Time for my Covid-19 review for 4/13/2020. I’m done with my justifications for my opinions, but I’m still tracking the numbers, and actually putting thought into what they might mean.
There’s a lot of stuff coming out now that is really throwing the numbers… CDC is recording every death that is even remotely related to Covid-19 as a Covid-19 death, even if the virus is not the cause of death (comorbidity). I’m done listing links that show this, do your own research. At this point I’m just tracking the numbers.
My primary issues with this pandemic are: 1) People are stupid. Mention of a pandemic and you can’t find toilet paper or cleaning supplies anywhere for several weeks/months… did those people not wipe their ass or clean their stuff prior? 2) The government has absolutely ZERO authority to “lock down” the country. They can recommend, even strongly urge, people to stay home, but they cannot legally force any American to do it, period.
My numbers that I’m going off of are only confirmed cases, including for seasonal influenza. My argument is that while Covid-19 is new to humans, the seasonal flu is still more fatal. My argument is also that many people will get seasonal influenza and/or Covid-19 and never know it, never get reported, and never get added to the numbers. Per the confirmed numbers below, you are more likely to die if you get seasonal influenza than you are if you get Covid-19.
Now for the numbers:
As of April 4, 2020 there were over 247,785 cases of seasonal influenza since 9/29/2019 in the US with a P&I Mortality rate of 10.0%, meaning approximately 24,779 deaths from the seasonal flu. This does not count Covid-19, which did not show up on the standard flu test (if you scroll through the link, you’ll see what types of virus they identify and include in these numbers). There are several reasons, IMO, that this is important: Out of the 1,303,970 people that went to the Dr. and were tested since September 29th for “flu like symptoms”, ONLY 19.0% of them actually tested positive for the flu. How many of those other 81.0% of cases were actually Covid-19?
https://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/index.htm
With 1,696,588 total cases and 105,952 total deaths, the Covid-19 Mortality rate Globally is 6.25%. This is from the WHO as of 4/12/2020, 10:00 CET.
https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/situation-reports/20200412-sitrep-83-covid-19.pdf
With 1,895,611 total cases and 117,653 total deaths, the Covid-19 Mortality rate Globally is 6.21%. This is from the “worldometer” as of 4/13/2020, 17:03 GMT.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
With 525,704 total cases and 20,486 total deaths, the Covid-19 Mortality rate in the US is 3.90%. This is from the CDC as of 4/12/2020, 16:00 EST. Keep in mind, they are now including any death even remotely connected, even if the virus was not related to the actual death.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/cases-in-us.html
With 573,138 total cases and 22,930 total deaths, the Covid-19 Mortality rate in the US is 4.00%. This is from the “worldometer” as of 4/13/2020, 17:03 GMT.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/
With 3,319 total cases and 82 total deaths, the Covid-19 Mortality rate in South Carolina is 2.47%. This is from SC DHEC as of 4/12/2020, 15:30 EST.
https://scdhec.gov/infectious-diseases/viruses/coronavirus-disease-2019-covid-19/monitoring-testing-covid-19
You also need to keep in mind that while the mortality for Covid-19 is creeping upward, only a fraction of people going to the Dr with symptoms are getting tested. The only people that are being tested are essentially the ones being admitted to the hospitals because of their illness. This means that only the critically ill are being added to the numbers. That makes a HUGE difference in the mortality rate since the ones being added to the overall number are the ones more likely to die from it.
Now, here’s a crazy thought experiment. Remember the number of people that went to the Dr for flu-like symptoms but didn’t test positive for the flu? That was 1,056,185 people with flu-like symptoms, but not the flu. If even 25% of those people had Covid-19 (264,046) and survived, the mortality rate for Covid-19 drops to 2.74%. If 75% of those people had Covid-19 (792,139) and survided, the mortality rate for Covid-19 drops to 1.68%. The thing to keep in mind here is that the infamous 0.6% mortality rate that has been thrown around by everyone saying that seasonal flu isn’t nearly as fatal as Covid-19 is based on assumptions by everyone involved. Granted, they may be educated assumptions, but they are still assumptions. That number is assuming that approximately 3,253,000 people will actually get the flu and never go to the Dr and never get tested (that’s about 1% of the US population). Now go back to the Princess Cruise that was stopped outside California. How many of those people never got Covid-19 (I believe it was 83%)? How many that got it were asymptomatic (I believe that was 50% asymptomatic)? I can’t find the links right now and my memory may be off, but I think those numbers are fairly close. All I’m saying is, I don’t think this is as bad as everyone is saying it is. It’s not good, but it’s not the end of the world. Remember, cruise lines are full of high-risk patients (elderly), so the actual infection of the general population will be much lower.
