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It's about time... All early characteristics of the novel coronavirus indicate it's far more dangerous than SARS/MERS/seasonal flu (which kills 30-60k/year in t

by mrb 7y ago

It's about time... All early characteristics of the novel coronavirus indicate it's far more dangerous than SARS/MERS/seasonal flu (which kills 30-60k/year in the US) so, unless a cure is found soon, we should expect it to kill more people than these other diseases combined : https://mobile.twitter.com/zorinaq/status/1222631493324828672 https://mobile.twitter.com/zorinaq/status/122263149332482867...

treis 7y ago
Viruses tend to become less deadly as they spread because dead people don't spread disease. Typically it mutates slightly into a less deadly strain. Then that strain spreads more quickly and gives the population some level of immunity against the more deadly one.
- munificent 7y ago
  > Viruses tend to become less deadly as they spread because dead people don't spread disease. This is why the longer incubation time of this coronavirus is such a concern. It gives a potentially fatal disease more time to spread before it self limits. Also, I've heard reports that some infected are asymptomatic, so it may continue to spread even while taking out some people.
- dpark 7y ago
  This sounds like extremely wishful thinking. Is there some support for this claim?
  - lgl 7y ago
    Yes, it's called evolution. But since this is hn, here're a few articles/papers on the subject. https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/news/071201_adenovirus https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/news/071201_adenov... https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/early/2014/11/26/1413339111.full.pdf https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/early/2014/11/26/141333911... https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2639916/pdf/8969242.pdf https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2639916/pdf/896... http://hedrick.ucsd.edu/BICD136/PDF-links/Galvani-Epid-evol.pdf http://hedrick.ucsd.edu/BICD136/PDF-links/Galvani-Epid-evol....
    - dpark 7y ago
      I was asking specifically about this claim: “Viruses tend to become less deadly as they spread“ I understand the basics of evolution. I also don’t have any trouble understanding the trades between transmission and virulence. However, this is not the same as saying that the typical virus becomes less virulent over the short term during a major outbreak.
- csomar 7y ago
  Not if this Coronavirus is asymptomatic for two weeks. These are still China claims and the west is still suspicious. But if this is true then holy cows.
svara 7y ago
I think it would be more helpful to cite actual epidemiology research and public health professionals rather than people who seem to use people's fears to garner attention. Edit: In order to make this a little less dismissive, the actual argument in that Twitter post is that due to lag between first symptoms appearing and death, you can't divide fatalities by total cases to get the mortality rate, and should instead use total cases N days ago. Makes sense superficially, but * cases that get reported are biased towards people who get more sick * the 20-56% mortality rate claimed based on guessing N=6 is inconsistent with the mortality rates outside of China, where no one has died so far. But I'm no epidemiologist, so don't believe me either.
- andrew_n 7y ago
  Yes, and the medical professionals dealing with this are getting statistics about diagnosis and recovery rates and times by analyzing case histories, not applying estimation formulas to totals. Data gets aggregated and used in mathematical models that can predict outcomes in various hypothetical scenarios, but given that this is a real-world situation, the professionals are going to be looking at the actual data first to find out what’s happening. They can directly answer questions such as, of the patients diagnosed 1 week ago, what’s their status today? Anyone looking at only total numbers of cases per day simply doesn’t have the data required to compute the things they’re trying to compute with much accuracy. It’s possible to produce estimates with confidence intervals based on sensitivity analysis, but nobody doing that with any care using aggregate data is going to come out with a number as high as 20% for a lower bound. Given that N=6 is a guess, the range reported should be bounded by plugging in plausible extreme values for your guess of N, not assuming your guess of N=6 is exactly correct.
- mrb 7y ago
  «cases that get reported are biased towards people who get more sick» True, the data is biased. «the 20-56% mortality rate claimed based on guessing N=6 is inconsistent with the mortality rates outside of China, where no one has died so far» It's not statistically inconsistent. When China had 100 cases confirmed, they had reported only 2 deaths. Now there are 100 cases outside China, so statistically we should expect 2. 0 actual vs 2 expected is statistically insignificant. Also the rest of the world is so much more prepared after the wake-up alarm call from China that out of the 100 confirmed outside China, they are probably receiving superior healthcare than overwhelmed Chinese hospitals. I would expect the mortality rate outside China to be slightly inferior. It also means though, that the first death outside China should happen soon. I predict in the next week.
themagician 7y ago
Stop spreading misinformation and getting your information from Twitter, and when you do—try reading it first. Even when compared to SARS in that chart it looks like it has a lower R0 value and about the same fatality rate, minus some odd outliers and what it likely fake news (it doesn't have a fatality rate of 56%). And the citation for that 56% number is a link another link to Twitter… that is self referential. And actually I think YOU are also that person. When people talk about "fake news" this is what they are talking about. This is like 3-layers deep of fake news. You are linking to yourself in a post that uses yourself as a citation.
- mrb 7y ago
  Yes I made the table, but which part of this table is misinformation? All data is valid. Twitter is not a good format to present a bunch of data, hence the convoluted link to a link to a link... However, for your information, the 56% case fatality ratio is calculated according to an epidemiological method known to produce a good estimate. See https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/ebf2/48c9fc0a1a23d1778b94083319aa995e34f4.pdf https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/ebf2/48c9fc0a1a23d1778b9408..., section Simple Estimators, specifically this formula: e₂(s)=D(s)/{D(s)+R(s)} which is: deaths/(deaths+recoveries) And the paper concludes: "The second simple estimate based on the ratio of deaths of those for whom the outcome is known, e₂, is reasonable at most points in the epidemic" ie. produces a good estimate of the eventual observed case fatality rate.
  - themagician 7y ago
    All the data is not valid. You give no citations for half your numbers and half the cells are empty. It's 100% bogus garbage. You are creating and spreading fake news. You might not be a bad person, but right now you are being a bad person.
    - mrb 7y ago
      «All the data is not valid» That's a non-answer. My data is valid. I challenge you to point out specific errors. My data comes from two sources: 1) Initially I replicated the chart by Dr. Melvin Sanicas, a vaccinologist and public health physician, that he posted on twitter (here: https://twitter.com/Vaccinologist/status/1220469109378502658 https://twitter.com/Vaccinologist/status/1220469109378502658). He had no citations for his numbers. So I performed light fact-checking but didn't bother documenting citations for each number because (a) he is a doctor and (b) his chart got massive reviews on twitter and no one pointed out significant errors. 2) For the rest of the number, I plugged them in myself WHILE adding proper citations to either peer-reviewed papers or to the best estimates available today. As to empty cells, they are empty when the data is not yet researched, or not known, or because it is irrelevant (eg. for most older diseases that have vaccines available I didn't bother researching if asymptomatic transmission is possible because it is irrelevant: most people in developed countries are vaccinated as such such diseases are no longer prevalent.)
el_benhameen 7y ago
I don't know enough to directly question your numbers, but you should be upfront that 1. you're quoting your own twitter feed from another username, and 2. you're not an expert (at least in the standard sense of the word) in epidemiology or a related field.
peteretep 7y ago
> All early characteristics of the novel coronavirus indicate it's far more dangerous than SARS Would you consider fucking off? This is your third or fourth bullshit post on this thread combining a sensationalist falsehood with a link to your Twitter feed.
- moralestapia 7y ago
  What a nice way to add to the conversation ... If you have something substantial to post, then do it, otherwise please respect the guidelines of this site ...
  - peteretep 7y ago
    Some actions warrant uncivil responses, and trying to induce the pain of unnecessary panic in other people to shill a social media account is among them.
Fomite 7y ago
No infectious disease epidemiologist I know would lump SARs, MERS and seasonal flu together like that, and I'd argue the data very much doesn't support the assertion that this disease is significantly more dangerous. Serious, yes. But it's quite a hurdle to go from what we're seeing now to "worse than seasonal influenza".

by mrb 7y ago

treis 7y ago

Viruses tend to become less deadly as they spread because dead people don't spread disease. Typically it mutates slightly into a less deadly strain. Then that strain spreads more quickly and gives the population some level of immunity against the more deadly one.

munificent 7y ago
> Viruses tend to become less deadly as they spread because dead people don't spread disease. This is why the longer incubation time of this coronavirus is such a concern. It gives a potentially fatal disease more time to spread before it self limits. Also, I've heard reports that some infected are asymptomatic, so it may continue to spread even while taking out some people.
dpark 7y ago
This sounds like extremely wishful thinking. Is there some support for this claim?
- lgl 7y ago
  Yes, it's called evolution. But since this is hn, here're a few articles/papers on the subject. https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/news/071201_adenovirus https://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/news/071201_adenov... https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/early/2014/11/26/1413339111.full.pdf https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/early/2014/11/26/141333911... https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2639916/pdf/8969242.pdf https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2639916/pdf/896... http://hedrick.ucsd.edu/BICD136/PDF-links/Galvani-Epid-evol.pdf http://hedrick.ucsd.edu/BICD136/PDF-links/Galvani-Epid-evol....
  - dpark 7y ago
    I was asking specifically about this claim: “Viruses tend to become less deadly as they spread“ I understand the basics of evolution. I also don’t have any trouble understanding the trades between transmission and virulence. However, this is not the same as saying that the typical virus becomes less virulent over the short term during a major outbreak.
csomar 7y ago
Not if this Coronavirus is asymptomatic for two weeks. These are still China claims and the west is still suspicious. But if this is true then holy cows.

svara 7y ago

I think it would be more helpful to cite actual epidemiology research and public health professionals rather than people who seem to use people's fears to garner attention. Edit: In order to make this a little less dismissive, the actual argument in that Twitter post is that due to lag between first symptoms appearing and death, you can't divide fatalities by total cases to get the mortality rate, and should instead use total cases N days ago. Makes sense superficially, but * cases that get reported are biased towards people who get more sick * the 20-56% mortality rate claimed based on guessing N=6 is inconsistent with the mortality rates outside of China, where no one has died so far. But I'm no epidemiologist, so don't believe me either.

andrew_n 7y ago
Yes, and the medical professionals dealing with this are getting statistics about diagnosis and recovery rates and times by analyzing case histories, not applying estimation formulas to totals. Data gets aggregated and used in mathematical models that can predict outcomes in various hypothetical scenarios, but given that this is a real-world situation, the professionals are going to be looking at the actual data first to find out what’s happening. They can directly answer questions such as, of the patients diagnosed 1 week ago, what’s their status today? Anyone looking at only total numbers of cases per day simply doesn’t have the data required to compute the things they’re trying to compute with much accuracy. It’s possible to produce estimates with confidence intervals based on sensitivity analysis, but nobody doing that with any care using aggregate data is going to come out with a number as high as 20% for a lower bound. Given that N=6 is a guess, the range reported should be bounded by plugging in plausible extreme values for your guess of N, not assuming your guess of N=6 is exactly correct.
mrb 7y ago
«cases that get reported are biased towards people who get more sick» True, the data is biased. «the 20-56% mortality rate claimed based on guessing N=6 is inconsistent with the mortality rates outside of China, where no one has died so far» It's not statistically inconsistent. When China had 100 cases confirmed, they had reported only 2 deaths. Now there are 100 cases outside China, so statistically we should expect 2. 0 actual vs 2 expected is statistically insignificant. Also the rest of the world is so much more prepared after the wake-up alarm call from China that out of the 100 confirmed outside China, they are probably receiving superior healthcare than overwhelmed Chinese hospitals. I would expect the mortality rate outside China to be slightly inferior. It also means though, that the first death outside China should happen soon. I predict in the next week.

themagician 7y ago

Stop spreading misinformation and getting your information from Twitter, and when you do—try reading it first. Even when compared to SARS in that chart it looks like it has a lower R0 value and about the same fatality rate, minus some odd outliers and what it likely fake news (it doesn't have a fatality rate of 56%). And the citation for that 56% number is a link another link to Twitter… that is self referential. And actually I think YOU are also that person. When people talk about "fake news" this is what they are talking about. This is like 3-layers deep of fake news. You are linking to yourself in a post that uses yourself as a citation.

mrb 7y ago
Yes I made the table, but which part of this table is misinformation? All data is valid. Twitter is not a good format to present a bunch of data, hence the convoluted link to a link to a link... However, for your information, the 56% case fatality ratio is calculated according to an epidemiological method known to produce a good estimate. See https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/ebf2/48c9fc0a1a23d1778b94083319aa995e34f4.pdf https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/ebf2/48c9fc0a1a23d1778b9408..., section Simple Estimators, specifically this formula: e₂(s)=D(s)/{D(s)+R(s)} which is: deaths/(deaths+recoveries) And the paper concludes: "The second simple estimate based on the ratio of deaths of those for whom the outcome is known, e₂, is reasonable at most points in the epidemic" ie. produces a good estimate of the eventual observed case fatality rate.
- themagician 7y ago
  All the data is not valid. You give no citations for half your numbers and half the cells are empty. It's 100% bogus garbage. You are creating and spreading fake news. You might not be a bad person, but right now you are being a bad person.
  - mrb 7y ago
    «All the data is not valid» That's a non-answer. My data is valid. I challenge you to point out specific errors. My data comes from two sources: 1) Initially I replicated the chart by Dr. Melvin Sanicas, a vaccinologist and public health physician, that he posted on twitter (here: https://twitter.com/Vaccinologist/status/1220469109378502658 https://twitter.com/Vaccinologist/status/1220469109378502658). He had no citations for his numbers. So I performed light fact-checking but didn't bother documenting citations for each number because (a) he is a doctor and (b) his chart got massive reviews on twitter and no one pointed out significant errors. 2) For the rest of the number, I plugged them in myself WHILE adding proper citations to either peer-reviewed papers or to the best estimates available today. As to empty cells, they are empty when the data is not yet researched, or not known, or because it is irrelevant (eg. for most older diseases that have vaccines available I didn't bother researching if asymptomatic transmission is possible because it is irrelevant: most people in developed countries are vaccinated as such such diseases are no longer prevalent.)

el_benhameen 7y ago

I don't know enough to directly question your numbers, but you should be upfront that 1. you're quoting your own twitter feed from another username, and 2. you're not an expert (at least in the standard sense of the word) in epidemiology or a related field.

peteretep 7y ago

> All early characteristics of the novel coronavirus indicate it's far more dangerous than SARS Would you consider fucking off? This is your third or fourth bullshit post on this thread combining a sensationalist falsehood with a link to your Twitter feed.

moralestapia 7y ago
What a nice way to add to the conversation ... If you have something substantial to post, then do it, otherwise please respect the guidelines of this site ...
- peteretep 7y ago
  Some actions warrant uncivil responses, and trying to induce the pain of unnecessary panic in other people to shill a social media account is among them.

Fomite 7y ago

No infectious disease epidemiologist I know would lump SARs, MERS and seasonal flu together like that, and I'd argue the data very much doesn't support the assertion that this disease is significantly more dangerous. Serious, yes. But it's quite a hurdle to go from what we're seeing now to "worse than seasonal influenza".