Talk:COVID-19 pandemic

Current consensus

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01. Superseded by #9

The first few sentences of the lead's second paragraph should state The virus is typically spread during close contact and via respiratory droplets produced when people cough or sneeze. Respiratory droplets may be produced during breathing but the virus is not considered airborne. It may also spread when one touches a contaminated surface and then their face. It is most contagious when people are symptomatic, although spread may be possible before symptoms appear. (RfC March 2020)

02. Superseded by #7

The infobox should feature a per capita count map most prominently, and a total count by country map secondarily. (RfC March 2020)

03. Obsolete

The article should not use {{Current}} at the top. (March 2020)

04. Do not include a sentence in the lead section noting comparisons to World War II. (March 2020)

05. Cancelled

Include subsections covering the domestic responses of Italy, China, Iran, the United States, and South Korea. Do not include individual subsections for France, Germany, the Netherlands, Australia and Japan. (RfC March 2020) Include a short subsection on Sweden focusing on the policy controversy. (May 2020)

Subsequently overturned by editing and recognized as obsolete. (July 2024)

06. Obsolete

There is a 30 day moratorium on move requests until 26 April 2020. (March 2020)

07. There is no consensus that the infobox should feature a confirmed cases count map most prominently, and a deaths count map secondarily. (May 2020)

08. Superseded by #16

The clause on xenophobia in the lead section should read ...and there have been incidents of xenophobia and discrimination against Chinese people and against those perceived as being Chinese or as being from areas with high infection rates. (RfC April 2020)

09. Cancelled

Supersedes #1. The first several sentences of the lead section's second paragraph should state The virus is mainly spread during close contact and by small droplets produced when those infected cough, sneeze or talk. These droplets may also be produced during breathing; however, they rapidly fall to the ground or surfaces and are not generally spread through the air over large distances. People may also become infected by touching a contaminated surface and then their face. The virus can survive on surfaces for up to 72 hours. Coronavirus is most contagious during the first three days after onset of symptoms, although spread may be possible before symptoms appear and in later stages of the disease. (April 2020)

Notes

On 17:16, 6 April 2020, these first several sentences were replaced with an extracted fragment from the coronavirus disease 2019 article, which at the time was last edited at 17:11.

010. The article title is COVID-19 pandemic. The title of related pages should follow this scheme as well. (RM April 2020, RM August 2020)

011. The lead section should use Wuhan, China to describe the virus's origin, without mentioning Hubei or otherwise further describing Wuhan. (April 2020)

012. Superseded by #19

The lead section's second sentence should be phrased using the words first identified and December 2019. (May 2020)

013. Superseded by #15

File:President Donald Trump suggests measures to treat COVID-19 during Coronavirus Task Force press briefing.webm should be used as the visual element of the misinformation section, with the caption U.S. president Donald Trump suggested at a press briefing on 23 April that disinfectant injections or exposure to ultraviolet light might help treat COVID-19. There is no evidence that either could be a viable method. (1:05 min) (May 2020, June 2020)

014. Overturned

Do not mention the theory that the virus was accidentally leaked from a laboratory in the article. (RfC May 2020) This result was overturned at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard, as there is consensus that there is no consensus to include or exclude the lab leak theory. (RfC May 2024)

015. Supersedes #13. File:President Donald Trump suggests measures to treat COVID-19 during Coronavirus Task Force press briefing.webm should not be used as the visual element of the misinformation section. (RfC November 2020)

016. Supersedes #8. Incidents of xenophobia and discrimination are considered WP:UNDUE for a full sentence in the lead. (RfC January 2021)

017. Only include one photograph in the infobox. There is no clear consensus that File:COVID-19 Nurse (cropped).jpg should be that one photograph. (May 2021)

018. Superseded by #19

The first sentence is The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is a global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). (August 2021, RfC October 2023)

019. Supersedes #12 and #18. The first sentence is The global COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an outbreak in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. (June 2024)

Proposal to formally mark as obsolete some so-called Current Consensus entries

I suggest we clean up some of the entries in Talk:COVID-19 pandemic/Current consensus by formally considering them obsolete (or cancelled, or whatever term) by talk page discussion. They are outdated and not in line with the current WP:GA version of the article, being artifacts of the very early pandemic. Namely:

• 2. The infobox should feature a per capita count map most prominently, and a total count by country map secondarily. (RfC March 2020) This has not been done in ages, and seems to be contradicted by point 7 anyway. Case counts have not been anywhere close to accurate, or even tracked all that much, for years now.
• 3. The article should not use {{Current}} at the top. (March 2020) Pointless visual clutter that is an artifact of those fast-moving days of March 2020; no one is going to add such a template now, and I bet no one has tried for years.
• 5. Include subsections covering the domestic responses of Italy, China, Iran, the United States, and South Korea. Do not include individual subsections for France, Germany, the Netherlands, Australia and Japan. (RfC March 2020) Include a short subsection on Sweden focusing on the policy controversy. (May 2020) This hasn't been an accurate description of the article for ages; the Responses section has subsections for each continent, not for countries, and given the pandemic's global spread since March 2020 it doesn't make any sense to regulate which countries are mentioned like this anyway (for example, Australia is covered now). Sweden has a short paragraph under Europe, which is all it needs, not a subsection.
• 7. There is no consensus that the infobox should feature a confirmed cases count map most prominently, and a deaths count map secondarily. (May 2020) Again, a case count map would be inaccurate now anyway, and a "no consensus" entry is an odd thing to have on a list of consensuses.

Are we agreeable that some or all of these can be collapsed and marked as obsolete? 2 and 5 are especially an issue since they are at odds with the article's state, but 3 and 7 also seem outdated in their own ways. Crossroads ^-talk- 17:49, 14 June 2024 (UTC)

• I support removal of the consensus topics listed above. I dont see a big need for these as the article is not so much current afairs anymore and of much less interest. As it becomes more of a historical article, it is quite easier to find quality sources and much less is controversial today. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 18:17, 14 June 2024 (UTC)
• Support for marking 2 and 7 as obsolete. Perhaps 5 could be marked as cancelled, as individual domestic responses of some countries especially those in 5 are not included in the main article, and have their respective articles outside of the main article. As for 3, it could be kept just for clarity. KapSoule (talk) 22:08, 16 June 2024 (UTC)
• Support removal in accordance with the arguments outlined by the proposer. SmolBrane (talk) 16:28, 18 June 2024 (UTC)
• Oppose removal: I think it is too broad to remove this many points of consensus at once. CFCF (talk) 10:40, 29 June 2024 (UTC)

  Which ones would you support? It wasn't my intention to make them all stand or fall together. Some can be marked and not others. Crossroads ^-talk- 22:10, 30 June 2024 (UTC)

  I think what I oppose is the assumptions attached to 5., that Sweden should have a short paragraph under Europe. I realize I may be biased, and perhaps am overinterpreting that this discussion may lead to a new strong consensus on what should or should not be in this article. However, I think whether or not it, or any other country response, merits mention beyond the specific continent-section is something that could be discussed without precedent elsewhere. So if you want to reinterpret that to Support - it would be fine by me. CFCF (talk) 19:26, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

• I support not listing/enforcing/claiming to enforce these specific items, but I think that we should retire the whole thing. There are still parts we agree on (e.g., that the lead should not compare it against WWII), but at this point, I think the "Current consensus" should be that normal editing rules apply to everything. WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:18, 13 July 2024 (UTC)
• support per WAID--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 22:43, 13 July 2024 (UTC)

So per the agreement above, I've collapsed three of the entries. I left 7 as is, since as a no consensus, I now think it doesn't seem that meaningful to overturn it as though there is consensus, so I just left it for now. I do think the thing overall is useful and should be kept, but outdated entries being removed helps. Crossroads ^-talk- 01:33, 14 July 2024 (UTC)

Mink

I request mentioning the 2020 Danish mink cull somewhere in this article. COVID-19 pandemic and animals calls it the largest COVID incident involving animals, and I belive it merits a mention. This [1] already used in this article refers to it.--94.189.43.2 (talk) 08:14, 26 July 2024 (UTC)

please make edit request with appropriate template,thanks--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 12:39, 27 July 2024 (UTC)

De facto "from-till" must be made better visible

The first paragraph MUST contain the year when life retuned to normal in most countries, as does the infobox (as a heading plus inside). It's history already, and people come here looking for the basic "from-till" info of any historical event - concisely and well visible. The details interest less and less users, they're yesterday's news.

To preempt conradiction: China kept strict rules for longer, the WHO had its own criteria, but historically and in practical terms, most people returned to normal life in 2022, the criteria being - pls. mentally add the phrase "in most countries" to every line:

• very low rate of severe illness and fatalities
• no mass closures, isolation, quaranteen, curfew, Zoom schooling etc.
• no mandatory mask wearing, social distancing, extreme hygene rules
• high vaccination and mass immunity rate

Please, don't fall back into pedantic arguments. Compare with Spanish flu pandemic etc.: deadly between X and Y, lingering for Z more years/months, period. All else is of interest only for epidemiologists and other specialists, i.e. here maybe worth keeping outside the intro (lead), but definitely not within. Thanks. Arminden (talk) 10:18, 28 July 2024 (UTC)