3 ms·

Someone always says this. And yet here we are with a virus that has an r0 much higher than flu, and is ~10 times more lethal. That the two things are correlat

by feral 7y ago

Someone always says this. And yet here we are with a virus that has an r0 much higher than flu, and is ~10 times more lethal. That the two things are correlated in certain modeling scenarios does not mean you can't end up something that both spreads and kills.

rbritton 7y ago
Influenza R0 has varied historically between 0.9 and 2.8 [0], where covid-19 is typically quoted as having an R0 around 2.3-2.5. It’s not substantially different in that regard. Lethality estimates also suffer from being based on bad data. “Patients who have been tested for SARS-CoV-2 are disproportionately those with severe symptoms and bad outcomes.” [1]. For that reason, the CFR in the US at least has been around 1%, but the IFR could actually be significantly lower. [0]: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19545404/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19545404/ [1]: https://www.statnews.com/2020/03/17/a-fiasco-in-the-making-as-the-coronavirus-pandemic-takes-hold-we-are-making-decisions-without-reliable-data/ https://www.statnews.com/2020/03/17/a-fiasco-in-the-making-a...
- feral 7y ago
  Otoh, the epidemic in the US is likely growing exponentially, and that encourages the current CFR to underestimate the actual CFR as new cases haven't had time to die. In terms of estimating the IFR, it's hard; estimates are about 0.7, much higher than flu. Your link says 'mean R0 1.3: range 0.9 to 2.1'. Compared to the mean R0 of flu, this disease spreads substantially more and is more lethal, hence is a good counterpoint to the flawed argument of the post that I was replying to.
dogma1138 7y ago
Stop comparing this to the seasonal flu, it's also quite likely that 3-4 years down the line when population wide antibody studies would be completed the CFR/IFR will drop by a factor of 10.

3 ms·

Someone always says this. And yet here we are with a virus that has an r0 much higher than flu, and is ~10 times more lethal. That the two things are correlat

by feral 7y ago

rbritton 7y ago
Influenza R0 has varied historically between 0.9 and 2.8 [0], where covid-19 is typically quoted as having an R0 around 2.3-2.5. It’s not substantially different in that regard. Lethality estimates also suffer from being based on bad data. “Patients who have been tested for SARS-CoV-2 are disproportionately those with severe symptoms and bad outcomes.” [1]. For that reason, the CFR in the US at least has been around 1%, but the IFR could actually be significantly lower. [0]: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19545404/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19545404/ [1]: https://www.statnews.com/2020/03/17/a-fiasco-in-the-making-as-the-coronavirus-pandemic-takes-hold-we-are-making-decisions-without-reliable-data/ https://www.statnews.com/2020/03/17/a-fiasco-in-the-making-a...
- feral 7y ago
  Otoh, the epidemic in the US is likely growing exponentially, and that encourages the current CFR to underestimate the actual CFR as new cases haven't had time to die. In terms of estimating the IFR, it's hard; estimates are about 0.7, much higher than flu. Your link says 'mean R0 1.3: range 0.9 to 2.1'. Compared to the mean R0 of flu, this disease spreads substantially more and is more lethal, hence is a good counterpoint to the flawed argument of the post that I was replying to.
dogma1138 7y ago
Stop comparing this to the seasonal flu, it's also quite likely that 3-4 years down the line when population wide antibody studies would be completed the CFR/IFR will drop by a factor of 10.