'Contagion' Medical Adviser's Warning on Coronavirus: 'If It Can Hit Me, It Can Hit Anybody'

As the coronavirus spreads, the 2011 pandemic thriller, Contagion is coming back into the cultural zeitgeist. The screenwriter behind Contagion, Scott Z. Burns used the expertise of knowledgable scientists such as Dr. Ian Lipkin to inform his story. Now, Dr. Lipkin has tested positive for COVID-19.

‘Contagion’ expert infected with COVID-19

Dr. Ian Lipkin was an expert who served on the 2011 film Contagion. This month, the medical adviser revealed the news: he tested positive for COVID-19. Dr. Lipkin told Fox journalist David Asman about his diagnosis on Lou Dobbs Tonight. The infectious disease expert was on the show to discuss “potential new treatments for coronavirus,” Fox reported recently.

Dr. Lipkin shared this warning: “If it can hit me, it can hit anybody. That’s the message I want to convey.” He discussed his experience with the virus.

“This has become very personal for me, too,” Dr. Lipkin said. “I have COVID as of yesterday. And it is miserable.”

“I heard you cough, I didn’t wanna be a hypochondriac and say, ‘I hope you don’t have it,’” Asman said on the Fox Business show. “But you do.”

Dr. Lipkin is currently “undergoing trial treatment for the virus and hoped to feel better soon.”

Dr. Lipkin warns Fox Business viewers about coronavirus

Lipkin apparently joined the Contagion crew “in an effort to raise public awareness about modern public health challenges.”

He wanted Contagion tp “be a wake-up call for the public that today’s fiction could easily become fact tomorrow.” In Dr. Lipkin’s expert opinion, “communities across the country” should be implementing “standardized coronavirus restrictions.”

“We have porous borders between states, between cities,” he advised.

Still, much about the COVID-19 outbreak is unknown.

“We really don’t know when we’re gonna get this under control,” he said.

One doctor says the ‘Contagion’ virus is not as bad as coronavirus

To add to the chaos, a doctor from Pittsburgh recently wrote an opinion column for TribeLIVE.com.

The infection in Contagion “had a very short incubation period — that is, hours,” he wrote. Meanwhile, the coronavirus has a longer incubation. The doctor expanded:

With covid-19 infection, most will walk around for near a week without feeling any symptoms, unknowingly spreading the virus. When we do finally feel sick, if you are lucky enough to get a test, then and only then are you asked to ‘quarantine.’ By then, if you were not already sheltering in place prior to the testing, you probably spread it to a whole bunch of people.

Dr. Carson concluded on what we can do to avoid the situation in Contagion.

“What you do now will affect the world, your country, your family and loved ones,” he wrote. “Be smart. Be safe. Share.”

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