For what it's worth, it has turned out worse than I thought. In the earlier thread I polled: "Serious concern. We could be looking at millions dead worldwide, and a recession."

I'm slightly more optimistic on the first part, and more pessimistic on the second. I'm more of an expert on the second part than the first, so this was a miss for me.

As for how it has affected me, personally, I'm not in the medical profession, but I was involved in a school library project in Ecuador this last year that has completely fallen apart, and someone I know well in Guayaquil is seriously ill and her husband has died. My income is perhaps half what it was in January. I really wish we'd attacked this thing earlier, when it was clear that China was having a serious problem, but things hadn't yet spiraled out of control.

Here is what I said, BTW. It's not a perfect prediction, by any stretch.