Thank you for sharing your story, Nairobi. I’m sorry about the loss of your wife, especially under such horrific circumstances. Your experience starkly illuminates why, if this pandemic takes hold in Africa, India, South America or other high population countries with poor health/medical care systems, it will ravage the globe and millions will die.
I might have missed this from one of your other posts, but would you mind sharing where (in general) you are living now? I hope you are better situated, although I’m sure you miss your wife. 'Glad you’ve joined the PP tribe. 
Soviet Union style healthcare for the masses, given the national bankruptcy
I would guess it is considered “cleaner” to cremate the virus. However, maybe they are burying as well. The implications of this would be quite GRAVE because this would suggest an even higher death toll. It’s in the hands of citizen journalists to document this I guess.
Authorities in major centres like Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen have given the green light for businesses to resume operations,
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/3049740/chinese-cities-keen-get-back-work-coronavirus-concerns-grow
When this pandemic takes hold and in its aftermath, the middle and/or working class (what’s left of them!) will be more likely to go bankrupt regardless of whether they have insurance. They will lose their homes, what little savings they have (if any), and pensions or retirement plans as the “everything bubble” collapses as planned (hastened by/blamed on the pandemic) in the greatest wealth transfer to the elite in modern history.
The poor will forego care and/or benefit from government subsidized care. The homeless populations will explode. Many will die. The wealthy will get the care they want or need, regardless of whether the health/medical systems are overloaded.
Increased revenues from private health/medical insurance, pharma, etc. increases wealth for the 1% and increases national GDP. Ironically, government subsidized health/medical outlays also increase GDP. A win-win situation, right? (Except for the sick and dying part.)
Slight-of-hand tax breaks, Universal Basic Income (UBI) or other helicopter money, and/or high-profile “disaster relief” will help appease and control the masses, while further enriching insiders. With unprecedented misery and devastation evident everywhere, our “leaders” will be touting fantasy GDP figures and other financial indicators, telling us that we have the “best economy ever!”
Epilogue: Recovery
Public perception of currency as “dirty money” and vectors for nCoV transmission will propel the use of cashless currency. Direct deposit for employment income, government income/subsidy; getting paid/paying for goods and services using Vinmo or other financial platforms will become the norm (except for a few hold-outs such as “the unbanked”, some older people, preppers and money-laundering criminals and terrorists).
This, in turn, makes it easier to introduce negative interest rates to spur spending to help speed the economic “recovery” from the pandemic. (Help the cause, Patriots: Go shopping!) Cashless and negative interest rates also allow for debt-based fractional asset lending (at exorbitant rates, of course) for virtually any asset. These new asset-based financial products and their derivatives will then be bundled, packaged and traded in the ““markets””.
Enter the era of Debt-Slaves-R-Us; a two-tier feudal system where the .0001% literally own the world for generations to come.
Simply checking for fever, providing masks and encouraging handwashing is not going to keep the asymptomatic infected workers from spreading this virus. And if nCoV can indeed be aerosolized, then there’s no stopping its spread even if they do keep the central air systems off. As a result, the number of infections and deaths are sure to increase, although the world may never know because they’ll be under reported.
It certainly does send a message to the world that China is again “open for business” and that the pandemic is under control. I guess economics and public perception trumps public health. The World Health [Trade] Organization would approve.
The Chinese public has certainly been tested. Judging by some videos and commentary the people in some locked down cities are ready to openly revolt. It’s an exceptional situation over there where the vast majority are normally obedient to the Emperor. Maybe reopening factories is the answer to bringing calm back to Chinese society in spite of the risks. I am still trying to digest how we just went from news of thousands of bodies being incinerated in Wuhan to its business as usual. Something does not add up here. Was this all a fraud?
What this pandemic nightmare should really be teaching us is that Western nations have far too high a dependency on Chinese manufacturing.
They produce most of our medications, medical supplies, gloves, masks, oxygen bottles and the majority of testing equipment. Does everyone see the risk? Especially if it can be proven that the Wuhan lab deliberately created a militarized virus that spreads by aerosol to kill (us)?
Well if this illness is the smoking gun of bigger intentions there is certainly a good case for industrial disengagement for our own sake. I also heard China produces 100% of all the world’s zippers. Holy crow, we can’t even put on our own pants without their exports.
This is another reason why globalization is a failure because it magnifies our vulnerability as a society. Someone else wrote in another thread that North American pharma does not even produce domestic antibiotics anymore.
Are we a bunch of fools or what?
Soviet Union style healthcare for the masses, given the national bankruptcyCurious, is that a partisan talking point or something else? I couldn't tell. In counter, let me quote something I saw recently.
"Public healthcare is so hard, only 35 out of 37 Western counties have managed to do it"Whether or not you support a public healthcare option, Insurance companies are hated as much, if not more than big banks right now. Most big hospitals are part of chain corporations with many services, and are just as hated, the way they go after people with bills too. Both are going to see tens of billions in uncollectable bills from this crisis. They will come to Congress with their hands out, expecting that much like financial firms in the 2008 crisis, this time they too will be bailed out by the tax payers. There is no appetite among the public for another bailout where the little guys gets screwed and the big guys walk away with pots of money now. Maybe their paid for congress critters can push something thru but the Democrats control the purse with the House, and their progressive wing isn't going to stand for business as usual. Their pound of flesh may well be a public option. If the virus tapers off with the Summer, then the national elections will play out after the first wave into the second wave in the late Fall. This virus isn't just going to do economic damage but political change as well.
There was NO appetite for bailouts in 2008 either. In fact, the average American wanted jail time for executives, NOT golden parachutes.
Unfortunately, Obama, a liberal Dem went ahead with bailouts, because it would preserve jobs - yea, right. If we had spent the same money on extended unemployment benefits and COBRA subsidies, we could have let the bad actors fail.
So the new liberal story will be we can’t have any healthcare failures, because in new waves of the epidemic we’ll need their services. However, they will sell assets of smaller, better run local system to the big guys at fire sale prices.
If you remember in 2008, failing financial institutions were given away to favored political insiders. Few people even noticed.
Aspencore Media has launched a Special Project, “Outbreak in Wuhan,” seeking to define the global impact of the deadly virus in the electronic industry.
https://www.eetimes.com/outbreak-in-wuhan/
Their analysis: “Our communities, especially in bushfire-prone areas, need more redundancy to make them resilient to disasters. This might mean towns storing water, non-perishable food, blankets, medical supplies, a generator, a satellite phone and possibly fuel, in protected locations.”
https://theconversation.com/no-food-no-fuel-no-phones-bushfires-showed-were-only-ever-one-step-from-system-collapse-130600