China Virus Threat 2020

[CharlesHarris]

A SITREP from flyover country:

Ed, et al

Thought I’d share a verbal snapshot of our local supply depot status. Went to north KC today to get tires for the car. There’s a Costco nearby, so I thought I would drop in to pick up a few things. The store is usually well stocked.

Zero balance items: children’s Tylenol, canned meats of all types, fresh beef and pork, baby diapers and wipes, hand soap, hand sanitizer, pasta, flour, rice, cheese, cured lunch meat, all jerky.

Available in quantity: Nuts, chips, candy, ice cream, booze. Disappointing but not unexpected. Our local wal mart and grocery stores are about the same. Nothing shelf stable at all and darned little meat.

While I was out and about I passed through Ft Leavenworth to check commissary. I like to get the larger institutional sized canned goods there when I shop (they provide food to the US disciplinary barracks so larger packages are the norm). The place looked like it had been robbed in a riot. Zero balance items included: milk, eggs, cheese, all fresh and frozen beef and pork, dry beans, canned goods of all types, flour, sugar, rice, crackers.

The commissary did have some fresh chicken, ice cream, and fresh produce.

I usually pay with a check and get cash back. Commissary would not do cash back and PX would not cash a check as they usually do. Odd, given their customer demographic and the low risk of anyone writing a bad check.

Data points to enhance your assessment.

Related. Stopped at the local firearms dealer. Zero balance on all common calibers of ammunition. No plastic bottom feeder pistols in stock. No AR pattern rifles in stock. They usually have plenty of both.

Called my sister who owns a pawn and gun. She reports a huge run on 9mm and 223 ammo, magazines, and firearms. Her suppliers will back order for her, but no firm ship date. She reports that standard “Elmer Fudd” ammo remains available, as do lever and bolt action hunting guns.

No hardships for our family. Just no immediate ability to resupply conveniently.
Hope it’s better in your area.

-John

[River Song]

Its been an interesting week. We are now self isolated but getting out to a park for a walk each day.
Food supplies are OK for a while.

Responses from people are interesting. From the right, some people think that the government(s) are over reaching. From the left, even if they were at the Last Supper they would complain about the portion sizes.

I honestly don't think people realize how bad this actually is.

Obviously things changed when the Imperial College report came out and our governments changed to suppression mode. However, the last sentence of the report was chilling ....

"However, we emphasize that is not at all certain that suppression will succeed long term; no public health intervention with such disruptive effects on society has been previously attempted for such a long duration of time. How populations and societies will respond remains unclear"

Let's be clear- this has all the makings of a 1918 situation. Whatever happens, the world will not be the same afterwards, and we need to think about new paradigms rather than the old left/right dichotomies.

The state is going to be a far bigger player whether we like it or not.

Keep safe

[Straight Shooter]

I have to agree (again) with your assessment RS , we have not left the the confines of our grounds for over a week and have no intentions of doing so until week twelve at least ! And that’s if things do not change .

Although we are talking to our friends and family on the phone , it’s a bit of a drag not seeing them in person at the end of any conversation the ( God Bless You ) has even more meaning right now .

[Pete Grey]

We too are now in lockdown, minimum four months food, we should be ok until we need new meds. But while the supermarkets have been stripped there are two well stocked convenience stores ten minutes walk away if we do need anything.

SS our security preps are similar to yours, i’m not expecting a breakdown in law and order yet but shutters are ready to fit, had new gates just before christmas, and new better quality padlocks on sheds, i’ve tried to age the locks with battery acid so the’re not so conspicuous. I run the CCTV cameras off batteries, so if the mains goes off i’ve still got coverage.

MB thank you for the info on the virus life on various media ie cardboard and plastic, so parcels and letters, i wonder how many people will disinfect ebay, amazon and other deliveries ?.

RS the imperial college model is pretty grim reading, however it appears they may have over egged it, they did not factor in that a good proportion of the elderly would have’d died anyway from the underlying health problems.

Yes the world will never be the same, and it’s changing for the worst. We must try to learn from this pandemic and hope it makes us stronger.

God bless you all and keep you safe.

[Mortblanc]

The Governor of my state, an area 200 miles north to south and 800 miles east to west and home to nearly 5 million, just issued an order that all "nonessential" retail outlets were to close at 8 PM tonight and remain closed until further notice.

(he did not say anything about banks)

Soon he will be "forced" to insure that all citizens follow the isolation guidelines because they are simply not behaving properly and are still out and about.

We are entering the stage of enforced isolation and will soon face the part where the government enforces that curview with force.

Once the final orders for martial law are issued I expect the internet to shut down to stop communications such as ours. Only the media sources under direct political control will issue "news".

We will open our computers to a screen that says "NO INTERNET CONNECTION" and that will be it.

Italy seems to be selectively rationing the available ventilators to use by individuals under the age of 60. No use wasting them on old people that are going to die anyway! I saw that in three different sources, hope it is not true but fear that it is. While the rest of Europe was spending on their version of NHS, Italy was paying back the EU for the loans of the recession era and living in forced austerity, not keeping up their medical system.

[Pete Grey]

MB in today’s tv statement Boris is shutting down non essential shops here, people allowed to shop for food and medication. We are allowed to leave our house once a day for exercise.

We knew he would as the idiots can’t behave sensibly. The police are being given emergency powers to enforce these restrictions.

He’s asking engineering firms to make ventilators, 30,000 of them, better late than never. They are also ordering millions of masks and thousands of gowns and gloves.

Talk about shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted.

[Straight Shooter]

With all of the crop failures around the globe these past three years......plus labour shortages and people self isolating HOW even if we have a bumper growing season .....do the crops get processed and delivered to the end user ? ....do we really believe that food will be in plentiful supply ? Especially at the height of this pandemic ? I for one can not see it and do not buy it , given all the upcoming restrictions being wheeled out at a days notice .....if our medical staff are short of basic PPE s surely food supplies will Have to suffer ? Let alone medications .....( there is enough food for everyone ) we are being told continuously ......until it runs out eventually to a dribble .

[bigpaul]

the UK is only 60% self sufficient in food even in the good times never mind in a pandemic.
there wont be the people to pick the stuff and so it will rot in the fields.

[Mortblanc]

How does that work?

You have 40% more people than you can feed but not enough to pick what you grow?

Someone needs to talk to the human resources manager.

[Pete Grey]

Migrant labour from eastern europe does most food picking in the UK as the unemployed don’t want to get their hands dirty, it shows our benefits system is too generous, cut their benefits and get them off their arses.

At the end of WW2 we were nearly self sufficient for food, even with there now being a larger population with the massive improvements in agriculture we should be in similar position, unfortunately the government regards food production as unimportant.