Zag for Life
Hospital admits for Corona dropping, ICU admits for corona dropping, Ventilator use is likewise dropping, Death rates are slowing. 20 years of data analysis shows the Influenza mortality ranges from 29K to 61K annually in the US. Surely there will be more fatal outcomes but the trend is better. Long slog to get this cleaned up but it appears progress is being made. Happy Easter friends..
Zag for Life
Interesting how Sweden handled its economy
https://news.sky.com/story/coronavir...demic-11966132
Zag for Life
Dashboard Link: https://ncov2019.live/data?fbclid=Iw...pidJ7R7ovzpGfI. (as of 4/16/2020 6:42pm PDST )
US Confirmed Cases 675,640. An increase of 27,637 from yesterday.
US Deaths 34,552. An increase of 2,079 from yesterday.
34522 / 675,640 = 5.1%.
Zag for Life
Reno, it's become well know now that you could die from something else but if you were seropositive, it's counted as a COVID death. Another aberration is in NY ( and who knows where else) where 4000 died and those deaths were counted as COVID but they were never tested for COVID so the Diagnosis could be confirmed or not.
Im not sure how or why the deaths were counted this way but death directly caused by Corona will likely be much less than advertised when the formal data is finally known. Johns Hopkins is the data management center. Duke and Hopkins are thought to be the best. Lots to be known yet. Death rates and mortality counts are slowing. I think that's a good sign.
Banned
Abe, this is the same method the CDC uses to calculate Flu death burden, among others. This counts things like deaths from pneumonia acquired in hospital, a proximate cause, as deaths from flu, the root cause of the hospitalization. https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/faq.htmOriginally Posted by MDABE80
Here's a rough visualization of the kind of thing the CDC uses to estimate true deaths. We know traffic accidents are down, homicides are down, and all other diseases are also WAY DOWN due to little human-human contact. So CDC uses all cause mortality to estimate deaths due to Covid-19. By the way, this graph is now 2 weeks old. In those two weeks USA deaths have gone from ~8.5K to ~38.5K.
Abe - When did Johns Hopkins ever provide a USA mortality rate of 1.4-1.9%? For reference, South Korea, which has had the most extensive contact tracing & testing, not hesitating to test the asymptomatic, to the extent that they barely have any cases or deaths now, has a Case Fatality Rate of over 2%. To believe that the fatality rate is actually ~1%, you have to believe Korea is missing >50% of cases. Abe, if you can demonstrate that Johns Hopkins was giving a USA mortality rate under 2% at any time this month (your quote was 1.4-1.9% in April) I'll never respond to any claims in any of your posts again. Ball is in your court, simply substantiate your claim.
The Johns Hopkins screenshot below is from today, April 18 2020. We are 25 days past when you predicted "this will mostly be over in 2-3 weeks" and the Johns Hopkins Mortality is quadruple what you claimed it was (quoted above) from early April, despite you telling us it has also been falling from that baseline.
Here's some background on counting or estimating deaths for a hurricane, epidemic, etc by comparing all cause mortality (total dead people) this week, to this same week last year and the year before. The Economist gives 5 free articles and then required a subscription, but I'll post a couple screenshots.
Zag for Life
The 2009 Swine Flu had 3,433 confirmed deaths in the United States, but hardly anyone uses that figure today because the CDC later estimated there were 12,469 deaths (range: 8,868–18,306). The number I see most often is just a round 10,000, but Trump, for example, likes to say there were 17,000 deaths from the Swine Flu and he'll point out it was a total catastrophe, which is interesting because, when it comes to confirmed deaths, there have already been nearly 10 times as many from COVID-19.
When authorities like the CDC eventually make their estimates on total COVID-19 fatalities, it will obviously be much higher than the confirmed number, and the process of getting to that estimated number will be no different from any other historic epidemic. HT to LTownZag who explains the process in greater detail in the previous post.
Agent provocateur
Zag for Life
And deaths from pneumonia that set in due to the victim having influenza in 1918 would have still counted as death from influenza because they wouldn't have gotten the pneumonia without the influenza? I've only seen tweets claiming that someone's friend's cousin's neighbor's grandma had a heart attack but was listed as having Covid...so I'd be interested in unbiased sources that claim this is happening.
There are also people who early on were told by doctors that they most likely had Covid but they wouldn't test them because they were conserving tests at that time for only people who had travelled outside the country. I'm not sure how or why they didn't think it was worth testing people for a HIGHLY contagious disease when they exhibited all of the symptoms other than us (refusing tests offered by the WHO months ago) not having tests because of how ill prepared the countr was. Hopefully the people who weren't allowed to get a test didn't die, wouldn't want to possibly inflate the scoreboard if the ME diagnosed it as Covid without an actual test that they were refused while alive
When this is all said and done, 4,000 *possible* mistaken causes of death are going to be a drop in the bucket, but if that's the hill people want to die on, go for it. Fine, we'll take away 4,000 from the total reported, that still leaves us with 30,000 Americans dying in a month. Right now in a neighboring county they're freezing an old ice rink because there's an outbreak in a nursing home and if it's as deadly for that community as it was at the nursing home in Washington the morgue will run out of space.
This should not be happening.
Moderator
Sweden experiment is failing:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...l-reaches-1000
Zag for Life
Trouble with those graphs is that they're based on ALL cause which doesn't depict the true/accurate story. What John Doe wants to know is how many people have the disease and how many people die from it. Those 4000 cases died from who knows? They ended in the wastebasket diagnosis of "COVID" even though we don't know what killed them.
When I was a commissioner at FDA (New drugs and devices) or NIH (Grants and medical contracts) the biostatistical sections always argued for all cause mortality . Why? Because it "purified" the data sets which are easier to manage and therefore easier to publish. And when you publish...….
Same thing happened with our randomized trials...…..For example, we randomized several hundred pts with unstable angina ( coronary disease that became active with unpredictable thresholds for disabling chest pain) . Although some were actually treated medically, because they were allocated to the surgical group they were counted as surgically treated. Why because the stat guys/gals ( the same ones busy now) employed an "Intent to treat principle"/which purified the data and they thought ( No MD's) data would be easier to manage. Small wonder that they thought was no difference in the outcome between the two therapies. So a series of papers were published indicating there was no difference I the therapies even though when "intent to treat" was eliminated, it was obvious surgery was tons better in the short and long term.
I apologize for the long winded reason why I have trouble with government data and unless I know the methods of data management..I just don't trust it. SO while the graphs look enticing, they may not show what's reality when ALL Cause mortality is used. So when the fancy displays are used, they may not be accurate. probably not.
SO does it matter when 4000 cases die when they are counted as COVID mortality? I mean "dead's dead right? Yes...very much so. why, because therapies are generated based on the data given. Wrong data/inaccurate data =wrong therapies. And if a therapy fails, it may be because the underlying data given likely are tailored to a model generated by the biostatistics section. Modeling at this point is haphazard. Likewise is "predicted" mortality or morbidity predictions
And when it becomes politicized as in now, it's hard to know reality. SO the question remains " How do we know for sure..for sure? Actually with a new disease we don't know much "for sure".. And I think the uncertainty in Tony's Fauci's daily presentations reflect that.
Enough of my thoughts for now. Things change week to week. Opinions from 1 month ago must, therefore , be tailored to the current data. AND it gets worse when the virus itself mutates..... Chasing down HIV heart disease ( my fiancé died from this 25 years ago --an MD surgeon) when it mutated every other month or so..was equally as difficult.
Banned
Thanks, SonuvaZag.
I'm learning this stuff as I go, via articles and podcasts. I noticed the coronavirus situation was being taken seriously by a lot of polymath super-smart nerdy thinkers back in Jan and early February, mostly
via people who are accustomed to thinking abstractly and in exponential term, or with emergent phenomena that aren't just "rounded down" to be assumed to be a variant of a familiar example (flu, cold, etc). I'm always linking my sources, since I don't want to be taken as an authority myself and want people to be able to read these articles and listen to these interviews too. If anyone ever notices that I'm incorrect regarding something relating to this epidemic, please let me know ASAP. The last thing I want to do is spread misinformation.
By the way, Washington is now in the top-10 states for the rate of contagiousness (new cases per each existing case). I wonder if our (thus far) success has lead to complacency?
https://rt.live/
Banned
Yes, that is correct. Here's a fantastic interview with John Barry, the author of the definitive book on the 1918-1919 pandemic. Many of its victims (more than 1-in-3) had a proximate cause of death of Pneumonia.
HIV/AIDS for example, isn't the proximate cause of death for nearly anyone. It renders the immune system ineffective though.
https://peterattiamd.com/johnbarry/
His book is The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History
Zag for Life
That could be the case. Or perhaps it's spreading to less urban communities who aren't taking social distancing as seriously in the first place. In any case, it is a reversal of the trend.
Agent provocateur
Zag for Life
Whats the "Y" axis Son??
And then there's this https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/co...ts/ar-BB12Q90W
Accounts for delays in getting a high resolution test with high sensitivity and specificity. I'm hearing this test was 30% sensitive and 30 % specific. Predictive value of the test is horrible.
Zag for Life
Damned if we do and damned if we don't. Does this mean we need to shut down America until 2021? Not really sure what the answer is. I do know if we don't open up for business soon, we are doomed regardless.
Moderator
There will be a midway choice. NY looks like we are slowly getting past this. The models out there show everything bottoming out around June 1... at least for the NYC area. Opening will be slow and gradual and a close eye will be kept on the numbers of people testing positive. Businesses will likely be open this summer, but expect to see some social distancing rules and everyone wearing masks. I do think that there will be enough testing, tracing, and therapeutics in place so that if there is a second "spike" we'll have enough things in place that it will be mitigated much better.
Moderator
Stark differences between densely suburban, like LI, compared to area like say Binghamton, population around 110K... note this is based on what my son has seen up there... is compliance with laws/just general safety of using masks. My son, up there, wears a mask in public no matter what... but he says he is the outlier up there... most locals are going about their business without it. Long Island, when I go out, there is like maybe 1 in 300 people that I see not wearing a mask. You've seen this thing get into towns of 2-300 people in the middle of nowhere.. so those places like Binghamton, may eventually catch up on the density as they seemingly never had their guard up.That could be the case. Or perhaps it's spreading to less urban communities who aren't taking social distancing as seriously in the first place. In any case, it is a reversal of the trend.
Zag for Life
Effective Reproduction (Rt). I pulled that image from the website LTown linked: https://rt.live/
Agent provocateur
Zag for Life
Absolutely, there are regional differences and many varieties between urban and rural. I worry about the false sense of security in some places.
And I'm wondering if LTown is right as it pertains to Spokane. I'm seeing masks but they are closer to outliers. Last week, the state of Washington was in the top three states for slowing the spread (almost to 0), so this is a pretty dramatic turnaround.
Subjectively, I would say we had our guard up pretty early in Spokane because of our proximity to Seattle but I wonder if there is a collective letting down of the guard. I don't mean to make this political, but it's just a fact that the liberty types around here are getting increasingly noisy about how eager they are to restart life as normal (I believe this is something we all long for on some level) and I suspect their message hits home more effectively after it's clear we have not been overwhelmed by hospitalizations yet. No one, including me, can be really sure how much of that is a result of the precautions we've taken.
Agent provocateur
Zag for Life
When I have ventured to get groceries, here in Deer Park, it seems to be about 50/50 with masks. They did have some N95 masks for sale, $10.00/each. I am wearing a cloth mask, 3-4 layers, made by a friend of ours, as one of a thousand, or so, that she has made and sent to people in need.
I am anxious to get my store open, and as a small store with only 3-4 customers a day, could probably do so safely. I do have enough money to last for another month or two, and would rather not die than make a few dollars.
No one can know if it is precautions or not. The learning curve could be huge.
It's not funny.
Zag for Life
Google & Apple : Contact Tracing via Cellphones
Interesting Read: https://onezero.medium.com/apple-and...e-90c705541eaa
Apple and Google are hoping to beat that number in the United States and other countries by eventually building basic tracing functionality into the operating system, so that at least some contact tracing features can work even if people don’t download an app. (The details are still being worked out.) That might help, but it’s likely months away, and even then public health authorities may be fighting an uphill battle to get individuals to opt in to a service whose primary benefit is to others, not themselves.
There is, however, a path by which contact tracing apps might go mainstream even without governments making them mandatory. It’s one that few have yet discussed, and Apple and Google themselves declined to comment on it when asked by OneZero. It involves private entities — workplaces, schools, and even social gatherings — telling people they have to use the app if they want to participate.
“Companies will require it before you’re allowed to go back to work,” predicts Ashkan Soltani, an independent security researcher and former chief technologist at the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, in a phone interview. “Your grocery store could require that you show it before you’re allowed to enter the store.”
Zag for Life
It’s hard for me not to imagine that somewhere down the road folks are going to have to prove their bona fides when it comes to COVID. If you’re a store owner, a concert venue operator, airline, etc., you will have to have some mechanism that lets you tell the public (with a straight face) that it is safe to visit / use the services.
In the wake of 9-11, the airlines (and the feds) had to demonstrate to the public that it was SAFE to fly.
In the wake of the Tylenol poisoning, consumer products companies developed tamper evident packaging that ensured products were SAFE to use.
Why would we treat the COVID-19 phenomenon any differently ? On my first airplane flight post-2020, I’m not willing to take my fellow passengers’ word that they are infection free. They should have to prove, via some universally accepted metric they are SAFE to travel with. As should I.
Enjoy your week. Looks like Mother Nature will favor my neck of the woods with some terrific Spring weather. I may have to take a spin just to get away from these four walls.
Last edited by RenoZag; 04-22-2020 at 05:32 PM.
Zag for Life
Might be a good time to commune with Lake Tahoe, Reno. Was up there for the 1st time in about 40 years last October & absolutely couldn't believe the traffic. Shouldn't be a problem now (though I guess I'm not up on possible travel restrictions).
This post is for March Madness seeding purposes only.
Zag for Life
UPS Fedex Amazon still have large facilities with thousands of workers coming and going everyday.
Zag for Life
Hey Reno. Regarding your last two posts in this thread.
I get that people want to be safe. But, at what cost?
The idea of flattening the curve was to prevent hospitals from being overrun. That has proven to never be in danger. We have gone from an estimated two million deaths to a figure that looks to max out at 60k. If you look at CDC statistics, overall deaths in this country on a week to week basis are almost identical for the past five years. And yet, because of bad models, panicked media and politicians we have caused unbelievable damage to our economy. Worse than that, we have given up our freedom and essentially done nothing to make ourselves safer. The virus will still run it’s course regardless, shelter in place or not.
Eventually we will have to start living again. If we are fearful of enjoying our lives, then what’s the point? If we are going to track everybody and make them out to be outcasts we will have given up a large part of our humanity. There is real danger in having suspicions of everyone you come in contact with.
People with high risk should use common sense and avoid dangerous situations. I get that. Those are the people that should take extra precautions and they are the folks we should have focused on. The rest of us need to go about our daily lives. Are there outliers? Of course. Are there risks? Absolutely. Life is full of risks. But, if we live our lives in fear, what kind of life is that? There will be more viruses. Are we willing to allow the government to tell us what we can wear, where we can worship, who we should associate with, where we can eat, what places we can visit, how we are allowed to get from here to there,etc.?
The Google thing is a really bad idea.
I believe if we give up doing the things we like to do because of an over abundance of caution, life won’t be worth living anyway.
I know there are people that feel differently. This is just my opinion.
God Bless. Mark.
Zag for Life
From another section in the MBB:
"For example, as of March 31, the Italian city of Nembro had 158 deaths in 2020 as opposed to 35 on average in the previous five years. But Nembro had only counted 31 confirmed deaths from COVID-19. So 31 confirmed COVID-19 deaths in the town, but over 120 more deaths (4X confimred deaths) than the same timeframe in the previous five years with no other reasonable explanation for the discrepancy.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/ar...ing-death-toll"
It's not funny.
Posting Permissions
