fetzler Loc: North West PA

The death rate (morbidity) is complicated to calculate and the numbers that you cite are far too large.

morbidity (%) = 100*#of deaths/ #of people infected.


It will take a long time to come up with a good estimate for the morbidity. Typically the CDC takes about 2 years to this number for the flu.

It is likely that the number of COVID deaths is overestimated. Hospitals are empty and not making money and indeed laying off staff. Hospitals are offered rather huge payments to say a death is caused by COVID. A positive COVID test is not necessary. There is big pressure for doctors to check this COVID box. If an old person with COPD and heart failure dies and has some COVID symptom, the COVID box is checked

Determining the the number of people infected is also difficult as there are many untested and unreported cases. Random testing of homeless people in a few communities suggest that large numbers have been infected but that none have been sick. Homeless folks and those with no symptoms don't get tested.

It appears that in may areas about 3% of the population in many areas of the country has been infected. In NYC the number is much larger (25%). 3% of the US population is approximately 10 million people. Only 1.4 million cases have been reported. It is important to note that no one will get tested with minor or symptoms. Such people will not volunteer and cannot be legally and ethically forced to do so. The disincentives are too great.

Current best estimate of the morbidity is in the low tenths of 1%. This is similar to flu. Except for protecting the OLD AND SICK we should return to normal just as we do with flu.

Some things to consider. Everyone will not be tested. Daily or weekly tests of the world'spopulation is logistically and financially impossible. It is also scientifically unnecessary. A vaccine is unlikely. No vaccines exist for other RNA viruses. COVID results from an RNA virus. Folks have been working on an HIV vaccine without success for 40 years.

Heard immunity will not likely be achieved for many years. This would require about 60% of the population to be infected. Indeed, the virus may go away before that.

It is time to go out and enjoy life. Remember you cannot do anything without risk. I you go for a drive you may kill yourself or another in a automobile accident. If you go for a walk in some parts of the country a mountain lion may eat you. My wife had an encounter with a black bear in my back yard. Fortunately my wife can be really mean if necessary. She is nice to me, however.

It is time to also remember that the actions of many of our governors has and will lead to the unnecessary deaths of many people. Some have estimated that 30,000 people will die from delayed treatment of cancer. A similar number is expected from suicide. I could list more. Undoubetely, homelessness will rise and some will die as a result. I am reminded that politicians are the leading cause of death.


Waiting to be safe = Never

Rongnongno Loc: FL

Instead of posting printscreens that mean nothing, look at the closed cases on the same web site.

You will see the real ration of survival for folks that are counted as closed meaning either cured or dead. THAT is the real ratio since all other cases are still open potentially going one way or the other.

THAT is what is improving significantly.

Cookie223 Loc: New Jersey

I agree with almost everything you stated, but the world has had countless warnings on many catastrophic events, some were true, and others not. A good example is the prediction of a huge earthquake that will happen in California, they’re used to them, and prepared for them, but it can’t be prevented. No different for the predicted volcano in Yellowstone that when it happens, it will most likely have devastating results. How do you prepare for that?
The whole world got caught off guard, and no country could ever be prepared for something of this magnitude.

fetzler Loc: North West PA

Unfortunately, I think not all closed cases are reported.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

That I agree with. We may never know.

EdJ0307 Loc: out west someplace

From Wikipedia:
Anthony Stephen Fauci is an American physician and immunologist who has served as the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) since 1984. Since January 2020, he has been one of the lead members of the Trump Administration's White House Coronavirus Task Force addressing the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States. Fauci is considered one of the most trusted medical figures in the country.
Hope that helps.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

Read the answer to someone else above.

Open cases (infected = unknown outcome)
Closed cases = (cured+death). This is where the real numbers are at the moment. This is what is improving.
You cannot used the open cases vs the dead to figure a ratio, sorry. Calculating this way is a joke.
Now if you want to use the open vs closed you can have a ratio that does not imply the real death toll.

If you use the ratio of closed case (death) vs the number of open cases you get the number of potential death from this. As the ratio decreases so does the potential number of deaths which is a good thing,

pendennis

The statistical methods used by the CDC are suspect, and even Dr. Birx has stated such. Estimates seem to hover at around 25% overstated. This overstatement is also skewing any related statistics.

The studies last month done by USC and Stanford, seem to be as realistic as any. They were also bolstered by a study at St. John's Hospital, NYC. They all cited total cases based on their samples, to be as much as 40x-50x greater than those reported. Anyone who states that deaths as a percentage of reported cases, has missed the actual penetration of the virus. We will only ever be able to estimate total penetration. This has always been true.

Most folks don't understand regression analysis, and it's what's used to determine the actual death rates. However, these analyses are missing the actual number of deaths. Anyone who died of anything, and who tested positive for COVID-19, has been counted as a COVID death. Other causae mortis are being subordinated to COVID. The hole in this logic are the number of deaths not in a hospital, had no autopsy, and were not tested post mortem.

This puts the entire analysis into suspicion.

Rongnongno Loc: FL

You are absolutely correct on that. Still some countries had some 'safe guard, inadequate, granted, but they were preparing for something less virulent.

Different countries had different reactions based on their leadership. The result is if some countries were able to react quickly to limit the damage other have a dismal response and their population will suffer greatly. Think India, Bangladesh, Brazil among others. We know nothing about what is going on there. Add countries like Iran, Russia that obfuscate the impact and it gets really scary.

As if the leadership was not enough there are other factors (Indian, Bangladesh among others) that are over populated and cannot take any measure to control the virus... Not only a bad social system but a bad government... Then you have poverty, isolation*...

-----------
* No access to health care.

pendennis

This imitates the penetration of the Spanish Flu pandemic. Statistics were suppressed (wartime propaganda), not reported for any number of reasons, and just missed with medical diagnoses. Same holds true today, yet we have a folks out there who believe that this can be pinned down to the person. What folly!

Flash Falasca Loc: Beverly Hills, Florida

I hope this is correct !!

(Download)

fetzler Loc: North West PA

We are not arguing the definition of open and closed cases. The reported data, however, likely contains too many deaths and not enough cured cases. It is a reporting problem.

Cykdelic Loc: Now outside of Chiraq & Santa Fe, NM

Listen slim....you posted “ When I first posted it was 2 out of 5 (40%) dying. Now it is 1 out of 4 (24%)”.

It’s pretty Freaking clear your we’re saying 24% are DYING NOW. If you didn’t mean to say that, than correct yourself. If not, you’re making a seriously flawed extrapolation.

Now, as for my screens meaning nothing.....I’ll assume you can’t read or you’re just an angry old man. They clearly show the REAL death rates both worldwide and in the USA now.

Cykdelic Loc: Now outside of Chiraq & Santa Fe, NM

You do understand that the H1N1 virus was at least as infectious, right? You also understand that there has never been a cure for the Spanish flu, H1N1, SARS........

In other words, like just about every other virus, we will need to live with it!

5dogsken

So many facts! So little time!

When Trump claimed in his scripted opening remarks on Monday that “Germany and the United States are leading the world in lives saved per 100,000,” and later ad-libbed that “Germany and the United States are the two best in deaths per 100,000,” he appeared to be referring to the latest statistics on deaths in only the eight countries with the most confirmed cases of Covid-19. In that ranking, if all of the other countries on Earth are ignored, it is true that the U.S. mortality rate is the seventh-worst and the German one the eight-worst.

051220_mrA chart posted online by researchers at Johns Hopkins showed mortality rates as of May 11 for the 10 countries with the most recorded Covid-19 infections. Photo: Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center
But that is very different from “leading the world in lives saved.” The fact is that while six Western European countries do have more deaths per capita from Covid-19 than the U.S., there are more than 130 countries with lower mortality rates than America, including Germany, which is far lower. As of May 11, according to statistics updated daily by the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, the U.S. had 24.66 deaths from Covid-19 per 100,000 citizens, compared to just 9.24 per 100,000 citizens in Germany.

What this means is that if the federal government in Washington had been as successful at keeping its citizens alive as the one in Berlin, the death toll in the U.S. would not be, as it is today, 82,246, but 30,817 instead.

In other words, Trump is engaged in a kind of statistical sleight-of-hand, one that seems designed to distract attention from the fact that more than 50,000 Americans who have died of Covid-19 would still be alive today had he managed the crisis as well as Angela Merkel.

Updated: Tuesday, May 12, 5:47 p.m. PDT
This article was updated with the latest Covid-19 mortality rates for the 10 countries with the most confirmed cases as of May 11.