Late yesterday, via a number of news sites....two more cases popped up. The original 'cluster' was in Bavaria, and went back to a Chinese business associate who flew over for a 3-day conference.
In this new update, there are two separate cases being added.
This first one is from the NW of the country, and involves a German who has a friend who went to China recently. This guy now shows the symptoms, and they suspect his wife will pop up shortly with symptoms.
The second case is a Baden-Wuerttemberg German, who went recently down into Milan, Italy. In this guy's case (25 years old), he is in a severe medical condition.
So far, there has not been a huge wave (like you see in northern Italy) with people affected and villages shut-down. There is talk of plans being assembled here in Germany....no one is sure about how they would work.
The magic number at present in Germany? 18. Based on the Italy situation, I would probably suggest another hundred being added being added by the closure of next week. That will probably start up significant worries.
The one thing I can point out......the whole grocery industry of Germany is based upon things being delivered each morning by a truck from some central 'depot'. You might have five or six pallets.....you might have twenty pallets. Later, some drink delivery guy will come by with a hundred-odd cases of beer, soda or water. It's called the 'just-in-time' delivery strategy. No one keeps a big warehouse for the store reserves.
If you had a warehouse operation shut-down because half the staff were sick....or half the drivers out because of the virus, then deliveries don't occur, and shelving starts to look bare, which triggers the public to worry.
Add to this scenario.....Germans are used to doing five to ten item grocery shopping. So maybe three days a week, they might stop off on the way home, and pick up small bag of groceries.
If you asked most Germans, they would admit that they have around a five-day supply of food in the house. A few might have an extended stock.....to last up to ten-to-twelve days.
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