Originally Posted by Cat Herder:
I think people hear the word "Pandemic" and panic thinking it means something it does not. It does not mean immediate global infection, hide in your basement, bring out your dead.
It simply means "the worldwide spread of a new disease."
CoV19 is just that, new. Novel. Novel means new. Novel COVID-19. New coronavirus from bats 2019, mutated from new coronavirus from bats 2002 (SARS-CoV-2). SARS= severe acute respiratory syndrome.
MERS= Middle East respiratory syndrome. But it came from camels. Also a novel=new virus. (2015-ish)
YES!! Every year we have a “flu pandemic” but the flu is not new so they don’t call it that!