The Third World

[Abnormal Palm]

One of my mates is a GP in Mumbai and I spoke to him last night on WhatsApp and he is shitting himself. I have a mate in Ghana, British guy basically stuck out there because he has a family and business, thinks it will be fine because they got through Ebola. I still keep in touch with a couple of people I met in Guatemala. They don't even get it yet.

I've been saying since January, what happens when this hits India and Africa and South America?

As dire as the situation is in Europe and the US, we have the basics of sanitation and food production and logistics and some semblance of welfare (as threadbare as it is).

These places are basically third world, for the most part. At best, they're going to end up reusing Chinese/American ventilators and PPE in exchange for their existence. Millions of people in India are migrating en masse due to the overnight lockdown. My mate was saying that so many of them don't really exist on the books anywhere, they won't even be data when they die.

What can these places even do?

[Abnormal Palm]

Burundi said they had no cases because they "put God first". Poor bastards.

Week-long religious gathering of thousands in India turns out to be the root of multiple clusters across the country.

It's heartbreaking. These people are cannon fodder.

[Abnormal Palm]

Many countries in Africa reporting their first cases and claiming to be on top of the situation.

The third world is going to be fucking decimated.

[honeychile]

I have a mate in Ghana, British guy basically stuck out there because he has a family and business, thinks it will be fine because they got through Ebola.

I believe Ghana didn't have any ebola cases? Unless he means Africa more broadly. In which case, well DRC is hardly through ebola and the difficulties of actually keeping medical teams safe. I always think whenever people say "we" will "get through" these things, who is the "we" and what is meant by "getting through"? Cos more than a thousand of "us" in Britain already haven't "got through".

That said, there are demographic reasons to be less pessimistic for some of the developing world aren't there? Taking sub-saharan Africa, the age pyramid is way more tipped towards younger ages than most other parts of the world, and many of the most dangerous comorbidities are the diseases of plenty (diabetes, heart disease) which are generally significantly less prevalent in those countries (with notable exceptions like South Africa). Hypertension and asthma could be a bigger problem in the metropolises.

None of that is to suggest that under-developed health systems won't be overwhelmed and cause major casualties, but i hope there are reasons to think the saturation of health systems may not be as disproportionate to more developed systems as would immediately appear to be the case.

If all that went for sub-saharan Africa, i would guess the picture in India appears could be quite a lot bleaker?

[thenoise]

Well people in poorer and more rural countries don't tend to move about as much, so there is a chance that some of them won't catch it at all.  Maybe they should concentrate their meagre resources on border control?  Although any communities that rely largely on charity/foreign aid will be fucked, of course, and the inevitable global recession will hit them hard as well.

[massive bereavement]

"Kashmir Valley reported six more positive cases of COVID-19 on Tuesday taking the total number of cases across J&K to 55. Kashmir is among the highest COVID 19 case density areas in the country which is around 6.14 cases per million of the population. With poor health infrastructure and climatic conditions the Valley also becomes one of the most high-risk zones for the corona virus outbreak."

Worried this could turn into something that further ramps up tensions between India and Pakistan.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Many countries in Africa reporting their first cases and claiming to be on top of the situation.

The third world is going to be fucking decimated.

On the plus side, when your country's life expectancy is 55 (for the great number of contributing reasons) that reduces the amount of the population who are at risk of dying after being infected with Coronavirus drastically. There aren't as many people aged 70+, and a lot of those with conditions which coronavirus would make life threatening already have died due to the basic lack of healthcare.

[Urinal Cake]

It looks like there are a few draconian things happening in India. Migrant workers essentially being detained, people sprayed with disenfectant not meant for humans, police hitting people who break curfew with poles- apparently one person has already died from that.

[Abnormal Palm]

Not to be at all insensitive but I wonder how this will affect India's #1 Test cricket status.

[solidified gruel merchant]

It looks like there are a few draconian things happening in India. Migrant workers essentially being detained, people sprayed with disenfectant not meant for humans, police hitting people who break curfew with poles- apparently one person has already died from that.

Are there ANY countries in the world that actually value their citizens, and humanity generally, or are they really all just barbaric despotic cunts who reluctantly put in just enough sugar to keep driving their respective economies?

[El Unicornio, mang]

It looks like there are a few draconian things happening in India. Migrant workers essentially being detained, people sprayed with disenfectant not meant for humans, police hitting people who break curfew with poles- apparently one person has already died from that.

Migrant workers have been having a rough ride there for a long time, sadly.

Saw another new report about how police there are making people who break the lockdown do loads of sit-ups and squats rather than fining them.

[Abnormal Palm]

Still very uncertain in Africa, as you'd imagine. Not a complete failure though, and some positives coming out of this. It seems they're about three or four weeks behind us so hopefully they can learn very quickly.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-52230991

[Dewt]

I hope they tell us what the answer is when they figure it out

[flotemysost]

My flatmate's from Brazil and is pretty worried about the spread of it there (thanks in no small part to their absolute clusterfuck of a president, obviously), her family are quite well off I think, but lots of people don't have access to great sanitation and are living very close together - those living in favelas are basically fucked.

Saw another new report about how police there are making people who break the lockdown do loads of sit-ups and squats rather than fining them.

Joe Wicks' new video 'too political'.

[notjosh]

South Indian police punish lockdown flouters by locking them in an ambulance with a fake 'corona patient'.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Oi0RXWyLEQ&feature=youtu.be

Can't find it now, but there was also a video of Indian police leading worshippers out of an illegal temple gathering, and giving them a whack on the legs with a big stick for good measure. And where my in-laws live (also in the South) they've apparently been stopping people in the street and making them do press-ups as punishment.

[bgmnts]

It's what Shiva would want.

[Abnormal Palm]

I was speaking to someone this week who said Africa seem to be doing OK and that they're used to it 'because of Ebola'. This person is very well qualified.

They've had a 43% increase in cases over the last week and it's barely hit them yet. Knowing friends in West Africa, this is heartbreaking to me. At least my mates in Asia are basically masked and tracked to fuck. In South Africa this week, there was looting and rioting so the coppers started pointing pump action shotguns to get people back in their corrugated iron huts. This is not a sustainable approach.

The thing I'm really struggling with is people thinking that anywhere is 'beating this' because their numbers are lower than the worst we've seen so far - probably from Italy. They're either too early along the path or under restrictions in every single case. Nowhere is anywhere near beating this. It's a terrible and dangerous narrative and when I've raised that point I've been told that we have to 'think positive'.

...

What does that mean in practice? Prepare a response not in line with reality but on a pipe dream deus ex machina whim?

Yes, that's exactly what it means.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

They are right in the sense that a severe breakdown of people's mental health will have far scarier consequences than this virus alone. It only takes a few crazies on the fringes to put the rest of us on edge. You saw how it went with the stockpiling.

[Abnormal Palm]

Is that a response to the rationale behind 'think positive'? If so, I understand what you mean. There's plenty to be said for calm and a considered response, albeit collective delusion while paddling towards a waterfall doesn't make me feel very calm. I'm not trying to be clever or sarcastic. That's very much how I feel, unfortunately.

I can't bear the combination of fatalism towards other people's deaths and cheery elective obliviousness. It's perfectly possible that they're just further along the path to understanding than I am. There may be no way around this, only a direct tunnel of unpreventable, inevitable death, so we might as well keep smiling until we're out the other side. I guess I just find that horrifying on many levels.

[chveik]

there is no other side. we'll have the recession and the climate crisis to deal with. I think this all shows that what we consider normalcy isn't sustainable.

[bgmnts]

I have ideas about the other side that would make an incredible sci fi story.

But it'll have to wait.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

I can't bear the combination of fatalism towards other people's deaths and cheery elective obliviousness. It's perfectly possible that they're just further along the path to understanding than I am. There may be no way around this, only a direct tunnel of unpreventable, inevitable death, so we might as well keep smiling until we're out the other side. I guess I just find that horrifying on many levels.

Often people will express themselves poorly and conflate competing ideas in their head, so you hear something they don't precisely mean. I don't often afford generosity to the general public but in these times when people are saying to 'think positive' I choose to afford them the benefit of the doubt that it is well-intended, benign at worst.

[Abnormal Palm]

Yeah, I agree with that and I'm trying quite hard to extend as much generosity of spirit as possible. To explain a little more why I was exasperated, it was in a context where we need to consider practicality over emotion. You're absolutely right, though.

there is no other side.

Just to clarify, that's not my phrasing. My main frustration right now is the fact that we're likely only near the start and many people seem to feel we're about to see the back of it.

[Twit 2]

Overheard Africa saying they're "gonna get this for a laugh lol."