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Italy and South Korea virus outbreaks reveal disparity in deaths and tactics

reuters.com

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Re: Italy and South Korea virus outbreaks reveal disparity in deaths and tactics

#291

Post by bad_user »

tomerico wrote: post #10

Italy has an older population, hence more susceptible to deaths and spreading of the virus: - Average age of death due to Coronavirus in Italy is 82 [1] - In Italy, 3.65% of the population is 80 or older [2]. - In Korea, 1.75% of the population is 80 or older [3] [1] https://www.epicentro.iss.it/coronavirus/bollettino/covid-19... [2] https://www.populationpyramid.net/italy/2019/ [3] https://www.populationpyramid.net/…

No, the far more likely explanation is that the total number of cases reported for Italy don't reflect reality.

Because they are overwhelmed Italian hospitals basically send people home if they have a fever or other symptoms with no test administered, instructed to come back in case the symptoms worsen, only people having trouble breathing being admitted in the ICU.

Italy could easily have in reality 10 times the number of reported total cases or more.

Re: Italy and South Korea virus outbreaks reveal disparity in deaths and tactics

#292

Post by TeMPOraL »

esistgut wrote: post #210
Diederich wrote: post #34

I noticed something else that might be an interesting correlation: available "acute" hospital beds. I don't have time to do the full correlation, but here's the data: https://stats.oecd.org/index.aspx?queryid=30183 Select "Curative (acute) care beds" Scroll down to the Per 1000 population. Italy: 2.62 Korea (assuming South): 7.14 The list of countries in that table is a good bit shorter than the countries fighting Co…

Italy has not yet reached the limit for ICU beds, whatever it is. People dying here is still within capacity, for now.

That disagrees with all the information that has been coming out of Italy for the last three days.

Perhaps because hospitals there (and in general) are always running at 80-100% capacity, so it didn't take much for the extra COVID-19 cases to max them out.

Re: Italy and South Korea virus outbreaks reveal disparity in deaths and tactics

#293

Post by mister_hn »

> They are testing hundreds of thousands of people for infections and tracking potential carriers like detectives, using cell phone and satellite technology.

No but thanks. I do not want to allow a spy-state that might stay after the virus is sunset.

Italy doesn't track people, as EU court ruled.

Re: Italy and South Korea virus outbreaks reveal disparity in deaths and tactics

#294

Post by runawaybottle »

jsjddbbwj wrote: post #201
2019-nCoV wrote: post #13

This outbreak is a litmus test for the competence of countries. It's already shone a bright light on the fragility of global supply lines, cheap travel and open borders. These are the aspects of life most likely to change after this is all over.

Do you remember ebola? I don't.

Ebola never got to America.

Re: Italy and South Korea virus outbreaks reveal disparity in deaths and tactics

#296

Post by cma »

nostromo wrote: post #95
Retric wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A large number of South Korea infections are even younger due to how it spread. Italy: Above 80: 1,532 (18.4)% vs age 20-29: 296 (0.0)% South Korea: Above 80: 243 (3.1)% age 20-29: 2,261 (28.7)% https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in_S... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in_I... Of note, neither country has had anyone under 30 die. Deaths in the 80+ age range are 8.23% in So…

I'm not sure how the media should report on deaths over 80, or even over 90. It's not that old people aren't worthy of protection, but when you're 85 in the US you have a 10% chance of dying in the next year for any and all reasons. So saying this disease kills 15% (for example) of 80+ year olds without context sounds horrific, but contextualized in the actual risks of just being very old to begin with, sounds much l…

An additional factor in why the death rate is so high in >75 year olds is that most deaths happen when ICUs are overwhelmed, and older ages get triaged into not getting a ventilator. There is a much higher rate for them naturally, but this amplifies the disparity even more.

Re: Italy and South Korea virus outbreaks reveal disparity in deaths and tactics

#297

Post by listsfrin »

skmurphy wrote: post #139
T-A wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I can tell from the media, Italy has not run out of intensive care units yet. See e.g. this: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/italy-coronaviru...

Here are two reports that would indicate that the standard of care has been substantially reduced https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/who-gets-h... "Doctors and nurses are unable to tend to everybody. They lack machines to ventilate all those gasping for air." ---- https://www.euronews.com/2020/03/12/coronavirus-italy-doctor... "Another nurse working in Lombardy, the Italian region the worst hit by COVI…

> Speaking to Euronews on the condition of anonymity

This should imply heavy fines. Creating panic while covered by anonymity is very easy and it brings no value to society. If officials later on try to bring real numbers nobody listens.

Re: Italy and South Korea virus outbreaks reveal disparity in deaths and tactics

#298

Post by creato »

toolz wrote: post #222
spac wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ICU beds are also taken by all the other sick people. Only a minority is actually free. And people don’t end up in the ICU because they panic: I spoke to several Italian hospital doctors and they are overwhelmed by the troves of patients who can’t breathe .

I just read an article that claimed Lombardy has 737 ICU beds available for covid 19. Given Italy has a 3.18 beds per 1000 people that means they have less than 3% of their hospital beds available for covid 19 patients. That's absurd. In relation the USA has roughly 14% of their beds as ICU beds according to a reference from https://www.sccm.org/Communications/Critical-Care-Statistics

You seem to think that for some reason, ICU beds go unused except in a situation like this? ICU capacity is probably built to meet some fraction of demand in normal circumstances. Those beds weren't all unused before this outbreak started.

737 ICU beds available isn't the same as the total number of ICU beds. Normal health problems that need hospital treatment (strokes, heart attacks, car accidents, etc.) are still happening during this outbreak (well, car accidents are probably reduced now with Italy's lockdown protocols).

Re: Italy and South Korea virus outbreaks reveal disparity in deaths and tactics

#299

Post by cplanas »

taeric wrote: post #165
aquadrop wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Norway has very good air quality and still relatively hard hit.

Do you have the numbers handy? And note, I mean hit hard with high severity cases. Not just cases. My hypothesis is that it is already everywhere. Most of this exponential growth is just how fast we can deploy testing.

I don't know about severity, but Norway is the European country with the highest infection ratio, after Italy and tiny Iceland. As of today:

- Italy: 1 case per 3.996 inhabitants - Iceland: 1/4.285 - Norway: 1/6.710 - Denmark: 1/9.081 - Switzerland: 1/10.035 - Spain: 1/14.831 - France: 1/23.292 - Germany: 1/30.160

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