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Covid : Infection rates v death rates and a possible second wave

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Justin Smith

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I've said all along there will be no "second wave" (as defined by as spike in the death rate more or less as high as the first) in any similar country to the UK with a death rate above (pref well above) 500 per million. Note I am not saying there will not be bumps and dips in the graph curves. Anyway, nothing has happened so far to make me change my mind. I'm not that interested in the infection rate, only the death rate, and one does not necessarily lead to the other, not in a European country anyway. The link between the infection rate and the death rate appears to be loosening, I'm not sure why, it may be that our hospitals are getting better at treating it, but one has to wonder, if the death rate drops to say 1 in 400 or 500 why are we persisting with these massively damaging measures to our society and economy ?
Note for the timings on the graphs, if someone is going to die from Covid the average length of time is about 18 days and here are the infection rates and death rates for France to the 17th August (Spain follows a similar pattern) :

France Covid infections and deaths to 17 Aug 20 750W L5 jpg.jpg

Could one of these people who think there will be a second wave please explain to me why, as our lockdown was eased off (unofficially at first - from only a few weeks into it - but then officially) our death rate has not only failed to go up, but has actually fell, and has continued to fall despite even the pubs being reopened ! :

UK infection and death rate to 17 Aug 20 750W L5.jpg
 
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NorthOxonian

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I don't believe that there is much chance of a huge second wave of deaths, but I do think it's premature to look at those graphs. There is a fairly significant lag time between infections and deaths. Obviously the hospitalisation rate has remained low, which is a good sign, but we can't be certain yet.
 

Crossover

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France Covid infections and deaths to 17 Aug 20 750W L5 jpg.jpg
Is that a negative death rate there in May?!
 

carlberry

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I must say I did like her collaboration with Eminem.
It was more sucesssful than her time at Talk Talk!

I've said all along there will be no "second wave" (as defined by as spike more or less as high as the first) in any similar country to the UK with a death rate above (pref well above) 500 per million. Note I am not saying there will not be bumps and dips in the graph curves. Anyway, nothing has happened so far to make me change my mind. I'm not that interested in the infection rate, only the death rate, and one does not necessarily lead to the other, not in a European country anyway. The link between the infection rate and the death rate appears to be loosening, I'm not sure why, it may be that our hospitals are getting better at treating it, but one has to wonder, if the death rate drops to say 1 in 400 or 500 why are we persisting with these massively damaging measures to our society and economy ?
Note for the timings on the graphs, if someone is going to die from Covid the average length of time is about 18 days and here are the infection rates and death rates for France to the 17th August (Spain follows a similar pattern) :



Could one of these people who think there will be a second wave please explain to me why, as our lockdown was eased off (unofficially at first - from only a few weeks into it - but then officially) our death rate has not only failed to go up, but has actually fell, and has continued to fall despite even the pubs being reopened ! :
We cant have a 'second wave' until we've finished the first wave. The virus is still only 8 months old, is still expanding in the Americas, and hasnt really taken off in Africa yet. Asia and Europe are still within their first wave.
 

brad465

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The OP appears to have got this from the Worldometer site, where if you look at these two charts of the overall global picture, the number of daily new infections is around its peak, but the peak death rate was back in April, where despite around 3x as many new cases now as there were leading up to the April death rate peak, the current death rate is below that peak both numerically and proportionately:


1597789191922.png
 

Justin Smith

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The OP appears to have got this from the Worldometer site, where if you look at these two charts of the overall global picture, the number of daily new infections is around its peak, but the peak death rate was back in April, where despite around 3x as many new cases now as there were leading up to the April death rate peak, the current death rate is below that peak both numerically and proportionately:


View attachment 82423

The infection rate is a hornets nest, it depends on how many tests are done. I despise Trump, but when he joked they should do less testing that is what he was getting at. The death rate is what counts, though even that is not as simple as it sounds, should someone included if they had Covid but may well have actually died from something else ?
 

LAX54

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I see in the news that Florida has had 10,000 deaths, which sounds terrible, but then when you see the population of Florida is 22 million or more, brings it in line with the Uk and other Countries, so not as bad as it sounds
 

greyman42

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When you consider the size of the USA it is not surprising that the virus has emerged in different parts of the country at different times. A bit like Europe really.
 

Class 33

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I know it's not quite half way through the week yet, so a bit early to tell. But so far this week the new cases AND deaths have taken a bit of a DOWNTICK compared to last week. Deaths are continuing to fall and fall as they have been doing for many weeks now. And hopefully the recent uptick in new cases was just a temporary blip, and they're now on their way down again. Though also the thing to bear in mind is that with testing being significantly increased over the past few weeks, then the odds are that there will be more likely an uptick in positive tests. The main thing to really take notice of is that the daily deaths are now very very low. But the media don't seem to take this into account!
 
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adc82140

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When you consider the size of the USA it is not surprising that the virus has emerged in different parts of the country at different times. A bit like Europe really.
Agreed. People need to stop treating the US as one country when it comes to Covid. The North East is on a similar trajectory to Europe, the southern states were relatively unscathed in April/May
 

Bletchleyite

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I know it's not quite half way through the week yet, so a bit early to tell. But so far this week the new cases AND deaths have taken a bit of a DOWNTICK compared to last week. Deaths are continuing to fall and fall as they have been doing for many weeks now. And hopefully the recent uptick in new cases was just a temporary blip, and they're now on their way down again. Though also the thing to bear in mind is that with testing being significantly increased over the past few weeks, then the odds are that there will be more likely an uptick in positive tests. The main thing to really take notice of is that the daily deaths are now very very low. But the media don't seem to take this into account!

Deaths are now very low because they've switched from using a measure that has loads of false positives to one that has loads of false negatives.

It needs to be based on what's on the death certificate or it's worthless beyond looking at the shape of it.
 

LAX54

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Agreed. People need to stop treating the US as one country when it comes to Covid. The North East is on a similar trajectory to Europe, the southern states were relatively unscathed in April/May

Maine to San Diego is nearly 3500 miles. London to Naples (Italy) 1200.
 

Grecian 1998

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The US is indeed far bigger than Europe. Population density varies wildly from state to state and is particularly sparse in most of the western states away from the coast - Montana is twice the size of the UK but has 1 million people. Very different to anywhere in Europe outside northern Scandinavia. Hard for the virus to spread there when there's so few people. Large parts of the NE however are much more similar to Europe in population density and therefore it's much easier for the virus to spread, as has been seen.

The fact that New York was badly hit is as relevant to Utah as Lombardy's outbreak was to Poland.

Another factor as to why the southern and western states have been hit harder during the summer is the weather. The heat in the arid southwestern states and the heat and humidity in the southeastern states drives people indoors. As air conditioning is far more widespread in the US than here (indeed I believe it reversed population decline in the south), it provides a nice breeding ground for the disease.

Not really surprising given New York (in the NE) is on the same latitude as Madrid, LA is further south than Tunis and Miami is at the same latitude as southern Algeria.
 

NorthOxonian

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Another factor as to why the southern and western states have been hit harder during the summer is the weather. The heat in the arid southwestern states and the heat and humidity in the southeastern states drives people indoors. As air conditioning is far more widespread in the US than here (indeed I believe it reversed population decline in the south), it provides a nice breeding ground for the disease.

I hope this is not an ominous sign of things to come when winter strikes in the UK and when we will spend most of our time indoors.
 

Grecian 1998

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I think it's established the virus breeds far more effectively indoors than outdoors. The question is really whether large enough numbers of people have obtained immunity, or the virus has become a milder strain, so its effect in its second winter is much less drastic than before. Given it's thought to be less than a year old, no-one really knows, hence why it's easy to find experts with wildly differing views.

Most parts of the US outside the NE are either still on their first wave or haven't really had one to date (albeit the latter are invariably the most sparsely populated states).
 

Justin Smith

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Agreed. People need to stop treating the US as one country when it comes to Covid. The North East is on a similar trajectory to Europe, the southern states were relatively unscathed in April/May

I've just checked the latest death stats for a few countries, the infection rates might be going up, and have done for a month or so, but the death rates aren't going up much at all. The fact is that even in the countries where the death rate has gone up it's still very low relative to the numbers dying of other causes in those countries. In the UK about 10,000 people die every week, about 1,500 a day, so if 10 people die of Covid that's around 0.7%...... Quite apart from anything else, with 10,000 dying every week, what is the chances that a certain proportion of them will have Covid when they die of something else ?.......
New York continues the trend I predicted weeks ago, its death rate remains on the floor. I'm not sure I'd go so far as to say they have herd immunity, but it's starting to look like it..... :
New York death rate to 22 Aug 20.jpg
 

trebor79

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Deaths are now very low because they've switched from using a measure that has loads of false positives to one that has loads of false negatives.

It needs to be based on what's on the death certificate or it's worthless beyond looking at the shape of it.
I'm not sure death figures or infection figures are all that important, or useful when wondering what measures should be in place.
Hospitalisations seems a far more useful measure. This figure continues to fall and has been hovering just about 100, and today was well below 100. There are less than one thousand patients currently in hospital, and less than a hundred in ventilator beds.
I wish the media would cease the obsession with case numbers and "spikes". They just aren't relevant if people aren't getting ill.
 

Bantamzen

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Deaths are now very low because they've switched from using a measure that has loads of false positives to one that has loads of false negatives.

It needs to be based on what's on the death certificate or it's worthless beyond looking at the shape of it.

Or perhaps the mortality rate is reducing because the virus is being detected through wider testing of people that are not dying of it? Just a thought like... ;)
 

Justin Smith

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I'm not sure death figures or infection figures are all that important, or useful when wondering what measures should be in place.
Hospitalisations seems a far more useful measure. This figure continues to fall and has been hovering just about 100, and today was well below 100. There are less than one thousand patients currently in hospital, and less than a hundred in ventilator beds.
I wish the media would cease the obsession with case numbers and "spikes". They just aren't relevant if people aren't getting ill.

I agree with much of what you say, apart from the death rate. That is important, provided it's people who have actually died of Covid, and not just with Covid though. Let's remember, the reason that much of the world has had all these lockdowns is because of the death rate, and only the death rate. That said I think it's been a massive overreaction, and I can't help worrying that if the world has done all this for a virus which kills about 1 in 200 (and we even know who those most at risk are), what would happen if we really did get an indiscriminate virus, particularly if the death rate was, say, 1 in 20 ? Judging by what happened with Covid I think the whole of society would literally break down. It's scary.
 

Yew

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This is probably the most apropriate place for this:


Hospital admissions for Covid-19 were over-reported at the peak of the pandemic, with patients who were taken in for other illnesses being included in outbreak statistics

...

An investigation for the Government's Science Advisory Group for Emergencies (Sage) found that people were being counted as Covid hospital admissions if they had ever had the virus, and were added to those being admitted directly due to it.
 

scotrail158713

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This is probably the most apropriate place for this:

It’s shocking really, but why does that not surprise me? The government after all were scaring us into complying with lockdown measures, so doing this is completely in line with that.
 

adc82140

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Is this still going on? I know that a routine admission for something else which happens to have a positive Covid test on arrival is classed as a "covid admission", but are they still counting it if they had a positive test in the past?
 

trebor79

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I agree with much of what you say, apart from the death rate. That is important, provided it's people who have actually died of Covid, and not just with Covid though. Let's remember, the reason that much of the world has had all these lockdowns is because of the death rate, and only the death rate. That said I think it's been a massive overreaction, and I can't help worrying that if the world has done all this for a virus which kills about 1 in 200 (and we even know who those most at risk are), what would happen if we really did get an indiscriminate virus, particularly if the death rate was, say, 1 in 20 ? Judging by what happened with Covid I think the whole of society would literally break down. It's scary.
Estimates at the moment is that actual death rate, including asymptomatic and mild cases is between 1 in 300 and less than 1 in 1,000.
It's just not a serious disease for most people. For those that it is, tough but that's life. Alcoholism, lack of excercise, smoking and over eating kill more people.
 

Meerkat

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Estimates at the moment is that actual death rate, including asymptomatic and mild cases is between 1 in 300 and less than 1 in 1,000.
It's just not a serious disease for most people. For those that it is, tough but that's life. Alcoholism, lack of excercise, smoking and over eating kill more people.
1 in 300 would be a LOT of people, and look even bigger if it happened quickly
 

Meerkat

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I assume that the quoted death rate is deaths of those infected?
Any estimates available of what proportion of the population would be infected before herd immunity kicked in, assuming a total end to restrictions??
 
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