7 ms·

Covid-19 has killed more people in the US than HIV/Aids did in 40 years

11 points by nimbius 5y ago

sushsjsuauahab 5y ago
Now do the flu
- nuerow 5y ago
  > Now do the flu The CDC's estimates for deaths from the flu are tiny and irrelevant when compared with the massive impact of COVID-19. It's estimated that in the past 20 years the yearly number if deaths from the flu peaked at 61k in 2017-2018, which is less than a tenth of covid19's death count. https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/past-seasons.html https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/past-seasons.html Keep in mind that the flu didn't benefitted from public health and safety containment policies such as mask mandates, lockdowns, social distancing, or even changes to workplace higiene. Thus the 730k deaths from COVID-19 are significantly lower than it would be if no precautions were taken.
  - sushsjsuauahab 5y ago
    There is a new flu vaccine every year and it is given to everyone, including the most vulnerable people on earth. We also have a covid vaccine now. In the last 30 days, the United States has averaged 2,000 or less deaths per week. Annualizing this comes out to 104k deaths per year. While this number is higher than the 50k ish deaths per year from the normal flu, it is not 750k per year. The people who died during the onset of corona virus were all unvaccinated, mostly elderly, in tight quarters, and almost all of them had underlying health issues from smoking, obesity, and heart disease. Those of us who have survived the initial onset are, based on the official evidence much more able to survive being infected with corona virus.
    - nojokes 5y ago
      When vaccinate, yes.
    - nojokes 5y ago
      At most 50% of adults will get flu shot in US https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/adult-flu-vaccination-rates-by-age/ https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/adult-flu-vaccinat...
      - sushsjsuauahab 5y ago
        70% of people over the age of 65, aka the most vulnerable people, receive the flu vaccine according to your link. I would like to add that they are vulnerable for a few reasons-- the first being that being old is correlated with dying from covid, the second being that old people are more likely to have been pack a day smokers, and the third being that old people are more likely to have heart disease.
        nojokes 5y ago
        Regardless, when infectious disease is more widespread, they get more hit by it. Wasting medical resources on preventable disease is stupid. It is in everyone interest to get everyone vaccinated.
rytcio 5y ago
These "Covid killed more people than BLANK" articles don't phase me, because we haven't separated the "died with covid" from the "did directly because of covid"
- rzzzwilson 5y ago
  Seems like a petty distinction when you realize that the US, in one year, accumulated more Covid-related deaths than all of World War 2, and is now approaching the total deaths from the Civil War.
  - rsj_hn 5y ago
    There is a difference between a 75 year old terminal cancer patient dying one month earlier from covid, and a 20 year old soldier dying. If you are just counting "lives lost" and view these as the same, then you are not really engaging in an honest damage assessment. You have to first decide and what percent of the death is attributable to covid and what is attributable to the lung cancer, etc. and then you multiply that by the life years lost. That will give you an estimate of the life-years the disease has cost us. Then you divide that by the total life years available to understand the expected toll to each person. I am not going to say, "the toll is X" -- in the future we will understand the toll of covid. We will also understand the toll of the reaction to covid -- the consequences of people not being able to go the gym, of cancelling doctors appointments and deferring cancer screening, of despair from job loss, destroyed careers, lost schooling, seniors dying in nursing homes unable to see their family members, and shortages. At the end of the day, when all these tallies are counted, a lot of people screaming about civil war style death counts are going to be deeply shamed for their foolishness.
    - WalterGR 5y ago
      “CDC estimated that 545,600–660,200 excess deaths occurred in the United States during January 26, 2020–February 27, 2021.” https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7015a4.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7015a4.htm
NoPie 5y ago
According to the WHO, 32 million people have died of HIV since the beginning of the epidemic. Deaths from COVID so far have been estimated to be around 5 million. And this doesn't even begin to consider the differences in age distribution of both diseases.

11 points by nimbius 5y ago

sushsjsuauahab 5y ago

Now do the flu

nuerow 5y ago
> Now do the flu The CDC's estimates for deaths from the flu are tiny and irrelevant when compared with the massive impact of COVID-19. It's estimated that in the past 20 years the yearly number if deaths from the flu peaked at 61k in 2017-2018, which is less than a tenth of covid19's death count. https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/past-seasons.html https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/past-seasons.html Keep in mind that the flu didn't benefitted from public health and safety containment policies such as mask mandates, lockdowns, social distancing, or even changes to workplace higiene. Thus the 730k deaths from COVID-19 are significantly lower than it would be if no precautions were taken.
- sushsjsuauahab 5y ago
  There is a new flu vaccine every year and it is given to everyone, including the most vulnerable people on earth. We also have a covid vaccine now. In the last 30 days, the United States has averaged 2,000 or less deaths per week. Annualizing this comes out to 104k deaths per year. While this number is higher than the 50k ish deaths per year from the normal flu, it is not 750k per year. The people who died during the onset of corona virus were all unvaccinated, mostly elderly, in tight quarters, and almost all of them had underlying health issues from smoking, obesity, and heart disease. Those of us who have survived the initial onset are, based on the official evidence much more able to survive being infected with corona virus.
  - nojokes 5y ago
    When vaccinate, yes.
  - nojokes 5y ago
    At most 50% of adults will get flu shot in US https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/adult-flu-vaccination-rates-by-age/ https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/adult-flu-vaccinat...
    - sushsjsuauahab 5y ago
      70% of people over the age of 65, aka the most vulnerable people, receive the flu vaccine according to your link. I would like to add that they are vulnerable for a few reasons-- the first being that being old is correlated with dying from covid, the second being that old people are more likely to have been pack a day smokers, and the third being that old people are more likely to have heart disease.
      - nojokes 5y ago
        Regardless, when infectious disease is more widespread, they get more hit by it. Wasting medical resources on preventable disease is stupid. It is in everyone interest to get everyone vaccinated.

rytcio 5y ago

These "Covid killed more people than BLANK" articles don't phase me, because we haven't separated the "died with covid" from the "did directly because of covid"

rzzzwilson 5y ago
Seems like a petty distinction when you realize that the US, in one year, accumulated more Covid-related deaths than all of World War 2, and is now approaching the total deaths from the Civil War.
- rsj_hn 5y ago
  There is a difference between a 75 year old terminal cancer patient dying one month earlier from covid, and a 20 year old soldier dying. If you are just counting "lives lost" and view these as the same, then you are not really engaging in an honest damage assessment. You have to first decide and what percent of the death is attributable to covid and what is attributable to the lung cancer, etc. and then you multiply that by the life years lost. That will give you an estimate of the life-years the disease has cost us. Then you divide that by the total life years available to understand the expected toll to each person. I am not going to say, "the toll is X" -- in the future we will understand the toll of covid. We will also understand the toll of the reaction to covid -- the consequences of people not being able to go the gym, of cancelling doctors appointments and deferring cancer screening, of despair from job loss, destroyed careers, lost schooling, seniors dying in nursing homes unable to see their family members, and shortages. At the end of the day, when all these tallies are counted, a lot of people screaming about civil war style death counts are going to be deeply shamed for their foolishness.
  - WalterGR 5y ago
    “CDC estimated that 545,600–660,200 excess deaths occurred in the United States during January 26, 2020–February 27, 2021.” https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7015a4.htm https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7015a4.htm

NoPie 5y ago

According to the WHO, 32 million people have died of HIV since the beginning of the epidemic. Deaths from COVID so far have been estimated to be around 5 million. And this doesn't even begin to consider the differences in age distribution of both diseases.