[Genuine Realist]

The gist of my post was that the most insouciant people I know aren't social media trolls, but MD's. It's a brand new flu, but diseases themselves are nothing new. That's the essence of the reaction, which amounts to a shrug.

Boy, it is hard to get a handle on this.

Not really if you are following what the scientists are saying.  There are plenty of people in full on denial about this, and my social media feeds are full of dismissive and factually incorrect statements about the virus, some even from medical workers.  But I think that they are just not following it closely or do not understand how diseases spread (being a medical doctor does not make you an expert in epidemiology or statistical modeling of disease spread).  

Unfortunately, I think it's going to take Wuhan-type numbers of cases before most Americans come around to what we're up against.  Hopefully I'm wrong.
[/quote]

[Genuine Realist]

The gist of my post was that the most insouciant people I know aren't social media trolls, but MD's. It's a brand new flu, but diseases themselves are nothing new. That's the essence of the reaction, which amounts to a shrug.

Boy, it is hard to get a handle on this.

Not really if you are following what the scientists are saying.  There are plenty of people in full on denial about this, and my social media feeds are full of dismissive and factually incorrect statements about the virus, some even from medical workers.  But I think that they are just not following it closely or do not understand how diseases spread (being a medical doctor does not make you an expert in epidemiology or statistical modeling of disease spread).  

Unfortunately, I think it's going to take Wuhan-type numbers of cases before most Americans come around to what we're up against.  Hopefully I'm wrong.
[/quote]