That figure does not include people who need critical care for other reasons but won\u2019t get it because the system is overwhelmed.<\/p>\n
Note that these are not<\/em> worst-case figures. Worst case: 70% of humans get it, and the mortality rate turns out to be 4.5% because the medical systems are overwhelmed. In round figures, that’s 250 million dead people, still<\/em> not including people who need critical care for other reasons who don\u2019t get it.<\/p>\n In people aged 20-29, this virus appears to ride along symptom-free at high rates. ((See the image below, a comparison of South Korean cases versus Italian cases. In South Korea, they are testing everyone. In Italy, they are testing only people with symptoms. Look how many more cases in the 20-29 age cohort they are finding in South Korea.)) That means that, by the time many people in that age cohort have symptoms, they have already been infecting other people for the incubation period, which is around 5-14 days. That makes it very hard to contain.<\/p>\n It does not<\/em> appear to be transmitted in a passively airborne fashion, like measles. However, viruses of this type can apparently survive for up to nine days on hard surfaces ((https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0195670120300463)), and this specific virus has been shown to survive at least three days ((various media sources, easily searched)). So it\u2019s not just people; it\u2019s things which people touch, including handrails and elevator buttons.<\/p>\n As of today, 03-16, the United States has no way to test widely for it. (We were offered tests, but we refused the offers of help and tried to develop our own, but then developed a faulty test kit which had to be redesigned, which meant substantive delays.) Initial testing protocol was pointless, because no test kits were available. Now that they are starting to become available, there aren\u2019t enough, and people are still being refused testing unless they have had contact with a confirmed case or travelled from a known hotspot, like Iran or Italy. In other words, we are flying blind, having no good measurement of size of the problem.<\/p>\n One way to try to infer the size of the infected-but-undetected population is to look at the number of tests of suspected cases which are positive. Based on that work, as of roughly 03-12, we probably had 100,000 infected people in the United States already. ((I\u2019m looking for the cite on this))<\/p>\n The United States has prepared very poorly. First, in 2018 we eliminated our federal pandemic response agency. Then, in the earliest days, we didn\u2019t socially distance early enough, and we still aren\u2019t;<\/em> a large percentage of the population is being encouraged by some media to go out and mingle.<\/p>\n Also, we have a population without universal health care, many with high-deductible coverage. Our population is used to rationing healthcare themselves, to deciding for themselves whether it\u2019s worth the cost to seek medical help. One result of such a system is that many people who should<\/em> seek help or screening don\u2019t do so.<\/p>\n Also, we have a population in which large numbers of people don\u2019t have sick leave or employment protections. It is absolutely routine for people in service sector jobs to work even when they know<\/em> they\u2019re sick. Restaurant servers, for instance, when they do<\/em> call in sick are routinely asked, \u201cWhen can you come in?\u201d or told to pop DayQuil and come in or lose their jobs. This means a large number of people have serious short-term incentives to engage in behavior which will result is a high rate of transmission.<\/p>\n Also, our supply of ICU beds, and ventilators, is much lower than what will be necessary for a pandemic of this size, so we\u2019re probably headed into a situation where we have to look at the \u201cno ventilator\u201d death rates, above.<\/p>\n To make matters worse, President Trump declared a travel ban in a manner which prompted a lot of people abroad to panic and fly home at the earliest opportunity, creating huge logjams of people in United States airports where people were packed closely for six hours or more. There are reports that the lines of suspected infected were queued up inches away from people who showed no sign of infection. It would have been hard to create a better system for spreading the virus among incoming travellers.<\/p>\n And here we are. Say what you need to say, being mindful of the commenting policy. Citations are helpful, and if anyone can help me source references or correct numbers, I\u2019ll be grateful; I wasn\u2019t planning on writing this, and didn\u2019t take good notes as I educated myself.<\/p>\n Finally, because humor will be one of the things which gets most of us through this: remember that it\u2019s only a quarantine if it\u2019s from the Quara region of France. From anywhere else, it\u2019s \u201csparkling isolation\u201d.<\/p>\n Grace<\/p>\n Resources:<\/p>\n First, the best overall summary piece I\u2019ve seen yet, as of 03-10<\/a>.<\/p>\n The best hand washing video I\u2019ve seen yet<\/a>. You may have thought you knew how, but unless you\u2019re a scrub nurse or a surgeon, I\u2019ll bet that you didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n Current status<\/a>.<\/p>\n Current status, presented graphically<\/a>.<\/p>\n COVID-19 community calculator<\/a>. Put your ZIP code in and see how your community will fare.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Hello, everyone. This is a COVID-19 (aka SARS-cov-2, aka \u201cnovel coronavirus\u201d) thread. Post what you like, including resources. I may incorporate the best of those into this original post so that people have them available. Initially, I\u2019m working from memory, … Continue reading ![\"\"](\"https:\/\/amptoons.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/coronavirus-ages-south-korea-italy-1120.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n