Hacker News Reader

Is that alone cause for declaring something a public health emergency? I’ve only seen videos of men who have contracted and recovered from it and no one mentioned disfiguring scars so far and couldn’t tell that was an issue myself based on their appearance.

View on HN

A contagious disease that makes a lot of people sick, has a considerable death rate, and often causes scars is definitely cause for declaring a public health emergency. Under what possible definition of the term would you think otherwise?

Maybe that's not a good sample? Both by size, and selection, insofar as if you've recently got disfiguring scars perhaps you'd be less likely to make and share a video of yourself. Also, how long does it take to know if marks from pox sores are going to be permanent scars anyway? Or how much they might fade? This is all so recent that even if you did still have marks on your face afterwards, could you really know whether they'll be "disfiguring" in the future?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com