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Today's Topics:
1. Coronavirus (hostilius)
2. NAM-IP computer museum in Belgium (Christophe Ponsard)
3. Re: Coronavirus (Gerry Demaret)
4. Re: Coronavirus (Daniel Pocock)
5. Re: Coronavirus (Jasper Nuyens)
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Message: 1
Date: Mon, 27 Jan 2020 16:51:28 +0000
From: hostilius <hostilius@protonmail.ch>
To: "fosdem@lists.fosdem.org" <fosdem@lists.fosdem.org>
Subject: [FOSDEM] Coronavirus
Message-ID:
<r-ZoeyJkNtNje_9bEeu-bU6VIN0yNuvk75xle4Tcvpoi92z2IaQU32iSsLGryaFhcxHg_t1o-qkDu-vJePgVvDZzATWeuJ6yYJj87pu-gms=@protonmail.ch>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
Hello,
Fosdem brings together people from many places all over the world,
which is awesome. But the timing of this year's Fosdem is unfortunate.
I suggest to discuss the potential effect of the Coronavirus (2019nCov)
on Fosdem, and potential measures.
The new virus appears to be transmittable from person to person, even by
people not showing any symptoms yet (this is different from the SARS
2002 virus).
Based on today's reports from Hong Kong university, the virus might have
an incubation period around 10 days. Currently 44000 people are
estimated to be infected (not yet sick), and that number might double
every 6 days.
The city of Wuhan (11 million inhabitants) was put under lockdown on
Jan 23. However, it is estimated that 5 million people were able to
leave the city prior to the lockdown.
I think this means, it's currently unknown how successful the quarantine
effort is.
Another developer conference by a large Telco, that was originally
planned to take place mid February in Shenzen (more than 1000 km away
from Wuhan), was already canceled.
How likely is it that the virus might already be spreading
internationally, with the majority of cases still being unnoticed,
because of the long incubation period?
How likely is it that the virus reaches the Fosdem venue and that many
attendees will catch it, thereby putting themselves at risk,
and further contributing to a quick international distribution?
Kind Regards,
a regular Fosdem visitor.
Sent with [ProtonMail](https://protonmail.com) Secure Email.
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Message: 2
Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2020 09:25:35 +0100
From: Christophe Ponsard <christophe.ponsard@gmail.com>
To: fosdem@lists.fosdem.org
Cc: info@nam-ip.be, christophe.ponsard@unamur.be
Subject: [FOSDEM] NAM-IP computer museum in Belgium
Message-ID:
<CAEOAzGP4xGOJMCo9i9WmwfA15JG+ewnBPzMQQfiDR2nyCVTrSw@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
dear FOSDEM visitors
if you plan to come to FOSDEM (very soon now) and are still looking for
interesting & computer related things to do,
you can consider visiting NAM-IP, a recent computer museum near Namur
(about 50km South of Brussels)
NAM stands for "Numerical Artifact Museum" but is close to name of the
hosting city
featuring a rare Hollerith tabulator (1890), Bull mecanography, mainframes
from the 60's (temporary exposition) and computer evolution until now
warning for us, software guys: no historical software running in the
current exhibitions (some mecanography demo possible though)
there are also some artefacts related to Multics
website: http://www.nam-ip.be/
opening hours & how to reach: http://www.nam-ip.be/NAM-IP-InfPrat.html
website is only French and Dutch but English booklets are available with QR
code scanning
guided tours may also be organised (contact animation@nam-ip.be or me to
see if possible)
I also plan to attend FOSDEM (the history track among others ;--)
Happy FOSDEM for those attending (physically or remotely) !
Christophe
--
*Christophe PONSARD*
NAM-IP Volunteer
*NAM-IP*
email: info@nam-ip.be
http://www.nam-ip.be/
Rue Henri Blès 192A
B5000 Namur (Salzinnes) - Belgium
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Message: 3
Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2020 14:21:39 +0100
From: Gerry Demaret <gerry@fosdem.org>
To: FOSDEM Visitors <fosdem@lists.fosdem.org>
Subject: Re: [FOSDEM] Coronavirus
Message-ID: <b4a674c0-e122-708f-83b8-74c235514fdf@fosdem.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8
On 1/27/20 5:51 PM, hostilius wrote:
> Fosdem brings together people from many places all over the world,
> which is awesome. But the timing of this year's Fosdem is unfortunate.
>
> I suggest to discuss the potential effect of the Coronavirus (2019nCov)
> on Fosdem, and potential measures.
Dear submitter, dear FOSDEM visitors,
Thank you for voicing your concerns.
There is currently no indication that there is a need for concern about
2019-nCoV spreading to attendees at the conference. The Belgian
authorities are closely monitoring the situation, and are prepared to
react quickly should a suspected case pop up:
<https://www.belgium.be/en/news/2020/coronavirus_outbreak_current_status>
We suggest our visitors follow the standard recommendations published by
the World Health Organization (WHO) to reduce exposure to and
transmission of a range of illnesses:
<https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/advice-for-public>
As always, any participant feeling unwell (regardless of 2019-nCoV)
should reconsider their attendance in person.
Best wishes,
Gerry
------------------------------
Message: 4
Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2020 15:09:44 +0100
From: Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro>
To: fosdem@lists.fosdem.org
Subject: Re: [FOSDEM] Coronavirus
Message-ID: <2506d42c-eaac-81e1-a88e-128e3a4a62d0@pocock.pro>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8
On 29/01/2020 14:21, Gerry Demaret wrote:
> On 1/27/20 5:51 PM, hostilius wrote:
>> Fosdem brings together people from many places all over the world,
>> which is awesome. But the timing of this year's Fosdem is unfortunate.
>>
>> I suggest to discuss the potential effect of the Coronavirus (2019nCov)
>> on Fosdem, and potential measures.
>
> Dear submitter, dear FOSDEM visitors,
>
> Thank you for voicing your concerns.
>
> There is currently no indication that there is a need for concern about
> 2019-nCoV spreading to attendees at the conference. The Belgian
> authorities are closely monitoring the situation, and are prepared to
> react quickly should a suspected case pop up:
>
> <https://www.belgium.be/en/news/2020/coronavirus_outbreak_current_status>
>
> We suggest our visitors follow the standard recommendations published by
> the World Health Organization (WHO) to reduce exposure to and
> transmission of a range of illnesses:
>
> <https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/advice-for-public>
>
> As always, any participant feeling unwell (regardless of 2019-nCoV)
> should reconsider their attendance in person.
>
The WHO advice says to avoid contact with people who exhibit symptoms
This press report, based on two papers published in The Lancet, suggests
that people can transmit the virus /before/ they exhibit symptoms
https://www.statnews.com/2020/01/24/coronavirus-infections-no-symptoms-lancet-studies/
If those reports are true, FOSDEM's legendary beer night and packed
corridors at ULB appear to be a higher risk environment than a normal
workplace.
The recent case of human-human transmissions in Germany:
- worker came from China to Germany with no symptoms
- Chinese worker gave training, still no symptoms
- Chinese worker returned to China, started feeling sick on flight
- 4 German workers confirmed with infection
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-health-germany-infections-idUSKBN1ZR2O1
Given the evidence above and also the massive gaps in evidence, this is
a serious ethical issue for the organizers and each participant to
contemplate.
There are some serious administrative questions, for example, if people
have already booked non-refundable flights and they decide not to
attend, will Free Software organizations still reimburse their tickets?
It would be good to see all the organizations who give sponsorship
giving their volunteers a free choice in this matter.
For those who are devroom organizers, do we make an extra effort to
offer RTC participation for speakers who choose not to attend? To avoid
going off-topic, we could discuss that on a thread on the FreeRTC list
https://lists.freertc.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss
and try to develop a list of last-minute RTC options for any event in
the same situation.
Regards,
Daniel
------------------------------
Message: 5
Date: Wed, 29 Jan 2020 15:10:17 +0100
From: Jasper Nuyens <jnuyens@linuxbe.com>
To: hostilius <hostilius@protonmail.ch>
Cc: "fosdem@lists.fosdem.org" <fosdem@lists.fosdem.org>
Subject: Re: [FOSDEM] Coronavirus
Message-ID:
<CADayN0=9Eo6KvB5O-zJtDudnu-Tg817z25h87C5vv+pS+Dn9-g@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
Dear,
Sadly, not all of your questions can be answered fully scientifically
yet. I guess it's a risk assessment.
As an added fact in Belgium, the normal seasonal flu will reach
epidemic proportions in a week or 2.
The initial symptoms of the novel coronavirus pneumonia are similar,
it will make differentiation by health workers more difficult.
Travel from China occurs through Brussels airport, and - baffling -
the government does not perform screening or quarantine measures nor
informs about it. On this website, you can see the planned arrivals:
https://www.brusselsairport.be/en/passengers
If one has the seasonal flu; please be responsible to not spread it at
FOSDEM and complicate matters further.
If one has had potential contact with people coming from one of the
affected regions 3 days before the event - even without any symptoms
or fever - please act responsibly and quarantine yourself; typically
after 3 days flu-like symptoms develop, after 8 days hospital
treatment becomes necessary due to breathing difficulty and other
problems - this is a deadly virus with a high mortality rate (still
uncertain how much exactly) and with a high strain on the health care
system (2-3 weeks in ICU with breathing machines are required for a
significant part of the infected people).
Dust or paint masks rated 'P3' can still be found at some hardware
stores in Belgium and offer adequate protection in combination with
goggles. All pharmacies in Belgium are sold out since yesterday. Lower
rated masks might protect others against your potential carrying of
disease as less droplets will be spread in the environment and could
be a good idea - if you manage to get hold of them. Don't forget that
masks are now mandatory when going outside in the regions in China who
were in a similar situation than us - Europeans - less than a month
ago.
Wash hands regularly, do not touch your nose or mouth, use
chlorine-warter 'javel' to clean potential virus locations (door
handles and such).
As the virus might be circulating undetected for over 10 days, and
transmission from one victim to 15 others isn't uncommon - after which
they become infectious quickly - it cannot be ruled out that the virus
might be circulating in Brussels in low numbers by the end of this
week (or even now).
The exponential growth of confirmed cases in China indicates what
could happen here - in a short timeframe.
HOWEVER; there have not been any confirmed cases in Belgium yet. And
from 1 case to 100 cases takes a while - after that,... well, we see
how it develops in China now. So FOSDEM might be over before things
get seriously in Belgium with respect to this virus.
Personally, I got the seasonal flue today, but I already decided the
risk wasn't worth it for me, and I will only give my presentation
about FreedomEV 2.0 (Tesla Hacking and free software on Electric
Vehicles) if I can do that remotely (probably not).
Ultimately it is everybody's own responsibility to decide what to do,
I kindly ask to properly inform yourself with respect to this matter.
And I sincerely hope that I am mostly wrong about my assessment.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novel_coronavirus_(2019-nCoV)
Greetings,
Jasper
--
Jasper Nuyens
Managing Director, Linux Belgium
http://www.linuxbe.com
Phone: +32 (0)2 747 47 01
Fax: +32 (0)2 747 47 10
GSM: +32 (0)478 978967
On Wed, Jan 29, 2020 at 1:43 PM hostilius <hostilius@protonmail.ch> wrote:
>
> Hello,
>
> Fosdem brings together people from many places all over the world,
> which is awesome. But the timing of this year's Fosdem is unfortunate.
>
> I suggest to discuss the potential effect of the Coronavirus (2019nCov)
> on Fosdem, and potential measures.
>
> The new virus appears to be transmittable from person to person, even by
> people not showing any symptoms yet (this is different from the SARS
> 2002 virus).
>
> Based on today's reports from Hong Kong university, the virus might have
> an incubation period around 10 days. Currently 44000 people are
> estimated to be infected (not yet sick), and that number might double
> every 6 days.
>
> The city of Wuhan (11 million inhabitants) was put under lockdown on
> Jan 23. However, it is estimated that 5 million people were able to
> leave the city prior to the lockdown.
>
> I think this means, it's currently unknown how successful the quarantine
> effort is.
>
> Another developer conference by a large Telco, that was originally
> planned to take place mid February in Shenzen (more than 1000 km away
> from Wuhan), was already canceled.
>
> How likely is it that the virus might already be spreading
> internationally, with the majority of cases still being unnoticed,
> because of the long incubation period?
>
> How likely is it that the virus reaches the Fosdem venue and that many
> attendees will catch it, thereby putting themselves at risk,
> and further contributing to a quick international distribution?
>
> Kind Regards,
> a regular Fosdem visitor.
>
>
>
> Sent with ProtonMail Secure Email.
>
> _______________________________________________
> FOSDEM mailing list
> FOSDEM@lists.fosdem.org
> https://lists.fosdem.org/listinfo/fosdem
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