@Dara O’Brien: Nothing wrong with having a plan in place

@LD: you could do with a few online spelling classes yourself Bud. Advise/advice, steaming etc

@Harry Meany: 50% right

@Dara O’Brien: This is the reality, it’s happening in other countries so why wouldn’t schools be shut down here?

@LD: it’s a primary school relax you,,
put back on the tin foil hat

@Dara O’Brien: i don’t think so i think its a great idea. Another case it could be used is snow days. College lecturers can do it why not teachers?

@Lydia McLoughlin: shush

@RAYZ88: The old and the boring “put on your tin foil hat” brigade are swiftly becoming the Comical Ali’s of this crisis.

@LD: great idea, unfortunately we don’t have the broadband infrastructure in a lot of regions across Ireland if this option was to go ahead.

@Dara O’Brien: Its very real where I am in Asia, we are doing online lessons to students at home in lieu of the standard classes. I wouldnt be surprised if Ireland did the same.On the bright side air pollution has dropped significantly from all the students, teachers and staff not travelling.

@Tomàs: Living in Dubai. This is happening on Sunday, all schools will be closing for a month with classes being streamed. This may actually happen in other countries.

@Dara O’Brien: it’s a precaution, this will get worse before it gets better.

@LD: there is time’s like now that you just want to here that phase ! Island of IRELAND FIRST…situated demands immediate action NOW!…we are island this is our greatest advantage lets used it NOW !

@Paul Cunningham: Ireland hasn’t got a decent enough broadband for this to work, come back in 50 years, might be OK by then

@LD: The problem isn’t broadband its the teachers unions , they would never support this and even if they did it would them them at least a year to get the structures and training in place.

@LD: It’s March – all schools WILL actually be closed in a few months!

@Gus Sheridan: yet companies all around Ireland use streaming services all day every day to hold meetings; I do it all the time. We absolutely do have the broadband to hold a few classes. This is already the case in China, not sure why everyone is so aghast at the suggestion.

@Harry Meany: Is he your friend? Or are you referring to the popular American Lager?

@LD: Take school summer holidays now

@LD: as if teachers will just sign up for that without unions insisting on a pay hike

@Tomàs: 6 cases in 5 million people of a disease which only kills elderly or people with already poor immune systems. Its basically a really bad flu. No one dead in uk or Ireland and 100 dead in italy population 60 million. Just continue with your life and if you get I’ll go the doctor 99.9% chance you will survive if you are fit and able bodied.

Media are doing what media do but they are causing harm to tourism and other industries

@LD: Live steaming? Go on………

@LD: “online steaming” – but won’t the screens on their smartphones get fogged up?

@LD: utter rubbish

https://www.cnbc.com/ so more than common flu. I agree panicking isn’t a good idea and I have 2 pre existing conditions which increase my risk of death if I get it. But saying it’s only a bad flu isn’t correct either

@Harry Meany: Please don’t be picky, it’s very bad mannars!

@RAYZ88: eh read the article again..it’s a primary and a secondary school!!

@LD: brilliant. I have had online lectures. They are a great solution!

@hard yaka: ” if you are fit and able bodied.”
So we don’t have a duty of care to all the people who aren’t fit and able-bodied? Just like how we all get vaccines for herd immunity; the argument there is that it is for the more vulnerable.
Transplant patients, anyone with lung issues, undiscovered underlying heart issues, etc. Let’s just say f-them and let this new virus run rampant, it’ll be grand?
There can be a space between mindless panic and sensible precautions for public health.

(btw, no-one dead in the UK and Ireland yet isn’t an argument, it’s only just arrived here, there are enough dead elsewhere to prove that it kills people)

@hard yaka: Make that a 96.5% chance you will survive and off you go.

@Denis McClean: not if you are fit Denis. The 3.5 % is elderly and people with poor immune systems

@LD: in a few months all secondary and some national schools will be closing for the summer holidays.

@Bobby wilson: in proper English now Bobby, preferably with no spelling errors!

@hard yaka: I am sure it only started with one person last autumn in wuhan in China ! and look how fast it reach the entire globe Now!

@LD: Google Apps for Education in use and has been for ages in many schools. The Hangouts function allows for live streaming of classes already, as do other add-ons. Teachers have had this tech. for a number of years now.

@Toon Army: Scientific journals /WHO have been consistent in saying 9 days since January.

@Connoroconner: in ideal lab conditions it lasts 9 days.

@Rochelle: the advice comes from the doctors in public health not FG not FF not SF

@Jane: The decision comes from the health minister, no doctor would object to a large gathering being postponed at the current time.

@Rochelle: that’s a daft comment. The virus is being dealt with according to WHO guidelines and the actions taken here are the same as most other countries. Health experts are making the decisions, not the politicians

@Toon Army: It’s times like this when you realise just how bad the people charged with running Ireland really are. I have no faith or confidence in how this crises is being managed. Mismanaged is probably a more appropriate word. It’s time to admit we don’t have a clue and bring in proper experts from countries who know what they’re doing. By this time next week a full scale epidemic will have broken out and they’ll still be telling us there’s no need to panic. It’s become a “save St Patrick’s day celebrations”at all costs exercise. Any properly run country would have cancelled this as soon as it became apparent the virus was here.

@Toon Army: Don’t forget the Rugby fans who are travelling to Dublin tomorrow. Who paid for the weekend and flights will still be allowed in with no real checks.

@Connoroconner: Yes exactly so why not provide the range?

@Connoroconner: The WHO have advocated for “aggressive measures” of containment to stop the spread. Do you really think that’s what we’re doing?

@Rochelle: top notch making a political football out of a health scare.

@Ken Hickey: In 1918 the chamber of commerce and local government in Philadelphia refused to cancel a parade called the liberty load parade despite a few cases of Spanish flue in the city, the parade went ahead and was attended by 200,000 people a good deal smaller than the St Patricks day parade. Within days people started dying two weeks later the virus was rampant with 10 of thousands infected. How can Harris go against the lessons of history.

@Martin Byrne: Liberty Loan Parade. (not Liberty Load.)

@james dimaggio: Listen carefully James – our folks are following WHO Guidelines. You “…bring in proper experts from countries who know what they’re doing” and they’ll just do the exact same thing.

@Rochelle: There is no spread. We’re in containment phase. There’s been no documented case of person to person transfer in this country. WHO advocate aggressive measures when spread occurs.

Personally I’m glad all countries are following WHO Guidelines and not the guidelines of the experts in the Journal comment section.

@Martin Byrne: STOP SCAREMONGERING FFS

Please read this

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/were-not-facing-second-spanish-flu/607354/

@Connoroconner: all the more reason to err on the side of caution, instead of the “move along now, nothing to see here” mentality

@Martin Byrne: Medical practices and medicine has come a long way since 1918. To compare the two is ridiculous. Life expectancy in 2016 was 53 its now 83. See how they don’t compare?

@NotMyIreland: @Bernard Sweeney This virus is just as contagious as the Spanish flu. The WHO put the mortality level 2% – 3.4% last night on BBC news at 10. Spanish flu was 2.4% when finally calulated(https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/12/1/05-0979_article) Medical practices have come along way but currently there is no vaccine for this and won’t be for at least 6 months. We could have the parade when the vaccine is available. Since when is logic scaremongering.

@Martin Byrne: misplaced logic is scaremongering, the point is every country is doing the same as us. Italy and Iran are special cases unlikely to be repeated here.

@Bernard Sweeney: Logic is Logic Bernard there is no such thing as miss placed logic, to call it that is to deny it was logic in the first instance.

I know a lot of people on here are depended on St Patricks Day and the tourist industry and that is their main motivation for wanting no action to be taken on the virus. But it remains clear the sensible action is to postpone the St Patricks Day festival. Its better that it just a financial cost than a human one.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: the Coronavirus doesn’t think much of an open border on the North.

@Paul Cunningham: It would be almost impossible to close it.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: We are an island even if it has two countries. Those two countries cooperate on a myriad of issues. Surely joined up thinking on how to stop Covid-19 entering the island was possible. All the more reason for reunification. A border in the Irish Sea would promote better control of transmission of viruses to the island.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: Not the point. We are an island, all be it shared with the north. It’s was still very easy to monitor all airports both north and south, along with any ferries. Same as the Uk btw. It’s mainland euro that would have a more difficult time.

@Thefallguy:

There are 2 different countries with 2 different Health systems and 2 different, but hopefully similar, approaches.

Its not possible for Ireland to monitor and control UK points of entry to the island. If we decide to shut down all airports, we still have no control over someone going into London, taking an internal flight to Belfast and driving down to Dublin.

Unless of course you think it would be easy to close off the border.

@Gavin Conran: I know Gavin but could of tested people coming in from these areas in the airport told them be careful what they do they next few days and stay at home if possible until results come back get ahead of the problem instead of wait and see attitude

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: so said Mr 26 county partitionist or his he about geographical description of the Island of IRELAND!

@bunty: terrified of upsetting Europe

@Bobby wilson:

I don’t have any time for fantasy geography

Why do you spell Ireland all in captials? It is a word. The correct way to spell it is Ireland with a just one capital, “I”.

The UK has capitals because it is an acronym, it stands for United Kingdom, which is short for United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: as I said you in in previous comment page 26 county state is officially called the republic of ireland [ROI] ..1948..legal description of this state.. 1948 Article 4 …no 22..area that covers 26 county state…..Ireland is 32 counties and not just 26 counties

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: irish six county state is control by London on till a majority say other wise last referendum was 1973! 1 million Catholic /Nationalist /republican /socialist population across the NORTH are crying out for a referendum NOW!

@Bobby wilson: No they are not. There is no indication that the people of Northern Ireland would vote to leave the UK

The only one shouting is you

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: why don’t British government allow the people in the six county decide that.. 2018..51% school children are from Catholic background..33% protestant background ..others no religion…16%…so the hour is near….tick tock..

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: as someone born bred in the six county I can tell you now! they are crying out for a change in the constitution, there is massive anger right all sections of the Catholic /Nationalist /republican /soft unionists /socialist /populations over this brexit..time is running out for your precious union..tick tock.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: calling it an internal flight is just semantics. It’s no different to flying London to Dublin. It’s a flight and you know everyone on the flight.

@Thefallguy:

I think you are confusing the reality with some sort of “united Ireland” aspiration.

It’s not semantics at all. It is a very important point. The flight start in the UK and ends in the UK. It doesn’t cross any international borders. That flight has absolutely nothing to do with the Irish health authorities, and they have no rights to information form it

All control of the information is with the UK authorities and if Ireland wants the information, it must get it from the relevant UK authority. We have no jurisdiction over Northern Ireland or any other part of the UK.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: You do realise that a few hundred thousand people died from seasonal flu because multiple millions of people get the flu every year and point one percent die. If the same amount of people get coronavirus, then the amount of people that die will be approx 20 times the amount of deaths that you mentioned above. You can’t compare figures like that when such a small portion of people have been infected with the coronavirus so far. The fear is that it will spread like the flu. The lack of logic of people using these comparisons is astounding and that blasé attitude is partly the reason these things spread so far and fast.

@Fandandi: You do realise that millions most likely contracted Covid-19 without even realising they did and never sought any medical help and all those cases are not being counted? This virus is most likely on par with the flu virus when it comes to overall mortality.

@Luke Windak: Could you put some figures in those people who had SARS-CoV-2 coursing through their veins but didn’t realise it? It’s it complex math? Does it use imaginary numbers?

@Luke Windak: You’re just regurgitating what you hear without understanding what’s being discussed. “80% of people with the virus aren’t experiencing any symptoms” is a description of those who are infected but are still in the incubation phase. This will always be a higher percentage than detected cases during this phase of the disease trajectory.

@Fandandi:
If. If. If.

There is no evidence that anything like those number’s will contract covid-19. In fact if instead of saying if this happens and if that happens, actually look rationally at the existing outbreaks. You will see that the rate of increase of cases outside of China is a lot less than the rate of increase of cases in China at the start of the outbreak.

So it is very unlikely that the number cases outside of China will reach close to what china has experienced

@Paraic:
Again you are posting posting malicious lies and misinformation.

“coursing through their veins” Is that for an additional scare effect?

According to Professor Chris Whitty, the UKs chief medical officer. It is estimated that 80% of cases get very mild symptoms and require no hospital treatment 15% will require treatment and 5% will be critical.

According to Prof Neil Ferguson of Imperial College London, there is also a distinct possibility that a very large percentage will contract the virus and get no symptoms at all.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: Nonsense, the corona virus has a much higher death rate 2% compared to 0.01% for the flu. The only reason more people have died from the flu, because it has infected more people. Can you imagine how many people would be dead if a similar number of people had been infected with this virus.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: I’m not saying it will or it won’t reach those numbers or anything else. I’m responding to your comparison to the seasonal flu where you give figures of how many people die from that and I’m simply pointing out its a pointless comparison due to the fact the amount of people who have it is vastly different. It’s apples and oranges.

@Luke Windak: Have you got evidence that this virus is most likely the same as a regular flu? You seem very adamant so I’m assuming you have. Also, I am aware that people may not have been tested for it due to lack of symptoms which is the case for the regular flu aswel. Have you any evidence to suggest it is millions though or are you just spouting off your opinions as facts to try back up your argument?

@GO GREEN: He’s always talking through his hoop. I just mute him (it’s bliss). The WHO used 2% “Naive case fatality ratio” up until recently. (You have to ask why the weren’t updating the value regularly because it grew over time and they were aware). It’s also misleading to the public to use naive CFR instead of better methods. At last, yesterday they’ve revised it up to 3.4% and that’s the percentage of ALL cases (includes new ones that are only in the early stages which is why it could mislead). Looking at the 55K or so closed cases, it’s obvious that 6% of them are deaths. That’s the harsh reality and it’s a large enough sample size now to give a good indication of outcomes of all detected cases. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

@Paraic: Yes ignorance is bliss.
You keep linking to the worldometers site to give credence to you case. It doesn’t

The don’t calculate any CFR the just give the basic ratios on the numbers. In fact if you look at their site, they clearly link to an article saying that calculation of CFR at this stage is impossible

The CFR number of 6% is meaningless as 40% of cases are unresolved.

You are deliberately posting lies and misinformation and have been doing so for months now. You should be ashamed of yourself.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: well said.maybe an article to help you back up your argument as people dont seem to want to listen to facts. https://slate.com/technology/2020/03/coronavirus-mortality-rate-lower-than-we-think.amp?__twitter_impression=true

@Fandandi: He keeps presenting ‘Infection fatality rates’ as ‘case fatality rates’ in the hope of confusing people. There’s a massive difference! Comparing estimated IFR of Covid19 with the CFR of flu is being knowingly deceptive. Either that or he’s just not very bright.

@sally: That’s an opinion piece not a medical study. You haven’t looked at the official figures. 94% recovered, 6% deaths from 55K closed cases. Any other way of looking at it is sugar coating reality with wishful thinking.

@Paraic: chap. you were banging on about a 40% death rate a few weeks back. now your trying to be smug quoting 6%. It has been consistently proven that you are misinterpreting data and cherry picking your doomsday bias from articles. You have even been shown to post articles that contradict your comments. Then you attack with arrogance, self righteousness and trolling accusations when your imbecilic rhetoric is questioned.

You seem to be relentless in your pursuit to spread fear and alternative facts.

My hope is that the readers of your comments are self aware enough to do their own research and come to their own conclusions as opposed to taking your nonsense as fact and letting it affect their mental health by panicking and worrying about your inaccurate comments.

Your a dangerous fella.

@Delboy79: I’ve given up trying to argue with people that are hell bent on ignoring facts on this. Let Paraic and the others sit at home with their piles of toilet paper watching reruns of contagion whilst us level headed people take this with a wait and see and measured approach. And even if we take China as a perfect example massive drops in the levels of new cases and deaths, they did absolutely no containment in the initial stages and even then out of 11.2 million people in the initial province only 67000 got the infection with the majority of these recovered.

@sally: agreed

@sally: You’ve deluded yourself if you think China is a metric for the rest of the world. Last time I checked, Ireland doesn’t have drones that can spray the streets with disinfectant, have fleets of tanker trucks equipped with decontamination fogging equipment, the ability to build new hospitals in 10 days. We haven’t closed schools or applied a lockdown. We won’t apply draconian measures like forcibly removing people from their homes. In Asia, everyone wears facemasks when there’s an epedemic as it’s part of their culture. Here we note that there are none available, so we convince everyone that they don’t work. In a few weeks, Ireland will be comparable to Italy today. China made hospital bed become available. Here we have no resources. It will be let rip through the population.

@sally:

Thanks for that.
There are some people on here who are rightly concerned about the spread of the virus and it is so easy to get caught up in the mediahype. There is a lot of conflicting information, and some gaps in knowledge on this virus.

Unfortunately there are also some on here who are maliciously and deliberately stirring it with misinformation and lies. @Paraic is one of those. He has been doing it since it started. He obviously get some sort perverse enjoyment out of all this. I think he is hoping for some sort of Dawn of the Dead scenario.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: reading all the above comments have left me seriously confused. Could you explain how the point Pauric made about 6% of closed cases been deaths is not correct? To me it would make sense to only use closed cases to look at the death rate? Obviously the 6% is way higher than the WHO rate of 3.4%, why is this? Sorry to ask you but your general comments did seem to be quite reasonable. I’m immunosuppressed and am starting to get a little nervous about the whole thing.

@NotMyIreland:
First of all, I am not a medical professional. I do have a background in data analysis and modelling.

Unfortunately we don’t really know the mortality rate. The only things that are known reasonably accurately is; the number of deaths, number of reported cases, and number of reported cases who have recovered.

There are currently 97,000 cases reported worldwide of which 3300 have died, and 53,500 have recovered. The WHO and all medical professionals are using 3300/97000 = 3.4% as the mortality rate. This makes sense as it is directly comparable with CFRs for other know viruses, but it is not entirely accurate

Paraic’s calculation is 3300/535500 = 6%. This doesn’t make any sense because there are still 44,500 case active. THis requires an assumption that they death rate will be 6% among those active cases, there is nothing to back this up and it very likely not to be the case as the death rate at the beginning of the outbreak was probably a lot higher as medical personnel were coming to terms with what was happening

@NotMyIreland:
There is another factor. A number of experts have said, based on previous virus behaviour and the way the virus is affecting people outside china, that the number of infections is 10 times that of the number of cases reported. The other 90% of cases are so mild, that the symptoms are hardly even noticeable, and an individual may never even be aware that they had it.

If this was the case, then the mortality rate would be one tenth of what is reported i.e. 0.34%.

The Case Fatality Rate is what is estimated to be the mortality rate at the end of the outbreak. It is calculated using known numbers of deaths divided by all cases, including those who never showed symptoms. This generally is an highly educated estimate using advanced statistical methods. it is usually presented as being between an upper and lower number.

@NotMyIreland:

And lastly. I have posted a number of times regarding a forecasted number of potentially reportable cases in Ireland. There are 2 things:

Firstly, the population of China is 1.4 Bn and for the 3 months to date have had 80,500 reportable cases. That is 0.006% of the population. that relates to 276 reportable cases in Ireland in a similar period, at the current WHO fatality rate for reportable case this would lead to approximately 9 deaths. If in the extraordinary circumstances the situation in Ireland was 10 worse than China, that would mean 2760 case with 90 deaths.

Secondly the rate of increase in cases outside china are increasing at a rate less than happened in China at the start of the outbreak. That would indicate that the number of cases outside of China would peak at a number less than the 80,000 cases currently in China. The mortality rate outside of China is 1.9% at the moment, but that changes daily

Again, any of these things can change, but they are reasonable estimates based on the information we currently have.

I hope that helped. Keep safe, and follow all the guidelines published by the HSE.

@Feardorcha Ó Maolomhnaigh: Thank you very much. It did explain a lot about the figures been quoted. Yeah you had corrected my bad maths before which had also put my mind at ease. Numbers never were my strong point!

@Monika Broughill: Mary Lou will be prancing around the dail today ….Jesus wept!!

@Ronan Mc Namara: if it was an article about jumpers people would try have a go at Mary Lou somehow.

@Dara O’Brien: poor logic shush your not making sense

@Dan: AAHHH no!!

@Ronan Mc Namara: you Re losing focus, stick to the subject

@Ronan Mc Namara: you are losing focus, stick to the subject

@Richard Parker: but Mary Lou’s kids are from one of the schools self isolating

My work requested that any staff with children and partners asked to self isolate-to work from home for the duration too.

@Dan: Mary Lou’s daughter is a student at the school in Glasnevin.

This school here.

https://www.thejournal.ie/coronavirus-case-dublin-department-of-health-5029140-Mar2020/

“Staff and pupils at the school are being told to limit their social interactions for 14 days after the department’s contact tracing exercise concluded that closing the school was required in order to prevent the potential spread of the virus”

@Mark Johnson: ah, would you ever give over!

@Connoroconner: priortise essential expenditure

@Ronan Mc Namara: It is a big deal to have to take a fortnight off. Many people can’t afford that. I’d like to know who is pushing for the citizens of Ireland to have no choices in such situations, because they aren’t offering to help them through this.