5 ms·

Epidemiologists have been saying that per-capita comparisons don't make sense, since if you start with 10 cases, and have an Rt of 2, you get 20 cases, no matte

Epidemiologists have been saying that per-capita comparisons don't make sense, since if you start with 10 cases, and have an Rt of 2, you get 20 cases, no matter if your population is 1 or 100 million.

jcims 6y ago
At 90 days some their first 100 cases, Sweden has half the cases of China. Does that mean they have been twice as effective at fighting the disease? Half as impacted?
- atemerev 6y ago
  Chinese statistics is unreliable. It makes sense to compare Western countries, but not Western countries to China.
  - jcims 6y ago
    OK Sweden has fewer confirmed cases (40k) than most if not all of Western Europe.
    - atemerev 6y ago
      Compared to population?
    - thomasz 6y ago
      Sweden doesn't test nearly as much as other countries in Western Europes. Comparing deaths is already complicated, comparing "confirmed cases" is completely useless.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
kgwgk 6y ago
And if you start with X cases, and have and Rt of 2, you get 2X cases, no matter if X is 10 or 1000.
ptx 6y ago
Perhaps it didn't make sense in the beginning, when outbreaks are sparse, but now that it's spread everywhere and it's a matter of suppressing it, that changes things, doesn't it? If you start with 10 cases and immediately take action like Taiwan, you have 7 dead. If you start with 10 cases and do nothing like Sweden, you have 4500 dead.
- svrtknst 6y ago
  Sweden hasn't "done nothing", please don't make things up.
  - new2628 6y ago
    In some cases they did worse than nothing, like when advising people not to wear masks.