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Wikipedia says about a few hundred thousand people globally die in a typical flu season that barely gets a mention in the news. That's perhaps the more topical

Wikipedia says about a few hundred thousand people globally die in a typical flu season that barely gets a mention in the news. That's perhaps the more topical comparison? Significantly more people catch a flu virus than this coronavirus. So far this flu season the CDC is reporting a CFR of about 0.5% in the US (19 million cases, 10,000 deaths). If the Wuhan coronavirus were equally fatal that would equate to roughly 190 deaths worldwide so far. If the flu were as lethal as the conservative estimates for the Wuhan coronavirus we'd have on the order of 400,000 deaths in the United States alone. That's why people are talking about this coronavirus and largely blasé about the flu. Additionally the flu typically only kills older or immunocompromised folks. When the flu starts killing healthy adults like H1N1 did in 2009 that tends to get a lot more attention.

dingaling 7y ago
> That's why people are talking about this coronavirus and largely blasé about the flu I disagree. People are talking about coronavirus because the media is talking about it, because it makes great headlines out of context. In January 2018, influenza and pneumonia in the USA had a CFR of 10.8%. That's horrific, but didn't earn media attention. Over 500,000 people die globally from influenza-related respiratory problems every year. Break out of the 24/7 news cycle.
- inferiorhuman 7y ago
  Over 500,000 people die globally from influenza-related respiratory problems every year. And how many people need to be infected to achieve that result? More people than the Wuhan coronavirus would need. Try an order of magnitude more. That's why the flu typically doesn't make the news and this coronavirus does. I don't know where you are, but in California the 2017-18 flu season was indeed heavily covered.
tigershark 7y ago
You are off by an order of magnitude I think. 10000 deaths over 19000000 cases is a mortality of 0.05%
- inferiorhuman 7y ago
  Yeah I missed a zero. It's funny to think how mild the flu is and how many people it kills. Even a 1-2% case fatality rate for the Wuhan virus is a huge jump in dead bodies.

dingaling 7y ago

> That's why people are talking about this coronavirus and largely blasé about the flu I disagree. People are talking about coronavirus because the media is talking about it, because it makes great headlines out of context. In January 2018, influenza and pneumonia in the USA had a CFR of 10.8%. That's horrific, but didn't earn media attention. Over 500,000 people die globally from influenza-related respiratory problems every year. Break out of the 24/7 news cycle.

inferiorhuman 7y ago
Over 500,000 people die globally from influenza-related respiratory problems every year. And how many people need to be infected to achieve that result? More people than the Wuhan coronavirus would need. Try an order of magnitude more. That's why the flu typically doesn't make the news and this coronavirus does. I don't know where you are, but in California the 2017-18 flu season was indeed heavily covered.

tigershark 7y ago

You are off by an order of magnitude I think. 10000 deaths over 19000000 cases is a mortality of 0.05%

inferiorhuman 7y ago
Yeah I missed a zero. It's funny to think how mild the flu is and how many people it kills. Even a 1-2% case fatality rate for the Wuhan virus is a huge jump in dead bodies.