The Coronavirus Thread

[JimC]

So what it boils down to is that there are indeed more people infected (often with little or no symptoms) than official figures show. However, the spikes in deaths in comparison to previous years, and the frequent non-counting of deaths outside hospitals as Covid-19 related mean that the number of actual deaths is also much higher. Your much lower average death rate may not be as low as first seems, Sean

[Sean Hayden]

"2.8% to 5.6% of the county's adult population has antibody to the virus—which translates to approximately 221,000 to 442,000 adults in the county who have had the infection." That is 28 to 55 times higher than the tally of confirmed cases at the time of the study.

https://reason.com/2020/04/20/l-a-count ... le-feared/

I'm not sure how much a recounting of misidentified deaths is going to move that Jim.

[NineBerry]

The number of confirmed cases is very low in the first place. If you don't do a lot of testing, it's natural that you then find a huge number of previously unconfirmed cases when doing a study. The mortality rate is still as it has been predicted by German experts at beginning of march (around 0.5% of infected people). So, this is actuall, not news.

Additionally, those numbers in this study are not reliable because they used a shitty test and a shitty test protocol (for example using multiple probands from the same household)

[Sean Hayden]

You can plug your ears and say that all you like NineBerry, but you're not the only expert around. It is news to many, and good news as well. There for awhile it really did seem like the mortality rate was going to be considerably higher.

[NineBerry]

The mortality rate is fucking high. And it's going to get worse if no measures are upheld and the infection reaches more vulnerable communities and the healthcare system fails.

[Sean Hayden]

It's not nearly as high as we feared. Go and patronize some sucker that needs you to mislead him in order to do the right thing. I've never suggested lifting restrictions and even just mentioned the other day that I thought my county was doing so too quickly.

But, you can't have me taking a bit of good news eh?

[pErvinalia]

[Sean Hayden]

--everybody stfu, we're going outside...

[NineBerry]

Everyone has to find their inner Crumple

[NineBerry]

What's going to happen next:

April 20th: Scientists find out that cats are a major vector in spreading the virus
April 30th: Governments decide, all cats are going to be culled
May 15th: All cats gone. Cat pictures are banned on the internet.

Still on time:

Two pet cats in New York state have tested positive for the coronavirus, marking the first cases in companion animals in the United States, federal officials said Wednesday.

The cats, which had mild respiratory illnesses and are expected to recover, are thought to have contracted the virus from people in their households or neighborhoods, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.

https://katu.com/news/nation-world/2-ca ... -for-virus

[laklak]

The number of potentially infected, from what I've read, ranges from 40 to 85 times the number now testing positive. We're currently running at about a 5% death rate, so in order for it not to drop we'd need one shitload more deaths. Now I haven't seen the data for the spike in annual deaths, but I'm skeptical it's 40 or 50 or 80 TIMES the normal numbers. That would be ALL over the media, wouldn't it? So it sounds like good news to me.

[JimC]

Some telling figures on deaths from Covid-19 per million of a country's population:
US 144
Germany 63
Italy 415
Australia 3

The real figures are going to be higher, of course, perhaps twice that amount, but probably no more.

The consequences of the antibody tests depend heavily on whether having such antibodies makes one immune, for at least a year or so. If not, then there will be wave after wave, particularly if restrictions are lifted. Plus making an effective vaccine problematic...

[laklak]

30 variants so far.

[JimC]

Back to California:

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-23/ ... s/12175944

Coronavirus spread in California weeks earlier than first thought and early deaths were likely mistaken for the flu, according to local US health officials.

A 57-year-old woman died of COVID-19 on February 6, far earlier than any other reported cases in the United States, said Santa Clara County health officer Sara Cody.

It was previously thought that the first US death from the disease was in Washington state on February 29.

The details of the deaths could help public health officials better understand how the outbreak took hold in the United States.

Additional early deaths may also be discovered in California after Governor Gavin Newsom said he asked medical examiners from across the state to search for deaths that might have been caused by coronavirus as far back as December.

So, more infected than thought, earlier transmission than thought, and probably many more deaths...

[pErvinalia]

It's a Democrat hoax. Fake deaths!