3 ms·

Similar to SARs and the 1918 Flu cause your own immune system to suffocate you as it sends too many white blood cells to the infection. It's called a cytokine

Similar to SARs and the 1918 Flu cause your own immune system to suffocate you as it sends too many white blood cells to the infection. It's called a cytokine storm. This is why this virus is not only dangerous to the old and weak, a healthy person's immune system becomes a liability in the following phases of infection. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4711683/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4711683/ https://mmbr.asm.org/content/76/1/16 https://mmbr.asm.org/content/76/1/16 http://cytokinestorm.com/ http://cytokinestorm.com/

knzhou 7y ago
This just isn't true. The 1918 flu mortality rate had a peak for people in their 20s (the so-called W shaped curve). But COVID-19's mortality rate is much lower for the young, like most illnesses.
- s_y_n_t_a_x 7y ago
  A shallow dismissal based on numbers coming from a communist country that runs concentrations camps is probably not the stance you want to take. Especially when the virus out-broke in a market 300m across the street from a level 4 virology lab where the leading expert in coronaviruses was working... I would definitely take everything coming out of the CPC with a boulder of salt. You can't argue that SARS-CoV-2 is not similar to SARS-CoV. We've seen these cytokine storms in SARS. We have less info on the 1918 Flu but there is a large amount of information suggesting it works the same way. We simply don't have enough information to say how deadly COVID-19 is in comparison, we won't know until more cases occur outside of China. Also, there's multiple reasons why the 1918 flu struck younger people harder: 1. The only generation with any immunity to the virus were older people who had experienced the 1889 flu pandemic (Russian Flu) 2. Most of the disease spread through the trenches and the hospitals the soldiers were sent back to. 3. It can cause your immune system to kill you via cytokine storms so it can kill healthy adults.
- blackrock 7y ago
  So the world will get inherited by the Lord of the Flies (a bunch of pre-teenagers), while the rest of us meets our maker.
- rjzzleep 7y ago
  To the other people commenting and saying it's not true here's a prelim study on the CFR per age and gender[0] Confirmed Cases (%) | Deaths (%) | CFR Overall | 44,672 | 1,023| 2.3 Age, years 0–9 | 416 | (0.9) | − − 10–19 | 549 (1.2) | 1 (0.1) | 0.2 20–29 | 3,619 (8.1) | 7 (0.7) | 0.2 30–39 | 7,600 (17.0) | 18 (1.8) | 0.2 40–49 | 8,571 (19.2) | 38 (3.7) | 0.4 50–59 | 10,008 (22.4) | 130 (12.7) | 1.3 60–69 | 8,583 (19.2) | 309 (30.2) | 3.6 70–79 | 3,918 (8.8) | 312 (30.5) | 8.0 ≥80 | 1,408 (3.2) | 208 (20.3) | 14.8 Sex Male | 22,981 (51.4) | 653 (63.8) | 2.8 Female | 21,691 (48.6) | 370 (36.2) | 1.7 Occupation Service industry | 3,449 (7.7) | 23 (2.2) | 0.7 Farmer/laborer | 9,811 (22.0) | 139 (13.6) | 1.4 Health worker | 1,716 (3.8) | 5 (0.5) | 0.3 Retiree | 9,193 (20.6) | 472 (46.1) | 5.1 Other/none | 20,503 (45.9) | 384 (37.5) | 1.9 Province Hubei | 33,367 (74.7) | 979 (95.7) | 2.9 Other | 11,305 (25.3) | 44 (4.3) | 0.4 Wuhan-related exposure* Yes | 31,974 (85.8) | 853 (92.8) | 2.7 No | 5,295 (14.2) | 66 (7.2) | 1.2 Missing | 7,403 | 104 | 2.8 Comorbid condition † Hypertension | 2,683 (12.8) | 161 (39.7) | 6.0 Diabetes | 1,102 (5.3) | 80 (19.7) | 7.3 Cardiovascular disease | 873 (4.2) | 92 (22.7) | 10.5 Chronic respiratory disease | 511 (2.4) | 32 (7.9) | 6.3 Cancer (any) | 107 (0.5) | 6 (1.5) | 5.6 None | 15,536 (74.0) | 133 (32.8) | 0.9 Missing | 23,690 (53.0) | 617 (60.3) | 2.6 Case severity § Mild | 36,160 (80.9) − − − − Severe | 6,168 (13.8) − − − − Critical | 2,087 (4.7) | 1,023 (100) | 49.0 Missing | 257 (0.6) − − − − [0] https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CbsG_zfvOmTWK8rCzr7XM2vSfSV7MpUM/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CbsG_zfvOmTWK8rCzr7XM2vSfSV...

knzhou 7y ago

This just isn't true. The 1918 flu mortality rate had a peak for people in their 20s (the so-called W shaped curve). But COVID-19's mortality rate is much lower for the young, like most illnesses.

s_y_n_t_a_x 7y ago
A shallow dismissal based on numbers coming from a communist country that runs concentrations camps is probably not the stance you want to take. Especially when the virus out-broke in a market 300m across the street from a level 4 virology lab where the leading expert in coronaviruses was working... I would definitely take everything coming out of the CPC with a boulder of salt. You can't argue that SARS-CoV-2 is not similar to SARS-CoV. We've seen these cytokine storms in SARS. We have less info on the 1918 Flu but there is a large amount of information suggesting it works the same way. We simply don't have enough information to say how deadly COVID-19 is in comparison, we won't know until more cases occur outside of China. Also, there's multiple reasons why the 1918 flu struck younger people harder: 1. The only generation with any immunity to the virus were older people who had experienced the 1889 flu pandemic (Russian Flu) 2. Most of the disease spread through the trenches and the hospitals the soldiers were sent back to. 3. It can cause your immune system to kill you via cytokine storms so it can kill healthy adults.
blackrock 7y ago
So the world will get inherited by the Lord of the Flies (a bunch of pre-teenagers), while the rest of us meets our maker.
rjzzleep 7y ago
To the other people commenting and saying it's not true here's a prelim study on the CFR per age and gender[0] Confirmed Cases (%) | Deaths (%) | CFR Overall | 44,672 | 1,023| 2.3 Age, years 0–9 | 416 | (0.9) | − − 10–19 | 549 (1.2) | 1 (0.1) | 0.2 20–29 | 3,619 (8.1) | 7 (0.7) | 0.2 30–39 | 7,600 (17.0) | 18 (1.8) | 0.2 40–49 | 8,571 (19.2) | 38 (3.7) | 0.4 50–59 | 10,008 (22.4) | 130 (12.7) | 1.3 60–69 | 8,583 (19.2) | 309 (30.2) | 3.6 70–79 | 3,918 (8.8) | 312 (30.5) | 8.0 ≥80 | 1,408 (3.2) | 208 (20.3) | 14.8 Sex Male | 22,981 (51.4) | 653 (63.8) | 2.8 Female | 21,691 (48.6) | 370 (36.2) | 1.7 Occupation Service industry | 3,449 (7.7) | 23 (2.2) | 0.7 Farmer/laborer | 9,811 (22.0) | 139 (13.6) | 1.4 Health worker | 1,716 (3.8) | 5 (0.5) | 0.3 Retiree | 9,193 (20.6) | 472 (46.1) | 5.1 Other/none | 20,503 (45.9) | 384 (37.5) | 1.9 Province Hubei | 33,367 (74.7) | 979 (95.7) | 2.9 Other | 11,305 (25.3) | 44 (4.3) | 0.4 Wuhan-related exposure* Yes | 31,974 (85.8) | 853 (92.8) | 2.7 No | 5,295 (14.2) | 66 (7.2) | 1.2 Missing | 7,403 | 104 | 2.8 Comorbid condition † Hypertension | 2,683 (12.8) | 161 (39.7) | 6.0 Diabetes | 1,102 (5.3) | 80 (19.7) | 7.3 Cardiovascular disease | 873 (4.2) | 92 (22.7) | 10.5 Chronic respiratory disease | 511 (2.4) | 32 (7.9) | 6.3 Cancer (any) | 107 (0.5) | 6 (1.5) | 5.6 None | 15,536 (74.0) | 133 (32.8) | 0.9 Missing | 23,690 (53.0) | 617 (60.3) | 2.6 Case severity § Mild | 36,160 (80.9) − − − − Severe | 6,168 (13.8) − − − − Critical | 2,087 (4.7) | 1,023 (100) | 49.0 Missing | 257 (0.6) − − − − [0] https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CbsG_zfvOmTWK8rCzr7XM2vSfSV7MpUM/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CbsG_zfvOmTWK8rCzr7XM2vSfSV...