 Okay, we're back real live. I'm Jay Fidel here on Think Tech, and we're talking Tim, Epochella, and me. We're still together. We've had our Trump week show, and now we're talking about Corona Watch, which is a new show we've just developed. And behind me, you can see a microscopic look at the coronavirus. Welcome back to the show. Nice to see you smile and face again, Tim. Good morning, Jay. Appreciate it very much. Good to see you. Good afternoon, I mean. And Tim joins us from the state of Washington, which is a relevant location these days, because they have coronavirus there for sure. They've had a number of deaths there in Washington. Anyway, we'll explore the state of the disease. We'll explore the mechanics of the disease, because that changes. Matter of fact, all of this changes. We wish we could do it every day, but for now, we're going to do it every two weeks. And we're going to try to get a handle on all those changes. Whatever we say today could be changed tomorrow. The rug could be pulled out from under us any day. Bottom line is this isn't going to go away, and it will continue to change. So let's talk first about the status of it. It started in China, but now it's in, I don't know, tons of countries, I think 70 countries around the world, and spreading fast. And, you know, we live in a flat world where the borders are, you know, sometimes very porous. People flying hither and yon and carrying the virus with them. And right now we have a, they keep telling us that we're on the way to a pandemic, but it sure seems like a pandemic. And then we had one other term, and that's endemic, because we need to talk about that. And endemic disease is a disease that is a permanent condition of the species that just goes on and on. And we have, we have to learn with it, but learn it, but deal with it. But it's part of life that would be hard on people because it's got a lethal quality to it. So can you give us a short report, Tim, about what is the global status, the global spread of this disease right now? Well, because the corona 19 virus is, it's a really tricky virus because you can transmit, to my understanding, you can transmit without having visible symptoms. And that's a perfect storm for, for people to get on, you know, cross borders and, and, you know, meet and greet people and not know that they're actually carrying the virus with them. That's why I think this one is a little bit of a concern versus some other, some other foods that we've had to deal with and some other viruses. So it is, it is spreading and it's spreading beyond where our testing kits have been. We haven't had testing kits in the United States, other countries have been testing the residents and finding out there are more cases than suspected. Yeah, well, I think one thing to note is that the number of cases is a function of how many test kits there are. If you have a community with no test kits, then you don't know who's in the incubation period. You know who's got it, maybe. You know, you can do an MRI, I think, a CAT scan on the lungs and you can tell by the lesions of the lungs that it's coronavirus. But, you know, short of that, you need a test kit. So if I give you a community with no test kits and no symptoms, you have no idea how many people have been infected, not until they develop, you know, the symptoms or get into the pneumonia phase or die. So it's not an accurate statement to say that in a given country, we have X units, X cases when you have no test kits in that state or country. I mean, for example, I mean, I think in Korea, we have a lot of cases. But I think they have a lot of test kits there. And maybe the same goes for Italy. We have a lot of cases, surprising number of cases, but not a lot of test kits, a rather a lot of test kits. And that's how you determine, you know, the cases. In Hawaii this morning, there was news that we have finally received test kits and we have tested six people. And none of them were found to be positive for coronavirus. And that's comforting, except why only six? What is the definition of the people who should be tested? How many test kits do we actually have? Who has them? Who administers them? How do I get one if I feel I've got it? A lot of questions. And the answers to those questions are going to be different in different places. And therefore, the numbers are going to be all a function of the answers to those questions. So we have to find out a lot more before we really know the scope of this disease, don't you think? Absolutely. And, you know, the transmission seems to be very, very efficient. People are being infected. That doesn't seem like they're having that close of contact, but yet they are being affected. I'm in Seattle right now. And in Seattle, there's a lake called Lake Washington, and just across from Lake Washington is the community of Kirkland. And that's the nursing care facility where we've had people infected and we have people who have died from that care facility. But the casual, you know, the transmission from this has hit the EMTs, the fire department that's gone in there with with, you know, patients and nursing students. So the nursing students are in quarantine, the about a third of the fire departments in quarantine, the school that the nursing students were at, that's been, you know, shut down and being cleaned up. So, you know, this, this, this is quite a, you know, an efficient virus, like all viruses, but this one seems to be a little more efficient. Yeah, oh, yeah, it's got a life of its own virus. The life of a virus is the way it affects the population. You know, as a collective, the quality, the life, the efficiency, if you will, of the virus is really based on what happens to the number, the large number of people that are affected by it. And you can't tell by just looking at the, you know, the virus object, the virus molecule or whatever you call it. You got to look at how it affects large populations, then you know the characteristics. So we should talk about that for a minute. Now, I get a lot of my current information from a paper that I received from a credible source, which was written by a fellow named James Robb, R-O-B-B. And he's an MD. He's a researcher. He's researched in virology. And he's researched in epidemiology, I think. Even he says he's been following it for a long time. And some of the points he makes in this paper are, I said it to you, Tim, right? You know what I'm talking about. Some of the points he makes in this paper are really, they're very interesting in this sense. It just shows you how little we know from other sources. This one sort of goes beyond the other sources we're getting, which can be not true or exaggerated or under-exaggerated, which can be, you know, just a sort of random, unscientific, non-medical kind of information. I would say that the government and the CDC has failed to, in my view, fail to give us good information that we need to have in order to sort of get our minds around what this is and how it works. So one thing that James Robb said is this is not like the flu. This is a lung disease. And the virus molecules try to get to your lungs. And they try to get through your nose, your mouth, what have you, your respiratory system. And then finally, ultimately, they get into your lungs. And when they get into your lungs, then the symptoms really begin in earnest, then you wind up with pneumonia. It's a bad pneumonia. And you feel like you're drowning in pneumonia. That's what pneumonia does to you and, you know, fluids accumulate in your lungs. And ultimately, you, you can't breathe. But the point he makes in this paper of his is that it's your lungs you got to worry about. So that means you have to think of the orifices in your body that are, that are, that are our gateway to the lungs. And that means the nose, the mouth. I mean, I've heard it said that the ears are also relevant and the eyes are also relevant. I don't, I don't know if that's as true as the nose and the mouth. Because if you touch your nose and you breathe in the molecule, then it's going to wind up by the breathing process in your lungs. And the same thing, maybe not exactly the same way, if you take in something in your mouth. So how do you stop that? Well, obviously, there's a lot of things that we can talk about regarding that. The other thing is the Yeah, it is important to mention that your eyes can receive this, this virus very easily. That's why CDC and Dr. Fauci from the, you know, director, he's the national director of the infectious disease. He has said, don't touch your eyes with your fingers, keep, you know, keep your fingers away from your face and your eyes are included in that. Yeah, that's why health care workers, not only where they're in 95 masks, but they're also wearing face masks or very tight goggles to protect their eyes, the membranes from from transmission of this virus into their eyes. Yeah, so let's talk about how the virus sheds and how it gets into your body. And I think it's very interesting. So it's this is not like airborne. It is it is born in your droplets that you send out when you speak or cough or sneeze. Those droplets have a substantial range. They can go you know, I don't know many feet before they drop to the ground. And it's that is the zone of danger. So if you're near somebody who's coughing or sneezing or even speaking close up, you're, you know, you might get you might you might have the virus thrown at you. And those droplets are the virus surrounded by a little film of lipid oil, a little oil, and the ultimately the the oil protects the virus against, you know, things that might stop it, and then winds up in your lungs and does its work. So the question is, you know, how does that virus get on you in the course of your daily life? Well, if you're sitting two or three feet away from somebody who has a virus and he's speaking at you, you're in the line of fire for sure. It's four or five or six feet, maybe less so, but still we don't know exactly how far the virus will travel from somebody who's speaking. If it's sneezing, it's probably, you know, much further distance because, you know, they're being projected by the sneeze or the cough. Same thing. And then it gets on your gets on you. It may not go directly into your mouth, your nose, your eyes or your ears for that matter. But it gets on your face. And I think that's one of the big pieces about touching your face and trying to have a trying to have a mask on the average person touches his face according to this paper. What is it? I want to say 190 times a day 190 times a day. And if you touch your face in one place with the virus is sitting, for example, on your cheek. And then you touch your mouth or your nose or your eyes would have you. Then the virus will find a way into your lungs. So the answer is to, you know, one, keep it off your face. I guess a face mask would help. Although there's so much discussion about how much it would help somebody who's trying to avoid the disease. And two, keep washing your hands so that if you do have the virus on your hands from no matter what source, including a projection from speaking or sneezing or coughing, then, you know, you don't want to your hand stuff the virus on. So you wash your hands and then when you touch your faces, less likely you're going to be transmitting a virus. What would you add to that? I would add that I believe the CDC is saying that a face mask is not effective. And the reason being is because these N95 masks, they're custom fitted when a health care worker has these masks on, they have they have been custom fit, which is to say they put a bag over their head and gas is kind of injected in the bag. And when that health care worker has the mask on, if they if they taste any flavoring from that gas, then they know that that fit, that mask that's been fitted to that particular health care workers face is inadequate. It's not properly fitted. So that's the protocol or that's the testing that they have to go through to have just one mask put on. So when you see everyone walking around with an N95 mask, chances are it's not been properly fitted and chances are it's not to be as effective as that individual may think. And that's why they're saying try not to hoard these masks because these masks are necessary for the health care workers. And, you know, they're in short supply right now. Yeah, and, you know, they say also that the the mask is more helpful for somebody on the other side of it, not necessarily the one who's wearing it because if I have the virus, and I cough into the mask, it's not going to, you know, shoot across the room. So that's that's helpful to the people on the other side of the room. The other thing is if you don't put the mask on tight, and you wind up touching your face, the mask of no value whatsoever. So I'm not sure I'd run around and get a lot of masks or hoard masks or or even, you know, pay big bucks for masks, because you can bypass all of that. Well, not all of it, but some of the risk anyway, by simply not touching your face. Now, what's interesting is you and me, Tim, we sit in front of the camera here like today, and we our face may itch. Our nose may itch. But we have learned not to touch our face, not to turn, touch our nose, because it looks ridiculous on the camera. You want to avoid doing that while you're doing a talk show. You and I have been doing talk shows for a long time. And we know this. Don't touch your face. Okay. Well, we have the discipline, but it does take some willpower. And if you don't think about it, if you're not disciplined about it, you will touch your face. You'll touch your nose, you'll touch your around your mouth, you touch your eyes, who knows what. And it's it's it's developing. And this is my this is my cut on it anyway. It's developing that discipline. We don't touch yourself. And thus, you know, you cut out a lot of the risk, or at least some substantial part of the risk of putting virus on your face. One more question before the break, Tim. And that is let's talk about vulnerabilities. It seems the emerging and this may change, but it seems to be emerging that if you're elderly, and I guess that means over a certain age, but the age is different in everything you read, what ages is the right age. But let's say elderly, and your and or your community, your immune system is compromised in some way, by reason of some other, you know, condition like diabetes. Then, you know, you're, you're you're much more exposed to the the final state of it, that is the the pneumonia state, which will kill you. But if you're a kid, some reason, although, you know, kids are affected by the, you know, the generic flu. They're not so affected by the coronavirus. They managed to get through it. And there's not a lot of reported cases of kids having coronavirus. What would you add to that? I would add that the doctor who tried to warn the public in China about this virus of himself caught the virus and he died and he was certainly under 40 years old. So there's exceptions to every, there's exceptions to all guidelines. And it's, you know, I've heard some financial shows on TV. And they're saying, oh, if you're under 50, you know, don't worry about it to go out there and don't think twice about it. And by all means, keep buying stock. You know, so it's this gonna be the 50 year over crowd that's gonna hit be hit by this and don't worry about it. So I found out a little off pudding. And I thought it was bad advice, you know, just so they can float the market and keep, you know, keep their own shirts on in their own investments from going down. Yeah, I think everyone has to be concerned and certainly by as a parent, I'd be very, very concerned for my children. And yeah, you're right, it's it seems to be hitting the older, you know, the older population. But like he said, there's exceptions for every guideline. And I think you'll find them with this particular virus. Yeah, this is not a time to take chances. It's because we don't know. We don't have the data, you know, nobody right now has the data of who's getting what and where and how and so forth. It's all guesswork right now. So for the moment, the best advice is be careful as you can. We can take a short break. We'll wash our hands during the break and come back in 30 seconds. And then we'll talk about the steps that are recommended and how good they are and how you can sort of visualize in your own world where the virus is and how to stay away from it and how to improve your chances. We'll be right back. Okay, we're back. We're live with a Corona watch. Important that we do this show because there's so much news about it. And because the news is changing day to day, even hour to hour. So Tim Apachele and I will talk about it once every two weeks and sort of catch up on what we've learned by watching into the interim. So, you know, one of the things, and this goes back to James Robb's paper, is, you know, what can you do to visualize where those buggers are, where the virus is in your world? It's not like you can shine a light on an ultraviolet light and see it there, but you have to imagine your mind where the risk is. So, for example, if somebody sneezes or coughs, and you know, of course, if he's been to China, or if he's been with people from China, that increase, but you don't know. You only know that he sneezes or coughs, and you have to make the best guess you can on a deductive basis. So, what do you do about that? You have to imagine in the world around us that surfaces are, they got virus on them. Some have greater likelihood than others. So, you have to clean those surfaces. And because the virus is surrounded by a lipid oil, an oil, you have to use materials that will get through the oil, expose the virus to the air, and the virus is then weakened or killed. I mean, this is what I've heard. So, what does that mean? That means, what? It means a solvent. It means some kind of cleaning, cleaning, a solvent. Alcohol comes to mind. And a spray bottle. And if you want to be, you know, careful, you would go around to any surface that you felt might be exposed, and spray it with alcohol. And that ideally, at least in your mind's eye, will minimize or reduce the risk. That's one thing. And that's kind of interesting because you don't know how long the virus lasts on that surface. I saw one piece that said, well, if it's metal, it lasts longer than cloth. That doesn't seem logical. I would say cloth would last longer than metal. And that piece said, and I don't believe this either, that it would last between six and 12 hours before it, you know, dies of its own in the air. I don't think that's true either. I think it's more likely days. And so it's really important to see the risk not only on your skin, on your face, on your hands, but on anything your hands might touch. And so if you're living in a, you know, in a place you want to be safe, you have to go around, look at all the surfaces your hands might touch. What do you think? I think you did correct on this. And the bottom line is this is the psychological aspect of this virus and the concern and the fear that is causing the stock market to drop 3000 points. And that is the absence of the consumer in grocery stores, the absence of the consumer in, in stores, you know, hardware stores and restaurants and bakeries and everything. And that's why you're starting to see restaurants not have the business they once were having. And again, to ignore it would be foolhardy, but at the same time, you can't just lock yourself away and, you know, be a prisoner of your own home. So there's there's a balance. There's a medium there. And I think proper precautions and washing the hands is the greatest advice I think anyone's offering right now and CDC included. But that is, that is the psychological aspect of this particular coronavirus. And that's got people concerned. That's why we are going to see a financial impact to the markets because consumerism is going to fall off airplane travel when I was just traveling from Seattle, excuse me, from Honolulu to Seattle. There wasn't a person that didn't have, except for myself, that didn't have a sandy wipe with them, wiping down the tray tables and the seats in front of them. Everyone was doing it. I was amazed. And that was that was five, six days ago. So it's only taken off since then and from there. Well, the airlines are spraying the, you know, the passenger space is probably the cockpit too. They don't want to lose their staff with some some kind of solvent. Maybe it's alcohol in order to try to minimize the risk. And so you say, well, okay, they did the armrests and they did the any surface I might touch, which is anything in the plane, because sometimes you cannot control what you're touching in the plane, you know, open the luggage rack on the top, your hands are there and so forth. So you know, query do I stop traveling? I go to the store, I'm picking up a pomegranate, you know, I touch the pomegranate. The next guy comes around, he touches the pomegranate. I've just arguably I've just transferred the virus to him. So I think it's a matter of defining your space. It's a matter of making sure that what you that when you touch something, you're somewhat careful about it. And and ultimately, when you get back in a controlled situation, you're washing your hands, you're not touching your face. And you keep your situation, including your surfaces around you clean by using some kind of solvent on this isn't so easy. This is a change in life. But we don't know enough yet to know where it really lives and how it really and for how long it lives and what its properties and characteristics are. We don't know. And I went somebody has to be accumulating data and making an analysis of it for us to know. And in the end, I think this is probably what will be the most important thing that people are informed on how to conduct their lives. And I think they have to recognize that they will have to change their lives. You know, for example, here at Think Tech, we we say hi to people. And we like people. We really like people. And they extend their handout because they want to shake. What do you think about shaking hands, Tim? I'm a fist bump kind of guy. I have been for quite a while now. And I'm not a germaphobe, but I, you know, in this current environment, I'll be greeting someone with a fist bump. I've seen the elbow to elbow suggestion. And that's just not going to happen with me. I'm sorry, it's just it's too much. And quite frankly, it looks too ridiculous. So I'll fist bump someone. And that'll be my form of greeting. Yeah, we had Sanford Marata here for a talk show yesterday. He talked about Japanese pottery. And so I was saying goodbye to him. I said, I'm reluctant to shake your hand even though I want to. And he said, no need to do a Japanese bow from the waist. It's very respectful. It's affectionate. And it doesn't involve any touching at all. So I've been doing bows from the waist. And you know, Tim, people appreciate that they like it. They think it's very affectionate and respectful. So when when this show concludes, I will be giving you a little namaste bow. Yeah, but don't touch your face. Well, I think our world is changing around us. And I think we, you know, as in all changes, you know, the government has to be, you know, careful and has to analyze things and learn things and bring people in who are competent to learn things and advise us. And we have to get good advice and candid advice. We cannot we cannot deal on lies. We have to have the real deal. It's like every other disease, we have to have the real deal. I think that's one of our, you know, missions here on Corona Watch that we provide what we know as, you know, the best information that has come to us. And that we tell people what's going on and hopefully they will, they will help moderate their risk in this until we have a cure or a vaccine. And hopefully we'll have that soon. So what would you in general, what would you advise people, Tim, about how to how to deal with the fear that comes out of this, how to deal with fear for family, how to deal with the issue of going to work or not getting on a plane or not, changing your lifestyle or not. What's your well for me, for me, when there's a vacuum of information, we as human beings can't help but fill that vacuum with our assumptions with rumors, with things we've heard that may or may not be correct. And that's what we do as human beings. My suggestion is, pay attention, you know, read up on the CDC. What is the current recommendations? What what are you hearing there from from the experts and from a factual standpoint, not from old wives tales about how to avoid these sort of things. That's number one and two is, I think you just have to follow the basics and put touching your face and washing your hands often and, you know, avoid the obvious if someone's sick, you know, stay six feet away from them. And hopefully the person who's sick, maybe they'll stay at home. You know, maybe they don't have a lot of sick time, but too bad. Stay home. Don't infect your coworkers. You know, these are common sense things that we've taken place with the flu and the common code that we just fail to practice. So now it's starting. It's time to practice that which we already know. Right. That's my recommendation and to apply critical thinking as we should for all news and all information to separate the wheat from the chat. Thank you so much, Tim. We'll do this again soon. This is Corona watch on think tech. We'll be back. I'm going to give you a fist bump. Yeah. Thank you very much. There it is.