Coronavirus Outbreak...

[NorrinRadd]

Hmm. I thought I'd posted this a few hours ago, but now I don't find the post.

Johns-Hopkins Covid-19 Tracker site.

[MaxVel]

Statistically, it's not. More information about the seasonal flu from the CDC:

During the 2017-2018 season, the percentage of deaths attributed to pneumonia and influenza (P&I) was at or above the epidemic threshold for 16 consecutive weeks. During the past five seasons, the average number of weeks this indicator was above threshold was 11 (range of 7 to 15 weeks). Nationally, mortality attributed to P&I exceeded 10.0% for four consecutive weeks, peaking at 10.8% during the week ending January 20, 2018.

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/season...-2017-2018.htm

This system tracks the proportion of death certificates processed that list pneumonia or influenza as the underlying or contributing cause of death. This system provides an overall indication of whether flu-associated deaths are elevated, but does not provide an exact number of how many people died from flu.

OK, so the 10% figure is the percentage of death certificates processed that list flu or pneumonia. It's not the percentage of people who caught the flu, who then died from it.

If we are going to compare the flu and Covid-19, then we need to look at the same measurements. If we compare numbers of people who die from each illness, then we are overlooking the significant differences between them. Flu is a well established illness then a lot is known about. It infects millions of people every year in the US alone.


The mortality rate (US) from the flu is about 0.1% - i.e. the percentage of all people who get the flu who then die from it.

So far this flu season, about 0.05% of people who caught the flu have died from the virus in the U.S., according to CDC data.

The death rate for COVID-19 appears to be higher than that of the flu.

In the study published Feb. 18 in the China CDC Weekly, researchers found a death rate from COVID-19 to be around 2.3% in mainland China. That's much higher than the death rate linked to flu, which is typically around 0.1% in the U.S., according to The New York Times.

So, as of right now, Covid-19 is more lethal than the seasonal flu. What the difference is right now is that a LOT less people have been infected. If Covid-19 infected people at the same rate as this past year's US seasonal flu (45 million estimated infected) then 1,035,000 people would die in the US from Covid-19 compared to 61,000 from the flu.


Another difference (apart from lethality) is the R0.

The measure scientists use to determine how easily a virus spreads is known as the "basic reproduction number," or R0 (pronounced R-nought). This is an estimate of the average number of people who catch the virus from a single infected person, Live science previously reported. The flu has an R0 value of about 1.3, according to The New York Times.

Researchers are still working to determine the R0 for COVID-19. A study published Jan. 29 in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) estimated an R0 value for the new coronavirus to be 2.2, meaning each infected person has been spreading the virus to an average of 2.2 people.

Source: Livescience article cited and linked above, emphasis added


This implies that if Covid-19 gets established, it will spread a lot more quickly than the flu - IOW, it's about twice as infectious. That, combined with the higher mortality rate, means that it's potentially very nasty, and could kill millions worldwide. If, worldwide, we can keep Covid-19 infections in the low hundreds of thousands (and subsequent deaths in the low tens of thousands) I would consider that a great result from where we are now.


My assessment: No reason to panic right now, but something to monitor and take seriously. There are known Covid cases in a suburb about 10 km from where I work. It's probably the tip of the iceberg. Myself and immediate family may well have been exposed, or will be exposed in the course of daily life in the near future. That's why I could care less about American politicians trying to score points off each other.

Psalm 91.

Stay safe out there, everyone.

[simplicio]

OK, so the 10% figure is the percentage of death certificates processed that list flu or pneumonia. It's not the percentage of people who caught the flu, who then died from it.

If we are going to compare the flu and Covid-19, then we need to look at the same measurements. If we compare numbers of people who die from each illness, then we are overlooking the significant differences between them. Flu is a well established illness then a lot is known about. It infects millions of people every year in the US alone.


The mortality rate (US) from the flu is about 0.1% - i.e. the percentage of all people who get the flu who then die from it.



So, as of right now, Covid-19 is more lethal than the seasonal flu. What the difference is right now is that a LOT less people have been infected. If Covid-19 infected people at the same rate as this past year's US seasonal flu (45 million estimated infected) then 1,035,000 people would die in the US from Covid-19 compared to 61,000 from the flu.


Another difference (apart from lethality) is the R0.



Source: Livescience article cited and linked above, emphasis added


This implies that if Covid-19 gets established, it will spread a lot more quickly than the flu - IOW, it's about twice as infectious. That, combined with the higher mortality rate, means that it's potentially very nasty, and could kill millions worldwide. If, worldwide, we can keep Covid-19 infections in the low hundreds of thousands (and subsequent deaths in the low tens of thousands) I would consider that a great result from where we are now.


My assessment: No reason to panic right now, but something to monitor and take seriously. There are known Covid cases in a suburb about 10 km from where I work. It's probably the tip of the iceberg. Myself and immediate family may well have been exposed, or will be exposed in the course of daily life in the near future. That's why I could care less about American politicians trying to score points off each other.

Psalm 91.

Stay safe out there, everyone.

Similar to the Spanish flu which caused millions of deaths worldwide after WWI. Though the Spanish flu depended on the catastrophe in Europe, a landscape devastated by war. But it was significant in the US. We just past the 100 year anniversary.

I think the lesson learned from the ebola outbreak was that public health functions need to coincide with the health care, they cannot be treated as separate spheres. The most significant failures of the response to ebola had to do with community outreach.

[Mountain Man]

So, as of right now, Covid-19 is more lethal than the seasonal flu. What the difference is right now is that a LOT less people have been infected. If Covid-19 infected people at the same rate as this past year's US seasonal flu (45 million estimated infected) then 1,035,000 people would die in the US from Covid-19 compared to 61,000 from the flu.

That's assuming that a straight line extrapolation from the existing limited data is an accurate predictor.

[Darfius]

Thanks for handing MM his rear and saving me the trouble, MaxVel.

And you're right, MM, the numbers he gave are assuming China gave accurate numbers, which they didn't. The case fatality rate is actually much higher, which is why they burned corpses round the clock and welded people into their homes. Ever hear of a country doing that for the flu?

[Cerebrum123]

That isn't really fair. Government has a known history of malicious (what once was at the time until it was revealed or uncovered) secrecy.

Darfius takes the Mandella Effect as something orchestrated by Satan. That's a bit further out there than distrusting our government.

[Mountain Man]

Thanks for handing MM his rear and saving me the trouble, MaxVel.

Yeah, that's what happened.

[Mountain Man]

Regarding the flu:

flu.JPG
https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden...-estimates.htm

So that's an average of 40,000,000 flu-related illnesses and 32,000 deaths a month. Are we really expecting COVID-19 to significantly contribute to that? Here are the latest numbers based on one month of monitoring:

covid.JPG
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019...ses-in-us.html

I've read some reports suggesting that the cornavirus may be even more widespread than we realize, but that many people don't bother to seek medical care due to relatively mild symptoms, and they recover without treatment or complications, meaning that the mortality rate could be much lower than what is currently estimated.

[Mountain Man]

So that's an average of 40,000,000 flu-related illnesses and 32,000 deaths a month.

Hold on, I need to correct my math...

It's an average of 8,000,000 flu-related illnesses and 6,400 deaths a month. Still far, far below what we've seen so for for COVID-19, at least in the US.

[Mountain Man]

Random... there's a video game called Plague, Inc. in which you design a virus and release it into the wild to wreak havoc on the world. The goal is to infect as many people as possible while combating humanity's attempts to eradicate your custom bug. Anyway, the game has been pulled from digital game stores in China.

The developer says:

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/20...ion_unaffected

[rogue06]

It is one thing to criticize Trump for the lack of preparedness and funding and the dismantling of teams of experts set in place by Obama. It's quite another thing to claim that Dems have been rooting for Americans to die en masse so Trump will lose office as a consequence. It's disturbing that Trump and his supporters can even think this.

It's far more than that. You have folks like Democrat presidential hopeful Tom Steyer hoping that this is "Trump's Katrina" and the New York Times trying to get folks to refer to it as "Trumpvirus" adding that "if you're feeling awful, you know who to blame."

IOW, the coronavirus is all Trump's fault, after all "if you're feeling awful, you know who to blame."

[demi-conservative]

I've read some reports suggesting that the cornavirus may be even more widespread than we realize, but that many people don't bother to seek medical care due to relatively mild symptoms, and they recover without treatment or complications, meaning that the mortality rate could be much lower than what is currently estimated.

With some thought it is obvious that this is the case, and that even if governments wanted to test everyone who potentially could have caught it from a known patients, there are not enough testing kits in the world to test all the cases. China did not have enough testing kits, and no one else in the world has too.

This means that the reported fatality rate, number of patients, R0, etc are all useless numbers.

[mikewhitney]

Was this version of the coronavirus found in the States before the China outbreak?

Relatedly, is there a way to know that this virus didn't exist among people in America a year ago?

So I'm asking if there is a way to know that this version of the virus is now being found in America (maybe some other countries) because they only started looking for it.

[rogue06]

What you claimed:
Your source does not support your claim.

Here's what Trump said in context (since VOX didn't bother to provide a complete quote):

So obviously, he's not saying the virus itself is a hoax but that the Democrats' attempt to politicize it and claim that his administration is unprepared or botching the response is the hoax. On the contrary, Trump is taking it very seriously:

"We are magnificently organized with the best professionals in the world. We have to take it very, very seriously ... We are preparing for the worst. My administration has taken the most aggressive action in modern history to prevent the spread of this illness in the United States. We are ready. We are ready. Totally ready."

And when he takes action they immediately start criticizing him for it

[Jim B.]

Did you know that the gal from the CDC who waited until Trump was out of the country to attempt to induce panic by screaming, "We're all going to die!" is Rod Rosenstein's sister?

https://theconservativetreehouse.com...steins-sister/

Is the coronavirus really any worse than the common flu?

No one seems to know, but if epidemiologists are very concerned, I think we all should be (cautiously) concerned as well.