Corona.

In the past four decades, natural disasters have killed 60,000 people, on average, a year.

This includes things like earthquakes, droughts, epidemics, and fires, although, of course, not all disasters are equally memorable.

Researchers have found that to get the same amount of media attention, a famine must kill 38,000 people, while a drought only has to kill 2,400, an epidemic 1,600, and a volcano eruption, just 1.

To catch the most eyes, a catastrophe should be shocking, scary, ongoing, and, most of all, uncertain.

The Coronavirus, or COVID-19, as it’s officially known, ticks all these boxes, and then some: the threat is invisible to the naked eye, deadly, foreign, and changing every day.

Here’s what we know: Although the number has since grown, at 120,000 confirmed cases, there were about 4,300 deaths, giving it an estimated fatality rate of 3.6%, significantly lower than SARs, at about 9.5%, or MERs, at 34%.

Although, we also know this number highly depends on where and who you are. Cardiovascular disease, high blood sugar, and chronic respiratory disease, for example, greatly increase your chance of death.

Even more significant is your age. The fatality rate drops to just 0.1% for 10–19 year-olds, and remains less than half a percentage point for anyone under 50.

After that, the odds rapidly deteriorate.

From 1.3% for those in their 50s, to 3.6% for 60s, 8% for 70s, and 14.8% for anyone older.

The vast majority, about 80% of those infected, experience mild to moderate symptoms — most commonly fever, dry cough, and/or exhaustion and then recover, many, on their own and some without even knowing.

And because these symptoms are so common, the most minor of cases likely aren’t reported to authorities, which may make the fatality rate appear far worse than it truly is.

That, in fact, is also the biggest challenge: A low fatality rate for the young and healthy makes it very easy to spread, which comes at the expense of more vulnerable groups. The incubation period is estimated anywhere from 1 to 14 days.

If this is true, those infected may spread the virus, undetected, most likely by coughs and sneezes, although it can also be found in blood, stool, and tears, for one or even two weeks without knowing they have it.

Scarier than everything we know combined, though, is everything we don’t. It’s not yet understood where it originated, who first contracted it, which animal transmitted it, or even how, exactly, it began.

Although the first cases were initially linked to a Wuhan seafood market, later analysis has cast doubt on this theory.

These large gaps in our understanding leave considerable room for anyone to fill as they wish.

Thus, the wide range of reactions: Depending on where you look, you will either see warnings that the situation is far worse than reported and may eventually kill hundreds of thousands or pleas to remain calm and comparisons to the seasonal flu.

Until recently, about 80% of all confirmed cases were located in Mainland, China, Meaning about 80% of what we know is based on information provided by that one source.

Which version someone is inclined to believe, therefore, is largely a litmus test of how much he or she trusts China.

There’s little doubt that once its leadership was committed, China acted incredibly quickly, making decisions that would be layered with bureaucracy elsewhere.

Famously, China seized the spotlight as an opportunity to demonstrate its political effectiveness on the world stage, swiftly converting universities, convention centers, and schools into makeshift hospitals.

According to a New York Times estimate, over 700 million Chinese have been simultaneously quarantined — a feat that requires an unthinkable degree of both political and cultural solidarity.

It’s state-owned telecoms collected travel records of every phone in the country, enabling checkpoints to quickly deny access to high-risk individuals.

In that same spirit of national brand-building, Chinese diplomats have given over 400 media interviews, published over 300 articles, and the city of Shanghai sent 500,000 face masks to the center of the South Korean outbreak.

China has tried to disassociate itself from the outbreak, suggesting it may have originated elsewhere. It’s also repeatedly congratulated itself for slowing its spread, which it argues would be far worse if not for its diligent work. What can’t be overlooked, however, is the phrase “Once its leadership was committed”. Too often journalists fall into the trap of either only celebrating China’s operational efficiency or fixating on its authoritarian pitfalls.

Clearly, the same top-down system responsible for building a hospital in 10 days also incentivized local government officials to suppress crucial early information about the virus and prioritize party loyalty above immediate human suffering.

Its genuinely-impressive successes exist in the context of failures like the example of Wuhan-based doctor Li Wenliang.

On December 30th, over a week before the first confirmed death, Li sent a message in a private doctors’ WeChat group warning of a new SARs-like outbreak.

Just hours later, 8 doctors from the group, including Li, were arrested by Wuhan Police for spreading rumors and disrupting social order, as announced by the Chinese National Health Commission.

After being compelled to sign a document admitting his alleged crimes, Li heroically returned to work, where he would contract and die from the very virus he tried to stop.

While his story is particularly tragic, it’s only made exceptional by his personal sacrifice. The forces which tried to stop him are sadly, not.

For every rare example of bravery, there are undoubtedly countless more scared into silence. And if even doctors must be this devoted to the party, there’s only more reason to doubt government-compiled data.

If numbers were misreported, outright fabricated, or even just poorly or hastily collected, they could drastically skew global measures like fatality and infection rate.

Thus, the large discrepancy of these numbers between countries.

On March 6th, the U.S. had a reported fatality rate of 5.9%, while South Korea reported 0.6. What these numbers obscure, are the number of people tested.

America’s number, for example, was based on a pathetic then-239 identified cases and 14 deaths, to Korea’s then-6,593 and 42.

The lesson of from is that the easiest way to maintain a low infection rate is simply not to test for it — something the U.S. has thus far excelled at — up until recently making test kits inaccessible to anyone not exposed to a confirmed case or having recently traveled to an infected region.

South Korea, on the other hand, had tested 8,000 people prior to its first case on January 20th. The next week, it would go on to test 82,000 people across the country.

By making this process easy, like with drive-through stations, it was able to screen about 10,000 people every single day.

The most dangerous kind of misinformation, therefore, aren’t crazy claims about fake cures, which are easily exposed and dispelled, but the treating of reported data as infallible, which creates unnecessary alarm in some places and a dangerous sense of comfort in others.

In truth, everything except the very basics should be viewed with some degree of skepticism. By the time you’re reading this, the situation may have changed, and many of these numbers may no longer be accurate.

At the same time, it’s important not to panic.

While it’s true that so much is unknown, the precautions are simple and straightforward.

This is the paradox of the Coronavirus: Although the medical solutions are simple — the World Health Organization recommends washing your hands with soap and water or an alcohol-based sanitizer, regularly, and not touching your face — stopping the virus is not easy.

In practice, no government on Earth can effectively manage and guarantee the compliance of every one of its citizens — especially in democracies where government power is limited.

While the virus appears to be waning domestically, in China, it’s entered a distinct second phase of international spread, to Italy, Iran, France, Germany, Spain, the U.S., and elsewhere. In the absence of the tight control made impossible at this scale, which countries succeed in containing their outbreaks largely depends on their level of public trust.

A good point of comparison are the cases of Hong Kong and Singapore — two places with similar population sizes, climates, and international exposure.

At first glance, Hong Kong would seem to be at far greater risk, with 13 border crossings to mainland China while Singapore is three and a half thousand kilometers away.

Even today, in response to the virus, three crossings remain open in Hong Kong, while Singapore became one of the first countries to deny entry to all PRC-passport holders and anyone who’s been to the mainland in the past 14 days.

Its government was quick to distribute masks — 4 for every household, whereas Hong Kong faced shortages, during which long lines formed outside pharmacies for hours, as customers waited for new shipments.

In Singapore, self-employed quarantined residents and holders of work passes are given about 70 U.S. dollars a day, along with free medical treatment, to incentivize good behavior.

Those who break quarantine laws are fined up to about $7,200 USD and face as much as six months of jail time.

Authorities in Hong Kong, on the other hand,began the crisis with little to no public trust, and only lost more after its slow closing of the border and failure to procure masks.

Its quarantine-breaking punishments were weak, resulting in several confirmed breaches. Worse, this often well-deserved distrust spirals into a self-propelling panic.

Because Hong Kongers didn’t believe their government could or would protect them, the most panicked began hoarding supplies, fearingthey might run out.

Everyone else followed suit in a dangerous game of musical chairs. And when the music stops, it’s most often vulnerable groups, like doctors, the disabled, and the poor who lose.

It’s also worth noting however, that Hong Kong’s wide-spread distrust predisposed its residents to take matters into their own hands, creating a more vigilant public.

A more severe example is Iran, where extreme suspicion of government has resulted in an outright crisis, inescapable by even the highest levels of authority.

This pattern has repeated time and time, and time, again, anywhere trust is low.

The lesson, repeated but never absorbed, with SARs, Ebola, MERs, and now today, is that, while the problem is a medical one for scientists to research, and develop treatments for, the suffering is most often self-inflicted.

The actions of people and governments make the difference between calm and chaos.

After the virus is contained, its treatment or vaccine, hopefully, discovered, and the media moves on to more shocking stories, we must not forget how much was preventable.

Otherwise, the same forces and incentives which aggravated the problem will only remain dormant — waiting for the next outbreak and enabled by our disinterest.