[Ed P]

Later it was reported that the man caught Snake Flu in Singapore.

As many will know coronavirus is a highly inaccurate name for the flu as it is too generic (bit like saying cricket balls and footballs are identical). Equally calling it novel or n-Cov 2019 is clumsy.

As a side note, when the ‘official’ common name at last emerges it will not be ‘snake’ flu or ‘bat’ flu or any other animal for that matter. The reason for this is that when a virus was named as Swine flu it caused an unnecessary mass slaughter of pigs.  The lack of a common name and the time taken to find one underlines the inefficiency of poorly led committees when it comes to taking decisions!

[Ed P]

Update on the Brighton victim. He is apparently a middle-aged Brighton resident who contracted the disease in Asia (not China). The authorities think they have identified and got in touch with all his contacts (no word on whether they have been asked to self-isolate for 14 days).

[Ed P]

Third case now – this time in Brighton.

There are a lot of language schools in that city. We can only hope it was picked up before he/she mingled with the student population or general public.

This is one case where the absence of any detailed information is a poor idea, but typical of this Government’s innate desire to stifle discussions of any sort in the press or media. Rumour spreads faster and is much more damaging.

[Ed P]

It seems to be spreading fastest in big cities. Singapore cases have tripled in the last four/five days. Its logical that this trend seems to be in effect as big city transport systems tend to bunch people together.

The area to watch is East Africa as there are large numbers of Chinese traders in that area, many of whom will have gone home for the New Year. If we see one or two cases in Kenya in the next couple of weeks you can bet that there are many dozens of unreported ones in Mozambique. Dar es Salaam and Tanzania.

[Ed P]

Thanks!

[Ed P]

The wifi router can also be a problem. On my totally carp BT ‘Smart’ Homehub the wifi Internet goes t-up every two weeks or so (no issues on wired!), and I have to restart the darned thing to get it to wifi handshake with the Internet. Then flawless for another two weeks – rinse and repeat.

[Ed P]

Thanks, I’ll bear that in mind as I will probably need a new phone this summer (dying battery). The Xiaomi Pocophone X2 may also be a good less expensive option later on.

[Ed P]

One problem seems to be that a significant number of infected people do not feel very ill. It was reported that this was a cause of a German outbreak, as one infected Chinese visitor felt under the weather and just thought she had a cold.

China is nearly the only source of face masks, and they now have major shortages. The medical profession in Europe is starting to get concerned at potential hospital shortages and the consequent impact on operations.

[Ed P]

Did you have to use an apk for the Google Playstore, or did Xiaomi escape US sanctions?

The Mi pic looks like a Beautify/over saturated setting is the default.

[Ed P]

For 30 seconds I misread your cpu choice to be the AMD Threadripper 3990x – wow, talk about kicking sand in the face of Intel!

[Ed P]

I have already stated my belief that a pandemic is likely. The big problem with ‘Snake’ flu is that it is infectious even when the patient has no flu symptoms. This makes any containment (except draconian) moot.

On the other hand I agree with @vfm the mortality rate does not look as bad as feared, it is currently running at similar rates (2+%) to ‘normal’ flu outbreaks. It is however a bit more selective in that it is reported to be picking off smokers with compromised immune systems (normally elderly ones).

[Ed P]

As you are building for all bells and whistles gaming, you may like to take a look at the recommended ray-tracing build for Cyberpunk 2077. link

The game itself has been delayed until September (probably to optimise for lesser hardware), but it still looks like it will push PC hardware specs in the manner that Crysis did way back when. Another guess at hardware is given here.

The hardware the developer used for his E3 demo last year is given here.

 

[Ed P]

As is often the case, scientific papers are written by scientists who are not very good at getting their points across.

I THINK that this paper actually has two findings:

1. A salt coated filter protects their user from flu. This acts by either weakening/deactivating the flu virus or killing it. (The mouse experiment)
2. Brine coated filters may then be sterilised for disposal by drying them.

[Ed P]

When (no if about it) Coronavirus becomes established here then we may want to try and take preventative steps.

Most research shows that surgical masks are fairly useless in preventing illness (but they do stop you passing it on). N95 or N100 respirator masks are effective but not easy to wear.

This research published in Nature shows that there may be a middle ground which increases the effectiveness of surgical masks and that is to soak the middle layer of the masks in brine. Nature link

I guess if push came to shove, soaking the whole mask might work, but be less comfortable to wear.

[Ed P]

Keith, I think Bob’s views on defence mirror those of a number of forumites. Have a first class military, but make it Swedish in style and outlook. i.e, Britain first and only Britain, and sod the Yanks.

[Ed P]

If you are not convinced about the merits of the command line then you could try the procedure given here (note the elevated prompt comment):

https://www.tecklyfe.com/restore-missing-invalid-root-certificates-windows/

[Ed P]

I suspect the ‘invalid certificate’ notice may have come from the way you installed it. Windows can be quite picky at requiring admin level command line access to many of its components and a critical component such as the root certificates falls into that sort of category.

[Ed P]

The official advice on the virus can be found here.

At the moment this advice is for people travelling from China, and is of the ‘containment’ variety. I assume if the virus gets established in this country the advice will change.

[Ed P]

“The link says you can unpack the cab file in file explorer to get the .stl file, and you can, and it then says you can right click the file to import it from its context menu but you can’t because W10 thinks a .stl file is a 3D object”

Can’t you fix that by ignoring the right click and just using the command line per my last post?  (Make sure you open cmd.exe in Admin mode).

[Ed P]

Sorry to hear that you have been ill. Get well soon and get back to finding flint tools!

[Author]

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