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32.8 million Americans have had confirmed positive tests for COVID-19 as of April 26[1], and the current US population is 328.2 million, so at a minimum 10% of

32.8 million Americans have had confirmed positive tests for COVID-19 as of April 26[1], and the current US population is 328.2 million, so at a minimum 10% of the people in the US have gotten COVID. A maximum of 100% of the people in the US could be infected[2], so that implies an upper bound of 10x worse or 5M deaths averted by all interventions combined. US CDC estimates that about 3 - 3.5x as many people have contracted as have tested positive[3], so a more realistic upper bound is that COVID-19 would have been 3x worse without any intervention (assuming that 100% of people would have been infected without intervention). So that gives you an upper bound. I'm not sure how to get a lower bound but it might be possible for someone with sufficient statistical know-how. [1] https://www.statista.com/topics/6084/coronavirus-covid-19-in-the-us/ https://www.statista.com/topics/6084/coronavirus-covid-19-in... [2] I'm ignoring reinfections here since, while reinfections happen, they are quite rare relative to first-time infections everywhere I have seen [3] https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/burden.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/burd... -- note this is as of January 15, when there were 24.2 million confirmed cases, and CDC estimated that there were about 83.1 million total cases.

Raidion 5y ago
There are a bunch of stuff that make this hard to calculate. One is that cases are undercounted, while deaths are almost certainly not. Another is that deaths are correlated to available healthcare. 3x cases would mean that the standard of care goes down, which means more deaths. More deaths would probably also mean increased "protective" measures. Risk tolerance (and risk of infection) is elastic. Seeing 3x more deaths would certainly mean at least some people would take it more seriously, which reduces risky behavior and slows down cases, etc. So you're right, if worst case everyone in the US gets infected, we're in for a lot more deaths, but aside from an apocalyptical R=100 type disease, not everyone is getting infected. The more infections there are, the more preventative measures are taken, etc. It's a hard problem.
- darkerside 5y ago
  I'm pretty sure what we saw this year demonstrates that protective measures are far less elastic than we might assume.
darkerside 5y ago
Great answer, thank you
nojokes 5y ago
This calculation does not take into account a collapse of the medical system. The problem with covid is the speed of its spread. We see this in India right now. There are not many cases per capita but their limited health care system could not handle this and people suffocate to death.
kungito 5y ago
This is very wrong because as another comment mentioned, we are constantly on the verge of collapse of the health care capacity. I have friends who work in hospitals and the measures a government in Europe seems to take seems to always have as loose as possible measures while keeping the health care system at near maximum strain. Many people recover from covid in the hospital and even bigger problem is that if many more people are sick from covid, the people with other unrelated issues are lacking health care attention. One number I've heard is that we will see an increase in deaths from unrelated health problems which would usually get detected on time but since it's hard to get an appointment

Raidion 5y ago

There are a bunch of stuff that make this hard to calculate. One is that cases are undercounted, while deaths are almost certainly not. Another is that deaths are correlated to available healthcare. 3x cases would mean that the standard of care goes down, which means more deaths. More deaths would probably also mean increased "protective" measures. Risk tolerance (and risk of infection) is elastic. Seeing 3x more deaths would certainly mean at least some people would take it more seriously, which reduces risky behavior and slows down cases, etc. So you're right, if worst case everyone in the US gets infected, we're in for a lot more deaths, but aside from an apocalyptical R=100 type disease, not everyone is getting infected. The more infections there are, the more preventative measures are taken, etc. It's a hard problem.

darkerside 5y ago
I'm pretty sure what we saw this year demonstrates that protective measures are far less elastic than we might assume.

darkerside 5y ago

Great answer, thank you

nojokes 5y ago

This calculation does not take into account a collapse of the medical system. The problem with covid is the speed of its spread. We see this in India right now. There are not many cases per capita but their limited health care system could not handle this and people suffocate to death.

kungito 5y ago

This is very wrong because as another comment mentioned, we are constantly on the verge of collapse of the health care capacity. I have friends who work in hospitals and the measures a government in Europe seems to take seems to always have as loose as possible measures while keeping the health care system at near maximum strain. Many people recover from covid in the hospital and even bigger problem is that if many more people are sick from covid, the people with other unrelated issues are lacking health care attention. One number I've heard is that we will see an increase in deaths from unrelated health problems which would usually get detected on time but since it's hard to get an appointment