COVID-19 | science, damage limitation, NO POLITICS

[Alan Klein]

Here is an article that shows comparing the number of regular flu deaths to COVID-19 deaths is misleading

https://news.yahoo.com/flu-deaths-were-counted-covid-053449918.html

If true, than the CDC has been getting the counts wrong for the flu for the last ten years.  If the guy's right, it doesn't say much for the government or the CDC, which wouldn't surprise me at all.  Worse, we're depending on the same people who did all this research on the flu and other viruses to give us expert advice on how to deal with Covid 19.  Am I the only one who sees the problem here? 

[Alan Klein]

Yes, if we are to compare Covid to the flu, we need to collect the data following the same process.

I have been involved with long term care homes ( both my parents and now my in laws ) and I cannot recount a single death during roughly 5 years that was the result of the yearly flu. And that's without any kind of lock down of the facilities...just a poster on the walls informing visitors to not enter the facility if they felt ill.

Now with Covid, we've seen it run havoc through these same type of facilities. Me thinks Covid is much more dangerous than the yearly flu.

Then why bother taking a flu shot yearly? 

[Robert Roaldi]

Here is an article that shows comparing the number of regular flu deaths to COVID-19 deaths is misleading

https://news.yahoo.com/flu-deaths-were-counted-covid-053449918.html

Thanx very much for that.

[Robert Roaldi]

Then why bother taking a flu shot yearly?

So we can continue to have fewer flu deaths, surely.

[elliot_n]

It seems to me that the virus hit Italy and Spain first after China.  So the infected came from Europe to NY.  ALthough CHinese were banned from the west coast, many came in to NYC through Europe.  So there were probably a combination of European stock and Chinese who came through Europe.  I recall reading that there were CHinese who came here through EUrope in another article.

Alan, you seem very determined to pin the New York outbreak on Chinese nationals visiting the city. The linked research paper does not support your view. Or at least it doesn't support the view that Chinese nationals brought the virus from China. Perhaps some Chinese contracted the virus in Europe, and then brought it to New York, but I'm not sure why your singling them out rather than any other nationality.

[chez]

Then why bother taking a flu shot yearly?

Ummm...maybe because that is one reason many don't die from the flu. Think before typing.

[chez]

Am I the only one who sees the problem here?

A firm yes.

[Alan Klein]

So we can continue to have fewer flu deaths, surely.

According to the people referenced, one never saw a death in the hospital he worked in and the other never saw a death due to flu in an old age home in five years.  Now that I think of it, I've never known anyone die of the flu either.  Maybe no one dies.  Maybe it's just a campaign to sell vaccines.  What is the truth?

[Alan Klein]

Alan, you seem very determined to pin the New York outbreak on Chinese nationals visiting the city. The linked research paper does not support your view. Or at least it doesn't support the view that Chinese nationals brought the virus from China. Perhaps some Chinese contracted the virus in Europe, and then brought it to New York, but I'm not sure why your singling them out rather than any other nationality.

Everyone agrees except the Chinese government of course that the flu started in Wuhan province in China with a Chinaman. The government there says he caught it from a bat.  Of course, we don't know if it was a Chinese bat.  Maybe it was an Italian bat that vacationed in China. 

[elliot_n]

Everyone agrees except the Chinese government of course that the flu started in Wuhan province in China with a Chinaman. The government there says he caught it from a bat.  Of course, we don't know if it was a Chinese bat.  Maybe it was an Italian bat that vacationed in China. 

Let's just stick with the epidemiology. Covid-19 in New York came from Europe. The implications of this, re. travel bans, are best left to the other thread.

[Alan Klein]

Let's just stick with the epidemiology. Covid-19 in New York came from Europe. The implications of this, re. travel bans, are best left to the other thread.

What are you the speech policeman?

[Alan Klein]

It says no politics.  It didn't say no sense of humor.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

It says no politics.  It didn't say no sense of humor.

No, it says "science, damage limitation, NO POLITICS"

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

So we can continue to have fewer flu deaths, surely.

Correct. It not only reduces the risk of becoming personally infected (and dying of complications), or if infected it reduces the severity of the consequences, but it also increases group immunity, which reduces the spread of the virus.

On the subject of deaths, attached is the official weekly statistics for the Netherlands about ALL deaths per week (the last week may still change a bit when new reports come in), as reported by the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS).

In the winter months, there is a normal increase due to influenza, with an exceptionally severe year 2018. The COVID-19 effect is clearly visible, both in timing and quantity.
 

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

Experts demolish studies suggesting COVID-19 is no worse than flu
https://arstechnica.com/science/2020/04/experts-demolish-studies-suggesting-covid-19-is-no-worse-than-flu/

Frustrated statisticians and epidemiologists took to social media this week to call out substantial flaws in two widely publicized studies trying to estimate the true spread of COVID-19 in two California counties, Santa Clara and Los Angeles.

The studies suggested that far more people in each of the counties have been infected with the new coronavirus than thought—that is, they estimated that true case counts in the two counties are up to 85 times and 55 times the number of the currently confirmed cases in the counties, respectively. Accordingly, this suggests that COVID-19 is far less deadly than thought. The large case counts in relation to unchanged number of deaths put COVID-19’s fatality rate in the same range as seasonal flu.

Which underlines the importance of peer reviewed publications, and the risk of jumping to conclusions before the scientific principles are applied.

[Bart_van_der_Wolf]

See how your community is moving around differently due to COVID-19
https://www.google.com/covid19/mobility/

As global communities respond to COVID-19, we've heard from public health officials that the same type of aggregated, anonymized insights we use in products such as Google Maps could be helpful as they make critical decisions to combat COVID-19.

These Community Mobility Reports aim to provide insights into what has changed in response to policies aimed at combating COVID-19. The reports chart movement trends over time by geography, across different categories of places such as retail and recreation, groceries and pharmacies, parks, transit stations, workplaces, and residential.

This might give some interesting insights into the kind of choices that people make, also as time goes by and people get anxious to restart the economy.

[chez]

It says no politics.  It didn't say no sense of humor.

What about your racist overtones?

[LesPalenik]

Never mind the race aspect. The virus is killing more men than women.

As the global death toll from the novel coronavirus mounts, evidence is growing that more men than women are becoming seriously ill — and dying — from the virus. In New York state as of April 9, for example, more than 60 percent of over 6,200 total deaths have been men.

From the early days of the first coronavirus outbreak in China, men were turning up severely ill at a higher rate than women. And this pattern seems to be largely repeating itself — if in slightly different numbers — in country after country.

https://www.vox.com/2020/4/9/21215063/coronavirus-covid-19-deaths-men-women-sex-dying-why

[Alan Klein]

Men use to smoke more than women.  I wonder if that has something to do with it. 

[Robert Roaldi]

I think it is generally acknowledged that smokers are especially vulnerable to C19. Any indications yet about vaping?