asian countries need to commit more long-term resources to eliminating wild animal poaching and selling, and either eliminating or cleaning up animal markets.

Don't you mean China, rather than "Asian counties"? Alot of weird and odd things are eaten throughout Asia for sure, but only China has a history of novel virus outbreaks with the wild animal/wet markets as the cause. China did nothing to eliminate this condition after the 2002/2003 SARS outbreak.

Panic buying is not a very sensible reaction, especially in countries where there is no indication of epidemic level spread. Italy’s reaction seems a tad over the top, more operatic than functionally useful.

Ebola, where the probability of death is 50% upon infection, is indeed a "health problem" to put it mildy. But Africa does not have the degree of trade, travel, commerce with the rest of the world as Asia.

"ASIAN COUNTRIES NEED TO COMMIT TO MORE LONG TERM RESOURCES..." Sorry you must mean CHINA correct? This wasn't Japan, Korea, Vietnam, etc.

As was SARS ,this was due to China's lackluster hygiene and its culture of eating wild life. The CCP tried to outlaw wet markets after SARS but the population won't give up its beliefs that many of these coronavirus hosts have special powers if you eat them.

Don't let anyone stop you from being critical of this practice. China isnt a race, its not racist. We can both appreciate a culture and also be critical of aspects that desperately need change.

Evidence is in now isn't it? You listen to China and your country will converge with China, health & economy.

You stand up to China, you preserve your country's health and econony.

I predict USA's tourism will soon go into a growth phase, whilst Japan et al will go into decline.

Scary if if turns out that a so called 'super spreaders' can actually pass on the virus without testing positive for it themselves. If that's the case then it will be very difficult to manage and treat.

Panic buying is not a very sensible reaction, especially in countries where there is no indication of epidemic level spread. Italy’s reaction seems a tad over the top, more operatic than functionally useful.

Well, the word quarantine comes from latin or some Italian dialect, and they applied it to ships to fight pandemics like the Black Plague. A ship had to wait 40 days to enter port. (Japan has failed world history.)

It appears that Italy is keeping it ol'skool!

Don't let anyone stop you from being critical of this practice. China isn't a race, it is not racist. We can both appreciate a culture and also be critical of aspects that desperately need change.

Thank you! I have been saying the same thing on a variety of posts. As long as there is credible substantial evidence to support such criticism, I agree.

While Moon was out wining and dining the cast of the movie "Parasite" after their 'triumphant' return to South Korea following the Academy Awards, the situation with coronavirus was slowly spiraling out of control.

The Takeshima/Dokdo issue couldn't have come soon enough for Moon.

To the cult-followers in Korea, this is a test from the devil. To some atheists and agnostics like me, this is karma at the way we humans treat animals. And I'm not just talking about the wet markets in China. The whole concept of intensive factory farming means more breeding ground for diseases.