How Is Covid-19 Impacting Life in Your City?

[mhays]

Nearly 6% of the known US cases have died. Your "99.9" is BS and you know it.

The real number is certainly lower than 6% because we miss a large percentage of cases due to lack of testing, and probably do catch most deaths. But the point remains whether it's actually 1% or 5%.

[the urban politician]

Originally Posted by mhays

Nearly 6% of the known US cases have died. Your "99.9" is BS and you know it.

The real number is certainly lower than 6% because we miss a large percentage of cases due to lack of testing, and probably do catch most deaths. But the point remains whether it's actually 1% or 5%.

You have absolutely zero evidence that the mortality rate of this infection is between 1-5% and if you are claiming so then you are pulling that out of your ass.

Nobody knows, we will only know in the future upon retrospect after a long, hard look at years of data.

But my guess is that it will be well south of 1%. A death rate of 1% is ludicrous and based on the most pessimistic perspective

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

You have absolutely zero evidence that the mortality rate of this infection is between 1-5% and if you are claiming so then you are pulling that out of your ass.

Nobody knows, we will only know in the future upon retrospect after a long, hard look at years of data.

But my guess is that it will be well south of 1%. A death rate of 1% is ludicrous and based on the most pessimistic perspective

It doesn't really matter what the mortality rate is, but it's obviously not "well south of 1%".

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

It doesn't really matter what the mortality rate is, but it's obviously not "well south of 1%".

In NYC, 21,216 people have either been confirmed to have died from COVID-19 or are presumed to have had it (had it listed as cause of death, but no test to confirm).

NYC is estimated to have 8,336,817 people right now.

22,216 divided by 8,336,817 is roughly 0.25% of the population of New York City.

Serology tests suggest 20%-25% of New Yorkers have had the virus, so multiply the number by 4 or 5, and that's the effective death rate.

[the urban politician]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

It doesn't really matter what the mortality rate is

Good point. 0.1%, 1%, 10%, 20%, 40%...........its all the same

[the urban politician]

Just for comparison, Smallpox’s case mortality rate was estimated to be 30%. Now that, my friend, is a virus worthy of running and hiding from.

As for Covid? Deadlier than Influenza, it appears, but way way way closer to that than a real killer like Smallpox was.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

Good point. 0.1%, 1%, 10%, 20%, 40%...........its all the same

What matters is mortality rate AND reproduction rate. If only 7 people are infected then a 1% mortality rate isn't scary. If 7 billion people get infected, then California, New York State, and Illinois die. Reproduction rate determines that. Also, everyone in Europe and the Americas will get sick enough to be hospitalized (the 20%).

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

Just for comparison, Smallpox’s case mortality rate was estimated to be 30%. Now that, my friend, is a virus worthy of running and hiding from.

As for Covid? Deadlier than Influenza, it appears, but way way way closer to that than a real killer like Smallpox was.

Not arguing that COVID-19 is worse than smallpox (it's obviously not, except that we have a vaccine for smallpox, even though we don't use it anymore), but is it correct to compare the smallpox case fatality rate to the COVID-19 infection fatality rate? Maybe that's appropriate for smallpox (all infections represent as cases?) but I have no idea. Obviously CFRs are easier to calculate and there probably wasn't the population monitoring in the past to get a decent estimate of the IFR. I guess the age distribution is also very different between now and then (which makes smallpox scarier, since it was more deadly on a younger population), and smallpox appears to have an even higher reproductive constant than COVID-19.

If we're talking CFRs, the CFR for COVID-19 is of course much higher than than the IFR estimate of 1%. Using the numbers for dead and recovered on the Worldometer site, it's 18% in the US, although that is possibly an overestimate as many "active cases" may never get marked as recovered. Using deaths / total cases you get 5.6%, which is an underestimate for the CFR because obviously deaths lag cases. 10% is probalby a reasonable estimate for the CFR for COVID-19 (and is ~compatible with the overall 10X underreporting that most studies indicate).

[pdxtex]

The CDC estimates the mortality rate for all cases is .4%
Point 4......virulent pathogen with 99.6% survival rate. Okay...

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by pdxtex

The CDC estimates the mortality rate for all cases is .4%
Point 4......virulent pathogen with 99.6% survival rate. Okay...

That seems incongrous with the population fatality rate in some Italian provinces where it appears nearly everyone got affected and strongly in tension with NYC (it would imply that 60% of NYC got infected, or that NYC had an atypical infected age distribution).

The source seems to be https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019...scenarios.html but they don't explain their methodology at all, unfortunately.

[JManc]

I read somewhere the virus is mutating and in the process becoming more infectious but less lethal, the goal of any virus; not to kill its hosts and to spread even more effectively. The earlier strains probably had a much higher death rate.

[10023]

Originally Posted by JManc

I read somewhere the virus is mutating and in the process becoming more infectious but less lethal, the goal of any virus; not to kill its hosts and to spread even more effectively. The earlier strains probably had a much higher death rate.

All viruses mutate and it would make sense that this is the direction of travel. That’s why we have so many endemic viruses that cause the common cold.

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by glowrock

A few quick points here:

1) I swear, the self-righteous, selfish, "Me! Me! Me!" attitude I've been reading by so many fellow SSPers here is truly disgusting! All this whining about not being able to get your hair cut, go to a bar, sit inside restaurants, go to the gym, etc... What about the freaking employees of those establishments? Does anyone care about their health and safety?

2) It's abundantly clear that the average income level of most SSPers is 3-5x the national/world average, apparently. All this talk about huge bonuses and commissions, paying cash for homes, huge down payments, etc... Wow, it's like we're on another goddamned planet from most people!

3) As many of you know, I've gone from working in a professional industry (oil & gas services) to retail (specifically a huge liquor store chain). Let's just say that the last couple of months have been insane for me, both in terms of ever-changing rules and regulations to of course a massive increase in sales. It's gotten to the point where the lines outside to get in have as many people as those in the store! I deal with hundreds of people every single day, not sure if any of them are carriers of COVID-19. Obviously the masks help greatly in preventing the spread from one person to another, but there's still a certain level of risk in what I do right now.

4) To everyone saying to open everything now, get rid of social distancing, etc... How many new cases/deaths are acceptable to you? You really think restaurants should be back to being packed? Bars packed to the gills three-deep? No distancing at all? With no real treatment and no vaccine? Seriously? I'm not saying a vaccine is the be all end all here, but a reasonable treatment protocol that reduces severity of the illness would be nice!

5) As a retail/service worker for the last year or two, I've seen the good, bad and ugliest of people's behaviors. If anything, I truly hope that there is a much greater appreciation for the people that allow all of you bitching and moaning about not being able to do everything you want right now on a freaking whim now and into the future! Be thankful that there are still delivery drivers, cashiers, warehouse/stockers, restaurant employees, postal carriers, transit employees, etc., (and of course our amazing nurses!) that are risking their own safety by dealing with the public right now!

6) I still can't get over the absolute narcissism and selfish behaviors by so many here. It makes me sick to my goddamned stomach.

Aaron (Glowrock)

Why is it selfish to want to open the economy but it's not selfish to sit there and beg the government to force businesses to shut down because of your fear? Many of which will never reopen, why isn't that selfish?

Let me flip the question on you: how many deaths are you willing to put up with to reopen? If it is ZERO, you aren't a rational person. So what number is it? Also, how many deaths of despair are you willing to put up with to save people in nursing homes?


Your moral posturing is off the charts bro, relax. You live in Chicago, they won't open up until probably 2025.

[jtown,man]

Originally Posted by mhays

Nearly 6% of the known US cases have died. Your "99.9" is BS and you know it.

The real number is certainly lower than 6% because we miss a large percentage of cases due to lack of testing, and probably do catch most deaths. But the point remains whether it's actually 1% or 5%.

I haven't see any article or researcher on TV who thinks the death rate is anything over 1%.

Bro, I feel like you are stuck in mid-March when we had no idea what was going on and we were scared and just wanted ACTION. It's fine to come out now...

[glowrock]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

Good point. 0.1%, 1%, 10%, 20%, 40%...........its all the same

How hard have you worked over the years to become such a complete jackass? My god, it's as if nobody in this world matters but you! You're behaving like a boorish ass, and it's absolutely sickening. I can throw several other SSPers in with you on this one right now, too.

I think it's time for me to make my final exit from SSP at this point. I don't want to be associated with such buffoonery.

Aaron (Glowrock)

[mhays]

Originally Posted by jtown,man

I haven't see any article or researcher on TV who thinks the death rate is anything over 1%.

Bro, I feel like you are stuck in mid-March when we had no idea what was going on and we were scared and just wanted ACTION. It's fine to come out now...

I should have said "more like 1%." It's still far more realistic than the "0.1" that was suggested out of either ignorance or hyperbole.

The recent antibody studies suggesting numbers like 0.4% are encouraging. There's debate over whether they're accurate enough to give a clear picture on infection rates.

Let's say it's 0.4% and we get to 70% infection in the US. That's just 942,000 US deaths if we open things up and don't find a vaccine or effective treatment.

[Pedestrian]

In Berlin, where bars and restaurants reopened earlier this month, authorities said Monday that the reproduction rate of the virus—the so-called R that shows how many people one person infected with coronavirus is passing the disease to—has climbed to 1.37 from below one. Scientists have said that an R above one for a substantial period could lead to exponential growth in infections.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/new-clu..._join#cxrecs_s

Expect memorial Day weekend activities to produce new hotspots amd significant increases in R0 rates across America.

[Pedestrian]

Originally Posted by 10023

All viruses mutate and it would make sense that this is the direction of travel. That’s why we have so many endemic viruses that cause the common cold.

No, it isn't. As usual, you know just enought to be very wrong. First of all, the "common cold" is not a disease but a syndrome caused by many viruses (guesses now are perhaps 200 different ones). There are at least 4 main unrelated groups: coronaviruses, rhinoviruses, parainfluenze viruses and respiratory syncitial viruses. Within these groups, there are a number of different distinct viruses (as there are at least 2 distinct SARS-CoV viruses). It's possible that back somewhere they may have a common ancestor, but within our period of observing them they are not mutations one of the other. And, indeed, by one estimate at least 20-30% of "colds" are caused by totally unidentified viruses.

It's true that all viruses mutate, but it isn't true that all viruses commonly undergo signficicant mutations of their immunologically important proteins. This, while SARS-CoV-2 has been observed to mutate, it has not undergone mutations of its spike protein in ways that are thought to make a vaccine to that protein ineffective.

[pdxtex]

Originally Posted by mhays

I should have said "more like 1%." It's still far more realistic than the "0.1" that was suggested out of either ignorance or hyperbole.

The recent antibody studies suggesting numbers like 0.4% are encouraging. There's debate over whether they're accurate enough to give a clear picture on infection rates.

Let's say it's 0.4% and we get to 70% infection in the US. That's just 942,000 US deaths if we open things up and don't find a vaccine or effective treatment.

It's going to be a philosophical debate. Do we accept the risk and carry on with life but adopt mitigating strategies or try the 100 percent containment method which has resulted in 100 percent economic catastrophe. It's safe to say the narrative was hijacked by the press and they made it look 1000 times worse. I also think because the world saw an authoritarian regime lock up its people we thought that was the an acceptable protocol. Honestly by the time we started noticing cases containing it was probably futile. It had already been spreading around the country. My vote is the world panicked and multiple opportunists seized this moment for their individual agendas.

[10023]

Originally Posted by Pedestrian

First of all, the "common cold" is not a disease but a syndrome caused by many viruses (guesses now are perhaps 200 different ones). There are at least 4 main unrelated groups: coronaviruses, rhinoviruses, parainfluenze viruses and respiratory syncitial viruses. Within these groups, there are a number of different distinct viruses (as there are at least 2 distinct SARS-CoV viruses). It's possible that back somewhere they may have a common ancestor, but within our period of observing them they are not mutations one of the other. And, indeed, by one estimate at least 20-30% of "colds" are caused by totally unidentified viruses.

How does any of this contradict that I said? I know all of this, trust me, and I never said or implied that viruses which cause colds had a single ancestor. They are different viruses but they are endemic in humans, partly because they are able to spread between human hosts without being fatal. The fact that many different viruses appear to have evolved to fit this ecological niche (essentially) supports the point.