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Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

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Re: Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

#101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) long covid is still being studied, obviously, but there are many cases of it - https://bgr.com/2020/08/21/coronavirus-symptoms-long-covid-s... It’s a disease that attacks your organs, there’s going to be damage.

I don't think anybody's denying it exists. What hasn't been shown is if long-term consequences are more prevalant with covid than with other viral lung infections.

Exactly.

Or if it's even caused by Covid and not some underlying pre-existing pathology that ANY disease could trigger.

Re: Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

#102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you need to look is not fatality rate, but total fatalities caused by the disease. Flu kills 60000 a year max in US, Covid kills 5x that number. And it is unclear what will be a fatality rate for younger people whose organs are damaged by previous infection.

Your math doesn’t add up.

Clarify please.

Re: Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

#103
post #16

Here's another recent meta-study (preprint) on the same topic: Assessing the Age Specificity of Infection Fatality Rates for COVID-19: Systematic Review, Meta-Analysis, and Public Policy Implications https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.23.20160895v... Abstract: This paper assesses the age specificity of the infection fatality rate (IFR) for COVID-19 using results from 29 seroprevalence studies as well as…

>This isn't good news, really, not for middle-aged-adults anyway. Or for anybody who knows middle aged and older people, especially if you spend time with them. I am honestly more concerned about killing my parents than dying myself of covid-19. This is why I skipped my mom's birthday for example, because I had pretty mild cold-like symptoms... or maybe mild covid-19.

That was always a risk even before COVID-19. Regular seasonal influenza can be deadly, especially to the elderly. Patients can transmit it to others when they are asymptomatic or presymptomatic. COVID-19 has a longer incubation period and a significantly higher fatality rate but the same fundamentals still apply.

Any of us could have inadvertently killed someone by giving them the flu without even realizing it.

Re: Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

#104

What percentage of people who get the flu are asymptomatic? I think the biggest issue with covid is people spreading it who don't even know they have it. A friend of mine just happened to get a test and was found positive. The only symptom they had was a headache. Who can take a day of work because of a headache?

Stories like this are the reason for all the social disrancing measures and work from home. Not everybody can follow this of course. But those jobs that can be done from home should be done from home. And social distancing should be followed as much as possible. Sadly, people have to be forced to do so it seems.

The only really sad thing is that so many people believe others should be forced (through the use of the monopoly of force the state holds) to do whatever they believe is "right"

Re: Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

#105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have seen evidence that the virus kills. That alone warrants action. In the beginning, the general lockdowns were fine, simply because we didn't know enough yet to come up with better solutions, and frankly didn't really have the time to rectify this before taking any action. Now whether or not to lockdown and what to lockdown can be applied more fine-grained. Of course, everything is still in flux, and some decis…

>That alone warrants action. In only warrants action if we're sure the negative consequences of the action won't be greater than the negative consequences of the viral deaths.

Interesting.

On one hand we have clear and ample evidence that the virus kills, and even more so when the health system of a country gets overloaded.

On the other hand we have a bunch of hypotheses arguing that lockdowns kill, etc, but no clear evidence for that yet. E.g. suicide rates are up on some locales like Japan and the UK, but down in others like Germany. (I am not disputing theses hypotheses as false, btw, as there is ample evidence that in order situations of e.g. economic turndown or e.g. isolation severe adverse effects occurred/occur; tho it remains to be seen what damage there actually will be)

Given how you seem all about the evidence, this should give you pause.

I agree that the effects of measures have to be weighted against the good of measures - namely "curve flattening". However, I still do think that the initial lockdowns were warranted as a short term measure, and that future, more fine-grained (hotspot) lockdowns are warranted.

Then there are other measures, such as facemasks... some people dispute the effectiveness... But really, that's a no-brainer now; even if it turns out the masks are not effective at all, the worst that came out of it really is mild discomfort wearing them (exceptions for medical conditions of course apply) - and some morons shouting at each other for either wearing a mask or not wearing a mask.

Re: Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

#106

For comparison, from what I've read the typical annual influenza fatality rate is around 0.1% (don't know what the under-70 rate would be). So, this puts covid-19 solidly in the uncanny valley of viral mortality rates; not low enough to be "just like a flu", not high enough to justify shutting down the world. No wonder opinions on it are so divided.

What you need to look is not fatality rate, but total fatalities caused by the disease. Flu kills 60000 a year max in US, Covid kills 5x that number. And it is unclear what will be a fatality rate for younger people whose organs are damaged by previous infection.

> Flu kills 60000 a year max in US

These numbers are patently false. If this was even remotely true pretty much every family would know someone who has died from the flu at some point.

The flu numbers are statistical evaluations based on no actual death counts. The real numbers of deaths from the flu are very likely much, much smaller.

Re: Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

#107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Of course you haven't seen papers describing long-term effects, simply because the virus hasn't been around long enough for any long-term conclusions. So you'd support locking down based on something for which we don't have any evidence yet?

It appears however, that the whole strategy of "learning of living with Covid" might turn out to be unrealistic, we'll be forced to go for virus eradication route. NZ and TW, and partially CN did it, and they are doing very good.

I wouldn't know about China, because frankly, the data they release is fishy. NZ and TW do better, but mostly because of travel restrictions (and people do not like to travel anyway right now for the most part) and because they are islands. Doing the same for the big islands of "Eurasia" and "America" and Africa seems less feasible.

The "solution" will be vaccines combined with some adjustments on how people live for the foreseeable future. Until the next pandemic comes along.

Re: Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

#108

For comparison, from what I've read the typical annual influenza fatality rate is around 0.1% (don't know what the under-70 rate would be). So, this puts covid-19 solidly in the uncanny valley of viral mortality rates; not low enough to be "just like a flu", not high enough to justify shutting down the world. No wonder opinions on it are so divided.

What you need to look is not fatality rate, but total fatalities caused by the disease. Flu kills 60000 a year max in US, Covid kills 5x that number. And it is unclear what will be a fatality rate for younger people whose organs are damaged by previous infection.

'organs damaged by previous infection' Fake news.

Re: Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

#109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you need to look is not fatality rate, but total fatalities caused by the disease. Flu kills 60000 a year max in US, Covid kills 5x that number. And it is unclear what will be a fatality rate for younger people whose organs are damaged by previous infection.

> Flu kills 60000 a year max in US These numbers are patently false. If this was even remotely true pretty much every family would know someone who has died from the flu at some point. The flu numbers are statistical evaluations based on no actual death counts. The real numbers of deaths from the flu are very likely much, much smaller.

I dunno, CDC says that.

Re: Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf]

#110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It appears however, that the whole strategy of "learning of living with Covid" might turn out to be unrealistic, we'll be forced to go for virus eradication route. NZ and TW, and partially CN did it, and they are doing very good.

I wouldn't know about China, because frankly, the data they release is fishy. NZ and TW do better, but mostly because of travel restrictions (and people do not like to travel anyway right now for the most part) and because they are islands. Doing the same for the big islands of "Eurasia" and "America" and Africa seems less feasible. The "solution" will be vaccines combined with some adjustments on how people live for…

I am not quite sure I buy "it is an island argument". There is very little political will I am sure, but virus doe not care about the politics. If winter death toll will be very high, it might trigger very drastic shifts in the policies. Vaccines might turn out to be not efficient enough as well.
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