3 ms·

2% would be over 6 million Americans. I don't understand why that percentage is often reported as insignificant.

by takeda 7y ago

tessierashpool 7y ago
that's legit -- the percentage is not insignificant -- but it does look like you're calculating 2% of all Americans (approx 327M). the 2% number is _case_ fatality rate, i.e., how many cases are fatal. so to get from there to actual deaths, you have to apply it to _cases_. so you need to combine that with the attack rate, or attack ratio. the only number I've heard for the attack rate is 30%, from the virologist Ian Mackay, who caveated it as a guess: https://twitter.com/MackayIM/status/1233511899083530240 https://twitter.com/MackayIM/status/1233511899083530240 it could probably never be anything but a guess, until after the fact. anyway, it would not be 2% of the US population. it would be 2% of 30% of the US population, which is approximately two million people. with the caveat that all of these numbers are early estimates based on limited data. 2M people is still a lot of deaths. but it's not just how many people are killed. the rate of hospitalization is 15-25%. approx 10% of patients in Italy right now are in intensive care. the disease expresses as severe pneumonia, so severe that survivors have experienced _organ failure_. you could be hooked to a ventilator for a month. in the United States, if you survive a medical problem that serious, it still ruins your life. probably this country will see not just a significant number of deaths, but also a spike in medical bankruptcies -- which are already a huge problem here.
- gdubs 7y ago
  So the question according to those numbers is, are we prepared to hospitalize 10% of the 30% of people who may get infected in the United States? In particular, do we have enough ventilation beds, the isolation infrastructure, the staffing? During a crisis you’d want daily briefings where questions like these could be asked. I’ve said in other threads: it feels like the US is sleepwalking through this. If the CDC believes, as they said last week, that this will spread inevitably — what exactly are we waiting for? We have two cases of unknown origin in Santa Clara county, yet schools are still open as of now. Wouldn’t it make sense to close them for two weeks now to hopefully slow the spread and give us additional time to ramp up our medical response?
  - tessierashpool 7y ago
    we definitely do not have enough hospital beds. as for the CDC, the Trump administration gutted the CDC in 2018. they fired its leadership and dramatically reduced its budget. they went to Congress last week or so for an emergency $2.5B, which is better than nothing, but $25B would have been a more realistic number. House leaders were basically complaining like "you should have asked us for more money." Trump et al also put Mike Pence in charge of the situation last week. Trump said, when announcing that Pence would be in charge, that "he's got a talent for this." however, as governor of Indiana, Pence prioritized ideology over public health, and the state experienced an HIV outbreak due to his leadership (a subsequent Yale study found the outbreak was entirely preventable). long story short: yes, the Federal government's response is extremely inadequate. it will probably continue to be inadequate throughout the crisis.
mytailorisrich 7y ago
Of course a small percentage of a huge number is a big number... The point is to reassure people and to prevent panic. For the vast majority of cases this virus is not a big deal so people should be vigilant but not be overly scared for themselves.
- rjtavares 7y ago
  Another way to see it is that "panic" could save a million lives (eg through the use of quarentines). Is it worth it then? I'm not saying that it's an obvious answer (panic causes its own problems), but it is a trade-off worth considering.
  - mytailorisrich 7y ago
    Panic is never productive. Saving lives requires a reasoned and reasonable approach. The trade-off between the options is being considered and quarantine is being used.
    - Retric 7y ago
      Panic can very much be more productive than inaction. It’s not the optimal choice, but sometimes doing something right now is better than doing something even better a little later.
      - mytailorisrich 7y ago
        Panic is not helpful (it should go without saying, but apparently not...). There is a huge gap between inaction and panic. There is no inaction at the moment, whether more actions should be taken is another issue.
  - javier123454321 7y ago
    It could also reduce the number of people that go get voluntary checkups if they believe to be infected. People tend to want to avoid quarantines.

2% would be over 6 million Americans. I don't understand why that percentage is often reported as insignificant.

by takeda 7y ago

2% would be over 6 million Americans. I don't understand why that percentage is often reported as insignificant.

that's legit -- the percentage is not insignificant -- but it does look like you're calculating 2% of all Americans (approx 327M). the 2% number is _case_ fatality rate, i.e., how many cases are fatal. so to get from there to actual deaths, you have to apply it to _cases_. so you need to combine that with the attack rate, or attack ratio. the only number I've heard for the attack rate is 30%, from the virologist Ian Mackay, who caveated it as a guess: https://twitter.com/MackayIM/status/1233511899083530240 https://twitter.com/MackayIM/status/1233511899083530240 it could probably never be anything but a guess, until after the fact. anyway, it would not be 2% of the US population. it would be 2% of 30% of the US population, which is approximately two million people. with the caveat that all of these numbers are early estimates based on limited data. 2M people is still a lot of deaths. but it's not just how many people are killed. the rate of hospitalization is 15-25%. approx 10% of patients in Italy right now are in intensive care. the disease expresses as severe pneumonia, so severe that survivors have experienced _organ failure_. you could be hooked to a ventilator for a month. in the United States, if you survive a medical problem that serious, it still ruins your life. probably this country will see not just a significant number of deaths, but also a spike in medical bankruptcies -- which are already a huge problem here.

gdubs 7y ago
So the question according to those numbers is, are we prepared to hospitalize 10% of the 30% of people who may get infected in the United States? In particular, do we have enough ventilation beds, the isolation infrastructure, the staffing? During a crisis you’d want daily briefings where questions like these could be asked. I’ve said in other threads: it feels like the US is sleepwalking through this. If the CDC believes, as they said last week, that this will spread inevitably — what exactly are we waiting for? We have two cases of unknown origin in Santa Clara county, yet schools are still open as of now. Wouldn’t it make sense to close them for two weeks now to hopefully slow the spread and give us additional time to ramp up our medical response?
- tessierashpool 7y ago
  we definitely do not have enough hospital beds. as for the CDC, the Trump administration gutted the CDC in 2018. they fired its leadership and dramatically reduced its budget. they went to Congress last week or so for an emergency $2.5B, which is better than nothing, but $25B would have been a more realistic number. House leaders were basically complaining like "you should have asked us for more money." Trump et al also put Mike Pence in charge of the situation last week. Trump said, when announcing that Pence would be in charge, that "he's got a talent for this." however, as governor of Indiana, Pence prioritized ideology over public health, and the state experienced an HIV outbreak due to his leadership (a subsequent Yale study found the outbreak was entirely preventable). long story short: yes, the Federal government's response is extremely inadequate. it will probably continue to be inadequate throughout the crisis.

mytailorisrich 7y ago

Of course a small percentage of a huge number is a big number... The point is to reassure people and to prevent panic. For the vast majority of cases this virus is not a big deal so people should be vigilant but not be overly scared for themselves.

rjtavares 7y ago
Another way to see it is that "panic" could save a million lives (eg through the use of quarentines). Is it worth it then? I'm not saying that it's an obvious answer (panic causes its own problems), but it is a trade-off worth considering.
- mytailorisrich 7y ago
  Panic is never productive. Saving lives requires a reasoned and reasonable approach. The trade-off between the options is being considered and quarantine is being used.
  - Retric 7y ago
    Panic can very much be more productive than inaction. It’s not the optimal choice, but sometimes doing something right now is better than doing something even better a little later.
    - mytailorisrich 7y ago
      Panic is not helpful (it should go without saying, but apparently not...). There is a huge gap between inaction and panic. There is no inaction at the moment, whether more actions should be taken is another issue.
- javier123454321 7y ago
  It could also reduce the number of people that go get voluntary checkups if they believe to be infected. People tend to want to avoid quarantines.