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posted by janrinok on Sunday March 01 2020, @03:29AM   Printer-friendly
from the sick-and-tired-of-being-sick-and-tired dept.

Many nations have begun to take special measures to address the problem of the spread of the COVID-19 virus over every continent. It would be pointless to report the details of all such measures; they are limited to each specific country and liable to frequent change as the situation develops. The USA FDA (Food and Drug Administration) have carried out what they describe as a "Supply Change Update", see the link below, but for others we suggest using a bit of web-search-fu to discover a site more appropriate to your own area of interest.

Worldwide, newspapers and other media need to maintain sales and subscriptions — many tend, therefore, to sensationalize their reporting. This has two undesirable effects: firstly it can result in data being quoted out of context to support the report they are making and, secondly, it tends to stress the possible effects of the COVID pandemic, should it be declared as such. In a comment elsewhere, I reported 2 tables which contain the most accurate figures we can find from a reputable source. They indicate the vulnerability of people to the virus by age, and any links to comorbidity (as far as they are known). There is no doubt that the virus poses a serious threat but it is not the same for all ages and many deaths are attributed to a combination of COVID-19 infection and other pre-existing conditions. For the latter it has not be proven that the virus was the sole cause of death; it is possible that the person would have died anyway. As postmortems have not been carried out in the vast majority of cases, the figures are open to misinterpretation. The WHO (World Health Organization) stresses that they will be unable to clarify these findings for a long time to come.

As it stands, for a person below the age of 70 with no other medical conditions, the chances of dying from a COVID-19 infection is less than 1%. That is still a large number of people at risk and the implications for every nation are significant. It is, however, much lower than some of the figures that have been quoted in the press. The figures for people over 70 and with other conditions cause the rate to rise quite sharply, and I would suggest that we all keep an watchful eye on the elderly or infirm members of our family and friends.

The majority of people will only suffer mild flu-like symptoms and will make a full recovery. - janrinok

Coronavirus (COVID-19) Supply Chain Update

Coronavirus (COVID-19) Supply Chain Update:

As I have previously communicated, the FDA has been closely monitoring the supply chain with the expectation that the COVID-19 outbreak would likely impact the medical product supply chain, including potential disruptions to supply or shortages of critical medical products in the U.S.

A manufacturer has alerted us to a shortage of a human drug that was recently added to the drug shortages list. The manufacturer just notified us that this shortage is related to a site affected by coronavirus. The shortage is due to an issue with manufacturing of an active pharmaceutical ingredient used in the drug. It is important to note that there are other alternatives that can be used by patients. We are working with the manufacturer as well as other manufacturers to mitigate the shortage. We will do everything possible to mitigate the shortage.

Additional Information on Human Drugs

Since January 24, the FDA has been in touch with more than 180 manufacturers of human drugs, not only to remind them of applicable legal requirements for notifying the FDA of any anticipated supply disruptions, but also asking them to evaluate their entire supply chain, including active pharmaceutical ingredients (the main ingredient in the drug and part that produces the intended effects, e.g., acetaminophen) and other components manufactured in China.

Also, as part of our efforts, the FDA has identified about 20 other drugs, which solely source their active pharmaceutical ingredients or finished drug products from China. We have been in contact with those firms to assess whether they face any drug shortage risks due to the outbreak. None of these firms have reported any shortage to date. Also, these drugs are considered non-critical drugs.

We will remain in contact with manufacturers so that we can continue to assist them with any potential issues in the fastest way.

The report continues for several pages and covers a variety of issues relevant to the USA.

Coronavirus lessons from the 1918-1919 Spanish flu

As the threat of additional community spreading of the coronavirus in the US grows, at least some people are recommending large-scale quarantines in American cities. There is precedent for this with the 1918-1919 Spanish flu and evidence that it was effective at curbing fatalities. Cities like St. Louis, Kansas City, Milwaukee, and San Francisco implemented strict quarantines early during the spread of infections and experienced lower fatality rates than cities that waited to impose quarantines. The quarantine in St. Louis was particularly notable because it was one of the top ten largest cities in the US at that time. On October 5, 1918, St. Louis ordered a wide range of measures being proposed currently for mitigating the coronavirus such as closing schools and other public places and many businesses.

Coronavirus Outbreak: All the Latest Updates

Coronavirus outbreak: All the latest updates:

Hopes that the coronavirus would be contained to China have vanished as the first case in sub-Saharan Africa was announced in Nigeria, while number of infections continue to grow in Europe pounding stock markets amid fears of a global recession.

On Friday, the US State Department raised its alert level for Italy, warning Americans to reconsider travel due to the outbreak. "Many cases of COVID-19 have been associated with travel to or from mainland China or close contact with a travel-related case, but sustained community spread has been reported in Italy," the department added. Italy has reported 650 coronavirus cases and 17 deaths - the most in Europe from the epidemic that originated in China, which is by far the most affected country.

The US on Friday warned against non-essential travel to Italy, a top destination for US tourists, over the growing coronavirus epidemic. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention "recommends that travellers avoid all nonessential travel to Italy. There is limited access to adequate medical care in affected areas," it said in a statement.

In China - the epicentre of the deadly disease - the National Health Commission reported on Saturday at least 47 new coronavirus deaths, bringing to 2,835 the number of fatalities nationwide. >There were also 427 new infections, up from 327 the previous day, pushing the confirmed cases in mainland China so far to 79,251, and more than 83,000 worldwide. Of the total number of deaths, at least 45 were from Hubei, the epicentre of the outbreak. Of the 45 deaths in Hubei, 37 were from the city of Wuhan.

The US state of California has confirmed a second case of coronavirus. "Now we have a case who did not recently travel or come in contact with anyone known to be ill," Sara Cody, the director of public health for Santa Clara County, near San Francisco, told reporters. She said the second patient is an adult woman who is being treated at a hospital.

Two South Africans on board the quarantined Diamond Princess cruise ship have tested positive for the coronavirus, according to a state-run medical institute. "We confirm that these citizens are currently being treated in Japan and are in good care," said a statement by the National Institute for Communicable Diseases.

Three Confirmed Cases of Corona Virus in Washington State

Washington State Department of Health reports there are now three confirmed cases of Coronavirus inside the state: https://www.doh.wa.gov/Emergencies/Coronavirus with 1 case in King County and 2 cases in Snohomish County. Seattle is inside King County and Snohomish is just north of King.

ABC reports that the infections are of unknown origin and that more potential cases exist in the bordering state of Oregon.

A second case of COVID-19 with an unknown origin was identified in Santa Clara county, California on Friday, and two other potential cases of unknown origin were identified in Oregon and Washington state.

NPR calls Seattle the first confirmed case of Corona virus in the US:

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the CDC, has reported the first case in the United States of a new and deadly coronavirus. A resident of Washington state in the Seattle area is infected. The man had traveled to central China to the city of Wuhan, where the virus was first discovered. It has killed at least 17 people, and scientists now say humans can transmit the virus to one another. And as Will Stone from member station KNKX in Seattle reports, officials in Washington state are trying to prevent the spread of the virus, and also projecting calm.

My own analysis indicates that the symptom profile has changed as well from flu like symptoms to mild flu like symptoms or mild cold like symptoms and more specifically that fever is not mandatory any longer but I am not able to find sources reliable enough to include in a submission.

Three More People Test Positive in England

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-51684624

Three more people from England have tested positive for coronavirus, taking the total number of UK cases to 23.

Two of the patients had recently returned from Italy, while the other had come back from Asia, chief medical officer Prof Chris Whitty said.

The cases are from Gloucestershire, Hertfordshire and Berkshire.

It comes as health officials try to discover how a man from Surrey caught the virus, after he became the first person to be infected within the UK.

The man, who is being treated at Guy's and St Thomas' Hospital in central London, had not been abroad recently - unlike the other cases in the UK.

[...] Ten more cases of the virus in the UK in just over two days might raise eyebrows, but health officials say all but one can be easily explained because the patients have travelled from the most affected countries, including Northern Italy and Iran.

Since the first UK cases were confirmed in York - two Chinese nationals - positive tests have been recorded in the south of England, Derbyshire, south Wales and Northern Ireland.

Government's Mixed Messages On Coronavirus Are Dangerous: Experts

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

“It’s really important for the U.S. government to be speaking with one common voice about these issues right now,” Tom Inglesby, an infectious diseases physician and director of the Center for Health Security of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, tells STAT

That’s not happening. On Tuesday (January 25), a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) official announced that COVID-19 could start spreading at the community level in the US shortly and that if the outbreak did hit the states, there could be “severe” disruptions to daily life. The next day, President Donald Trump held an evening press conference in which he said he didn’t think an outbreak in the US is inevitable. “I don’t think it’s inevitable because we’re doing a really good job in terms of maintaining borders and turning—in terms of letting people in, in terms of checking people,” he told reporters. He did not mention a new disease case reported the same day in California that couldn’t be accounted for by foreign travel or contact with someone known to be infected.

In the same press conference, Trump contradicted his own health officials. He predicted that there might be just one or two more people who report being infected in the next short period of time, yet, minutes later, Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Alex Azar and CDC Principal Deputy Director Anne Schuchat both said that they expected the number of infections to grow. There are currently 60 reported cases of COVID-19 in the US. 

Earlier in February, Trump also said the spread of the virus could dissipate by April when the weather warms. While some viruses, such as the flu, don’t spread as easily in higher temperatures, it is not clear SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, is one of them. Government officials saying that the coronavirus outbreak is just like the flu isn’t entirely accurate, notes Ronald Klain, who oversaw the Ebola response in President Barack Obama’s administration. He responded to comments Tuesday by Chad Wolf, acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, in testimony before Congress. “The responsible answer [to whether the outbreak is like the flu] is ‘we don’t know yet,’” Klain said.

“Americans need facts and science—not reassurance that all will be well. The presidential press conference on the coronavirus pandemic was, sadly, a disappointment,” Arthur Caplan, a bioethicist at NYU Langone Health, says in a statement emailed to The Scientist.

Disagreement between the State Department and CDC about the decision to fly home 14 Americans infected with SARS-CoV-2 also led to questions about who was leading the effort to contain the disease in the US. The CDC recommended that the patients not be flown home from Tokyo after leaving quarantine on the Diamond Princess cruise ship, but the State Department overruled the recommendation, according to The Washington Post. 

Government messaging may become more consistent, as President Trump announced Wednesday (January 26) that Vice President Mike Pence would be coordinating the response to the disease threat going forward. Now, government health officials and scientists are required to coordinate any statements and public appearances with Pence’s office, officials tell The New York Times reports. That includes Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. 


Original Submission #1Original Submission #2Original Submission #3Original Submission #4Original Submission #5Original Submission #6

 
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  • (Score: 4, Informative) by legont on Sunday March 01 2020, @03:59AM (24 children)

    by legont (4179) on Sunday March 01 2020, @03:59AM (#964757)

    Active Cases 41,679 including 7,568 (18%) Serious or Critical
    Closed Cases 45,313 including 2,979 (7%) Deaths
    https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ [worldometers.info]
    Since we now have more closed cases than open, this 7% dead number is unlikely to go down unless more people with mild symptoms are tested.

    --
    "Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +2  
       Informative=2, Total=2
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  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @05:41AM (13 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @05:41AM (#964787)

    I disagree with your interpretation of the data. I think you've interpreted the data incorrectly and I don't share your pessimism at all. Here are a few issues and some additional commentary:

    1) It is widely believed that Iran is seriously underreporting the number of cases in the country. The deaths are being reported and in significant numbers, but the failure to properly report the number of cases skews the death rate.

    2) Many of those early cases are Hubei province. The death rate is significantly higher there than elsewhere in China. The large number of cases in that one province is almost certainly not representative of the death rate elsewhere. The disparity is due to the health care system in Hubei province being overwhelmed.

    3) The death rate on that site is still dropping. On February 27, the death rate from closed cases was 7.26%. On February 29, it's 6.57%. I don't see a table on the site showing the number of deaths and recoveries each day, but with a bit of math, I calculated the death rate among cases closed in the past week was around 2.55%. That number is still heavily influenced by Hubei province and the inflated death rate from Iran. It's worth noting that the death rate between February 15 and February 22 among closed cases was 8.7%. The week before that, the death rate among newly closed cases was 11.1%. Even the death rate for cases currently being closed has dropped a lot over the past week and is continuing to improve.

    4) The death rate absolutely should fall as better containment measures are hopefully implemented and prevent hospitals from being overwhelmed. A better understanding of the virus and perhaps early detection will improve the ability to treat it. Trials of treatments like remdisivir are expanding. If that drug or others are effective, that will also lower the death rate. Improved treatment probably contributes significantly to why the death rate among recently closed cases is dropping sharply.

    As you noted, we also really don't have a good idea how many patients contracted coronavirus, recovered, and were never counted at all. Improved detection probably contributes to why the death rate for recently closed cases has declined. A lot of recent deaths are still in Hubei province along with the recent totals coming from Iran.

    Although prior cases are informative, what matters is the chances of recovery in cases that will be closed in the future. In the past week, the recovery rate was 97.45%, not counting recoveries we don't know about. Provided the healthcare system isn't overwhelmed in your location, if you were to contract this virus in the future or even have a currently active case, your chances of recovery will probably be quite a bit better than 97.45%. Improved detection will probably increase the number of cases that we know result in recovery. If the screening expands and detection is earlier, when patients aren't as ill, it will probably allow treatments to be administered sooner in the infection cycle. At absolute worst, that wouldn't improve the recovery rate. More likely, earlier treatment will improve the recovery rate, though it isn't known to what degree.

    Even as the recovery rates improve, and I believe that trend will continue, that optimism shouldn't prevent us from enacting containment measures. For a virus that spreads widely, a lot percentage of critical cases with a massive number of infections can still overwhelm hospitals. If we take proper precautions and don't allow hospitals to become overcrowded, I see no reason that the recovery rate won't be quite a bit better than 97.45%.

    • (Score: 5, Funny) by driverless on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:04AM

      by driverless (4770) on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:04AM (#964791)

      I disagree with your interpretation of the data.

      His interpretation of the data is intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to his newsletter.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:43AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:43AM (#964801)

      For your #2, it's likely that many people simply recovered before being diagnosed. Early on it wasn't well understood what was going on and the early reaction was not very constructive.

      Think of it this way : suppose you are a resident of Wuhan. Are you going to go to the government today and say "I had a sniffle two weeks ago, but now I'm fine, would you like to test me for coronavirus?" I certainly would not.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @03:31PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @03:31PM (#964922)

        They might also test you for spare kidneys...

    • (Score: 2) by edIII on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:48AM (1 child)

      by edIII (791) on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:48AM (#964802)

      If we take proper precautions and don't allow hospitals to become overcrowded

      Check.

      The death rate absolutely should fall as better containment measures are hopefully implemented and prevent hospitals from being overwhelmed.

      Check.

      Trials of treatments like remdisivir are expanding. If that drug or others are effective, that will also lower the death rate. Improved treatment probably contributes significantly to why the death rate among recently closed cases is dropping sharply.

      Citation needed. Other sources, not ones political in nature, are saying that's optimistic to say remdisivir is an actual cure. Even in ideal conditions, necessary testing and production levels are a year away. We have a treatment for Ebola now, so optimism isn't unwarranted, but your time window is. Best estimates are we won't get it fast enough. To get the point where can direct a cure, we need the testing kits to perform the aforementioned detection and containment. We are not adequately supplied at this time, and the logistics to increase it, and ship our current supplies to where they need isn't forthcoming in the highly charged political environment.

      that optimism shouldn't prevent us from enacting containment measures.

      There is a difference between optimism, ignorance, and dangerous indifference. This virus is now political, and it's been determined that it's a political weapon aimed at the incumbent and far right politics.

      I disagree with your assessment of the social dynamics involved, and find you to be highly optimistic in terms of U.S preparedness to enact any of the reasonable measures called for, in the time windows they need to be performed in. That time window, btw, was yesterday. Whatever we do now is simply catching up with the problem.

      --
      Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
      • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:44AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:44AM (#964816)

        When I suggest that improved treatments were responsible for the lower death rate, that was a general statement and not just about remdesivir. Regarding it being promising, I'll cite Scientific American [scientificamerican.com], which discusses very preliminary tests involving SARS and MERS. Remdesivir wasn't effective at treating ebola and its efficacy against COVID-19 remains to be seen. Even without a proven antiviral drug, a better understanding of the virus and its effects should help doctors better treat the symptoms and manage the complications from the infection.

        Regarding my optimism, I was cautionary and emphasized the importance of limiting the burden on hospitals. I am not confident that the federal government will do enough. I submitted the portion of the story about the social distancing during the Spanish flu pandemic. while I didn't directly say this in my summary, the articles linked discuss why some cities implemented those measures sooner than others. Political disputes, lack of agreement between doctors and political leaders, and objections from local businesses delayed action in some cities. The cities that act later had much higher death rates than those that implemented social distancing policies sooner. As with a century ago, much of the mitigation will have to come from state and local authorities. The federal government will still have to provide many of the necessary resources, but it will be up to states, counties, and cities to directly implement many of the mitigation strategies. I am hopeful because the overall role of the federal government is limited and that perhaps state and local authorities will be more willing to take the necessary steps.

    • (Score: 2) by legont on Sunday March 01 2020, @05:10PM (6 children)

      by legont (4179) on Sunday March 01 2020, @05:10PM (#964956)

      I have many objection to this optimistic view, but let me point one. The US currently has under a million hospital beds - 0.3% of the population. The number of serious and critical cases is at 18%. Therefore, if we kick everybody out of hospitals, we could handle 1.5% infection rate. Now, I don't know how many of the beds have lung ventilation machines, but I'd be surprise if more than 10%. Hence the US can handle no more than 0.15% infection rate at any given point.
      Make no mistake - if we can't stop infections, it will be ugly - way worse than 1918 flu.

      --
      "Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:16PM (2 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:16PM (#964991)

        Yes, if we don't act to stop the spread of infections, this can easily overwhelm the hospital system here. We'll be stuck trying to create makeshift hospitals here, just like in Wuhan. The reason I'm hopeful is that social distancing would be implemented by state and local authorities rather than at the federal level. Even as the federal government seems unable to make the right decisions, one can hope that state and local authorities aren't paralyzed by the same political infighting and incompetence.

        Estimates this morning suggest that the virus has been circulating for six weeks in Washington State. That was before travel restrictions were implemented. It was also around the time that students would have been returning from China for the start of the new semester. I don't remember where i saw it, but I read an analysis estimating something like 3-10 people probably were infected with coronavirus and came to the US prior to the travel restrictions. If there are a lot more unreported cases, it may mean that infections are far more widespread than we know about. That could presumably push the 3-10 number considerably higher. My point about college campuses and universities is that they're distributed throughout the US. There may not be anything special about Washington State in this regard. It may be widespread throughout the US right now and we just don't know it. An analysis this morning suggested anywhere from 150-1500 people in Washington State are infected. There may well be other outbreaks that we just don't know about yet but are of similar extent. There's no reason to feel confident that this is confined to the west coast, either.

        The two things the federal government can do are to provide accurate information, particularly about the extent of infections in the US, and to provide the necessary funding to the state and local officials who will actually have to implement social distancing. The expansion of testing in the US is probably already helping to detect a few more cases. It took far too long but we're at least moving in the right direction. The funding is a bigger problem because Congress and the President are too busy arguing with each other to actually pass the necessary legislation. Unfortunately, it may take a big surge in cases before they decide it's urgent and authorize a larger amount of funding, closer to what's probably going to be needed. At the state and local levels, it depends on putting aside politics and putting public safety ahead of business interests. States are generally less divided politically than at the federal level. They may be more decisive in that respect. Trump's statements and many of his actions aren't helpful. I expect that many governors will be more responsible. In terms of economic concerns, that's a bigger concern for me, that some places will prioritize the economy ahead of promptly implementing social distancing.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:27PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:27PM (#964995)

          Facts matter. I did make a mistake in the above post and I want to correct it ASAP.

          Here's an article discussing the amount of infected people arriving in the US prior to the travel restrictions: https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/28/health/coronavirus-uncounted-cases-community-spread/index.html [cnn.com]. The range provided is 4-10, and I'm pretty sure I read a different account where that lower end was three or four. That's splitting hairs. But the 4-10 number was for passengers arriving in California. While a substantial amount of air travel from China does go to California, there were almost certainly more infected passengers arriving elsewhere in the country. If a significant portion of the passengers were students, and that seems likely in that time period, that suggests that infected passengers may have dispersed throughout the country. There's no reason to think that California and Washington State are unique in the amount of infections. My error was not in the number, but in thinking it referred to the entire country rather than just California.

          • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @11:16PM

            by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @11:16PM (#965119)

            You can get per-nation updates at https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries [worldometers.info] FYI

            (I guess my providing a useful link on a single line triggers spamdetect too)

            (ah well)

            Lorem ipsum?

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:31PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:31PM (#965037)

        if we can't stop infections, it will be ugly - way worse than 1918 flu.

        No, it won't. With as much evidence as you provide.

        • (Score: 2) by edIII on Monday March 02 2020, @06:26AM

          by edIII (791) on Monday March 02 2020, @06:26AM (#965366)

          You're two sentences are not a refutation that can be taken seriously either. If you want to refute it, use numbers, stats, and sound logic.

          We're listening.

          --
          Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @08:52PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @08:52PM (#965070)

        You may want to know that there are 258 severe cases outside Hubei in all the rest of China combined: 7,365 minus 7,107. Per total 2,370 patients presently ill there: 35,329 - 32959. That is 11%, not 18%. Straight from China NHC:
        http://www.nhc.gov.cn/xcs/yqtb/202003/9d462194284840ad96ce75eb8e4c8039.shtml [nhc.gov.cn]
        When calculating anything about this virus, subtract Hubei. It somehow behaves VERY differently EVERYWHERE else.

    • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @08:41PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @08:41PM (#965066)

      In Chinese, and site requiring Javascript to access:
      http://www.nhc.gov.cn/xcs/xxgzbd/gzbd_index.shtml [nhc.gov.cn]
      A report for every day gets posted some hours after the day ends. Report contains daily change in number of confirmed cases, severe cases, deaths, recoveries, and suspected cases, and the cumulative numbers of the above; for all China, then separately for Hubei province, specifically denoting the part for Wuhan.
      The one for February 29th: http://www.nhc.gov.cn/xcs/yqtb/202003/9d462194284840ad96ce75eb8e4c8039.shtml [nhc.gov.cn]

      Presently, one can see that a daily reduction in number of severe cases is about 10x higher than the number of deaths. Which means that while about 10% of people with severe form of infection die, the other 90% get better (same percentage as with severe flu infection BTW). ("Severe form" is defined as severe pneumonia requiring oxygen supplementation or artificial ventilation.)
      As of today, they report 12,917 (79,824 - 66,907) confirmed cases outside Hubei, of them 109 (2,870 - 2,761) died and 10638 (41,825 - 31,187) recovered. Which gets you roughly 1% death rate. What, how, and why happened in Wuhan to bring death rate there to a whopping 10% (2,195 deaths with 19,227 recoveries) and in the rest of Hubei to 4.5% (566 dead per 11,960 recovered) , we may never get to learn, but to do any informed thinking, you need to de-skew the data by substracting Hubei.

      Use Google Translate to read it for yourself, and work out the numbers to your satisfaction.

  • (Score: 2) by driverless on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:08AM (2 children)

    by driverless (4770) on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:08AM (#964792)

    Well that just proves it, it's a manufactured virus cheaply mass-produced in China for getting rid of our Old People.

    • (Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:41AM

      by fustakrakich (6150) on Sunday March 01 2020, @06:41AM (#964800) Journal

      it's a manufactured virus

      Yes [nature.com]

      to examine the emergence potential (that is, the potential to infect humans) of circulating bat CoVs, we built a chimeric virus encoding a novel, zoonotic CoV spike protein...

      seems that way

      --
      La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @03:33PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @03:33PM (#964924)

      Is it the same lab that's engineering the climate hoax? Very smart people in JJJJJJJJJJJhina.

  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday March 01 2020, @03:09PM (1 child)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Sunday March 01 2020, @03:09PM (#964908)

    unless more people with mild symptoms are tested.

    I'd say more likely: when more people with mild symptoms are tested. In your stats, how many have been tested and found negative?

    --
    🌻🌻 [google.com]
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:02PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:02PM (#965023)

      If we just stop testing then the number of cases testing positive will surely go down. Right? What works for CO2 also works for COVID19.

      https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-44067797 [bbc.com]

  • (Score: 2) by quietus on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:33PM (4 children)

    by quietus (6328) on Sunday March 01 2020, @07:33PM (#965038) Journal

    No. No. No. Your 7 percent, which you keep repeating on this site and the green one, under different usernames, is bogus -- even by the numbers on worldometer itself, the site you keep referencing.

    Allow me to quote the flagship medical journal of the BMC Series:

    The symptoms of COVID-19 are fever, dry cough, fatigue, nasal congestion, sore throat and diarrhoea. On February 14th, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (China CDC) published the first details of 44,672 confirmed cases, in the biggest study since the outbreak began [3]. Their findings show that COVID-19 was mild for 81% of patients and had an overall case fatality rate of 2.3%. Of those confirmed cases, only 2.2% were under 20 years old. Compared to adults, children generally present with much milder clinical symptoms. It is likely that future serological studies will show much asymptomatic disease in children. As opposed to H1N1, pregnant women do not appear to be at higher risk of severe disease. The severity of the disease appears to be associated with age, with the elderly most at risk; those over 80 years of age had a Case Fatality Rate (CFR) of 14.8%. The CFR was also increased in those with comorbidities including cardiovascular, diabetes, chronic respiratory disease, hypertension, and cancer. The cause of death is respiratory failure, shock or multiple organ failure.

    I've put a number of items in the text above in bold, due to all the panicky things about the seriousness of covid-19 I've read here.

    Once again, I pose the question: the scientific community has decided to publish all research and facts in the open for all to see. Prominent scientific publications (Nature.com, TheLancet.com) have dedicated free sections on covid-19. Independent medical institutions (John Hopkins, the WHO, CDC) gather data directly from the field and publish it in the open. Why then do you choose to keep referencing a site which hasn't even got the population numbers correct for my own country, Belgium? Why do you keep pushing that 7% number as every scientific article published on Nature.com, theLancet.com and WHO insist on a CFR of around 2%?

    • (Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @09:12PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 01 2020, @09:12PM (#965079)

      Day-by day reports; in Chinese, and site requiring Javascript to access:
      http://www.nhc.gov.cn/xcs/xxgzbd/gzbd_index.shtml [nhc.gov.cn]
      A report for every day gets posted some hours after the day ends. Report contains daily change in number of confirmed cases, severe cases, deaths, recoveries, and suspected cases, and the cumulative numbers of the above; for all China, then separately for Hubei province, specifically denoting the part for Wuhan.
      The one for February 29th: http://www.nhc.gov.cn/xcs/yqtb/202003/9d462194284840ad96ce75eb8e4c8039.shtml [nhc.gov.cn]

      Presently, one can see that a daily reduction in number of severe cases is about 10x higher than the number of deaths. Which means that while about 10% of people with severe form of infection die, the other 90% get better (same percentage as with severe flu infection BTW). ("Severe form" is defined as severe pneumonia requiring oxygen supplementation or artificial ventilation.)
      As of today, they report 12,917 (79,824 - 66,907) confirmed cases outside Hubei, of them 109 (2,870 - 2,761) died and 10638 (41,825 - 31,187) recovered. Which gets you roughly 1% death rate. What, how, and why happened in Wuhan to bring death rate there to a whopping 10% (2,195 deaths with 19,227 recoveries) and in the rest of Hubei to 4.5% (566 dead per 11,960 recovered) , we may never get to learn, but to do any informed thinking, you need to de-skew the data by substracting Hubei.

      Use Google Translate to read it for yourself, and check the numbers to your satisfaction.

    • (Score: 2) by legont on Sunday March 01 2020, @11:06PM (2 children)

      by legont (4179) on Sunday March 01 2020, @11:06PM (#965116)

      The site I reference posts all the formula used and I believe the correct one is the one they post:

      3,001 / (3,001 + 42,733) = 7% CFR (worldwide)

      I post under my real name. What is your fucking real name?

      --
      "Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
      • (Score: 2) by janrinok on Monday March 02 2020, @06:55PM

        by janrinok (52) Subscriber Badge on Monday March 02 2020, @06:55PM (#965610) Journal

        I post under my real name. What is your fucking real name?

        Cool down - knowing your name doesn't make the facts you claim any more or less accurate. It is exactly the same for those with whom you are discussing this matter.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @07:11PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @07:11PM (#965614)

        ok, le gunt