Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

ucdavis.edu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 196 posts

Re: California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

#121

Post by briandear »

asveikau wrote: post #37
rchaves wrote: post #32

will US learn to be less car-centric after this?

As an American, I hope so, but it is also pretty deeply ingrained. Cities and towns have also already been built spread out and many homes are completely dependent on getting in a car as a necessary first action. Around cities, many are also priced out of where they work with transit not up to the task. But perhaps those who are able to WFH are getting a glimpse of what it can be like.

Spread out homes sound like a feature not a bug. Population density increases infectious disease R0.

Re: California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

#122

Post by CraigJPerry »

ckarmann wrote: post #112
Fjolsvith wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The more interesting question is: Will we come ahead in lives saved without the covid measurements. I'm still waiting to see what has happened to the number of deaths caused by heart attack, stroke, etc. that aren't COVID related. I'm betting those causes of death have dropped by about the same amount of COVID deaths.

At least in some European countries where COVID cases has submerged the healthcare system, it is a very bad time to have a stroke or a car accident since the ER rooms are full and a lot of hospital resources are diverted to fight the pandemic. So it increases the mortality of these other situations.

I’m not sure that’s true https://youtu.be/sN6Trgzf9kY

Re: California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

#123

Post by arcticbull »

Udo_Schmitz wrote: post #108
arcticbull wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny you should mention that. You have approximately a 1% lifetime risk of dying from a car crash in the US [1], and your risk of dying from a COVID infection is 0.37% per the latest study from Germany (and it overwhelmingly only kills the old and sick). Given you develop immunity after (no evidence you don't yet), that represents a lifetime risk too. Which means, your lifetime risk of dying in a car accident remain…

>your risk of dying from a COVID infection is 0.37% per the latest study from Germany 1.: Study is not complete yet and is of 500 people in the hardest hit area in Germany[1] 2.: Why do you compare deadly car accidents in the US with COVID-19 mortality rate in Germany? 3.: COVID-19 Mortality rate in the US is 5.3%[2] [1] https://www.tagesschau.de/regional/nordrheinwestfalen/corona... [2] https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/d…

Re 1: Hardest hit would be the most helpful place to study. And I look forward to continued updates. The Stanford study, while there's certainly questions, has numbers in line with the Gangelt study. [1]

Re 2: Because much of the audience here is American, and there's not a similar study of the US population.

Re 3: No, the COVID-19 mortality rate is not 5.3%. The case fatality rate is 5.3%. Those are not the same, for an obvious reason -- currently the overwhelming majority of tests are carried out on people who go to hospital because they're sick. It's adverse selection bias.

For instance, it'd be like trying to measure the fatality rate of skydiving by measuring the odds that someone who ends up in the hospital with a skydiving injury dies. You'd think it's 99% fatal, but of course, it's not.

All you know is the numerator, not the denominator.

[1] https://www.stanforddaily.com/2020/04/17/santa-clara-county-...

Re: California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

#124

Post by mattigames »

briandear wrote: post #116
Udo_Schmitz wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>your risk of dying from a COVID infection is 0.37% per the latest study from Germany 1.: Study is not complete yet and is of 500 people in the hardest hit area in Germany[1] 2.: Why do you compare deadly car accidents in the US with COVID-19 mortality rate in Germany? 3.: COVID-19 Mortality rate in the US is 5.3%[2] [1] https://www.tagesschau.de/regional/nordrheinwestfalen/corona... [2] https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/d…

That death rate is skewed. A COVID death is counted if the person had the infection and died, even if a co-morbidity would have killed them anyway. A person that has no symptoms or mild symptoms isn’t necessary known to have had the disease, which means there is a significantly lower death rate because the known infections is what’s used for the death rate, not the actual number of infections. A newly released study…

That doesn't matter much when there is no strong evidence that to have had COVID guarantees immunity[0] because being asymptomatic now doesn't mean they will be asymptomatic in the future, just South Korea has reported 116 people re-infected[0]

[0] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/04/17/no-evidence-peop...

[1] https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/04/200413110301074.html

Re: California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

#125

Post by arcticbull »

dragonwriter wrote: post #91
arcticbull wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if we'll see a big drop in flu deaths as overwhelmingly only the old and sick die of COVID, and those folks are at large risk from the flu also.

> I wonder if we'll see a big drop in flu deaths The flu season overlapped with a period that included initial reports and fear of a novel respiratory disease and then historic, mandatory countermeasures (for the vast majority of the population) against communicable respiratory disease; it would be bizarre if there wasn't a big drop in flu deaths.

I meant in following years, as those who likely would have succumbed to the flu in following years succumb to COVID now. For the current period, there's absolutely no way flu, car and so on deaths don't plunge.

Re: California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

#126

Post by arcticbull »

mattigames wrote: post #107
arcticbull wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny you should mention that. You have approximately a 1% lifetime risk of dying from a car crash in the US [1], and your risk of dying from a COVID infection is 0.37% per the latest study from Germany (and it overwhelmingly only kills the old and sick). Given you develop immunity after (no evidence you don't yet), that represents a lifetime risk too. Which means, your lifetime risk of dying in a car accident remain…

You are not taking at all into account the likelihood of suffering permanent life-long damage to lungs, hearth, kidneys and brain[0] which makes you predisposed to develop other painful (and sometimes fatal) conditions. Also there is not enough evidence to believe COVID happens only once per person[1] South Korea, the country with the best testing so far has reported 116 people re-infected[2], so there IS evidence ab…

> Also there is not enough evidence to believe COVID happens only once per person.

There's also no evidence it doesn't. What we do know is that the disease hasn't mutated significantly to date, and we see strong antibody response. [1] In time, we'll have a vaccine and it may require a number of booster shots, but what we know so far suggest reason for optimism, not pessimism.

[1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/the-coronavirus-isnt-m...

Re: California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

#127

Post by DanBC »

Fjolsvith wrote: post #75
hannob wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The more interesting question is: Will we come ahead in lives saved without the covid measurements. Because it tells a very interesting story how many lives we're willing to accept to be lost in normal circumstances. Cars, air pollution, avoidable infections, ... - there's a lot of harm society could avoid and doesn't.

> The more interesting question is: Will we come ahead in lives saved without the covid measurements. I'm still waiting to see what has happened to the number of deaths caused by heart attack, stroke, etc. that aren't COVID related. I'm betting those causes of death have dropped by about the same amount of COVID deaths.

In the UK people are delaying seeking medical help for things like stroke or heart attack. At the moment we think these deaths are going to increase.

Re: California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

#128

Post by natrik »

eanzenberg wrote: post #115
mediumdeviation wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That seems unlikely given that in the week of April 6 to 12, Covid 19 has risen to the 2nd leading cause of death in the United States[1]. [1]: https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/04/16/coronaviru...

This is bad analysis which uses historic numbers and plops COVID against them. Everyone right now is dying of COVID and not much else. Apparently it’s healing cancer and heart attacks. https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/COVID19/index.htm

I get the point you're trying to make with the data, but could you expand more on "healing cancer and heart attacks."?

Not sure I follow

Re: California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

#129

Post by _ph_ »

CraigJPerry wrote: post #122
ckarmann wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At least in some European countries where COVID cases has submerged the healthcare system, it is a very bad time to have a stroke or a car accident since the ER rooms are full and a lot of hospital resources are diverted to fight the pandemic. So it increases the mortality of these other situations.

I’m not sure that’s true https://youtu.be/sN6Trgzf9kY

Not sure how this is a contradiction to what the previous poster said. There is a huge variation across Europe and across regions of each country. There are regions where the medical system is completely overloaded. Northern Italy, central Spain and France. It plays a huge role, what phase of the pandemic a country is in. The peak of hospital load is clearly yet to come in the UK. Also, as the vlogger says, people are coming less to the hospitals with non-covid diseases, partially because the local docters are loaded.

Re: California Covid-19 traffic report finds silver lining

#130

Post by dmarchand90 »

afthonos wrote: post #67
hannob wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The more interesting question is: Will we come ahead in lives saved without the covid measurements. Because it tells a very interesting story how many lives we're willing to accept to be lost in normal circumstances. Cars, air pollution, avoidable infections, ... - there's a lot of harm society could avoid and doesn't.

Those are unfortunately baked into our accounting, much like “killed by bandits” was accounted for in medieval trade until states started being able and willing to provide meaningful security.

I didn't know that "killed by bandits" was a standard in medieval trade logs! Is there a book or article you could happen to recommend to learn more about that?
Post reply on HN