[marshray]

Not overreacting: This is not the flu, current estimates are ~20% of cases require hospitalization. Where it has hit with full force, hospitals fill up and people drop dead in the streets. China has shut down big parts of their economy and put major cities into quarantine.

Not hoarding: Empty shelves are how capitalism sends signals to producers that they need to increase production, much like how packet loss tells TCP to cut back on its rate of sending. My local Lowe's has been out of N95 masks for a month.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/specific-groups/gu...

[Jtsummers]

> Not hoarding: Empty shelves are how capitalism sends signals to producers that they need to increase production, much like how packet loss tells TCP to cut back on its rate of sending. My local Lowe's has been out of N95 masks for a month.

You should look into the beer distribution game [0]. Empty shelves don't always signal what we think they signal. And increased production cannot be scaled back as easily as TCP packets.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beer_distribution_game