Will Disneyland USA suffer? ALL Of Disney's Theme Parks Now Closed - Reopening Dates Unknown

PiratesMansion

Well-Known Member
Rent a car and road trip. It's more fun. And safer!

@TROR if you're going to road trip I would do some research about which states have closed their restaurants. I know IL isn't the only state to have done that, and I know some other states are even more intense than we are (i.e. our restaurants are still open for takeout, but I know that's not the case everywhere), on top of it being an evolving situation.

Hopefully you're able to get home quickly and safely.
 

Phroobar

Well-Known Member
There were the Polio outbreaks in the 50's.

In the late 1940s, polio outbreaks in the U.S. increased in frequency and size, crippling an average of more than 35,000 people each year. Parents were frightened to let their children go outside, especially in the summer when the virus seemed to peak. Travel and commerce between affected cities were sometimes restricted. Public health officials imposed quarantines (used to separate and restrict the movement of well people who may have been exposed to a contagious disease to see if they become ill) on homes and towns where polio cases were diagnosed.
 

Disneyland68

Active Member
Or maybe they are a Millennial? 😷

I just read this interesting article in The Hill, and it explains some of the differences in reaction to this virus that we've seen right here in this thread. The Harris Poll just did a survey and found that Millennials are somehow the most concerned about dying from Coronavirus, while older people (ahem!) are less concerned. And yet it's all the old people it's killing, while young people aren't being killed by it.

Here's a key sentence from the article, and it suddenly explains a lot to me...

"It also raises the question of what is driving such fear among millennials — is it their engagement in social media that is creating greater concern, or is it their lack of any comparable events in their lifetime? Or a combination: A lack of any real experience with a pandemic crisis, combined with hearing about it constantly through social media, means that they have no personal experience to moderate or check against what is in their feed. Older people, in contrast, have been through comparable crises, making it natural for them to wonder what all the fuss is about."


Many Millennials are too young to really remember 9/11 and what that felt like for adults. Let alone other things like the stock market crash of '87, the worst of the Cold War in the early 80's when we were certain we'd all be dead by 1985, the Gas Crises in '73 and '79, the horrible Hong Kong Flu in '68, the Cuban Missile Crisis in '62, etc.

But maybe if we'd made a bigger deal out of the Swine Flu in 2009 they would have better coping skills for this Coronavirus? The '09 Swine Flu was bad (with apologies to any pigs that may read this and anyone else from the pork community), but Disneyland never closed and you could always buy bath tissue at Target.

2009 Swine Flu H1N1 in United States
60.8 Million US Cases
274,304 US Hospitalizations
12,469 US Deaths
Up to 575,000 Deaths Worldwide


I was on this message board regularly in 2009. We never talked about it, much less its impact to Disneyland. And over 12,000 Americans died from that virus. That's fascinating to compare!

Aloha,
Best post to date about understanding how different age groups in general are reacting to the Wuhan Virus. Everything is relative. Older folks have seen much worse in their lifetime than the younger crowd and thus react differently. For example the Swine Flu which my wife caught at WDW I’m 2009. Over 12K deaths yet nobody back then made it a big deal like today’s Wuhan Virus. Been there and done that.
 

Sailor310

Well-Known Member
I saw video (sorry, can't find it again) of Ft Lauderdale beach packed with kids on spring break. Knuckleheads!

whoops!
TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) — Two of Florida’s most popular beaches are closed to the public in order to help stop the spread of the novel coronavirus, NBC 6 Miami reported.

The mayors of Miami Beach and Fort Lauderdale held a joint news conference on Sunday to announce the closures. Miami Beach Mayor Dan Gelber declared that spring break was “over.”

“We can’t have the kinds of crowds we’ve had, the kinds of gatherings,” Gelber said. “I walked down Ocean Drive yesterday and what I saw was incredibly disturbing, it wasn’t just the typical large gatherings of people, but it was young people who believe they’re invincible and probably don’t really think of this in any way as a health crisis.”

Gelber also said the city was closing all non-essential retail stores as well as all parking garages and parking lots, except to residents. Loomis Park is also closed. The city also reopened Ocean Drive to traffic in an effort to limit the gathering of spring breakers in South Beach, the news station reported.

Mayor Dean Trantalis said Fort Lauderdale has closed the dry portion of its public beach from Harbor Drive to north of Oakland Park Boulevard. The beach will remain closed through April 12. All Fort Lauderdale bars and restaurants will close by 10 p.m.

Both cities are requiring bars and restaurants to operate at 50 percent capacity.

“This is not forever, we’re gonna defeat this disease, there is light at the end of the tunnel,” Trantalis said.
 
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smooch

Well-Known Member
Well I have had a few friends now who have been officially laid off. I read a story linked in the WDW Coronavirus thread from a 39 year old Type 1 Diabetic with good blood sugar controls and he is talking about how excruciating the pain is from his case of Coronavirus and the fact that he has good controls of his sugars yet it is making his case far more severe really scared me today. I'm a Type 1 Diabetic with good controls but I am only 20 so I'm not as old as he is but reading his personal account of it all made me remember that no matter how good I am controlling my sugars I still am simply just more at risk for all this because of my diabetes. I have been serious about quarantining, I still work 2 days a week but the office has gone to rotating half of the advisers and assistants each day so it isn't as crowded. I sanitize every time I touch a package that is delivered or mail that I have to post / distribute, I wipe down the whole area around me when I arrive at the start of the day and after my lunch. Plus with all the things around me continuing to shut down it is making me much more nervous about all this. I am being smart and safe because I don't want to contract anything, but also the whole economic side of all of this is really scaring me. I know we will bounce back eventually like in the past, but hearing about everyone who can't afford groceries or is getting laid off makes me truly sad. I am so grateful I am still able to get 2 days in the office so I can at least get paid something (paid hourly because I'm not full time there) but I wish it was possible for me to work from home but I work mainly as the receptionist / general assistant of the office so I can't do that remotely.

I hope we are able to get test kits and contain everything as best we can, but after seeing the Spring Break stuff and hearing about people I know who are still going out constantly instead of even just hanging with each other at their houses instead of going out, I can see this problem getting worse and worse. People here just don't like being told what to do, as a country I feel like people think not being allowed to go do all these recreational things is limiting their freedoms but it is for a good reason, so we don't turn into Italy and deal with all that terrible death and suffering. I hate having to change my lifestyle to deal with all this, but it is for a good reason. For people who say this is overblown, I kinda agreed before I felt it was good to limit everything and get people to not go out as much, but now I see people talking about how they don't want everything closed down and want the option to still go out. I somewhat agreed before but after seeing the Spring Break stuff I think places need to be closed because idiots won't make the right decision. This is getting really serious, I am terrified we won't be able to flatten the curve and we will completely implode our healthcare system like Italy did.
 

JD2000

Well-Known Member
It would be interesting to compare actions taken so far with past viral epidemics and the result they had on the world economy or better yet the average person; and is what is being done today reasonable and not more than less hysterical reactions. I don’t see people vacationing to Disney resorts at nearly the same rate as before. So to compensate, investments could be reduced dramatically, greater emphasis made on Annual Passports, etc.
 

Sailor310

Well-Known Member
For what it's worth, Aljazeera:
In China, life returning to normal as coronavirus outbreak slows
Draconian measures, which appear to have quelled the outbreak in China, are gradually being relaxed.

I hope they don't relax too much and have a new flare up, but I take hope from this.

 

No Name

Well-Known Member
Honest question: How do governments have the power to force private businesses to close? I have a degree in political science and even I don’t understand that. Not arguing the response to the virus at all just genuinely curious if anyone knows the answer.

There are towns that don’t let businesses operate on Sundays every week. I never understood how that is legal either.
 

Phroobar

Well-Known Member
https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/18/politics/national-parks-service-coronavirus/index.html

National Parks waving entrance fees!!! This is good.....wish I had one closer!!!:cool: Loads of room to get out there and hike as well as admire nature's beauty....just keep your distance from people AND bears!!! :oops:
National Parks are the number one place for Chinese tour bus tourists. You get shoved out of the way by them with a "sorry. sorry." It gets really annoying when a bus load comes through and they have to follow that guy with the flag as he runs through the area. Best to be at areas early in the morning or late afternoon.
 

smooch

Well-Known Member
National Parks are the number one place for Chinese tour bus tourists. You get shoved out of the way by them with a "sorry. sorry." It gets really annoying when a bus load comes through and they have to follow that guy with the flag as he runs through the area. Best to be at areas early in the morning or late afternoon.

I don't think you have to worry about that for a while...
 

flutas

Well-Known Member
For what it's worth, Aljazeera:
In China, life returning to normal as coronavirus outbreak slows
Draconian measures, which appear to have quelled the outbreak in China, are gradually being relaxed.

I hope they don't relax too much and have a new flare up, but I take hope from this.


Counter news article.

https://time.com/5804136/china-coronavirus-quarantine-new-normal/
 

DrAlice

Well-Known Member
Like @TROR, life at the campus I work for has been crazy this week. Tons of conflicting messages and then a final shut down mid Monday. We're all scrambling to move course content online and operating on very little sleep. It's been rough.

And, now I have to homeschool the kid too.

And... We are being told to settle in for the long haul. I mean into NEXT YEAR. Public health officials think there will be a resurgence of cases at the end of summer. I have no idea what they are basing this on, but expect school closures through the summer.

How did we get here? It's all so surreal. And, in a lot of ways, infuriating. We can self isolate to try and "flatten the curve", but without mass testing, I think it will be all for not. I hope we don't destroy the economy in the process.

Ugh... not a cheery post. Sorry. I really should get some sleep.
 

thenerdbaker

Well-Known Member
Like @TROR, life at the campus I work for has been crazy this week. Tons of conflicting messages and then a final shut down mid Monday. We're all scrambling to move course content online and operating on very little sleep. It's been rough.

And, now I have to homeschool the kid too.

And... We are being told to settle in for the long haul. I mean into NEXT YEAR. Public health officials think there will be a resurgence of cases at the end of summer. I have no idea what they are basing this on, but expect school closures through the summer.

How did we get here? It's all so surreal. And, in a lot of ways, infuriating. We can self isolate to try and "flatten the curve", but without mass testing, I think it will be all for not. I hope we don't destroy the economy in the process.

Ugh... not a cheery post. Sorry. I really should get some sleep.
The lack of testing is extremely frustrating. My work has someone who has the symptoms and the doctor has said they likely have it but won't test. We are a small team with a lot of interaction with each other. Tomorrow we figure out how to see clients over video calls and remote access the computers. Testing would have helped us figure out who could stay in the clinic and who needed to stay home. I feel like the country is flying blind without mass testing. On the bright side clients have been really nice about working with us through all this and are being patient.
 

mandelbrot

Well-Known Member
Like @TROR, life at the campus I work for has been crazy this week. Tons of conflicting messages and then a final shut down mid Monday. We're all scrambling to move course content online and operating on very little sleep. It's been rough.

And, now I have to homeschool the kid too.

And... We are being told to settle in for the long haul. I mean into NEXT YEAR. Public health officials think there will be a resurgence of cases at the end of summer. I have no idea what they are basing this on, but expect school closures through the summer.

How did we get here? It's all so surreal. And, in a lot of ways, infuriating. We can self isolate to try and "flatten the curve", but without mass testing, I think it will be all for not. I hope we don't destroy the economy in the process.

Ugh... not a cheery post. Sorry. I really should get some sleep.
They're basing the resurgence theory on the idea that the country won't be on relative lock down for six months. After this current viral surge has peaked and gone down (probably by June, hopefully earlier) there will be a lot of public pressure to reopen businesses and ease restrictions on social interaction. This could result in another wave of exponential viral transmission which will likely result in another wave of closures and shutdowns. The hope is that by that time testing will have become so widespread that those who get the virus then will be better isolated and the next wave of shutdowns will be much less.

By the times this surges again we will hopefully be like South Korea with mass testing and plenty of medical supplies so that the current level of disruption won't be experienced again. And next year there could very well be a vaccine for Covid-19 so further disruptions should be minimal. It will then become like the seasonal flu: deadly, but the extreme cases spread out enough that our health care system never gets overwhelmed.

As for the economy...well, it's toast. It will need to be rebuilt and restructured and that will take a while.
 

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