Coronavirus

[AZRI11]

The

The new number of 24.7% infected vs last weeks number of 21.2% infected does not change the fatality rates, compared to what we calculated last week.
(If it does, likely someone isn't making the right calculation.)

More infected just means correspondingly more deaths down the road. You would have to know the deaths in advance, to know if that new number of infected changes the rate.

Medical personnel were not prepared for this in NYC. Flying blind and the public's fear of going to emergency room during a pandemic and (piling on) the elder care facilities, it was a cluster f#!%. Now that they have their bearings and with fewer patients from nursing homes the deaths will (and are) dropping. Worst is past, now it's wait and see how much better it gets. This is not the pandemic from the movies that makes Stephen King look like nostradamus. That pandemic will eventually happen, especially if we keep slaughtering and eating animals. When that happens we will all proclaim Joaquin Phoenix as "nostradamus"

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

d, if most people aren't taking this seriously, why are the cases / hospitalizations / deaths lower than we anticipated?

Whaaaa....? The number of cases and the number of deaths is now far higher than I anticipated, and I think it's safe to say that most people were hopeful that we'd see a better result. I did not fully account for the incredible ability of this virus to spread, even with mitigation in place (also we took action later than I anticipated, and the infection had been present upon initiation of lockdown for longer than thought). I think it is something like a 1 week delay increases the outbreak size by about a factor of 4! So there is a strong dependence on predicted outbreak size on when you think intervention will take place.

In retrospect, we should have locked down the entire nation in mid-late-February, which I was hoping/planning for, when it became apparent that we had widespread community transmission of the virus in Seattle (that's the date when it was obvious - about mid-late-February to those in public health in Seattle). That would have allowed (maybe) us to scale the testing capacity to properly contain the virus before the numbers of tests required became intractable without massive additional effort on the part of the government and industry. We'd likely be going back to work right about now, with massive intervention measures in place, and fewer deaths.

 

[powertoold]

The number of cases and the number of deaths is now far higher than I anticipated, and I think it's safe to say that most people were hopeful that we'd see a better result.

Again, I'm just rehashing what some on this thread and Brix / Fauci have estimated. It's gone from like 2m to 240k to 140k to 100k to probably even lower now, as the deaths in the last 2 days well below the trend line.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

It's gone from like 2m to 240k to 140k to probably even lower now, as the deaths in the last 2 days well below the trend line.

I'm not aware of anyone who thought 2 million deaths would happen with intervention. That 140k number is not out of the question at the moment - we won't know until we actually get all the deaths properly accounted for (not counting collateral deaths (like heart attacks & appendicitis deaths caused by not going to the hospital), but counting actual COVID-19 deaths). Seems pretty likely that we'll be over 100k counted deaths by the end of May.

We've had 53k deaths minimum in the last 30 days, and I don't see why we'd have fewer than 43k in the next 34 days.

 

[powertoold]

we won't know until we actually get all the deaths properly accounted for

We'll never know for sure, as who knows how we account for people with mild symptoms who died from coincidental problems.

 

[Norbert]

Medical personnel were not prepared for this in NYC. Flying blind and the public's fear of going to emergency room during a pandemic and (piling on) the elder care facilities, it was a cluster f#!%. Now that they have their bearings and with fewer patients from nursing homes the deaths will (and are) dropping. Worst is past, now it's wait and see how much better it gets. This is not the pandemic from the movies that makes Stephen King look like nostradamus. That pandemic will eventually happen, especially if we keep slaughtering and eating animals. When that happens we will all proclaim Joaquin Phoenix as "nostradamus"

It's too soon to celebrate. If people lose patience among all the re-opening talk, and actual re-opening, Rt may go above 1 again.

rt.live latest update now shows most states with an improved Rt, but in many cases only slightly below 1.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

We'll never know for sure, as who knows how we account for people with mild symptoms who died from coincidental problems.

We'll never get a precise count, true, but that's losing the forest for the trees. We'll likely also miss cases like the first (currently known) death in California, when a healthy 57-year-old with no apparent cardiovascular disease had her heart rupture (left ventricle exploded). The number of deaths and the different circumstances make it difficult to find & do autopsies in all of these cases. So it kind of averages out. We just do the best to count.

Fortunately with statistics and the law of large numbers, it's possible to make pretty accurate adjustments at a population level and get a good idea of true mortality due to COVID-19.

In any case, seems like 100k is a certainty in confirmed cases, and it'll likely end up somewhere in that 100-200k range assuming no second wave. And no one expected 2 million deaths in a mitigated epidemic (that was the primary purpose of intervention).

 

[powertoold]

And no one expected 2 million deaths in a mitigated epidemic (that was the primary purpose of intervention).

No one expected such a high asymptomatic percentage as well. It goes both ways. We can focus on this or that statistic or evidence all day. It averages out to the current statistics (57k deaths as we speak). I'll just use those.

I saw people here going bonkers over this or that hypothetical. It created more hysteria than necessary, and most of the hypotheticals never even materialized. That's why we should just focus on the current stats.

 

[dfwatt]

We'll never know for sure, as who knows how we account for people with mild symptoms who died from coincidental problems.

What does that mean? Could you please give me an instance of a medically plausible etiology for death from a quote-unquote coincidental problem in the context of minimal severity of covid-19 infection? I'd love to see whether you have any idea what you're talking about.

 

[sparcs]

Trump White House vows to double coronavirus testing in May in push to reopen the economy

Brett Giroir, the assistant secretary of health in the Trump administration, said at the president’s daily press briefing that testing would more than double in May from approximately 4 million in April, when a host of snafus plagued the states and federal government.

so 4 million in April is about 133k per day. Doubling that would only get us to 266k per day, but Fauci indicated he wanted in the neighborhood of 500k per day.

They are already in the low to mid 200k tests per day. So is this just some sort of PR that they are doing more than April? or something missed by the Marketwatch article like doubling from the end of April?

 

[powertoold]

What in the world are you talking about? Could you please give me an instance of a medically plausible etiology for death from a quote-unquote coincidental problem in the context of minimal severity of covid-19 infection? I'd love to see whether you have any idea what you're talkin about.

Patient X hospitalized for CAD. Has runny nose. Ends up testing positive for COVID-19. Dies of CAD. Simple. Do you work in healthcare?

 

[SageBrush]

Well, on the other hand, if most people aren't taking this seriously, why are the cases / hospitalizations / deaths lower than we anticipated?

Look at a SIER model. Mitigation is a continuous function.

 

[SDRick]

I'm not aware of anyone who thought 2 million deaths would happen with intervention.

I was under the impression that the original 2 million+ estimate out of London did consider mitigation. What good would a model be if it did not incorporate a (guaranteed) change of behavior when anticipating death projections of that magnitude.

Perhaps someone with more knowledge on this model can clarify. I am unable to find the original paper.


.

 

[SageBrush]

Patient X hospitalized for CAD. Has runny nose. Ends up testing positive for COVID-19. Dies of CAD. Simple. Do you work in healthcare?

I'll save @dfwatt the effort: you have no idea what you are talking about.

Death certificates are hierarchal in structure to identify the major, and then contributing causes of death in decreasing importance. Covid-19 positivity in the absence of pneumonitis or myocarditis would be an afterthought on the certificate, on the same line as toenail fungus.

The one exception would be if the clinician thought that the MI was from Covid related hyper-coagulability. For now that is only a theoretical, and if it happens at all, it is numbers too low to affect public health accountings.

 

[dfwatt]

Patient X hospitalized for CAD. Has runny nose. Ends up testing positive for COVID-19. Dies of CAD. Simple. Do you work in healthcare?

Not simple. Yes I do work in healthcare. The vast majority of males over 70 and more than 50% of males over 55 in Western cultures have some degree of coronary artery disease, defined as the presence of plaque in major coronary arteries. This does not mean that they've had a heart attack it simply means that they are at risk. Covid-19 and specifically the production of something called interferon-gamma is implicated in the destabilizing of plaque structures and the high incidence of heart attacks in covid-19. To see this as coincidental is BS. You've proven your ignorance. So please don't offer any more medical opinions.

 

[sparcs]

American Airlines will give face masks to passengers, require them for flight attendants amid coronavirus

First US airline to figure out that passengers might need masks. Delta is mentioned in the article, but only employees will be required to wear masks.

 

[powertoold]

Not simple. Yes I do work in healthcare. The vast majority of males over 70 and more than 50% of males over 55 in Western cultures have some degree of coronary artery disease, defined as the presence of plaque in major coronary arteries. This does not mean that they've had a heart attack it simply means that they are at risk. Covid-19 and specifically the production of something called interferon-gamma is implicated in the destabilizing of plaque structures and the high incidence of heart attacks in covid-19. To see this as coincidental is BS. You've proven your ignorance. So please don't offer any more medical opinions.

Lol what? Your post is nothing but diversion. I presented a medically plausible case as you requested. Move on.

Better yet, say someone with mild symptoms tested positive at a drive-thru but later has some coincidental issue that leads to their death on a COVID floor / ICU.

 

[AlanSubie4Life]

I was under the impression that the original 2 million+ estimate out of London did consider mitigation. What good would a model be if it did not incorporate a (guaranteed) change of behavior when anticipating death projections of that magnitude.

Perhaps someone with more knowledge on this model can clarify. I am unable to find the original paper.


.

"In total, in an unmitigated epidemic, we would predict approximately 510,000 deaths in GB and 2.2 million in the US, not accounting for the potential negative effects of health systems being overwhelmed on mortality. "

https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/im...-College-COVID19-NPI-modelling-16-03-2020.pdf

 

[dfwatt]

Lol what? Your post is nothing but diversion. I presented a medically plausible case as you requested. Move on.

Better yet, say someone with mild symptoms tested positive at a drive-thru but later has some coincidental issue that leads to their death on a COVID floor / ICU.

If my post is diversion what are your posts? You have no idea what you're talking about. The notion that there's a neat dividing line between covid-19 and other causes of death in people with known vulnerabilities and comorbidities is staggeringly naive and biologically and scientifically ignorant. And it's part of the motivated and systematic discounting that you're doing about the severity of the pandemic. You're spreading disinformation and potentially contributing to risk.

 

[powertoold]

If my post is diversion what are your posts? You have no idea what you're talking about. The notion that there's a neat dividing line between covid-19 and other causes of death in people with known vulnerabilities and comorbidities is staggeringly naive and biologically and scientifically ignorant. And it's part of the motivated and systematic discounting that you're doing about the severity of the pandemic. You're spreading disinformation and potentially contributing to risk.

Yo, you asked me, "Could you please give me an instance of a medically plausible etiology for death from a quote-unquote coincidental problem in the context of minimal severity of covid-19 infection?"

I answered your question with one example. Please use your imagination since you work in healthcare.

It's true I don't know as much you about interferon alfa omega phi delta, but that's not what you asked about. So again. Move on.