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Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

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Re: Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

#41

Post by eitland »

chrisco255 wrote: post #33
mmastrac wrote: post #15

> Horwitz believes that mask-wearing may be helping by reducing the initial dose of virus a person receives, thereby lessening the overall severity of illness for many patients. Now if only we could drill this lesson into everyone's head.

Except this is happening in countries and states with no mask wearing. So your null hypothesis is shot.

As I write this the post I reply to is downvoted, but it seems to be true in Norway were there's hardly a mask to be seen outside of the big cities.

Full disclosure: An alternative explanation here in Norway seems to be that the second wave mostly hits younger people.

Edit: there's a dead comment saying "citation needed".

As for the "hardly a mask to be seen" that is my eyewitness account based on what I see in shops and gas stations I visit as well as reading and watching the news.

The numbers of deaths / infections can be derived from here: https://www.vg.no/spesial/2020/corona/?utm_source=corona-wid...

Re: Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

#42

Post by NikolaeVarius »

chrisco255 wrote: post #33
mmastrac wrote: post #15

> Horwitz believes that mask-wearing may be helping by reducing the initial dose of virus a person receives, thereby lessening the overall severity of illness for many patients. Now if only we could drill this lesson into everyone's head.

Except this is happening in countries and states with no mask wearing. So your null hypothesis is shot.

Citation needed

Re: Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

#43

Post by NikolaeVarius »

eitland wrote: post #41
chrisco255 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except this is happening in countries and states with no mask wearing. So your null hypothesis is shot.

As I write this the post I reply to is downvoted, but it seems to be true in Norway were there's hardly a mask to be seen outside of the big cities. Full disclosure: An alternative explanation here in Norway seems to be that the second wave mostly hits younger people. Edit: there's a dead comment saying "citation needed". As for the "hardly a mask to be seen" that is my eyewitness account based on what I see in shops…

Citation needed

Re: Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

#44

Post by IgorPartola »

chrisco255 wrote: post #38
mikewarot wrote: post #14

I'm very glad fewer people are dying, but Most people didn't die with Polio... they were somehow crippled for life... I suspect the same is true with Covid-19. We need to eliminate it, not manage it.

Was that true of SARS1? What gives you that suspicion?

Yes. People who have survived severe cases of SARS1 apparently had lasting lung damage that put that at significantly increased risk with COVID.

Re: Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

#45

Post by chrisco255 »

tgb wrote: post #29

What about the vitamin D hypothesis that HN loves so much? I'm far from sold on it yet, but summer in the northern hemisphere should correlate with increased Vitamin D levels, which is hypothesized to be protective from severe results in COVID-19. The concern here then of course is that the death rate is about to start going back up.

Vitamin D is protective against all viruses, not just Covid. But we did see spikes in cases and deaths during the summer months in sun belt states. However, many of the worst cases did come from patients in long-term care. It remains to be seen whether the seasonal flu and pneumonia or Covid will be more deadly this winter.

Pneumonia deaths without Covid have exceeded those with Covid in the United States since August: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/index.htm

We're also at less than the number of typically expected weekly deaths across the board for the past couple of weeks.

Re: Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

#46

Post by oefrha »

chrisco255 wrote: post #33
mmastrac wrote: post #15

> Horwitz believes that mask-wearing may be helping by reducing the initial dose of virus a person receives, thereby lessening the overall severity of illness for many patients. Now if only we could drill this lesson into everyone's head.

Except this is happening in countries and states with no mask wearing. So your null hypothesis is shot.

Point to me a single country or state "with no mask wearing". There are sane people (and believe it or not, a lot of them) everywhere, even where politicians are insane.

Re: Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

#47

Post by AndrewSChapman »

I'm not so sure this is true.

Here in the UK the deaths are climbing back up again as the second wave comes in. Yesterday we had 241 Covid-19 fatalities, a number not seen since the start of June.

Additionally, the way the UK is counting deaths changed a few months ago. Originally we were counting everyone that had been diagnosed with Covid, now if the death doesn't occur within 28 days of infection the death isn't counted as a Covid-19 death.

And finally, we're testing a hell of a lot more now so the alleged case numbers back in April (~5000 a day) don't marry up at all with case numbers now (~20,000 a day). I'm guessing back in April it was closer to 80,000 cases a day in reality, which would make the disease just as deadly now as it was back then.

Re: Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

#48

Post by zwieback »

Medicine is basically process engineering: try some stuff and keep knocking back the worst thing on the pareto chart. Make a note of what worked and do more of that but also try other stuff.

The other thing I keep wondering about is whether people that are both sensitive and vulnerable have already caught Covid and have either died or recovered. Since we don't know everything about how you catch it it would be hard for the statisticians to control for that effect.

Re: Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

#49

Post by yaypolitics »

shay_ker wrote: post #35
dx87 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The lung damage at least looks like it is repaired over time in most people. https://eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-09/elf-cps090320.ph...

That looks awesome! I just hope it's possible to get that kind of treatment for everyone affected.

No need to worry, ACA gave everyone affordable health insurance.

Re: Studies Point to Big Drop in Covid-19 Death Rates

#50

Post by kalaido »

mmastrac wrote: post #15

> Horwitz believes that mask-wearing may be helping by reducing the initial dose of virus a person receives, thereby lessening the overall severity of illness for many patients. Now if only we could drill this lesson into everyone's head.

Years of studying pointed in different directions. Now all of a sudden they work. Same with vaccinations - if you shortcut the process the acceptance rate will drop significantly
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