To self-quarantine or not to, that is the question.

Seasonal flu annual death rate: 0.1%

Coronavirus deathrate: 3%+ Non-elderly

Coronavirus death rate: 15% for elderly

These figures may very well change depending on how bad this gets, or how quickly the response grows.

Every day the number of confirmed infections and deaths keep increasing. 6500 total deaths confirmed as I write this.

If you have symptoms or have been around someone with symptoms, but they or you have not been tested- and you could potentially save just 1 life- would you stay home despite the costs to you and your family?

How many lives are worth the stubbornness and disbelief that this is serious enough-or that we could be responsible for someone's infection or death unknowingly? Imagine if just one trip outside of your home was enough to infect 1 person, that in turn infected 10, and so on-leading to deaths.

Collectively not staying home is exactly why this is spreading so fast. IF we had self-quarantined or been ordered to in the beginning, we could have slowed and possibly contained this sooner. Period. There is zero argument that negates this fact. Think of the lives we could have saved. Think of the lives that could be saved if those infected with the flu stayed home.

However, nobody wants to do that. No one wants to change their life to save another. The threat of economic and social collapse if we do all stay home, is just to frightening. Well, guess what. The threat of total economic and social collapse as a result of the virus spreading, has already shown us; it can happen either way.

Imagine having sick pay and healthcare that covers the full costs of even having just the flu. A lot of people would be able to stay home, and that would save a lot of lives. This is quite easy to fathom as an idea, but very difficult when it comes to changing our healthcare system, getting everyone in our government & nation to accept it, and Congress' attempts at enacting bills to help with tax relief & sick pay coverage. Well, now we are seeing what happens when people can't afford healthcare. They don't stay home, and they don't get tested, and they don't get treatment, even for the common flu.

As of February 11, 2020- Overall, the CDC estimates that 12,000 and 61,000 deaths annually since 2010 can be blamed on the flu. Globally, the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that the flu kills 290,000 to 650,000 people per year.

How many people will this pandemic infect and kill? We won't know that answer for a while. Most estimates are guesses, but the signs are grim. We don't have a vaccine or a treatment yet. President Trump today announced he will not order a full nationwide shutdown, but that we should have this contained by July or August, and that he may consider shutting down hotspots.

It's not rocket science to understand that if we don't self-quarantine and shut down all international and domestic travel, along with major arteries in the United States; we may not be able to contain this for a very long time, and this virus would then become commonly contracted- like the flu. That doesn't mean it's like the flu. It means it could be as easy to get as the flu.

It's time to think and make a decision. If there was even a 1% chance you could be infected, with no symptoms-because you were around someone with symptoms- and possibly infect others or kill just 1 person- can you live with yourself?

If you have any symptoms of flu or this virus, but you're still going to work, and going about your daily life as if little has changed- it may just take someone close to you or someone you've come into contact with getting sick or dying- to bring reality to your doorstep.

My take is most people will go with self-preservation, and the health and lives of others will not be spared.

The biggest difference from the flu, is this pandemic has the ability to overwhelm our healthcare system at an alarming rate. That's not what happens with the flu. Flu season definitely puts a strain on healthcare during peak season, but not the way that this virus has the potential to do. So, many estimates are that we are going to see a lot more deaths and infections than we have with the flu.

We really don't know yet how many people have had it, how many people have it, or how many people have been exposed.

The United States is surprisingly far behind the rest of the world with regard to testing. Why is that? Mainly, this is because the pandemic response team was fired, funding for CDC and pandemic response was gutted, our highest level of government was not prepared & didn't take it seriously enough, or respond quickly enough. They've been telling us all it was going to be just fine, so we went about our daily lives. The US refused supplies of testing kits from the WHO, to manufacture our own. Now the top doctors are saying we have a real problem ahead, and the worst is yet to come. Still up until yesterday the President is saying it's okay, it'll go away.

I can understand the desire to calm people and reassure them. However, misleading them along the way is not okay. This is what happens when you are a one man show, not prepared, don't understand how pandemics work, and don't have a team in place from the very beginning to advise you quickly, to take action faster. This is what happens when a 'know it all' doesn't know jack shit.

Was the decision to refuse WHO test kits really because of greed? Did big Pharma want to cash in on this?

Was this administration so afraid of how such an action would affect our fiscal budget, or how it would affect the election campaign? Was it both?

Were the CDC test kits not working or as good as the one's we would have our private sector manufacture?

Why are people being denied testing? Is it still that we just don't have enough test kits or that we are limiting it to those who traveled or knowingly made contact with the potentially infected?

Obviously we don't have the capacity yet to keep everyone home, mail everyone a home test kit, and so some will say the criticism is unwarranted. That would be true if we had been prepared, if the pandemic team was ready, if the stable genius President already knew the flu vaccine would do nothing to stop this.

We need to question and hold accountable, everyone involved in making decisions about the response to this pandemic. It is patriotic and democratic, to question your government. Do not let the fear of reprisal for sedition or being put down on social media, keep you from protecting yourself, the people, this nation; from the careless actions of others or delayed response by our leaders. Speak up, do your research, question, and analyze answers. Seek the truth.

Do not let the Surgeon General or President of the United States tell you that they've had enough criticism, or that the media is just creating a frenzy, rather than trying to get real truthful answers & hold our leaders accountable and transparent.

The time for belly-aching about the media questions has long passed. It's not Fake News for our media to question everything, and demand answers for the people. The 1st Amendment is in place for this reason. The American people deserve to be truthfully informed, and they have the right to question all aspects of what the government does. Transparency is what Democracy is about. The moment you let your leaders or the supporters of one party tell you-it's unpatriotic and sedition-to question your government and it's decisions- is the moment democracy dies in darkness.

Just because we question our government and want to hold them accountable, especially when the lies stack up daily & professionals contradict this administration; doesn't mean we want to create more division and separation. We want answers fast, and actions that are faster.

This virus is the yin and the yang, no matter how you slice it. It's the universe throwing a curve ball at the President so fast, giving him a limited opportunity to do good and act appropriately- to do something other than think about himself for once. He's been pious, divisive, and gloating for quite some time now.

This story reminds me of the ant and the grasshopper. The grasshopper played and sang all summer while the ant worked diligently, saving for winter. When winter came, the grasshopper was not prepared, starving and dying of hunger, and begs the ant for food. This is Trump's winter. The season of real change is upon him and he's now finally asking everyone around him to help him. The problem is he was still in denial that he needed help, during the crucial first 8 weeks of this outbreak. Now it's starting to hit home.

Now, it's time to buckle in and hunker down.

During this crisis, the President has had Republicans all over Facebook and Twitter siding with him, that everyone is panicking for no reason, that it's not a big deal, that it's just going to go away, that it's all a big hoax by the Democrats to make him look bad, that the previous administration is at fault, and that he inherited the poor setup for this particular crisis. Cities are shutting down across America, the Bay Area is ordering people to stay inside their homes starting tomorrow. Some hoax.....

His conservative religious followers might actually now be wondering, considering, or preparing if maybe he is the anti-Christ and this is pestilence; if they weren't so in love with their false idol and still in denial- relegating anyone who thinks this is different from the flu and doesn't support the President's take on this situation- as just a liberal hack with half a brain. This is no apocalypse, but the example of how quickly and easily one could be laid out to fruition and completion, is staring us in the face with the response of this administration, and the way it encouraged people that this is no big deal.

Instead, people are out there, not staying home; acting like nothing has changed- very likely spreading this disease unwittingly- without a care in the world. "Hey man, it's just another flu."

Someone laying in a hospital bed right now, is telling a healthcare professional or a family member; this is not like the last time I got the flu. Of the 6,500 people who drowned in their own mucus and died from an aggressive pneumonia that likely also lead to sepsis; all of them can no longer say it any louder.

"Stay home, save lives."

#stayhome