The time lapse from December 29, 2019 to April 1, 2020 is 92 days. That’s 18.4 5-day periods. According to algoritme 0, the number of infections in the world on that day should be between 524,287 and 1,048,575. In reality, the counter (according to worldometer) stood at 858,361 infections. Because algorithm 0 does not take into account any measures or dynamics in population resistance, it seems that from a world perspective the pandemic wave is still in the exponential phase in reality, even if it has already passed in China and is leveling off in some European countries. On a global scale, those effects are still like a drop on a glowing plate.
Because his near neighbor in Oegstgeest became infected on April 1, he tries to sketch a chain of six imaginary contamination situations, looking for leads to understand the state of the world at that time. He starts working from a perspective that he attributes to the single virus that emerged from a contamination on the Wuhan market on December 29, 2019. He chooses this day because it precedes the date on which the World Health Organization was notified of a new type of pneumonia and it is likely that some infections had occurred before that date.
Wuhan, December 29, 2019
My name is Nobody, I am a virus. You know, bad news packed in protein. The bad news is my RNA, or rather my RNA in combination with the contents of a human cell in an alveoli. In many images, I look more robust than I am when I am out to propagate myself. Then I shake open my protective cover and let my RNA run its course in combination with the contents of that cell, which I entered through the action of one of my tentacles. Then, I am not there for a while. I build several copies of myself up again later from the RNA strands and proteins that I have now made.
So I am actually these new coronavirus myself, but now in plural and partly adjusted here and there. The thing is, that my presence triggers the immune system of my carrier, but in some cases not in time. Then immune reactions start too late to cope with the massive numbers of my unscathed offspring.
So my name is Nobody, I am a virus and came somehow attached to the hand of a market merchant who put me close to his mouth on December 29, 2019. I was transported to his throat with a lukewarm sip of tea. There I missed the turn to the stomach and rolled in his windpipe. He inhaled somewhat further. I was able to enter a useful cell to clone myself in just in time. I had five days of work before my wearer noticed anything. He was doing the preparations for the New Year’s festival along with a few relatives when my presence made him sneeze. I can say that I or rather droplets I hid in were inhaled by two of those present.
On January 4, I had infected 3 people. All in Wuhan.
… to be continued