The grapevine on campus at Stanford University says that the two students acknowledged yesterday by the university as presumptive cases of COVID-19 have been confirmed as positive for the infection. The surprise is that apparently a professor at the med school has also been confirmed to be infected too.
People were already leaving campus, this will speed things up even more.
Official confirmation awaits.
Leader of Italian Democratic party has coronavirus
“Zingaretti is the first leading Italian politician confirmed to have the disease. Two councillors in Lombardy, the northern region worst hit by the virus, tested positive last week and a police officer who is part of the security team for Matteo Salvini, the leader of the League, tested positive on Friday.
Italy is grappling to contain Europe’s worst outbreak of the virus, with 4,636 cases detected as of Friday evening, according to official figures. Of that number, 197 people have died and 523 people have recovered. Italy has so far carried out 36,359 tests.
Eleven towns – 10 in Lombardy and one in Veneto – have been under lockdown for almost two weeks. The government is yet to announce whether the quarantine period will be extended. Schools and universities across the country have been closed until 15 March while major sporting events, such as Serie A football games, will be played behind closed doors until 3 April.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/07/italy-democratic-leader-nicola-zingaretti-coronavirus
‘Preppers’ have endured years of mockery. Coronavirus fears have given them a booming self-survival business
"The researchers concluded that “prepping is not a marginal subculture, but an increasingly mainstream phenomenon, driven not by delusional certainty, but a precautionary response to a generalized anxiety people have around permanent crisis.”
Co-author Sarah Browne, assistant professor in marketing and strategy at Trinity College Dublin, told CNN that preppers felt they were portrayed as “silly” or “paranoid,” and wanted to show they were “logical and practical while non-preppers are naïve and ill-prepared.”
She said preppers do not see crises such as the coronavirus as “a temporary breakdown in otherwise functioning system” but as evidence of a “large-scale problem.”’
https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/06/europe/coronavirus-preppers-business-europe-gbr-intl/index.html
I’m sure this has been posted here before, but I was curious to see trackers for Cruise Ships and Airplanes. Here are two sites I found. Until all cruises and flights are shut down, they do not instill any confidence in me that this will be contained in any way.
Cruises: https://www.cruisemapper.com/
Airplanes: https://www.flightradar24.com/44.35,-115.63/4
Update: It’s also mind boggling, while viewing the Cruise Ships and clicking on them individually, to contemplate the massive amounts of resources that were mined and unearthed and used (and waste generated) to create and run these grotesque behemoths. In looking up an answer to how many people are on cruise ships at any one time, here is what I found for 2018:
”Total worldwide ocean cruise capacity at the end of 2018 will be 537,000 passengers and 314 ships. Annualized total passengers carried worldwide will be 26.0 million (a 3.3% increase over 2017).”
Yikes!
The “how-to-avoid-getting-infected-by-the-coronavirus” thread/page is getting a “Threat found. This web page contains potentially dangerous content. Threat: HTML/ScrInject.B trojan Access to it has been blocked. Your computer is safe.” message from my ESET antivirus software. Is anyone else having this issue?
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/saudi-arabia-starts-all-out-oil-war-destroys-opec-flooding-market-slashing-oil-prices
Russia has said No to the proposed 1.5 million barrel cuts, and has also announced from the 1st of april “No OPEC or non-OPEC country is required to make any production cuts anymore”.
OPEC+ is dead. The cartel just simply ended. And in response, Mbs from Saudi Arabia has launched a price war instead. It’s a no holds barred every man for himself race to the bottom by all players involved.
The target? US Shale production which is tethering on the brink of collapse under massive debt loads and non-profitable wells. AKA the Amazon strategy: Grow fast wasting billion to grab market share, then jack up the price.
Saudi Arabia thinks that, if the price is going to go down anyway, if they just slam it through the bottom with the real virus supply chain shocks amplifying this strategy, US shale will go bankrupt before they do, restoring the price and their national budget.
It literally is an all out price war! Remember just weeks ago they CUT production by 0.5 mil barrels and the meeting of the OPEC+ was to CUT again by a total of 1.5 million barrels! Now that the production cuts have failed, SA announces they will INCREASE production!
If i where you i’d grab some popcorn and watch the Oil price open on a Monday. It could very well tap $30 or even sub $30! Anything’s on the table now.
And I share Chris’, Adam’s and Belmonti’s appreciation for your outstanding and tireless contributions to the PP community. 
PS–That’s a heck of a basement stash you have! It looks suspiciously similar to the Indiana Jones, “Raiders of the Lost Ark” closing scene–yes?? I’m jealous!
You won’t have to wait until Monday as tomorrow (Sunday) late afternoon the markets in NZ, AUS, and Asia will open and the sh**storm that is commodities-pricing-in-a-crisis will commence. It’s going to be one helluva of a show alright.
No no man - that really is his basement. I’ve seen it myself. When you turn and look the other way you see corridors of crates sooooo looonggggg that you can see the curvature of the earth.
Itsa thing of beauty.
Yes - me too but it came and went away. All good now for me anyway.
Hey Deso, So glad to see your posts and that you’re feeling better.
In your opinion, could the recent arrests of the four Saudi princes be related in some way? I suspect so without knowing the connection, since it all comes down to money and power in the end.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/saudi-arrests-crown-prince-salman/2020/03/07/04f6d62e-5fff-11ea-9055-5fa12981bbbf_story.html
The “how-to-avoid-getting-infected-by-the-coronavirus” thread/page is getting a “Threat found. This web page contains potentially dangerous content. Threat: HTML/ScrInject.B trojan Access to it has been blocked. Your computer is safe.” message from my ESET antivirus software. Is anyone else having this issue?Which page are you talking about?
PS–That’s a heck of a basement stash you have! It looks suspiciously similar to the Indiana Jones, “Raiders of the Lost Ark” closing scene–yes?? I’m jealous!What can I say, Steven called, needed a set to film the ending in. I was free that week. Harrison Ford is cool, tells the crudest dirty jokes too when he's drunk. You know among all that, I only have about 90 n95 masks, half of them still left over from the H1N1 crisis in 2009. They are right next to the 6 crates of bovine semen (don't ask...) I do have a completely spectacular supply of Corona Beer. It was on sale. Reminds me I need to order limes...
Ha! Grayman, you got by dtrammel’s OpSec and didn’t get shot?? I’m impressed! And still a bit jealous. You guys must have been at this “prepping thing” a bit longer than me. Nice to know that the research concludes that we’re not “delusional” after all. 
Yes, I am also seeing alerts that there is a site infection and had to do a computer scrub to clean the junk out. No doubt caused by having opened bad links. Be careful what links you read since infections are coming from unknown sources. It’s amazing it has taken this long to get inside the site but it should be expected. Maybe Adams new Webmaster will clean it up.
Ha! Grayman, you got by dtrammel’s OpSec and didn’t get shot?? I’m impressed! And still a bit jealous. You guys must have been at this “prepping thing” a bit longer than me. Nice to know that the research concludes that we’re not “delusional” after all.He got in when the perimeter guns were down for maintenance. And he promised not to tell anyone too <frowns> https://youtu.be/HQDy-5IQvuU
Sparky - I never said I didn’t get shot. Or stabbed, bitten and atomic wedgied.
But it was worth it.
Gives you chills.
PM me with the links where you get it. I’ll investigate and see if I can alert Adam.
I work in San Francisco. Some on the ground anecdotes:
- My wife and I both exhibited mild COVID symptoms last week which resolved after a few days.
- We both requested testing during that period. Denied.
- We both requested remote and/or extended PTO given the circumstances. Denied.
- Rice and hygiene supplies are empty from local markets (99 Ranch, Costco, Safeway, etc.) Thank god for the deep pantry.
- The streets are definitely less crowded. Only a few people here and there wearing masks. Overall, the City feels more early 90s, when SF was in a recession. More elbow room, less bustle, same grime. The new normal.
In conclusion, life goes on but we could very well be an asymp spread family. We’re taking all the precautions we can given the information we have. Stay safe everyone.