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.
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
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-lance... 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-idUSKBN1Z... 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
On 29/01/2020 15:09, Daniel Pocock wrote:
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-lance...
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-idUSKBN1Z...
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.
One further point, if you want to help or if you know somebody with the skills, the WHO just started recruiting temporary staff to work on health emergency preparedness: https://careers.who.int/careersection/ex/jobdetail.ftl?job=1905880&tz=GMT%2B01%3A00&tzname=Europe%2FZurich Regards, Daniel
Hello Gerry, thanks for your response. Although there are no reported cases in Belgium yet, the general risk applies, some attendees traveling to Fosdem might have already caught the virus elsewhere, without knowing, without feeling unwell. Currently the WHO is in a meeting, and will decide if it's necessary to declare a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC). An announcement is expected later today (Thursday), at 19:30 Brussels time, hopefully they will provide updated recommendations. Kind Regards
On 30/01/2020 15:34, hostilius wrote:
Hello Gerry,
thanks for your response.
Although there are no reported cases in Belgium yet, the general risk applies, some attendees traveling to Fosdem might have already caught the virus elsewhere, without knowing, without feeling unwell.
Currently the WHO is in a meeting, and will decide if it's necessary to declare a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).
An announcement is expected later today (Thursday), at 19:30 Brussels time, hopefully they will provide updated recommendations.
I got some more information to share and please don't accuse me of spreading fake news or contradictions because it is already obvious to me that some of this is contradictory. Different countries now have different attitudes to the virus. Russia is now discouraging public gatherings. Just as FOSDEM celebrates 20 years of freedom, McDonald's in Moscow was about to celebrate 30 years with free hamburgers. Their party is cancelled on the basis that a large public gathering is a health risk: https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-china-health-russia-mcdonald-s-corp/russia... In the WHO press briefing tonight, they didn't mention Russia but they said countries who make restrictions on borders or trade need to make decisions based on facts rather than fear. The main points from the WHO: - there is now an official international emergency - but they explicitly don't recommend any prohibition on travel and trade, in other words, they give FOSDEM organizers a clear GO! Beer night is GO! They repeated this point several times. The stats, from various sources: the risk of death (2%) is actually a lot lower than SARS (10%), the bigger challenge is the rapid spread and the fact that people spread the virus without showing symptoms. Some doctors are giving medical notes to people who want to cancel work-related travel, usually on the grounds that they don't want to use airports. If anybody doesn't trust the WHO, feel free to ask your doctor for a medical note. Some speakers commented they will only check the news and decide before going to the airport (e.g. Friday 3pm) and if they cancel, devroom managers won't have a lot of time to replace them. Looking at FOSDEM demographics, a lot of speakers are frequent travelers who use airports every week. What are the chances that 1 in 5,000 people contracted the virus in an airport in the last 7 days? Every conference is unique. FOSDEM visitors use every hotel in Brussels. Even if just one hotel is quarantined (like the cruise ship in Italy and hotels in NYC and UK today), some of us will be impacted. Many of these appear to be false alarms but everybody still has to wait in quarantine for confirmation. No Coronavirus there, but still a huge inconvenience. Some people may choose to stay away because of the risk that their hotel or aircraft will be accidentally quarantined for a day rather than risk of the virus itself. Regards, Daniel
Thank you Daniel for your multi-angled and nuanced analysis, I am very confused by the pro-travel statement by the WHO, I was expecting something completely different in light of the epidemical analyses and clinical characteristics. I agree with your analysis, except from your remark about the mortality rate. There is no indication (except from hearsay) that this is anything less than the 9.5% of SARS; on the contrary. The exact mortality rate is in this stage unclear, but it seems to be more than 11%: 11% of the early 99 patients died, but only 31% is - as of today - discharged; 58% still remain in the hospital, so the casualties amongst this group could still increase the percentage. These numbers also depends on access to decently equipped Intensive Care Units (ICU) - which is very problematic with the number of already confirmed cases: now at 8163 in China, with an additional 12167 identified probable cases; more than 20.000 people. Add to that that the number of cases have doubled every 2 days till today - and that they can remain undetected for 10 days. A grim outlook. https://3g.dxy.cn/newh5/view/pneumonia About 75% of these people will get a double pneumonia and more than 10% will need mechanical ventilation for survival. Because of these enormous amount of infected people, the organisational constraints can make the mortality go up instead of down, some doctors believe it might become 30%. But it's hard to tell at this stage, there are also reasons why the mortality can go down (see next). The most comprehensive clinical study to date can be found here (The Lancet publishes updated versions regularly): https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30211-7/f... On a positive note, China is experimenting with a lot of different approved drugs which might be affective against this disease - this has the potential to reduce the mortality rate and is a sparkle of hope. Hopefully, we get lucky and will this lead to an optimised way to deal with infected people with a lesser need of ICU dependency. https://innophore.com/2019-ncov/ What would the people in Wuhan say if asked if there should have been quick and more drastic countermeasures? I believe we are getting in that situation now (but maybe it will take another week or even two to get into that situation). With respect to FOSDEM, we all know how crowded it can be. I do believe the individual risk of infection this weekend is still very low. But there needs to be only one person who picked it up, passing through Brussels Airport or from another international hub. Personally, I just prefer to be too cautious instead of otherwise, 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 Thu, Jan 30, 2020 at 9:16 PM Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro> wrote:
On 30/01/2020 15:34, hostilius wrote:
Hello Gerry,
thanks for your response.
Although there are no reported cases in Belgium yet, the general risk applies, some attendees traveling to Fosdem might have already caught the virus elsewhere, without knowing, without feeling unwell.
Currently the WHO is in a meeting, and will decide if it's necessary to declare a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC).
An announcement is expected later today (Thursday), at 19:30 Brussels time, hopefully they will provide updated recommendations.
I got some more information to share and please don't accuse me of spreading fake news or contradictions because it is already obvious to me that some of this is contradictory.
Different countries now have different attitudes to the virus. Russia is now discouraging public gatherings. Just as FOSDEM celebrates 20 years of freedom, McDonald's in Moscow was about to celebrate 30 years with free hamburgers. Their party is cancelled on the basis that a large public gathering is a health risk: https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-china-health-russia-mcdonald-s-corp/russia...
In the WHO press briefing tonight, they didn't mention Russia but they said countries who make restrictions on borders or trade need to make decisions based on facts rather than fear.
The main points from the WHO:
- there is now an official international emergency
- but they explicitly don't recommend any prohibition on travel and trade, in other words, they give FOSDEM organizers a clear GO! Beer night is GO! They repeated this point several times.
The stats, from various sources: the risk of death (2%) is actually a lot lower than SARS (10%), the bigger challenge is the rapid spread and the fact that people spread the virus without showing symptoms.
Some doctors are giving medical notes to people who want to cancel work-related travel, usually on the grounds that they don't want to use airports. If anybody doesn't trust the WHO, feel free to ask your doctor for a medical note.
Some speakers commented they will only check the news and decide before going to the airport (e.g. Friday 3pm) and if they cancel, devroom managers won't have a lot of time to replace them.
Looking at FOSDEM demographics, a lot of speakers are frequent travelers who use airports every week. What are the chances that 1 in 5,000 people contracted the virus in an airport in the last 7 days? Every conference is unique.
FOSDEM visitors use every hotel in Brussels. Even if just one hotel is quarantined (like the cruise ship in Italy and hotels in NYC and UK today), some of us will be impacted. Many of these appear to be false alarms but everybody still has to wait in quarantine for confirmation.
No Coronavirus there, but still a huge inconvenience. Some people may choose to stay away because of the risk that their hotel or aircraft will be accidentally quarantined for a day rather than risk of the virus itself.
Regards,
Daniel _______________________________________________ FOSDEM mailing list FOSDEM@lists.fosdem.org https://lists.fosdem.org/listinfo/fosdem
On 31/01/2020 00:12, Jasper Nuyens wrote:
I agree with your analysis, except from your remark about the mortality rate. There is no indication (except from hearsay) that this is anything less than the 9.5% of SARS; on the contrary. The exact mortality rate is in this stage unclear, but it seems to be more than 11%: 11% of the early 99 patients died, but only 31% is - as of today - discharged; 58% still remain in the hospital, so the casualties amongst this group could still increase the percentage. These numbers also depends on access to decently equipped Intensive Care Units (ICU) - which is very problematic with the number of
That is an excellent point and it came up indirectly in the WHO press conference They explained that the main reason for a state of emergency is not because of China (who can build new hospitals in just 10 days) but because of their fear that other countries with less resources (less ICUs) will struggle. WHO also commented that China has committed to send resources to those countries. I feel that is very commendable from the Chinese but it will also be important to observe how well it works in practice, for example, in countries where the Chinese experts don't speak local languages or where local health practitioners have never worked with China before. To compare it to the larger free software organizations, people might die while bureaucrats have bun fights.
already confirmed cases: now at 8163 in China, with an additional 12167 identified probable cases; more than 20.000 people. Add to that that the number of cases have doubled every 2 days till today - and that they can remain undetected for 10 days. A grim outlook. https://3g.dxy.cn/newh5/view/pneumonia
The incubation period, where infected people display no symptoms, is particularly scary for me too A report today said that the rigorous screening at airports can only detect 33% of people with infection. The other 66% pass that screening and share the infection later. An Australian airline has just confirmed transmission between passengers on a domestic flight and they are now trying to track down the other 170 passengers for quarantine.
About 75% of these people will get a double pneumonia and more than 10% will need mechanical ventilation for survival. Because of these enormous amount of infected people, the organisational constraints can make the mortality go up instead of down, some doctors believe it might become 30%. But it's hard to tell at this stage, there are also reasons why the mortality can go down (see next). The most comprehensive clinical study to date can be found here (The Lancet publishes updated versions regularly): https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30211-7/f...
On a positive note, China is experimenting with a lot of different approved drugs which might be affective against this disease - this has the potential to reduce the mortality rate and is a sparkle of hope. Hopefully, we get lucky and will this lead to an optimised way to deal with infected people with a lesser need of ICU dependency. https://innophore.com/2019-ncov/
As the WHO emphasized tonight, the Chinese are taking it very seriously Even if they don't find the solution in China, the fact that Chinese cabinet ministers are on the ground in Wuhen (according to the WHO) shows they are committed to the issue. If this happened in the US, do you think the US president would visit ground zero or would he seek refuge at one of his golf courses? He might toss a coin to decide whether to blame Iran or Mexico for the problem.
What would the people in Wuhan say if asked if there should have been quick and more drastic countermeasures? I believe we are getting in that situation now (but maybe it will take another week or even two to get into that situation).
With respect to FOSDEM, we all know how crowded it can be. I do believe the individual risk of infection this weekend is still very low. But there needs to be only one person who picked it up, passing through Brussels Airport or from another international hub.
Personally, I just prefer to be too cautious instead of otherwise,
To be completely transparent, there are other factors in my life right now that might prevent me attending FOSDEM. Coronavirus is an uncertain risk that I am evaluating daily but the other factors are also evolving on a daily basis. I regard the WHO advice as useful but also political. Watching the press conference, I felt there was a bit of politics there. Their support for China was constructive. I also felt some bias: they suggest trade should not stop without facts. There is a niggling feeling I have: should that be inverted, should trade /not/ continue until we have facts? FOSDEM organizers have the last word of course. FOSDEM organizers could also take measures to reduce crowding, for example, cancelling all the booths and putting people on the external doors to control crowd levels in the buildings. Moving main track and keynote speakers out of the Novotel and spreading them around different hotels could also be a good N+1 strategy. Regards, Daniel
Dear, please have a look at this article: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30260-9/f... It matches with my own number crunching efforts and the less-than-exponential growth we see today in Wuhan as a result of the drastic measures they undertook there. This is a glimpse of hope. This evolution will be in vain and exponential growth will resume if similar 'extreme' measures will not be applied in other affected areas across the world. Let's take an example to the discipline and carefulness of the Chinese people to not infect others. I quote: "draconian measures that limit population mobility should be seriously and immediately considered in affected areas, as should strategies to drastically reduce within-population contact rates through cancellation of mass gatherings, school closures, and instituting work-from-home arrangements". Please contact your health and political representatives to take action sooner than later; as these will have exponential effects. It does take political courage to take hard and early measures; but it is necessary. The alternative strategy in the past - and educated to epidemiologists - has been to prevent mass panic by minimising the effects and spreads of a disease. But, as this disease spreads this fast, this strategy will be quickly obsoleted by,... mass panic. Ensuring the public can keep their trust in their elected officials who are supposed to protect them, is the best option. We have time now to prepare and act. I invite attendees to the international gathering at Fosdem to perform afterwards - as much as practically possible - a self imposed 2 week 'holiday at home' quarantine regime and the other safety measures as implemented in Wuhan, to limit possible transmissions. Thank you for considering this and preparing for what looks like drastic actions - my own numbers indicate the spread of this virus in Europe might only lag 3 weeks behind the spread in Wuhan - with a high variability (meaning a high impact of possible countermeasures). Chorine water (a Javel solution) can properly destroy this (and other) virus and can be used to to disinfect door handles and other often touched surfaces. Yet be careful for your eyes and skin with this. “BLEACH SOLUTION A simple and inexpensive way to keep your sick room clean is with a solution of bleach. Ordinary household bleach can be prepared in a strong (1:10) solution and a weaker (1:100) solution. The strong version is for disinfecting patient waste and for disinfecting spills of blood, mucus, or other bodily fluids. The weaker version is useful for disinfecting surfaces, bedding, medical equipment, and reusable protective clothing (which shall then be washed). It can also disinfect aprons, boots, and items to be thrown away. Yes, items you discard must be disinfected. To prepare a bleach solution, you’ll need: • A mixing container that can hold ten “measures.” For example, a ten-cup container. • Containers to hold the solutions (consider labels or separate colors for the 1:10 and 1:100 solutions). • Chlorine bleach • Clean water • A measuring cup or similar item Now, mark the mixing container at the 90 percent level. This will tell you the proper proportions for your mix. Then, pour water to the 90 percent level and add the rest with your bleach. You have just made your 1:10 solution. To make your 1:100 bleach solution, pour water to the 90[…]” Excerpt From: Joseph Alton. “The Ebola Survival Handbook: An MD Tells You What You Need to Know Now to Stay Safe”. Suggestion: I filled a flower spray with a weaker solution to be practical to disinfect received packages, door handles and other contact surfaces. On Fri, Jan 31, 2020 at 12:40 AM Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro> wrote:
On 31/01/2020 00:12, Jasper Nuyens wrote:
I agree with your analysis, except from your remark about the mortality rate. There is no indication (except from hearsay) that this is anything less than the 9.5% of SARS; on the contrary. The exact mortality rate is in this stage unclear, but it seems to be more than 11%: 11% of the early 99 patients died, but only 31% is - as of today - discharged; 58% still remain in the hospital, so the casualties amongst this group could still increase the percentage. These numbers also depends on access to decently equipped Intensive Care Units (ICU) - which is very problematic with the number of
That is an excellent point and it came up indirectly in the WHO press conference
They explained that the main reason for a state of emergency is not because of China (who can build new hospitals in just 10 days) but because of their fear that other countries with less resources (less ICUs) will struggle.
WHO also commented that China has committed to send resources to those countries. I feel that is very commendable from the Chinese but it will also be important to observe how well it works in practice, for example, in countries where the Chinese experts don't speak local languages or where local health practitioners have never worked with China before.
To compare it to the larger free software organizations, people might die while bureaucrats have bun fights.
already confirmed cases: now at 8163 in China, with an additional 12167 identified probable cases; more than 20.000 people. Add to that that the number of cases have doubled every 2 days till today - and that they can remain undetected for 10 days. A grim outlook. https://3g.dxy.cn/newh5/view/pneumonia
The incubation period, where infected people display no symptoms, is particularly scary for me too
A report today said that the rigorous screening at airports can only detect 33% of people with infection. The other 66% pass that screening and share the infection later.
An Australian airline has just confirmed transmission between passengers on a domestic flight and they are now trying to track down the other 170 passengers for quarantine.
About 75% of these people will get a double pneumonia and more than 10% will need mechanical ventilation for survival. Because of these enormous amount of infected people, the organisational constraints can make the mortality go up instead of down, some doctors believe it might become 30%. But it's hard to tell at this stage, there are also reasons why the mortality can go down (see next). The most comprehensive clinical study to date can be found here (The Lancet publishes updated versions regularly): https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30211-7/f...
On a positive note, China is experimenting with a lot of different approved drugs which might be affective against this disease - this has the potential to reduce the mortality rate and is a sparkle of hope. Hopefully, we get lucky and will this lead to an optimised way to deal with infected people with a lesser need of ICU dependency. https://innophore.com/2019-ncov/
As the WHO emphasized tonight, the Chinese are taking it very seriously
Even if they don't find the solution in China, the fact that Chinese cabinet ministers are on the ground in Wuhen (according to the WHO) shows they are committed to the issue.
If this happened in the US, do you think the US president would visit ground zero or would he seek refuge at one of his golf courses? He might toss a coin to decide whether to blame Iran or Mexico for the problem.
What would the people in Wuhan say if asked if there should have been quick and more drastic countermeasures? I believe we are getting in that situation now (but maybe it will take another week or even two to get into that situation).
With respect to FOSDEM, we all know how crowded it can be. I do believe the individual risk of infection this weekend is still very low. But there needs to be only one person who picked it up, passing through Brussels Airport or from another international hub.
Personally, I just prefer to be too cautious instead of otherwise,
To be completely transparent, there are other factors in my life right now that might prevent me attending FOSDEM. Coronavirus is an uncertain risk that I am evaluating daily but the other factors are also evolving on a daily basis.
I regard the WHO advice as useful but also political. Watching the press conference, I felt there was a bit of politics there. Their support for China was constructive.
I also felt some bias: they suggest trade should not stop without facts.
There is a niggling feeling I have: should that be inverted, should trade /not/ continue until we have facts?
FOSDEM organizers have the last word of course.
FOSDEM organizers could also take measures to reduce crowding, for example, cancelling all the booths and putting people on the external doors to control crowd levels in the buildings. Moving main track and keynote speakers out of the Novotel and spreading them around different hotels could also be a good N+1 strategy.
Regards,
Daniel
-- 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 01/02/2020 10:28, Jasper Nuyens wrote:
The alternative strategy in the past - and educated to epidemiologists - has been to prevent mass panic by minimising the effects and spreads of a disease. But, as this disease spreads this fast, this strategy will be quickly obsoleted by,... mass panic. Ensuring the public can keep their trust in their elected officials who are supposed to protect them, is the best option. We have time now to prepare and act.
In one piece of news that many people have yet to notice, Monash University has cancelled[1] 900 summer semester exams and delayed the start of the next semester. Monash is a bit bigger than ULB. It is home to one of Australia's top[2] medical schools and a lot of top researchers. There are experts in Australia's universities on a par with and maybe even ahead[3] of those at the WHO. If they are now taking these measures against mass gatherings then it needs careful attention. It is not clear to me why Monash would make such a statement for political reasons rather than scientific reasons. Regards, Daniel 1. https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/monash-uni-cancels-900-exams-dis... 2. https://www.braingainmag.com/the-top-10-australian-universities-for-medicine... 3. https://about.unimelb.edu.au/newsroom/news/2020/january/melbourne-scientists...
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
Dear all, 20 days have passed since Fosdem 2020, and nobody has reported to be hospitalised with a double pneumonia or as a confirmed COVID19 carrier. Because of this, I think we can be relieved that FOSDEM was early enough to have missed the pandemic spread of this virus and nobody got infected at this celebration of Freedom. I tend to say that one is either too early or is too late to take preventive measures, luckily it turned out to be too early. I'm so happy to have been wrong! As such, I want to apologise for spreading fear about the greatest OpenSource and Free Software event in the world. It seems that I owe you a beer - and I will provide that plentiful (as in free) at FOSDEM 2021! Obviously, there is no positive news about the worldwide spread or treatment of COVID19 yet, and I wish everybody a good health and strength to deal with this over the coming months! May the Source be with you! 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 3:10 PM Jasper Nuyens <jnuyens@linuxbe.com> wrote:
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
On 20/02/2020 11:56, Jasper Nuyens wrote:
Dear all,
20 days have passed since Fosdem 2020, and nobody has reported to be hospitalised with a double pneumonia or as a confirmed COVID19 carrier. Because of this, I think we can be relieved that FOSDEM was
Given the fact that so many people work remotely, we often never know what is happening in the health or other parts of their life. From time to time a community publishes an obituary for somebody but there have been (non-Coronavirus) cases where people passed away and it wasn't noticed for some time. Debian recently discovered[1] having over 101 developers with missing keys, nobody knows what has happened to some of these people. This is one of those challenging aspects of relationships in remote online communities.
early enough to have missed the pandemic spread of this virus and nobody got infected at this celebration of Freedom.
I tend to say that one is either too early or is too late to take preventive measures, luckily it turned out to be too early. I'm so happy to have been wrong!
As such, I want to apologise for spreading fear about the greatest OpenSource and Free Software event in the world. It seems that I owe you a beer - and I will provide that plentiful (as in free) at FOSDEM 2021!
Nobody thinks this was about spreading fear. I had the impression you raised the issue out of concern for the community and those we would have come into contact with post-FOSDEM. Incidentally, on the very same days it was discussed on the FOSDEM list, the British super-spreader passed[2] through Geneva airport for the second time. A number of other people he infected in France also passed through the airport as they returned to the UK and Spain. Had I traveled to Brussels that week, my path may well have crossed theirs as Geneva is the closest airport from my home in Lausanne. So I appreciate your warning about this. Regards, Daniel 1. https://lists.debian.org/debian-vote/2019/12/msg00218.html 2. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/10928686/coronavirus-businessman-super-spreade... -- Debian Developer https://danielpocock.com
Stereo type: most of hackers are not social animal, most of time stay in home. So that’s why we are not easy to get the virus? Best regards, -- Xianjun Jiao Senior researcher, imec-Gent university 210.007, IDLab, iGent, Technologiepark 126, 9052, Ghent, Belgium Mobile: +32 484 57 22 32<tel:+32%20484%2057%2022%2032> On Feb 20, 2020, at 14:59, Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro> wrote: On 20/02/2020 11:56, Jasper Nuyens wrote: Dear all, 20 days have passed since Fosdem 2020, and nobody has reported to be hospitalised with a double pneumonia or as a confirmed COVID19 carrier. Because of this, I think we can be relieved that FOSDEM was Given the fact that so many people work remotely, we often never know what is happening in the health or other parts of their life. From time to time a community publishes an obituary for somebody but there have been (non-Coronavirus) cases where people passed away and it wasn't noticed for some time. Debian recently discovered[1] having over 101 developers with missing keys, nobody knows what has happened to some of these people. This is one of those challenging aspects of relationships in remote online communities. early enough to have missed the pandemic spread of this virus and nobody got infected at this celebration of Freedom. I tend to say that one is either too early or is too late to take preventive measures, luckily it turned out to be too early. I'm so happy to have been wrong! As such, I want to apologise for spreading fear about the greatest OpenSource and Free Software event in the world. It seems that I owe you a beer - and I will provide that plentiful (as in free) at FOSDEM 2021! Nobody thinks this was about spreading fear. I had the impression you raised the issue out of concern for the community and those we would have come into contact with post-FOSDEM. Incidentally, on the very same days it was discussed on the FOSDEM list, the British super-spreader passed[2] through Geneva airport for the second time. A number of other people he infected in France also passed through the airport as they returned to the UK and Spain. Had I traveled to Brussels that week, my path may well have crossed theirs as Geneva is the closest airport from my home in Lausanne. So I appreciate your warning about this. Regards, Daniel 1. https://lists.debian.org/debian-vote/2019/12/msg00218.html 2. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/10928686/coronavirus-businessman-super-spreade... -- Debian Developer https://danielpocock.com _______________________________________________ FOSDEM mailing list FOSDEM@lists.fosdem.org https://lists.fosdem.org/listinfo/fosdem
Thank you Daniel, I have been following the various outbreaks of this virus, epidemiology and clinical features closely over the past weeks. Probably too much instead of focusing on improving FreedomEV; "Free software for electric vehicles". But I think this movie sums things up and should be watched by people who are misguided by mass media 'its like the flu'-reports. Downplaying the risks associated with this outbreak will only contribute to panic as people will lose their trust in the media and government: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JfKwiolUX8 On the other hand, there is also positive news coming from China (Google Translate copy/paste probably needed): https://news.163.com/20/0219/17/F5P0QH3E00018AOR.html This latest medical report has not been propagated to news channels yet (or health specialists here) and it shows a few interesting things: 1) Only 1% to 0,1% of the AIDS patients get infected - probably because they take the anti-viral medicine on a regular basis (this is given to COVID19 patients typically only long after onset), probably the earlier this is given, the better. One might consider providing this to a community to prevent the spread - although there are possible side effects (and I'm not a doctor). 2) Side remark: The number of cases in Wuhan of the general population must be much higher than 5% to notice this difference - meaning more than 1 million infected people now. 3) Oral/throat swabs are negative with 'recovered' people while their anal swabs are still positive. This is very important to prevent disease spreading by cases dismissed from the hospital. Toilet disinfection seems imperial too. 4) The positive treatment results of experimental Remdesivir are so spectacular that it is probably no longer ethical to give 1/3th of the patients placebo instead in the clinical trial. Hopefully Gilead Sciences and the Chinese clone Radixivir have already been started to ramp of volume production to a worldwide scale. This is super great news as it means less people will need Intensive Care (and if that's full, this equals to less death). I'm always an optimist, and prefer to look at hopeful information. The mass media distortion of the actual facts doesn't really help to prevent panic; I believe that only if one provides correct information such a panic can be avoided and trust can be maintained. If this crisis is handled properly; and with that I also mean that all countries including Iran should have access to Remdesivir and other medication - in contradiction with the US Export Restrictions - we might still be able to prevent hundreds of millions of deaths, we are all into this together. There is also some fabricated anti-chinese fake news circulating on Twitter - next to the fake Chinese government news - and that doesn't help to get the complete picture about the situation in Wuhan and what might come to the rest of the world. But it is certain that many countries where local spread is detected now, are completely unprepared, and that this will first get worse before it gets better. Oh, and I try to limit digital exposure to the virus news to 1,5 hour to stay mentally sane ;-) Good health! And free beer next year ;) 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 Thu, Feb 20, 2020 at 2:59 PM Daniel Pocock <daniel@pocock.pro> wrote:
On 20/02/2020 11:56, Jasper Nuyens wrote:
Dear all,
20 days have passed since Fosdem 2020, and nobody has reported to be hospitalised with a double pneumonia or as a confirmed COVID19 carrier. Because of this, I think we can be relieved that FOSDEM was
Given the fact that so many people work remotely, we often never know what is happening in the health or other parts of their life. From time to time a community publishes an obituary for somebody but there have been (non-Coronavirus) cases where people passed away and it wasn't noticed for some time. Debian recently discovered[1] having over 101 developers with missing keys, nobody knows what has happened to some of these people. This is one of those challenging aspects of relationships in remote online communities.
early enough to have missed the pandemic spread of this virus and nobody got infected at this celebration of Freedom.
I tend to say that one is either too early or is too late to take preventive measures, luckily it turned out to be too early. I'm so happy to have been wrong!
As such, I want to apologise for spreading fear about the greatest OpenSource and Free Software event in the world. It seems that I owe you a beer - and I will provide that plentiful (as in free) at FOSDEM 2021!
Nobody thinks this was about spreading fear. I had the impression you raised the issue out of concern for the community and those we would have come into contact with post-FOSDEM.
Incidentally, on the very same days it was discussed on the FOSDEM list, the British super-spreader passed[2] through Geneva airport for the second time. A number of other people he infected in France also passed through the airport as they returned to the UK and Spain. Had I traveled to Brussels that week, my path may well have crossed theirs as Geneva is the closest airport from my home in Lausanne. So I appreciate your warning about this.
Regards,
Daniel
1. https://lists.debian.org/debian-vote/2019/12/msg00218.html 2. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/10928686/coronavirus-businessman-super-spreade...
-- Debian Developer https://danielpocock.com _______________________________________________ FOSDEM mailing list FOSDEM@lists.fosdem.org https://lists.fosdem.org/listinfo/fosdem
participants (5)
-
Daniel Pocock -
Gerry Demaret -
hostilius -
Jasper Nuyens -
XianJun Jiao