4 ms·

Since about a week ago data has been coming in from antibody testing in Europe... and the results are that IFR (infection fatality rate) is clearly less than 0.

by jbotz 7y ago

Since about a week ago data has been coming in from antibody testing in Europe... and the results are that IFR (infection fatality rate) is clearly less than 0.5% (0.37% in one city in germany[1]) and the number of actually infected people at least 15 times to 30 times higher than the confirmed number of cases. [1] https://www.n-tv.de/wissen/Heinsberg-Studie-entraetselt-Coronavirus-article21704605.html https://www.n-tv.de/wissen/Heinsberg-Studie-entraetselt-Coro...

endymi0n 7y ago
Note though that the study, its methods and especially its politically charged presentation by repeat social media offenders are still disputed [1] [1] https://www1.wdr.de/nachrichten/offene-fragen-heinsberg-studie-corona-100.html https://www1.wdr.de/nachrichten/offene-fragen-heinsberg-stud...
- Barrin92 7y ago
  Today there's been a new result from antibody tests in the netherlands done on blood dononrs which showed about 3% infection rate. Extrapolated to the population that would imply 500k infections, 20x higher than the official stats. The Heinsberg study isn't the only source pointing to this. Almost a month ago the NYT also ran a story on randomly tested Iranian airplane passengers which suggested that as of that time there may already have been 500k-5mil infections in the country. https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/dutch-study-suggests-3-per-cent-of-population-may-have-coronavirus-antibodies https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/dutch-study-sugges...
  - perl4ever 7y ago
    Possibly dumb question, how do we know someone with antibodies was exposed? The whole idea of vaccination is based on multiple things producing the same antibodies, so isn't it plausible there could be related viruses or genetic factors or something that would lead to antibodies for some people that hadn't been exposed?
    - Barrin92 7y ago
      Yes, there is the chance of false positives with antibody tests, in particular for other strains of Corona, but scientists can do a sample of antibody tests on people they know to have been infected with covid-19 and get a rate for false positives and take that into account.
  - Lewton 7y ago
    Netherlands is currently at 30000 cases with 3000 dead, cfr of 10%. 20x infection would put the IFR at 0.5% which is well in line with what is expected
joshuahedlund 7y ago
I'm not so sure that's clear yet. Just going on blunt metrics, the virus has already killed 0.1% of NYC's entire population, probably on pace to hit 0.2% if the down-curve even only roughly matches the up-curve. So it would have had to have spread to 50% of the population for the fatality rate there to be only 0.4%, which seems unlikely (there's only a smattering of antibody data around the world so far but nothing has found spread even close to 50%, especially at the level of a metropolis)
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- claytongulick 7y ago
  When you include 3,700 non-positive deaths in your total death count, yeah - the numbers look scary. The reporting we're seeing is CFR, not mortality rate. They are very different things. Mortality rate is the number of deaths caused by a disease. CFR (Case Fatality Rate) is the total number of deaths by those diagnosed with a disease. They are very different numbers, and have very different meaning for different analysis and methodologies. Saying that that virus has killed .1% of NYC's population is inaccurate.
  - joshuahedlund 7y ago
    Even w/o those non-positives, the death count for NYC is in the neighborhood of 8,000[0] (and still rising at a decent clip) for a population of 8 million. That's 0.1%. You can also look at individual counties[1] and you get some variation but the same picture. Ex. 2.7k deaths in Queens for a population of 2.3mil, 0.4k deaths in Richmond for a population of 0.4mil (That's 0.1% for the entire population and not even nearing the maximum yet, so obviously the IFR's and CFR's will be even higher.) [0]https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-deaths-confirmed-probable-daily-04152020.pdf https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-d... [1]https://covid19tracker.health.ny.gov/views/NYS-COVID19-Tracker/NYSDOHCOVID-19Tracker-Fatalities?%3Aembed=yes&%3Atoolbar=no&%3Atabs=n https://covid19tracker.health.ny.gov/views/NYS-COVID19-Track...
chefkoch 7y ago
That study has been widely critized as there a many false positives with this kind of test and the counting method seems flawed.
yread 7y ago
As another data point in the Netherlands (officially 30k cases - only serious cases and hospital workers were tested, 30% of the tests are positives), actual seroprevalence is 3% ~500k people have been infected (~2 weeks ago), dividing the excess deaths, you get 1.3% mortality rate. https://twitter.com/jankluytmans/status/1250769486174654464 https://twitter.com/jankluytmans/status/1250769486174654464

by jbotz 7y ago

endymi0n 7y ago

Note though that the study, its methods and especially its politically charged presentation by repeat social media offenders are still disputed [1] [1] https://www1.wdr.de/nachrichten/offene-fragen-heinsberg-studie-corona-100.html https://www1.wdr.de/nachrichten/offene-fragen-heinsberg-stud...

Barrin92 7y ago
Today there's been a new result from antibody tests in the netherlands done on blood dononrs which showed about 3% infection rate. Extrapolated to the population that would imply 500k infections, 20x higher than the official stats. The Heinsberg study isn't the only source pointing to this. Almost a month ago the NYT also ran a story on randomly tested Iranian airplane passengers which suggested that as of that time there may already have been 500k-5mil infections in the country. https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/dutch-study-suggests-3-per-cent-of-population-may-have-coronavirus-antibodies https://www.straitstimes.com/world/europe/dutch-study-sugges...
- perl4ever 7y ago
  Possibly dumb question, how do we know someone with antibodies was exposed? The whole idea of vaccination is based on multiple things producing the same antibodies, so isn't it plausible there could be related viruses or genetic factors or something that would lead to antibodies for some people that hadn't been exposed?
  - Barrin92 7y ago
    Yes, there is the chance of false positives with antibody tests, in particular for other strains of Corona, but scientists can do a sample of antibody tests on people they know to have been infected with covid-19 and get a rate for false positives and take that into account.
- Lewton 7y ago
  Netherlands is currently at 30000 cases with 3000 dead, cfr of 10%. 20x infection would put the IFR at 0.5% which is well in line with what is expected

joshuahedlund 7y ago

I'm not so sure that's clear yet. Just going on blunt metrics, the virus has already killed 0.1% of NYC's entire population, probably on pace to hit 0.2% if the down-curve even only roughly matches the up-curve. So it would have had to have spread to 50% of the population for the fatality rate there to be only 0.4%, which seems unlikely (there's only a smattering of antibody data around the world so far but nothing has found spread even close to 50%, especially at the level of a metropolis)

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
claytongulick 7y ago
When you include 3,700 non-positive deaths in your total death count, yeah - the numbers look scary. The reporting we're seeing is CFR, not mortality rate. They are very different things. Mortality rate is the number of deaths caused by a disease. CFR (Case Fatality Rate) is the total number of deaths by those diagnosed with a disease. They are very different numbers, and have very different meaning for different analysis and methodologies. Saying that that virus has killed .1% of NYC's population is inaccurate.
- joshuahedlund 7y ago
  Even w/o those non-positives, the death count for NYC is in the neighborhood of 8,000[0] (and still rising at a decent clip) for a population of 8 million. That's 0.1%. You can also look at individual counties[1] and you get some variation but the same picture. Ex. 2.7k deaths in Queens for a population of 2.3mil, 0.4k deaths in Richmond for a population of 0.4mil (That's 0.1% for the entire population and not even nearing the maximum yet, so obviously the IFR's and CFR's will be even higher.) [0]https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-deaths-confirmed-probable-daily-04152020.pdf https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-d... [1]https://covid19tracker.health.ny.gov/views/NYS-COVID19-Tracker/NYSDOHCOVID-19Tracker-Fatalities?%3Aembed=yes&%3Atoolbar=no&%3Atabs=n https://covid19tracker.health.ny.gov/views/NYS-COVID19-Track...

chefkoch 7y ago

That study has been widely critized as there a many false positives with this kind of test and the counting method seems flawed.

yread 7y ago

As another data point in the Netherlands (officially 30k cases - only serious cases and hospital workers were tested, 30% of the tests are positives), actual seroprevalence is 3% ~500k people have been infected (~2 weeks ago), dividing the excess deaths, you get 1.3% mortality rate. https://twitter.com/jankluytmans/status/1250769486174654464 https://twitter.com/jankluytmans/status/1250769486174654464