Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU • Hacker News Board

Re: Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU

#291

Post by tristanj » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 11:02 PM UTC

hef19898 wrote: post #219

tristanj wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I shared the story of a Wuhan coronavirus survivor here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22272264 It’s an account from a 23 year old healthy male who contracted the virus late December. He was hospitalized with fever and developed pneumonia. Within a week he was in critical condition with near fatally low blood oxygen (claimed 60%) and digestive issues. He would have died without medical treatment. There are seve…

And all these cases are anecdotal data. Reporting or not reporting them doesn't change anything regarding the Corona virus and the overall number. Quite the contrary, these stories are totally in line with official reports and thesis / papers by doctors, virologists and so forth. Because is disputing that the severe cases are ugly and, well, severe.

I disagree. Stories and anecdotes are a much more effective way to communicate the situation to the public than guidelines, facts, and figures.

I've had people try to tell me "You don't need to worry, the virus only affects elderly people, younger people who get it will be fine." (paraphrasing)

I respond with this datapoint to let people know the virus can be severe, requiring hospitalization, even for young people.

Re: Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU

#292

Post by rorykoehler » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 11:24 PM UTC

hef19898 wrote: post #280

cobookman wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The WHO numbers are the CCP numbers. Foreign nationals are not allowed in to confirm.

So all the youtubers arw able to counter proof them with videos people in other countries, without any relevant medical expertise, are analysing. Great. Now tell me, how exactly are the youtubers and people on Twitter getting the "true" numbers if China is censoring everything? And why do you refuse to accept that the Chinese figures do align pretty well with numbers from other countries? Or do the Chinese and the WH…

I'm not taking either side, only saying its a possibility. Given how egregious figures and "facts" from the CCP have been previously I trust them less than most. They made their reputation so they have to live with it.

Re: Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU

#293

Post by ekianjo » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 3:27 AM UTC

oxymoran wrote: post #235

ekianjo wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Several weeks already. How long does this super highly infectious disease take to spread outside of China? You have to wonder the claims made on transmission at this stage.

The disease takes about 2-3 weeks to run its course through each patient. It’s slow burning and mildly yet unpredictably lethal. That sounds innocuous but it is a recipe for disaster.

Transmission seems clearly far less bad than initially thought. If it were exponential we should be at millions infected right now.

Re: Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU

#294

Post by dredmorbius » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 3:31 AM UTC

OnACoffeeBreak wrote: post #260

dredmorbius wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Chinese authorities at some level -- it's not clear that this was CCP or local Wuhan decisionmakers -- clearly tried to shut down initial reports of the outbreak, as evidenced by Dr. Li Wenliang's detention and citation. As a new disease, with the first cases possibly being acquired as early as late November 2019, it wasn't until mid to late January 2020 that city and national authorities appeared to start taking the…

> The fact that SARS, MERS, and 2019-nCoV all appear to have emerged during November may be significant. From [1]: The “seasonal” reflects the fact that viruses can’t tolerate high heat and humidity, preferring the cool and dry conditions of winter and spring, Webby said. That’s why flu, as well as the four coronaviruses, are less prevalent in warm, humid months. 1: https://www.statnews.com/2020/02/04/two-scenarios-i…

Right.

Also less prevalent in warm and humid regions (though spread in Singapore and Thailand is ... interesting).

This is among the reasons my concerns' been on a breakout in North Korea, which has both a meterological and political/epidemiological climate that seems highly favourable to outbreak of a disease such as 2019-nCoV.

Though it's politically viable to order a near-complete shutdown of transportation and travel, the likelihood of this being effective (particularly against high-level party members breaking quarantine), or pragmatically possible to sustain (what exists of the PRK economy likely requires people in close contact), limiting epidemiological effectiveness.

Re: Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU

#295

Post by poyu » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 3:58 AM UTC

odiroot wrote: post #238

torgian wrote: post #144

My wife is mainland Chinese, and she has been saying that it a worse than what the government is saying. Also, since Li Wenliang died, well, frankly a lot of people are pissed at the CCP. Anyway, I feel like it’ll be an epidemic ( it already is, I believe ) in China, and be much better controlled outside of China. Unfortunately my wife is also stuck in Chongqing; Taiwan is essentially closing up its borders and we do…

My partner is currently in Taiwan. Can you share with me, where do you get reliable local news about the virus? Can be in Mandarin.

Just go to any news website, Yahoo is pretty big in Taiwan and they have a special section dedicated to the Coronavirus.

Re: Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU

#296

Post by user5994461 » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 11:47 AM UTC

tristanj wrote: post #157

allovernow wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The WHO has been reporting numbers almost identical to those out of China, which are unquestionably and severely underreported and can only represent a distant lower bound. I don't think anything coming from the WHO can be trusted. I honestly think it hugely irresponsible for the WHO to report these numbers without clear disclaimers. In fact, there are clear politics at play here, as the WHO has only come out with ma…

I believe it goes further than this. WHO and China are both trying to downplay the severity of the pandemic because they know if they publish more accurate estimates, it will cause mass panic. Panic is not helpful in any situation, and leads to an unstable society, hoarding, and destructive behaviors.

I'm making an interactive map showing the progression of the virus, from various sources. https://coronaprogress.com/

I don't believe anymore that they are trying to downplay it, or they are being really bad at it. We shall be approaching a hundred thousand confirmed cases within 10 days.

Re: Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU

#297

Post by refurb » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 12:53 PM UTC

baq wrote: post #187

refurb wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jeeze dude. There are millions of Americans who weather cancer and heart surgery just fine without ruining their finances.

By putting whatever they’ve got left in an offshore trust and declaring bankruptcy?

No, by hitting their out of pocket max and having insurance pay the rest.

By your same logic, everyone who has a baby in the US must be ruined financially as well?

Re: Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU

#298

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 1:20 PM UTC

hef19898 wrote: post #282

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I didn’t misunderstand anything. The “real experts” are saying that the denominator (number of infected) is likely much higher than official numbers. But they are not saying that the numerator (deaths) is accurately represented by official figures. Deaths are easy to count if you only count deaths of confirmed infected people. There’s plenty of evidence that people are dying outside of the medical system, and tha…

Now the interesting question is which number is greater, unreported cases or unreported deaths. I'd say the number of unreported cases tends to be way higher than unreported deaths. Fits apparently epidemics in general. Also it is kind of logic. Severe cases have a bias to end up in hospitals, and to reported when they end deadly, only leaving the measuring error due to reporting issues. Less severe cases on the othe…

[deleted]

Re: Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU

#299

Post by skat20phys » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 1:39 PM UTC

kdumont wrote: post #270

hef19898 wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just checked the last Situation Report from Feb. 7th from the WHO: 31,211 confirmed cases and 637 deaths in China. Makes a rate of roughly 2.04%. And I trust the WHO to get the calculation behind that right.

That's exactly what I don't understand. Logically, wouldn't deaths typically lag diagnosis by some amount? If so, we would expect the death rate to be higher than current deaths/cases because we need to use the confirmed cases from some number of days ago. That number of days being the average time between someone being diagnosed and dying. Another stat is that there are roughly 700 deaths and 2400 recoveries, which…

Your intuition is right but it's complicated.

This paper gives a discussion of different biases:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4504518/

There's a standard paper on this topic the authors I forget atm but all estimates will be biased. The best estimates are sort of unintuitive and account for estimated time-to-death and the time since diagnosis.

Re: Life and Death in a Wuhan Coronavirus ICU

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Post by hef19898 » Sun, Feb 09, 2020, 4:09 PM UTC

cycrutchfield wrote: post #288

hef19898 wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fast quarantine for example is one big difference. People with symptoms that could be Corona related going to hospitals is another big difference. Tests being developed. Hospitals being on alert. But believe whatever you want.

That certainly helped with SARS. But nCov appears to be transmissible at the time symptoms appear or even earlier. That is a big difference from SARS and makes self-isolation and quarantine significantly less effective.

So we went from "no difference at all" to "the differences won't matter". If want to panic, do it. But please don't spread it, online or offline. Already too many people are doing just that.