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Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

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Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#351

Post by amadvance »

arcticbull wrote: post #340
DiogenesKynikos wrote: post #330

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The flu mutates regularly, and there's a ton of strains. ... which a substantial fraction of the population is immune to. Only 5-20% of the population gets the flu each year. CoVID-19 will infect 60-70% of the population, at a minimum, unless measures are taken to contain its spread. > Results showed 0.37% mortality rate, which is an order of magnitude lower than the fatality rates being published I've seen most pe…

> Only 5-20% of the population gets the flu each year. Only 20% of America is 70,000,000 people. That's staggering. The economic impact of the flu is enormous. > I've seen most people assuming a mortality around 1%, which is not that far off from these results. In Italy, 1% may well be correct, given how the healthcare system was overwhelmed there. It may be 1% in Italy because the population of Lombardy was overwhel…

> may be 1% in Italy because the population of Lombardy was overwhelmingly old

Multiple official sources in Italy estimate that the real number of infected is 10 times the reported one. This explains the high dead rate.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#352

Post by arcticbull »

ModernMech wrote: post #348
arcticbull wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

COVID is unlikely dramatically more deadly than the flu, so the question is, if you're okay sharing your health data over COVID, why not the flu? It kills 650,000 people (60,000 Americans) every single year. The reality is widespread panic moments are when we lose our civil rights. Remember 9/11? That year more people died slipping and falling in the shower than died in the twin towers. More people died because they…

> It kills 650,000 people (60,000 Americans) every single year. That's over a ~6 month season. If you average that out it's 10k per month. We'll have 20k dead tomorrow from covid and it hasn't even peaked yet. This is with extreme lockdown measures implemented. How much worse would those numbers be if everyone was going about their business as usual the way they do the flu?

Well, a study of a German town showed 15% are already immune/have had it and a mortality rate of 0.37% vs the flu at 0.1%. [1] If you run the numbers and project that onto the US population we'd see an incremental 600K deaths this year. Unlike the flu, which mutates aggressively and recurs, we haven't seen much mutation of COVID. That means, unlike the flu which will kill 60K next year, and the following and so on, this will kill 600K once. [2]

So, my answer to your question, is an incremental 600K once. Although given those numbers are averaged and the impact is 100X worse for the elderly than the young, I question whether these would be incremental deaths at all.

In Italy the average dead its 80.5 years old with 3 underlying conditions. If COVID hadn't taken them, the flu may well have. One study showed a case fatality rate of 10% in the over-75s for H1N1.

Ideally, we'd isolate them, and let everyone else out like the Swedes.

[1] https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/04/09/999015/blood-tes...

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

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#353

Post by usaar333 »

arcticbull wrote: post #337
usaar333 wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. A healthy 30 something has an IFR of something like 0.1%. Doesn't justify a lockdown for a year; does for a couple months. 3. Sweden has experienced over 500 covid deaths in a week. That's a 30% excess death rate. Hardly "fine". 4. I see little evidence it is in line with the flu, unless you are talking about historically deadly flus, not seasonal ones. Flu would not have killed 1.5% of the Diamond Princess popula…

> A healthy 30 something has an IFR of something like 0.1%. Doesn't justify a lockdown for a year; does for a couple months. It's not 0.1% for a 30-something. The Gangelt survey showed a total population fatality rate of 0.37%, and so far the CFR has ranged from 0% in children to 0.1% for 30-somethings to 15% for 85 year olds. The Gangelt survey showed 0.37% actual vs. a CFR of 2% overall in Germany so we can divide…

We have to be pretty careful about demographic adjustments. Does the town surveyed have any nursing homes or hospitals? If not, that'll drastically drop the death rate.

By my napkin math, you get to about a 2-fold difference which explains the 0.37% vs. 0.7% numbers. But remember the flu 0.1% also includes those highly susceptible people.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#354

Post by donarb »

rburhum wrote: post #290

Went over the docs (Google and Apple's), but there are a few things that are not clear to me. This is my summary of how I interpreted it works: - A [Tracing Key] is stored locally in every device. - A [Rolling Key] gets regenerated every day based on the [Tracing Key] - A [Proximity Identifier] gets regenerated every 15 minutes and broadcasted to other bluetooth devices. - The Contact Tracing Bluetooth Specification…

> Q: Which "cloud server"? Whose cloud server?

Apple/Google are providing the API to public health systems who would write an app that uses the API. So your city/county/state would distribute an app used by people who live there. The server would be owned by the entity that wrote the app.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#355

Post by Eridrus »

arcticbull wrote: post #292
Eridrus wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you assume the goal of contact tracing is to literally find every infection, yes, this isn't going to work. If you assume the point of this is to reduce R0, then this will work just fine at any stage of the pandemic. There's obviously a question of what you should do when you find out you have been in contact, and that will differ depending on the stage. We probably want to be in a position where everyone who has…

How much more can you reduce the R0 below "nobody's allowed within 6 feet of each other"?

a) It's about letting people resume their activities and keep a low R0.

b) It's not 0, so there's still room to reduce the number, even now.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#356

Post by arcticbull »

dmarchand90 wrote: post #329
arcticbull wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

COVID is unlikely dramatically more deadly than the flu, so the question is, if you're okay sharing your health data over COVID, why not the flu? It kills 650,000 people (60,000 Americans) every single year. The reality is widespread panic moments are when we lose our civil rights. Remember 9/11? That year more people died slipping and falling in the shower than died in the twin towers. More people died because they…

I'm not sure where you get the source the covid19 is no deadlier than the flu as that seems to be thoroughly debunked at this point

It's worse, about 3.7X worse according to the latest data, with impact massively skewed towards the older (100X more lethal to them than to a 20-40 year old).

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#358

Post by donarb »

y7 wrote: post #311
rburhum wrote: post #290

Went over the docs (Google and Apple's), but there are a few things that are not clear to me. This is my summary of how I interpreted it works: - A [Tracing Key] is stored locally in every device. - A [Rolling Key] gets regenerated every day based on the [Tracing Key] - A [Proximity Identifier] gets regenerated every 15 minutes and broadcasted to other bluetooth devices. - The Contact Tracing Bluetooth Specification…

> Q: Wouldn't this list be insanely long? More so if it doesn't have any concept of location? I don't think such a list would be that long: 1. It's not unreasonable to have some approximate concept of location (e.g. "New York City and surroundings") 2. A contract tracing app is only useful when the number of new infections is low enough, such that all possible contacts can be tested. 3. For a tracing key 32 bytes wou…

The "location" data would be self size limiting since its based on the users who are using the app provided by a local public health agency, like a city or county.

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#359

Post by ENOTTY »

fauigerzigerk wrote: post #100

Promising opt-in is a bit disingenuous. These tech giants are creating a technological capability. Whether or not it is opt-in, opt-out or mandatory is then decided by governments, now and in the future. This is of course nothing new. But it's worth noting considering how high the tolerance for extremely intrusive government action currently is and how extremely weak any resistance is bound to be. I'm not saying I'm…

> Edit: Reading the spec, I found a piece of information that may be of interest

Shouldn't you read the spec before commenting?

Re: Apple and Google partner on Covid-19 contact tracing technology

#360

Post by rburhum »

y7 wrote: post #311
rburhum wrote: post #290

Went over the docs (Google and Apple's), but there are a few things that are not clear to me. This is my summary of how I interpreted it works: - A [Tracing Key] is stored locally in every device. - A [Rolling Key] gets regenerated every day based on the [Tracing Key] - A [Proximity Identifier] gets regenerated every 15 minutes and broadcasted to other bluetooth devices. - The Contact Tracing Bluetooth Specification…

> Q: Wouldn't this list be insanely long? More so if it doesn't have any concept of location? I don't think such a list would be that long: 1. It's not unreasonable to have some approximate concept of location (e.g. "New York City and surroundings") 2. A contract tracing app is only useful when the number of new infections is low enough, such that all possible contacts can be tested. 3. For a tracing key 32 bytes wou…

Thanks for the answer. Now, I am not sure your tracing key gets updated as far as I understood. Isn't the individual 15-minute long identifiers that get updated?

Also, not sure you can limit to surroundings just yet... people are still moving too much.

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