Flu case fatality rate (CFR) is around 0.2%. At the moment from the data we have from China, Covid19 is around 2.6%. If we look at the data excluding China, and excluding Iran which is skewing the figures, its around 5%. If you look at Italy alone at the moment its around 15%.
What the WHO are doing is looking at the number of mortalities against the number of cases, which is wrong. A better method would be to look at those cases with outcomes. How many people have been died against the number discharged (and died) gives you a much higher CFR from known outcomes. If we say a person takes 7 days to die from being confirmed as having the virus to day of death, then its around 5.7%.
This is much, much more deadly than the flu!
Secondly, the R value in terms of if one person catches it, how many other will catch it. For flu, its around 1.3. This based on current data is around 1.4-3.6, so its considerably more contagious than flu. Remember the super spreader a few weeks ago who infected a considerable number of people. Also, there is the incubation period - estimated to be 14 days but has been proven to be up to 27 days at the moment and people spreading it with no symptoms. So testing for a fever can be a waste of time. Even the swabs have proven to be unreliable hence why China changed the way they count cases causing a huge spike about 2 weeks ago as they also based a confirmed case on a positive CT scan of lung damage.
Next is the hospitalisation rate for this virus. 14% of cases end up "severe" and 5% "critical". CFR for critical cases is around 50%
So lets put some of that into figures based on the government saying around 80% of the population of the UK could catch this..
Population of the UK is 66 million people. 80% is 52,800,000 people infected
CFR of 0.2% is 105,600 deaths
1% CFR is 528,000 deaths (which is what the government are reporting no doubt to keep some calm)
2% CFR is 1,056,000 deaths (current CFR is around 2.3~2.6% based on various studies)
3% CFR is 1,584,000 deaths
4% CFR is 2,112,000 deaths
5% CFR is 2,640,000 deaths (current CFR based on outcomed records)
This is based just on the UK. Obviously it may be less (or God forbid more) than these figures, but to compare this to the flu and say its not as bad is just ridiculous. Plus lets not also forget the most data we have is from China, and we don't know how truthful they have been with this data. The true figures will come from EU countries, Japan, Singapore, South Korea etc. At the moment they are just about coping with the numbers, and hopefully it can be contained but as more people catch it and more die or recover, we may get a better picture of its severity.
By the way, the WHO said yesterday during their investigations in China, they did not find any evidence of unrecorded mild cases. Therefore, if you believe that, then this virus is as serious as we are seeing. There was some hope an increase in mild cases would lower the CFR but it appears to not be the case.
But could you imagine just 1,000 people needing ICU beds at any one time in the NHS? Just wont happen. But to compare this to the flu is like comparing apples and oranges. Totally different.
The fact the government is being careless about this is just staggering. The number of stories I am hearing of people flying in to the UK from Italy, Iran, Japan, Hong Kong with no checks and just being told to dial 111 if they feel ill is just crazy. They may not feel ill for at least a week, maybe two - think about how many contacts you would have with people in two weeks!
Sorry to go on, but people comparing this to the flu and saying its no different is just ill advised.
sources:
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/ja...ign=ftm_links&utm_content=tfl&utm_term=022420
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-death-rate/
https://nucleuswealth.com/articles/updated-coronavirus-statistics-cases-deaths-mortality-rate/
