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Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

reuters.com

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Re: Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

#91

Post by koyote »

kian wrote: post #55
falcor84 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, for what it's worth, if they get the virus while on a long tour of duty, by the time they get back they should be good to contribute to the herd immunity.

Only if they form antibodies. Studies have been suggesting that people who get it in asymptomatic form are not all forming antibodies - leaving them wide open to be future communicators of the disease.

Wouldn't that mean that a vaccine is close to impossible?

My layman understanding is that a vaccine relies on the body creating antibodies.

Re: Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

#92

Post by xienze »

ashtonkem wrote: post #79
eximius wrote: post #10

This is mixed news. While this indicates the death rate may be lower and the infection rate higher among the general population, the demographic of individuals in the US military are going to be of significantly higher health than the general population. So, it doesn't necessarily ease the risk for demographics already identified as 'at-risk'. If anything, their risk might be understated given the higher infection ra…

The former only holds if you assume that a large majority of asymptomatic carriers never develop symptoms. It’s entirely likely that an asymptomatic positive test is a precursor to developing symptoms.

Sure, but remember that symptoms range from mild to moderate in the majority of cases.

Re: Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

#93

Post by usaar333 »

ashtonkem wrote: post #81
jjtheblunt wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does the mortality rate across entire population (not particular subpopulations) exceed that of the flu?

Yes. Current understanding of the mortality rate is that it’s roughly 10x more lethal than the flu across all age demographics. This means you might only have a 0.2% of dying as a 20 year old, but you only had a 0.02% chance of dying of the flu. The caveat is that mortality rate is intimately tied with the availability of certain types of care; if you need a vent and the hospital is full, you die even if otherwise yo…

I don't think that's true. covid has stronger age dependence. Just look at the ratio of covid vs. influenza deaths on the CDC's website (https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/COVID19/index.htm). 3:1 covid:flu for over 85, but 1:1 for 25-35 and 1:10 for children. (relative ratios as we don't know total covid infections).

This is especially striking with children: if the US had the same number of covid infections as seasonal flu, you'd probably have lower pediatric deaths from covid than flu.

Re: Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

#94

Post by Lewton »

Barrin92 wrote: post #39
endymi0n wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note though that the study, its methods and especially its politically charged presentation by repeat social media offenders are still disputed [1] [1] https://www1.wdr.de/nachrichten/offene-fragen-heinsberg-stud...

Today there's been a new result from antibody tests in the netherlands done on blood dononrs which showed about 3% infection rate. Extrapolated to the population that would imply 500k infections, 20x higher than the official stats. The Heinsberg study isn't the only source pointing to this. Almost a month ago the NYT also ran a story on randomly tested Iranian airplane passengers which suggested that as of that time…

Netherlands is currently at 30000 cases with 3000 dead, cfr of 10%. 20x infection would put the IFR at 0.5% which is well in line with what is expected

Re: Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

#95

Post by JackFr »

andrewla wrote: post #13

There's always the chance that the test itself is not particularly good and just has a high false positive rate. Although it is difficult for a PCR test to produce a match if there is no genetic material present, it may amplify trace signals, depending on the cutoffs chosen.

This seems to me the most obvious implication. That when you only test symptomatic people, the test might be accurate, but in testing everyone the false positive rate is much higher.

Re: Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

#96

Post by paypalcust83 »

There are multiple, dynamic risk-factors being discovered, treatment options, and different genomes of this species of virus circulating.

1) Being overweight is a major risk-factor for requiring critical care, and most US military folks aren't weight-enabled.

2) Being older is another risk factor. Also, most US military folks aren't well-aged either, typically in their 20's-30's.

3) Having type A blood group is a potential risk factor. Type O blood group is a potential protection factor.

4) Being male was a risk-factor for the L-strain. It's possible the military folks caught an S-strain that has less gender specificity, but it also may have nothing to do with it.

5) SARS-CoV-2 as a species maybe drifting genetically towards more communicability but less virulence. H1N1, HIV and others have also shown this pattern.

6) COVID-19 may not be best helped with non/invasive high-pressure ventilation that causes extreme barotrauma. In fact, it may not even be the same as previous instances of ARDS.

7) It's possible they were exposed to a variant of one of the newer genomes of S-strain that goes up to 78% "asymptomatic" community spread.

8) "Asymptomatic" means subclinical in terms of manifested, obvious symptoms. There is still the real possibility of internal organ damage regardless. Only a vaccine will be able to end this threat.

Re: Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

#97

Post by ashtonkem »

usaar333 wrote: post #93
ashtonkem wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Current understanding of the mortality rate is that it’s roughly 10x more lethal than the flu across all age demographics. This means you might only have a 0.2% of dying as a 20 year old, but you only had a 0.02% chance of dying of the flu. The caveat is that mortality rate is intimately tied with the availability of certain types of care; if you need a vent and the hospital is full, you die even if otherwise yo…

I don't think that's true. covid has stronger age dependence. Just look at the ratio of covid vs. influenza deaths on the CDC's website ( https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/COVID19/index.htm ). 3:1 covid:flu for over 85, but 1:1 for 25-35 and 1:10 for children. (relative ratios as we don't know total covid infections). This is especially striking with children: if the US had the same number of covid infections as sea…

These statistics don’t support that conclusion, because these statistics are for total deaths. You can’t meaningfully compare the total deaths from a disease that’s done for the season (Flu) with one that’s still on going (COVID-19).

What you should be comparing is case fatality rates.

Re: Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

#98

Post by koyote »

glofish wrote: post #4

I find this to be good even excellent news. It is quite possible the virus is not nearly as dangerous and lethal as people fear. If the young have nothing to worry about the prospects are pretty good. The best way to reach herd immunity is to have lots of immune people around you.

> If the young have nothing to worry about the prospects are pretty good.

Italy posts a weekly pdf analysing the demographics of their deceased: https://www.epicentro.iss.it/en/coronavirus/bollettino/Repor...

Not a single death of anyone between 10-19 and only one death under 10. 7 in their 20s. Those are statistically minuscule numbers considering Italy has over 22k deaths and over 168k confirmed positives.

This paragraph is also quite interesting:

"As of April 13th, 217 out of the 18,641 (1.2%) positive SARS-CoV-2 patients under the age of 50 died. In particular, 47 of these were less than 40 years (32 men and 15 women), age range between 5 and 39 years. For 6 patients under the age of 40 years no clinical information is available; the remaining 33 had serious pre-existing pathologies (cardiovascular, renal, psychiatric pathologies, diabetes, obesity) and 8 had no major pathologies."

Re: Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

#99

Post by ashtonkem »

xienze wrote: post #92
ashtonkem wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The former only holds if you assume that a large majority of asymptomatic carriers never develop symptoms. It’s entirely likely that an asymptomatic positive test is a precursor to developing symptoms.

Sure, but remember that symptoms range from mild to moderate in the majority of cases.

That’s a different argument altogether.

Re: Coronavirus clue? Most cases aboard U.S. aircraft carrier are symptom-free

#100

Post by usaar333 »

ashtonkem wrote: post #97
usaar333 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's true. covid has stronger age dependence. Just look at the ratio of covid vs. influenza deaths on the CDC's website ( https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/COVID19/index.htm ). 3:1 covid:flu for over 85, but 1:1 for 25-35 and 1:10 for children. (relative ratios as we don't know total covid infections). This is especially striking with children: if the US had the same number of covid infections as sea…

These statistics don’t support that conclusion, because these statistics are for total deaths. You can’t meaningfully compare the total deaths from a disease that’s done for the season (Flu) with one that’s still on going (COVID-19). What you should be comparing is case fatality rates.

But can you not compare the ratios between age groups? That's all I'm doing here - showing deaths have a higher age correlation with covid than flu. - not making any statement about absolute CFR/IFR.
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