By Levine
Elon Musk isn’t worried about coronavirus — and doesn’t think anybody else should be either.
“The coronavirus panic is dumb,” the Tesla boss tweeted Friday.
His pronouncement swiftly went viral, racking up more than 240,000 retweets.
Musk’s tweet launched a heated debate among fellow Twitter users over whether the Tesla chief was right — or spreading dangerous complacency.
“There may be unnecessary precautions & panic @elonmusk. But consider what is driving it. When faced with risks, the best way to manage overreaction is expert leadership providing honest information. The absence of that logically sparks overreaction. So what exactly is dumb?” chided MSNBC anchor Stephanie Ruhle.
The virus keeps marching across the globe. So far, more than 100,000 cases have been reported, with over 3,500 deaths. The overwhelming majority have been in China, where the illness originated, but cases of the disease have now been reported on every continent.
The Centers for Disease Control have urged Americans to brace for what could be a drawn-out fight against the virus, with potentially “severe” disruptions to daily life.
The United States has reported 335 cases and 17 deaths. There have been 44 confirmed cases in New York.
