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Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

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Re: Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

#121

Post by ageitgey »

DanBC wrote: post #87
ageitgey wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are conflating a lot of different things. Traffic fatalities were actually down overall (total numbers), but up per mile driven . In other words, people were driving much less and dying in lower total numbers, but the people who were driving were driving faster and thus a bit more likely to die. That article is poorly written to generate headlines and clicks. Arguing over a specific IFR is also kind of pointless…

> and not deadly at all if you are 15 Very low risk, but not no risk.

Yes, not zero risk. But to give you an idea of the risk, here are the numbers from England (only, not entire UK):

- Total COVID deaths: 28,137

- Deaths, 0-19 years of age: 18

- Deaths, 0-19 years of age, no pre-existing condition: 3

You are definitely going to see individual news reports on those 3 cases because they are exceptional and scary. But you aren't going to see individual news reports on the 25,721 people aged over 60 who died of COVID during the same period.

And keep in mind that not only are the raw numbers astronomically higher for the older age ranges, but those older age ranges are also much smaller populations. So it's even worse than it appears.

For example, 15,020 people aged 80+ died of COVID. But 80+ year olds are only 4.6% of the population in England. Under 18s make up more like 25% of the population but only account for 18 deaths. That's about as close to low risk as you can get without being zero risk.

Re: Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

#122

Post by mcv »

lmilcin wrote: post #98
mcv wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I heard, about half the deaths are people under 55 (edit: I can't find that source anymore and all figures suggest it's wrong). The individual risk is still higher the older you are, but plenty of young people have died from this (610 in the US, for example). But even if you don't know anyone who died from it, you can still know people who are ill. My ex-brother-in-law has been in and out of the hospital 4…

That's not true. All believable statistics I have seen show only very small number of deaths in age group 55 and lower. Outrageous claims require outrageous proofs, you need to volunteer your sources if you want to convince anybody that 55 and younger are large share of deaths. "From what I have heard" is not an outrageous proof on HN. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-age-se...

There's different ways of looking at statistics. Most statistics are about the death rates for infected cases per age group, which doesn't account for situations where elderly people are kept from coming into contact with the virus in the first place.

Unfortunately, I'm unable to find good global statistics on absolute number of deaths broken down per age group.

I have come across the claim I mentioned in response to a claim that young people almost never die from this. That is simply not true: young people do die, but it looks like half is indeed an exaggeration. Even so, the claim that it's in the double digits is also false; in the US, 610 people under 44 have died[0]. Claims that young people are perfectly safe are dangerous, even if the danger is a lot higher for older people.

[0] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-age-se...

Re: Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

#123

Post by LandR »

ageitgey wrote: post #47
ManlyBread wrote: post #12

I became numb to news like this because it doesn't seem to have any reflection in the reality around me. The numbers are supposed to be huge yet hospitals are nearly empty and no one I asked knows anyone who was infected. The 80x number looks like science fiction to me.

People want this thing to be over, so there's a desire to find reasons to believe that we are further along than we thought. Combined with this being a novel disease that no one fully understands, there's a lot of room for those theories to develop. The current best science answer to how many people remain susceptible to infection is "nobody really knows but our best guess is not to assume the best case without bette…

I don't think for most people dying is the scary outcome, like you say it's very very unlikely for a healthy young person.

But what is the odds that you survive but then require kidney transplant or lung transplant or have leave ICU only to face weeks or months of recovery. This latter bit is a unknown to me, so I don't know what my actual risk is.

Re: Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

#124

Post by helij »

qeternity wrote: post #110
amanaplanacanal wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe. New Zealand took a different path and managed the problem with far fewer deaths.

For now. They will have second/third waves. We’re not going to cure this before we reach herd immunity. New Zealand just delayed the inevitable (which is what flattening the curve is all about: delay infections enough so that we can reasonably treat)

And there might not be a second/third wave. Some countries observe the virus weakening. People who would've died two months ago if they caught it are now showing milder symptoms. We have 80 year olds now who would need a ventilator two months ago recovering completely as per some doctors from Europe (Italy, Serbia).

Re: Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

#125

Post by LandR »

mcv wrote: post #91
ageitgey wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People want this thing to be over, so there's a desire to find reasons to believe that we are further along than we thought. Combined with this being a novel disease that no one fully understands, there's a lot of room for those theories to develop. The current best science answer to how many people remain susceptible to infection is "nobody really knows but our best guess is not to assume the best case without bette…

From what I heard, about half the deaths are people under 55 (edit: I can't find that source anymore and all figures suggest it's wrong). The individual risk is still higher the older you are, but plenty of young people have died from this (610 in the US, for example). But even if you don't know anyone who died from it, you can still know people who are ill. My ex-brother-in-law has been in and out of the hospital 4…

In my country the breakdown for excess deaths is:

15 - 44 = 27

45 - 64 = 589

75 - 84 = 1356

85 + = 1761

If you are under 40 your risk of dying seems to be very very low.

Re: Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

#126

Post by gizmo »

LandR wrote: post #123
ageitgey wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People want this thing to be over, so there's a desire to find reasons to believe that we are further along than we thought. Combined with this being a novel disease that no one fully understands, there's a lot of room for those theories to develop. The current best science answer to how many people remain susceptible to infection is "nobody really knows but our best guess is not to assume the best case without bette…

I don't think for most people dying is the scary outcome, like you say it's very very unlikely for a healthy young person. But what is the odds that you survive but then require kidney transplant or lung transplant or have leave ICU only to face weeks or months of recovery. This latter bit is a unknown to me, so I don't know what my actual risk is.

Close to 0, if you're reasonably healthy.

Re: Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

#127

Post by fastball »

vertex-four wrote: post #83
fastball wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can have a pandemic without fear though.

Really? Has there ever been one? Or is the fear a natural human response to an invisible, omnipresent killer?

Well, I guess I should say you can have a pandemic without a fear-mongering news media that significantly exacerbates it.

I personally am not "fearful" of COVID-19, as are many (most) people I know, so it is clearly possible for the general human.

Re: Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

#128

Post by lbeltrame »

LandR wrote: post #123
ageitgey wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People want this thing to be over, so there's a desire to find reasons to believe that we are further along than we thought. Combined with this being a novel disease that no one fully understands, there's a lot of room for those theories to develop. The current best science answer to how many people remain susceptible to infection is "nobody really knows but our best guess is not to assume the best case without bette…

I don't think for most people dying is the scary outcome, like you say it's very very unlikely for a healthy young person. But what is the odds that you survive but then require kidney transplant or lung transplant or have leave ICU only to face weeks or months of recovery. This latter bit is a unknown to me, so I don't know what my actual risk is.

> only to face weeks or months of recovery.

FTR, this also happens with other respiratory diseases. You can also take quite a bit of time (months) to fully recover from "regular" pneumonia.

Re: Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

#129

Post by RaceWon »

chosenbreed37 wrote: post #86
ageitgey wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People want this thing to be over, so there's a desire to find reasons to believe that we are further along than we thought. Combined with this being a novel disease that no one fully understands, there's a lot of room for those theories to develop. The current best science answer to how many people remain susceptible to infection is "nobody really knows but our best guess is not to assume the best case without bette…

> - The disease is astronomically worse for elderly people. One study said that for young person, getting COVID was as risky as going for a ~200 mile car drive but as a 90 year old it was as risky as flying a WWII bomber mission Interesting comparison. So here we're talking about the risk of dying from Covid-19. What about the risk of becoming seriously ill? What I'm curious is about is the percentage of people (youn…

>> What I'm curious is about is the percentage of people (younger or otherwise) who either develop no symptoms or develop symptoms so mild as to not be attributed to the virus. Do such people exist?

My spouse and I both work in a hospital. She got covid and so did one of our two siblings. Neither of them had any symptoms (spouse is in her 50's, our sibling is twenty plus.) I never got it nor did our other sibling. I also don't have antibodies. Go figure... it makes no sense to me.

As a side note: we are not in patient care, however when this was at it's early peak here in the States--I don't know how the nurses, aides, and doctors were able to do their jobs everyday. It was fricken scary walking through the halls and passing workers dressed in plastic; what with all the unknowns at that time, and the news reports of death throughout the world. Those workers deserve respect if not outright awe and a Huge Cash Bonus... Huge.

Re: Initial Covid-19 infection rate may be 80 times greater than originally reported

#130

Post by jmull »

qeternity wrote: post #10

History books will not be kind to our past and present handling of covid-19. Incurring incredible economic and social damage without fully understanding the threat. It’s been very clear for some time that covid is not nearly as lethal as once feared AND even more clear that we over quarantined. In the UK we have hospitals built specifically for covid that are completely unused. This isn’t flattening the curve, it’s c…

> History books will not be kind to our past and present handling of covid-19.

History has not been approving of the casual disregard for human life and probably won’t be in this case either.

For the US, I think history will judge us harshly for our overall lack of response. (We’re scaling back pretty much every response for short-sighted political reasons even as cases are starting to spike again.)

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