Deprive the fire of it's fuel and it goes out. In this case the fuel is people and the virus is the fire. If nearly everyone isolated themselves in their homes for a 2 or 3 weeks the virus would run out of people to infect. Essentially what they had to do in Wuhan. We aren't taking it seriously enough in the West to do this.

The problem is, though, that we live in a very connected world. If absolutely everyone, worldwide, isolated themselves, then yes, the virus would die out. But if everyone does so except Iran, say, or Oklahoma, then Iran or Oklahoma reinfect the world and everyone has to do it again.

Yes, and maybe we have to ban travel from Iran(!) or Oklahoma until they cooperate.

Oklahoma would be very hard. Iran would be easier for us... but not for Iraq. You probably couldn't prohibit travel from Iraq into Syria. And so it goes...

Recessions kill people, too. Suicide rates go up, healthcare suffers, poverty worsens.

An enormous outbreak seems likely to cause a recession. The economy is people. People get sick and die, the economy suffers.

It's almost as if we're incapable of creating a planetary economy that can handle shocks with robustness and resilience.

People often harp on this point, but plagues travelled the globe long before globalization. They just moved a bit slower from area to area. But they were quite devastating in less connected ages.

Yes, this is all true.