4 ms·

Every study on coronavirus antibodies that's released gets panned here, yet every single one of them show strong enough evidence that infection is more widespre

Every study on coronavirus antibodies that's released gets panned here, yet every single one of them show strong enough evidence that infection is more widespread and death rates lower than widely assumed. Even if every one of them is flawed, all the information taken as an aggregate paints a picture. In my province (Alberta, Canada) the health authority has recently expanded tested and as a result there's more confirmed cases and a lower death rate. Other health authorities in the country have strongly suggested infection rates are much higher than confirmed cases (which lowers the death rate since every single death is being accounted for in our country). So there's concerns with this study, and maybe another, but there's no evidence to counter the conclusion we're seeing again and again.

blago 7y ago
I don't think anyone doubts that infections are much more common than the recorded rate - we all know that a significant number of people are asymptomatic, hence never tested and recorded. The problem is that those observations are typically used to conclude that "this is just a bad flu" and advance political demands such as "liberate X" and "immediately reopen the country". The question that truly matters is "which model is less wrong" and the overflowing ICUs in NYC and Europe (that's the bottom line) provide a clear answer - we should err on the side of caution.
- Mikeb85 7y ago
  > The problem is that those observations are typically used to conclude that "this is just a bad flu" and advance political demands such as "immediately reopen of the country". And why not? Should studies and observations be dismissed just because the result isn't what some people want? >The question that truly matters is "which model is less wrong" and the overflowing ICUs in NYC and Europe No overflowing ICUs here. Emergency rooms are way under capacity. Where I am, we have a population of 4 million. Only 40 ICU visits during the whole pandemic. Only 59 deaths and the majority were individuals over the age of 80. Over half were in nursing homes. And yet there's a vocal group who don't want anything to reopen. Where is the line where we reopen? 25,000 Albertans die every year. 275,000 Canadians die per year. 2.8 million Americans die every year. It's not reasonable to wait until coronavirus is completely eliminated when economic hardship itself is correlated to a higher mortality rate. Edit - just looked at some closer stats for my region: only 3 deaths under the age of 60. Population 4 million. With 3k official cases and likely 30k or more total cases.
  - blago 7y ago
    Congratulations! It's working. As to when and how it is appropriate to reopen without spiking the curve and killing millions - many of whom would die from easily treatable and unrelated conditions because they wouldn't be getting the attention they need - I think we should defer to the experts.
    - Mikeb85 7y ago
      This thing was never on pace to kill millions. Maybe if it was actually as deadly as SARS and that was a valid concern, but it's proven to be nowhere near as deadly as SARS.
      - blago 7y ago
        It killed hundreds of thousands and counting AFTER we did the unthinkable - shut down the world.
        Mikeb85 7y ago
        It hasn't reached 200k so no, not hundreds of thousands. Swine flu killed ~500k, it doesn't look like this'll get there. It might, but it's not even the worst pandemic of the 2000's yet. https://www.nytimes.com/article/coronavirus-vs-flu.html https://www.nytimes.com/article/coronavirus-vs-flu.html
        Lewton 7y ago
        > Swine flu killed ~500k, it doesn't look like this'll get there. ... Are you willing to put money on this? It'll be the easiest money I'll ever make The US is already at 3x more deaths from Covid-19 than the most pessimistic estimates of how many died there from swine flu Those 500k deaths you're talking about? All happened in Africa and Asia. This pandemic has barely begun to hit India and Bangladesh. Same with Africa
        7y ago
travisporter 7y ago
Not related to your overall point, but if every study is flawed, you cannot take the aggregate as more accurate than the sum of its parts. Maybe if we did a meta-analysis by aggregating all the data.
- Mikeb85 7y ago
  Every study shows the same trend. So do you throw out that information because it's not as accurate as you'd wish for?
postingawayonhn 7y ago
> Every study on coronavirus antibodies that's released gets panned here For the same reasons every time. These studies are not making changes in response to the criticism.
- Mikeb85 7y ago
  Or maybe conducting a perfectly objective study during a pandemic and lockdown is tough. Some data is better than no data.

blago 7y ago

I don't think anyone doubts that infections are much more common than the recorded rate - we all know that a significant number of people are asymptomatic, hence never tested and recorded. The problem is that those observations are typically used to conclude that "this is just a bad flu" and advance political demands such as "liberate X" and "immediately reopen the country". The question that truly matters is "which model is less wrong" and the overflowing ICUs in NYC and Europe (that's the bottom line) provide a clear answer - we should err on the side of caution.

Mikeb85 7y ago
> The problem is that those observations are typically used to conclude that "this is just a bad flu" and advance political demands such as "immediately reopen of the country". And why not? Should studies and observations be dismissed just because the result isn't what some people want? >The question that truly matters is "which model is less wrong" and the overflowing ICUs in NYC and Europe No overflowing ICUs here. Emergency rooms are way under capacity. Where I am, we have a population of 4 million. Only 40 ICU visits during the whole pandemic. Only 59 deaths and the majority were individuals over the age of 80. Over half were in nursing homes. And yet there's a vocal group who don't want anything to reopen. Where is the line where we reopen? 25,000 Albertans die every year. 275,000 Canadians die per year. 2.8 million Americans die every year. It's not reasonable to wait until coronavirus is completely eliminated when economic hardship itself is correlated to a higher mortality rate. Edit - just looked at some closer stats for my region: only 3 deaths under the age of 60. Population 4 million. With 3k official cases and likely 30k or more total cases.
- blago 7y ago
  Congratulations! It's working. As to when and how it is appropriate to reopen without spiking the curve and killing millions - many of whom would die from easily treatable and unrelated conditions because they wouldn't be getting the attention they need - I think we should defer to the experts.
  - Mikeb85 7y ago
    This thing was never on pace to kill millions. Maybe if it was actually as deadly as SARS and that was a valid concern, but it's proven to be nowhere near as deadly as SARS.
    - blago 7y ago
      It killed hundreds of thousands and counting AFTER we did the unthinkable - shut down the world.
      - Mikeb85 7y ago
        It hasn't reached 200k so no, not hundreds of thousands. Swine flu killed ~500k, it doesn't look like this'll get there. It might, but it's not even the worst pandemic of the 2000's yet. https://www.nytimes.com/article/coronavirus-vs-flu.html https://www.nytimes.com/article/coronavirus-vs-flu.html
        Lewton 7y ago
        > Swine flu killed ~500k, it doesn't look like this'll get there. ... Are you willing to put money on this? It'll be the easiest money I'll ever make The US is already at 3x more deaths from Covid-19 than the most pessimistic estimates of how many died there from swine flu Those 500k deaths you're talking about? All happened in Africa and Asia. This pandemic has barely begun to hit India and Bangladesh. Same with Africa
        7y ago

travisporter 7y ago

Not related to your overall point, but if every study is flawed, you cannot take the aggregate as more accurate than the sum of its parts. Maybe if we did a meta-analysis by aggregating all the data.

Mikeb85 7y ago
Every study shows the same trend. So do you throw out that information because it's not as accurate as you'd wish for?

postingawayonhn 7y ago

> Every study on coronavirus antibodies that's released gets panned here For the same reasons every time. These studies are not making changes in response to the criticism.

Mikeb85 7y ago
Or maybe conducting a perfectly objective study during a pandemic and lockdown is tough. Some data is better than no data.