Infection fatality rate of Covid-19 inferred from seroprevalence data [pdf] • Hacker News Board

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

#131

Post by timr » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 7:02 PM UTC

arto wrote: post #120

dnautics wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (1) A COVID-19 infection can have long-term effects even in young people. What is the rate of this?

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.10.14.20212555v...

That's interesting, thanks. First study I've seen with more than a handful of participants, doing something other than self-reporting of symptoms.

That said, it's notable that:

* They don't have a control group (makes it impossible to know what the baseline rate of these symptoms is in the population).

* They don't measure the various criteria for "organ impairment" before the participants caught covid (makes it impossible to know if the people who were found to be abnormal were abnormal before catching the virus -- there are a fair number of smokers and obese people in this sample, so this isn't an idle concern).

* They find a fairly strong association with hospitalization (i.e. the people who are sickest, end up having the most lingering symptoms).

* The people who were sickest tended to have the most pre-existing risk factors for the same outcomes being measured by the study (i.e. there's a hidden correlate).

Because of these limitations, you can't really draw any broad conclusions from this study. In general, I'd say that it shows that older / obese / unhealthy people are more likely to have both severe Covid, as well as concomitant symptoms of severe Covid.

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

#132

Post by danenania » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 7:03 PM UTC

bleepblorp wrote: post #124

moralsupply wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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"

It's generally illegal, outside of narrow circumstances, to fire guns in populated areas largely because stray bullets will kill people. Stray respiratory droplets exhaled by people infected with SARS-CoV-2 will also kill people. Presumably you're OK with rules that prevent people from firing guns in public. Why are you not OK with rules that are intended to reduce the risk of people unnecessarily spreading fatal inf…

While I'm not against the lockdowns for covid, following this line of logic would justify a lockdown 100% of the time due to influenza, which is also a fatal disease spread by respiratory droplets. The hard question is where to draw the line.

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

#133

Post by cma » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 7:04 PM UTC

rossdavidh wrote: post #2

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.

0.1% for flu is of symptomatic infections. I think covid would get another near ~2X multiplier under the same measure.

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

#134

Post by cma » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 7:07 PM UTC

nate_meurer wrote: post #117

noja wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple and oranges. That flu fatality rate is without social distancing.

No, IFR is the infection fatality rate. It's the number of fatalities divided by the number of infections. If you reduce the infection rate, the proportion of those infections that results in death will not change. This of course doesn't apply if healthcare systems are overwhelmed, but that's not what we're talking about here.

For flu the commonly cited IFRs out there are restricted to symptomatic people (though still lower than flu CFR, this inflates it relative to seropositivity IFR estimates on covid).

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

#135

Post by moralsupply » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 7:08 PM UTC

bleepblorp wrote: post #124

moralsupply wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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"

It's generally illegal, outside of narrow circumstances, to fire guns in populated areas largely because stray bullets will kill people. Stray respiratory droplets exhaled by people infected with SARS-CoV-2 will also kill people. Presumably you're OK with rules that prevent people from firing guns in public. Why are you not OK with rules that are intended to reduce the risk of people unnecessarily spreading fatal inf…

The idea of a "causal nexus" is not accepted in any law system (natural or positive). The fact something can happen due to your actions can't be used as an ethical argument to limit your freedom of action.

From the perspective of individual freedoms the ban of guns is unacceptable under the pretense they might end up harming others by chance; if that's the case, the police and the military themselves shouldn't have guns. Besides, populations that live under strict gun control surprisingly have more people being harmed by guns than populations that don't have strict gun controls (case in point: criminals don't care about laws, by definition).

Also under the perspective of individual freedoms, the enforcement of masks is not justifiable. If you feel unsafe due to a potential virus outbreak, take your precautions but don't force others to do whatever they want to do. Otherwise, we'd fall into authoritarianism.

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

#136

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 7:08 PM UTC

bleepblorp wrote: post #124

moralsupply wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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"

It's generally illegal, outside of narrow circumstances, to fire guns in populated areas largely because stray bullets will kill people. Stray respiratory droplets exhaled by people infected with SARS-CoV-2 will also kill people. Presumably you're OK with rules that prevent people from firing guns in public. Why are you not OK with rules that are intended to reduce the risk of people unnecessarily spreading fatal inf…

[deleted]

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

#137

Post by ghaff » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 7:11 PM UTC

ekianjo wrote: post #106

SomeoneFromCA wrote: post #97

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.

It's usually less than that (but still in the tens of thousands). But 2017-18 was estimated at >60,000. https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html#:~:text=Whil....

You are of course welcome to ignore the CDC. You have a lot of company these days.

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

#138

Post by anoncake » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 7:14 PM UTC

ceejayoz wrote: post #89

dnautics wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> (1) A COVID-19 infection can have long-term effects even in young people. What is the rate of this?

We don’t know yet, which is a reason to be cautious.

Feel free to be cautious for any reason you want. But don't expect it of others if you can't provide evidence there is reason to be cautious.

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

#139

Post by marvin » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 7:14 PM UTC

rossdavidh wrote: post #2

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.

Covid-19 is perfectly evolutionarily adapted to fit into this gap. Its divisive ability has practically been evolutionarily selected for.

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

#140

Post by ceejayoz » Sat, Oct 17, 2020, 7:16 PM UTC

anoncake wrote: post #138

ceejayoz wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don’t know yet, which is a reason to be cautious.

Feel free to be cautious for any reason you want. But don't expect it of others if you can't provide evidence there is reason to be cautious.

We've got plenty of concrete evidence COVID infections can result in long-lasting chronic symptoms. That's sufficient reason to be cautious until we know the rate.