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Maybe Italy is a worst case, both because it didn't quarantine early enough, and because greater population inversion. > It's now a well-established fact that

Maybe Italy is a worst case, both because it didn't quarantine early enough, and because greater population inversion. > It's now a well-established fact that older people and those with underlying health issues are more susceptible to succumbing to Covid-19. With 23 percent Italians aged 65 or above and a median age of 47.3, the Italian population is the oldest in Europe. This is chiefly responsible for the high fatality rate in Italy.[0] Also these articles.[1,2] And similar to the age effect in China. 0) https://www.ibtimes.sg/fatality-rate-7-16-why-coronavirus-death-rate-double-italy-rest-world-40975 https://www.ibtimes.sg/fatality-rate-7-16-why-coronavirus-de... 1) https://nypost.com/2020/03/12/heres-why-the-coronavirus-death-rate-is-so-high-in-italy/ https://nypost.com/2020/03/12/heres-why-the-coronavirus-deat... 2) https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/03/italy-elderly-population-coronavirus-risk-covid-19 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/03/italy-elderly-...

sorum 7y ago
Italy isn't the worst case, they're just 2 weeks' ahead of most other countries. Looking at the latest SitRep from WHO, my home country (Sweden) has small no. infected (775), but grew 25% vs the previous day. If that rate keeps up, number of infected will keep on doubling every 4-5 days and in 14 days' time will be at what Italy is today (17k infected). And then another week later it'll break 100k. Exponential growth is a bastard in that sense.
- mirimir 7y ago
  True. But still, maybe Italy is a worst case. Trying to be optimistic here, being >70 and all ;)
  - goatlover 7y ago
    Iran is likely the worst case, but it’s hard to know the full situation there.
- elorant 7y ago
  I had the same worries for Greece when in just two days recorded cases doubled from 100 to 200, but since the government imposed partial lockdown measures the rate of infections slowed down significantly. My guess is the same will happen everywhere. It's just that it's easier to see the growth slowing when you have an order of magnitude less incidents than Italy. We have to trust the process.
  - TeMPOraL 7y ago
    > but since the government imposed partial lockdown measures the rate of infections slowed down significantly. They shouldn't have; what you're seeing is noise. There's a lag of roughly two weeks between when a person is infected and when they'll get caught by a test, so any benefits of the current lockdown will only be visible close to end of March.
- tapland 7y ago
  In Sweden we've avoided testing people who haven't been in high risk areas, and moved from that to only testing 'risk groups' (elderly and with preexisting conditions), so the numbers shouldn't be seen as reflective of the total number of infected.
  - toohotatopic 7y ago
    Isn't Sweden itself a risk area? Looking at cases per 1M population [1], Sweden is at no 10, and its neighbors Norway and Denmark are at 2 and 6. How come there are so many cases per capita? All the neighboring regions like Poland, Russia and even the North of Germany, have fewer cases. [1] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
    - Yetanfou 7y ago
      Sweden, like the UK and possibly the Netherlands has chosen to let the disease spread among the population to achieve what they call "herd immunity" [1 - Swedish]. There might be some truth to the herd immunity thought, the problem is they don't have any control over the speed at which the infection will spread through society. Eventually everyone who can be infected will get infected no matter what is done so that herd immunity will also occur in a situation where the spread is limited by isolation as is done in most other countries. In other words, herd immunity is a given outcome of all approaches and as such does not need to be stated as a goal. The goal should be to limit the load on the health care system so as to limit the number of people who will die in the wake of reverse triage in an overloaded system. In short, the stated goal will always be achieved so it is a variable which can be struck from the equation. Having this as a goal is the equivalent of not having any goal at all. [1] https://www.expressen.se/nyheter/strategin-lat-manga-smittas-i-lagom-takt/ https://www.expressen.se/nyheter/strategin-lat-manga-smittas...
      - makomk 7y ago
        This isn't exactly the stated goal of the UK, so much as something our government has concluded is the inevitable outcome no matter what they do. The goal is the one you suggest - to limit the load on the healthcare system and the number of people who die as a result.
- wcoenen 7y ago
  > but grew 25% vs the previous day. If that rate keeps up, number of infected will keep on doubling every 4-5 days 1.25^3 ≈ 2 so the doubling period for 25% growth would be closer to 3 days.
Ericson2314 7y ago
Italy may be a worst case, but we haven't seen the worst from it yet.
toolz 7y ago
what's the source for italy being the oldest country? As of 2018 Germany was the oldest in the EU and their crude mortality ratio is among the lowest so far. https://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/median-age/ https://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/median-age/
- majos 7y ago
  That figure may be “% of population >= 85 years old”, where Italy does lead the EU. See p21 in this report [1] from Eurostat for a breakdown by country. About 3.45% of Italy is at least 85, compared to about 2.75 for Germany. That’s about 40% higher. So Italy is older in the sense of “more people who are very old”. But you are right that the mortality difference so far is not explained entirely by this gap. It may be informative to watch how this evolves in Greece, and to a greater extent (due to more infection before a lockdown) France and Spain. Those are the next oldest countries in the EU by this measure, and all are well above 3%. [1] https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/3217494/10166544/KS-02-19%E2%80%91681-EN-N.pdf/c701972f-6b4e-b432-57d2-91898ca94893 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/3217494/10166544/KS-...
mackrevinack 7y ago
and it doesn't help that italians have a tradition of kissing each other on the cheek, twice, when they meet
- willyt 7y ago
  On the other hand, Italy has very good food hygiene standards, as anyone who has been told off for touching the fruit and veg in the grocers can tell you. You never have a shop assistant handle money and then touch food, which you see all the time in the UK/US

sorum 7y ago

Italy isn't the worst case, they're just 2 weeks' ahead of most other countries. Looking at the latest SitRep from WHO, my home country (Sweden) has small no. infected (775), but grew 25% vs the previous day. If that rate keeps up, number of infected will keep on doubling every 4-5 days and in 14 days' time will be at what Italy is today (17k infected). And then another week later it'll break 100k. Exponential growth is a bastard in that sense.

mirimir 7y ago
True. But still, maybe Italy is a worst case. Trying to be optimistic here, being >70 and all ;)
- goatlover 7y ago
  Iran is likely the worst case, but it’s hard to know the full situation there.
elorant 7y ago
I had the same worries for Greece when in just two days recorded cases doubled from 100 to 200, but since the government imposed partial lockdown measures the rate of infections slowed down significantly. My guess is the same will happen everywhere. It's just that it's easier to see the growth slowing when you have an order of magnitude less incidents than Italy. We have to trust the process.
- TeMPOraL 7y ago
  > but since the government imposed partial lockdown measures the rate of infections slowed down significantly. They shouldn't have; what you're seeing is noise. There's a lag of roughly two weeks between when a person is infected and when they'll get caught by a test, so any benefits of the current lockdown will only be visible close to end of March.
tapland 7y ago
In Sweden we've avoided testing people who haven't been in high risk areas, and moved from that to only testing 'risk groups' (elderly and with preexisting conditions), so the numbers shouldn't be seen as reflective of the total number of infected.
- toohotatopic 7y ago
  Isn't Sweden itself a risk area? Looking at cases per 1M population [1], Sweden is at no 10, and its neighbors Norway and Denmark are at 2 and 6. How come there are so many cases per capita? All the neighboring regions like Poland, Russia and even the North of Germany, have fewer cases. [1] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
  - Yetanfou 7y ago
    Sweden, like the UK and possibly the Netherlands has chosen to let the disease spread among the population to achieve what they call "herd immunity" [1 - Swedish]. There might be some truth to the herd immunity thought, the problem is they don't have any control over the speed at which the infection will spread through society. Eventually everyone who can be infected will get infected no matter what is done so that herd immunity will also occur in a situation where the spread is limited by isolation as is done in most other countries. In other words, herd immunity is a given outcome of all approaches and as such does not need to be stated as a goal. The goal should be to limit the load on the health care system so as to limit the number of people who will die in the wake of reverse triage in an overloaded system. In short, the stated goal will always be achieved so it is a variable which can be struck from the equation. Having this as a goal is the equivalent of not having any goal at all. [1] https://www.expressen.se/nyheter/strategin-lat-manga-smittas-i-lagom-takt/ https://www.expressen.se/nyheter/strategin-lat-manga-smittas...
    - makomk 7y ago
      This isn't exactly the stated goal of the UK, so much as something our government has concluded is the inevitable outcome no matter what they do. The goal is the one you suggest - to limit the load on the healthcare system and the number of people who die as a result.
wcoenen 7y ago
> but grew 25% vs the previous day. If that rate keeps up, number of infected will keep on doubling every 4-5 days 1.25^3 ≈ 2 so the doubling period for 25% growth would be closer to 3 days.

Ericson2314 7y ago

Italy may be a worst case, but we haven't seen the worst from it yet.

toolz 7y ago

what's the source for italy being the oldest country? As of 2018 Germany was the oldest in the EU and their crude mortality ratio is among the lowest so far. https://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/median-age/ https://worldpopulationreview.com/countries/median-age/

majos 7y ago
That figure may be “% of population >= 85 years old”, where Italy does lead the EU. See p21 in this report [1] from Eurostat for a breakdown by country. About 3.45% of Italy is at least 85, compared to about 2.75 for Germany. That’s about 40% higher. So Italy is older in the sense of “more people who are very old”. But you are right that the mortality difference so far is not explained entirely by this gap. It may be informative to watch how this evolves in Greece, and to a greater extent (due to more infection before a lockdown) France and Spain. Those are the next oldest countries in the EU by this measure, and all are well above 3%. [1] https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/3217494/10166544/KS-02-19%E2%80%91681-EN-N.pdf/c701972f-6b4e-b432-57d2-91898ca94893 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/documents/3217494/10166544/KS-...

mackrevinack 7y ago

and it doesn't help that italians have a tradition of kissing each other on the cheek, twice, when they meet

willyt 7y ago
On the other hand, Italy has very good food hygiene standards, as anyone who has been told off for touching the fruit and veg in the grocers can tell you. You never have a shop assistant handle money and then touch food, which you see all the time in the UK/US