Seems like the majority of comments I've read are basically of the "go into quarantine lock down" variety.
The current sell-off is because people are scared of the uncertainty. It could turn into something more and get even worse, but we have to wait and see for that.
I don't know that it's so much "willful ignorance" as it is the perpetual feeling that we're "at the end of history." I.e. the opinion that bad things happened in the past and bad things can't happen now because we're beyond it.
Something catastrophic is absolutely going to happen world-wide eventually, but at this point I can't say one way or another whether this is it.
Right now we're at a point of probably peak uncertainty. We know enough to be nervous, but it isn't real until it's real.
Bloomberg Surveillance podcast is free and also availability through other platforms but here it is through Apple podcasts:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bloomberg-surveillance...
Because so many people are trying to conceal information to keep tourism going, stability, re-election, GDP and so on, we really don't know how bad it is.
But when's the last time a flu caused a 13% sell-off? It seems pretty serious.
After reading The Fifth Risk by Michael Lewis, I'm really starting to be convinced our collective willful ignorance is becoming problematic.