COVID-19: Analysis, Statistics, Dangers, Outlook, Conclusions

[lovingcamela]

And....

What about viral shedding? (Hopefully I have these terms right.) Research is showing that the virus load is higher and sheds more 2-3 days before symptoms show up. This is why mask wearing is important because pre-symptomatic and asymptomatic cases are shedding the virus.

And...

Can the people who know talk about immunity and antibodies? A corona virus is a common cold. We don’t normally have immunity from a cold. Perhaps that is why we may not have antibodies after a couple of months of covid infection. So no long lasting immunity?

And...

The ever growing number of post covid symptoms such as women’s hair falling out and not growing back. Weird!

[mathguy]

Extremely flawed analysis and harmful advice. Urge everyone reading this to do the exact opposite of what this guy is recommending. Unbelievable

Extremely flawed? That's your comment?? Wonder which of my detractors this registered male with 9 posts could possibly be (doesn't take me too many guesses)

You offer no reasoning, no data, no hypotheses of your own. Further I don't really offer too much "advice" on what you should/shouldn't do. If you had read it you would know that. I do offer a tiny bit of that in the conclusions. However, you are horribly offer the mark if you think the research is faulty. It wasn't about "advice" so much as it was about the other scientific viewpoints and why that has caused a major issue from a scientific, political, and psychological aspect.

I'll bet you can't even explain to me how this makes people sick. How it either similar to H1N1 or is dissimilar. I'll bet you can't. You even get the benefit of getting to use Google and I *still* bet you can't properly explain it.

The overwhelming issue here, and the really crappy thing, is this is now largely a psychological matter, one of a form of mass delusional panic.
That was the point about car accidents too. TA was right above (with some caveats to the actual danger level). However, the point is you don't worry about that b/c you don't constantly hear people talking about it. You don't worry about a freak brain hemorrhage or blood clot or diabetic shock or heat stroke if you go play basketball on a super hot day, etc... b/c you have accepted the risk level of all of these various things in your life. Are they risks? Yes. The relative risk though is so ridiculously low that making it such a huge issue is the problem. What's happening is people like yourself are listening to media, you are fearful, you are convinced this is a horrible apocalyptic killer.

Do you know that science can't even point to anything in our history where there has been a "so-called" second wave with respiratory illnesses? There isn't any such thing. You can read numerous data on this fact. Dr. Knut Wittkowski went to great length in his 1.5hr debate to discuss how absurd the notion is b/c we don't have any data to support it. And we have 12 pandemic respiratory pathogenic outbreaks since ~1918. We've had 2 or 3 with H1N1 B. There is no such thing as some "second wave". NEVER EVER has any respiratory distress pathogen in modern history across ~12-15 epidemic/pandemics causes such a stir in society. Never.

The "flaw" is in the massive social movement to stigmatize this as some sort of crazy killer unlike any other. There is simply no evidence whatsoever to support that claim. Not within the perspective of known respiratory infections and other ailments and their relative dangers. Nothing. Do we KNOW if antibodies will last? No. However, to print stories as if there is an idea they won't (particularly based on really fast studies where the veracity of data is in question) and make it sound as if they will all the sudden somehow act different than ALL of the ones we know about in the past (which include coronaviruses btw - back to the 1960s) is absurd. We do need more research. Yes. We need to stop panicking people though. This is not going to kill a zillion people. That's just silly. It's not even a blip on the leading causes of death now. Not even a blip. Doesn't even register within the top 10-15 currently not even as a sliver that you can visibly notice on a bar chart when shown to scales!

This is mostly panic. Plain and simple. Many of the people don't even know they are pare of that panic culture. It's subconscious.

Why didn't something like this movement of panic occur with HIV? You only have to look at the issue if information exchange (as the psychiatrist talks about earlier in my research), social viral phenomenons, highly polarized political climates with massive agendas (learn about "cancel culture" and you will see a similar type of thing there - people who can't speak out about their true beliefs for fear of persecution among a blind society of people following a "social media herd" - yes, that's a whole other issue people). This is real. We are entering an age of extreme delicate nature with the flow of information. In fact, I've been working on it for a few years now with some long standing theories I have in that arena. I even want to launch a project which could end up being "Facebook" or "Google" big if it took off right. It might not be me or my colleagues that do it finally, but I'll bet you my own progeny that *someone* does it. It's TOO important b/c of what is going on. I won't say more on that b/c it's extremely proprietary information and IP.

If you can even give me one example of why you believe it's a flawed analysis and back it up with data, coherent thought, obvious understanding of the biochemical process, and knowledge of research studies on the various preprint and medical journal platforms (even if it's surface level) then I will entertain that debate with you. Until then? You post amounts to, "nah nah boo boo... I don't think you are right.... I don't like you.... and my daddy is smarter than yours too, so there! *blows raspberry*". You want to debate it? I'll debate it. But you didn't offer a single shred of reasoning as to why. I have offered tons. And again, what you do with your personal safety is your business, my point was about the veracity of data coming out of media and that the common theme is panic/fear mongering about a viral strain (which has happened NUMEROUS times throughout our history with no evidence to the contrary of some apocalyptic or serious killer effect - other than that we "notice" deaths easier now for any given "new" situation - another aspect of the info age). That's the bad part. The fear is completely and totally unwarranted. Completely. In every way, every shape, every form. Absolutely unwarranted.

EDIT: Camela, I didn't see your new post until I was done. I will come back and add my thoughts. Good questions. Promise I will come back and do it. Got sidetracked with this post (LOL). I will come back today and make an edit.

[mathguy]

Camela, I'm going to separate each of your questions/comments out and offer my insight on each. These are great questions and very relevant; though I'm unhappy, once again, with the way much of mainstream media and thus, social media, have propagated these ideas.

And....

What about viral shedding? (Hopefully I have these terms right.) Research is showing that the virus load is higher and sheds more 2-3 days before symptoms show up. This is why mask wearing is important because pre-symptomatic and asymptomatic cases are shedding the virus.

Yep, this is true of most viruses. Viral load is high during viral shedding b/c this is the time when the individual is typically "sick" or actively infected (even if symptoms are not present as you mentioned with asymptomatic).

Viral shedding is a normal process that all viruses go through in our immune system. You are typically contagious during this period of heavy viral load (lots of infected cells) and throughout the viral shedding process. This is part of our innate & adaptive immune system (we also have a category called passive immunity) that handles fighting this issue but it's really no different thus far than any other virus.

And...

Can the people who know talk about immunity and antibodies? A corona virus is a common cold. We don’t normally have immunity from a cold. Perhaps that is why we may not have antibodies after a couple of months of covid infection. So no long lasting immunity?

Right, we do not have innate immunity from colds. Correct. Our innate & adaptive immune system invokes a series of events that involve various white blood cells (i.e. phagocytes, lymphocytes). The lymphocytes are our commonly known helper B cells and "killer T cells".

When our body recognizes a foreign invader, such as a virus, it begins the process of creating antibody proteins (this is mostly "B" lymphocytes). They are capable of binding to an antigen (the virus/foreign invader) using a particular receptor binding structure to the cell membrane. When these antibodies are available the immune system can flood the body sending them to many cells to attach so we can't be infected further.

The above can do 2 major things:

#1 It can inoculate you from further viral penetration as the cell is no longer susceptible to invasion.
#2 It acts as a marker for either killer T lymphocytes to remove the virus from the infected cell OR other phagocytic cells that are part of the white blood cell immune system.

The immune system is very, very complex and to explain it in great detail here would be impossible. I'm hoping to hit to the major points for you.

-Some people will fight off the infection very quickly, for example, b/c their "innate immune" response kicks in immediately and begins sending phagocytes to the invading organism. The "phage-" is Greek for "to eat, consume". So you can see why they have that name. They just destroy the virus and the cell altogether.

-Some people will not have that response and will have to rely on their "adaptive immune" response which will take longer as the B cells need to ramp up production of antibody proteins and send them out to cells for binding and ultimately viral shedding.

-Some people will even have a strong adaptive immune response that simply recognizes the invader and sends killer T lymphocytes into action very quickly before they ever become symptomatic.

It really depends on each person, genetics, viral load, and their particular immune response.

---

As for the whole issue about "how long will immunity last?" and stories that have come out reporting how antibody levels drop quickly and some of that "bad news"?

We need to take a step back from that for a moment. First of all that is a totally normal response after viral shedding is complete and antibodies have inoculated you successfully. Why? You are no longer sick. So, yes, serum concentration of various Ig's (immunoglobulins - antibody proteins created by the white blood cells) goes down. The antibodies are no longer needed to fight now.

Some examples and links to data:
Concerns about Waning COVID-19 Immunity Are Likely Overblown
Can You Get Covid-19 Again? It’s Very Unlikely, Experts Say
How Long Does COVID-19 Immunity Last?
A new study from King’s College London inspired a raft of headlines suggesting that immunity might vanish in months. The truth is a lot more complicated—and, thankfully, less dire.


So, the point is, that's a normal response after producing antibodies and getting healthy. We do need to study the antibodies longer, for sure, b/c this is new, but there is absolutely nothing to suggest it doesn't act just like any other COV or Rhinovirus (or any other typical virus or infection for that matter).

And...

The ever growing number of post covid symptoms such as women’s hair falling out and not growing back. Weird!

The post COVID recovery stuff is still very shaky. I do understand the concern there and about the "long haulers" you had mentioned earlier, but I'm not at all convinced based on what I've seen and read that this isn't somewhat psychosomatic. For one it's highly subjective when it comes to things like "lethargy" or "brain fogginess" and "lack of energy".

We don't have any study data yet to say one way or other if the people experiencing any of these other empirical observations (like the hair falling out, or even lesions in the lungs....) are not some other factor that was already there, or is simply coincidental, or has to do with certain genetic abnormalities and/or predispositions. We don't know. That doesn't mean that's what it is though or that we should even think that's what it is just b/c we don't have the data yet.

The other thing we need to know badly, with lengthy large studies, particularly with stuff like "lung damage" or "heart damage", is whether or not the person/people had histories of smoking, drug use, prior bouts of bronchitis, emphysema, lifelong asthmatic conditions, heart disease, etc.. etc...

The trouble there is we have no idea if some of these (if they are even completely true) were already present, or already beginning due to other lifestyle behaviors, and it wasn't "COVID" that caused it. It was, for example, any chronic infection that got serious enough which brought on and exacerbated poor lung function, lesions, heart muscle issues... that were already present. It might be that many of them were already in full swing and it just wasn't noticed until the person was so heavily monitored and measured post-COVID.

In short, we need a TON of research into that area b/c there is simply no good data at this point, no decent studies, to suggest anything one way or the other. Yet, again, this is where I go back to the psychological aspects.

Also, let's remember just b/c we say we don't know doesn't mean we need to think it's highly possible that that IS what's happening. No no. In fact, we have more reason to believe it all acts basically like any other virus or any of the ~15 epidemic respiratory incidents that have cropped up globally over the last 100 years.

This is one of huge troubles we are starting to face today with the info age and social media. To give a silly example for the sake of argument it's like this: if I told you, hey I don't think there is a gunman in the 7-eleven right now, probably not, this seems like a safe area, why don't you go get us some candy while I pump gas. Would you immediately jump to thinking there is very possibly a gunman in there?

Absolutely not. In fact, you'd probably damn near piss yourself if there were a gunman in there over the incredibly insane coincidence. However, here, what we are doing is assuming the worst, and that it's highly likely as well, without any reason to expect it. That's where the psychological aspect is hurting us badly. And like one psychiatrist I mentioned in the essay said, the mass panic can potentially be harmful for years to come in our society. It's a really awful situation (what it is doing to the psychology of the average person - a terrible terrible shame). :/

I hope this helps to shed some light and give insight to your questions! Really good questions! I enjoyed answering them Camela!
If you have any concerns or doubts let me know and I will try to clear them up.

[mfcfrank]

Any studies on active sugar daddies over 65 with diabetes? Russian roulette? Seems like retirement from this practice is advisable until there is a reliable vaccine. Comments?

[mathguy]

Any studies on active sugar daddies over 65 with diabetes? Russian roulette? Seems like retirement from this practice is advisable until there is a reliable vaccine. Comments?

What's the deal with diabetes/diabetics - RISK LEVEL

There are studies on the effects of diabetes, yes. Not exactly in the way you asked lol.

Diabetes carries extra risk but the reasons need to be examined b/c it may not actually be the diabetes or COVID-19. I'll explain. It tends to be worse in type 1 diabetes vs type 2 diabetes. However, the general theme is once again, age. For example, regardless of the type of diabetes, there is a 700-1000x increase in serious complication or even fatality (in the worst cases) for someone aged 80 vs someone aged 40.

So, again, age is a HUGE factor. It is the MAIN factor bar none. The general idea there is that late in life there are many compromised systems, concomitant infections, complications of respiratory functioning, COPD, etc...

And, yet again, remember that we know ~35%-40% of all deaths occur in various nursing homes/outbreaks where the average age is 80-85 with ~3 comorbid conditions. This is important b/c we need to realize that's a large number. That means a HUGE number of deaths occur mainly in people who are already on "deaths door" (unfortunately). Not to be insensitive.

There are also other reasons we hypothesize that diabetes has higher risks. In type 2 diabetes this is typically an adult onset condition caused by poor diet (high sugars) and increased BMI association.

Here are a couple reasons why diabetes may result in more severe illness or, in the worst cases, even death:

1. There are already major concerns over the restrictive ventilatory effect of adipose tissue, particularly abdominal fat (adipose tissue). It cause respiratory distress (i.e. we would see severe cases and/or death more commonly in high BMI or obese diabetic patients).

2. ACE2 is highly expressed in epicardial adipose tissue. SARS-COV-2 has a strong affinity for ACE2 receptors (this is also why kidney disease, lung diseases, heart trouble, etc... are high risk factors). ACE2 is a receptor that the SARS-COV-2 virus uses to enter the cell membrane and infect the target cell. So any areas or places where ACE2 is found heavily are target areas for increased severity of infection (this is also obviously mediated by genetics and your own innate and adaptive immune functions - that's a case by case issue).

Another reason diabetes is believed to be a problem, again it's not really the diabetes itself, it's an underlying issue which tends to be common in diabetes. This next one has to do with "inflammation". Diabetics are already at increased risk of inflammation and inflammatory conditions. That makes the possibility of a "cytokine storm" more likely as diabetes is characterized by chronic low-grade inflammation.

What makes this particularly bad is that SARS-COV-2 doesn't *only* infect alveolar epithelial cells of the lungs and upper respiratory system. It also infects some/certain circulating immune system cells which effectively induces apoptosis of the lymphocytes (death to white blood cells - immune fighting cells). As the T cells of the adaptive immune response inhibit innate immune response (phagocytic cells, neutrophils, natural killer cells...), the resulting lymphocytopenia (low white blood cell count) could suppress the innate immune system further and buildup the secretion of cytokines. The overproduction of cytokines is bad and can result in the "cytokine storm" I've talked about before. Cytokines are a pro-inflammatory cellular structure and obviously are not good for any susceptible to chronic low-grade inflammation in the body (i.e. diabetics).

If you are borderline diabetic you could get a form of new-onset diabetes as COVID-19 has a tropism for B-cells (beta cells) which are made in the pancreas. Diabetics have reduced or non-functioning pancreatic cells for producing insulin. The B-cell impairment with the possibility of inflammatory cytokine conditions and counter regulatory hormonal response could precipitate acute metabolic complication (such as diabetic ketoacidosis or hyperglycaemic syndrome).

In such cases you don't actually get severely ill or die of COVID-19 itself, rather, it's a result of what COVID-19 *can* do. However, let's remember this is all still very rare and doesn't happen a lot, but we do notice increases when certain concomitant conditions are present. What we don't yet know is if it's SARS-COV-2 --> COVID-19 that is actually causing it or if it's simply the fact that people with these particular conditions are more susceptible due to things COVID-19 ends up doing in the body which many other people can fight off.

VACCINE

Let me also mention vaccines again (since you mentioned it in your question). Vaccines are not always a magic medicine bullet. They are not at all. Vaccines come in different flavors. You have live attenuated viruses (weakened), dead viruses, recombinant/conjugate vaccines that contain subunits or parts of the virus. Finally there is one other called, toxoid vaccines.

When you get a vaccine you are being injected with a virus. That's what a vaccine is. It's a virus, sometimes live, but weakened, low load, or it's only part of the virus, or it's dead, etc... and it basically "tricks" your immune system into producing protein antibodies so you will easily fight on the real virus if you come into contact with it. The issue is that a vaccine can make you sick. It can. Sometimes it can even be severe. Particularly if it's live viral vaccination. This is also why certain age groups get different kinds of vaccines (for protection). Children and older people too get boosters b/c they need a "boost" to keep the immunity as they got such a weak load, dead, subunit viral vaccination.

A live viral vaccination creates the strongest response with the longest immunity from the immune system but it also has the highest risk of getting sick. The other issue to consider with vaccines is that they only have a certain efficacy level. As an example something like the measles vaccine will have >98% success (meaning only 2 in 100 wouldn't be inoculated by the vaccine when they got it - those 2 the viral vaccine didn't work in "tricking" their body to create enough immunity or the response wasn't strong enough). The season flu vaccine that many people get has an efficacy of about 60-70% (yes, folks, that means 30-40 people in 100 who get inoculated with the flu vaccine will not actually be immune - sorry to break it to you that way). It's likely that the SARS-COV-2 vaccine, particularly initially, will have at best 50-60% efficacy if we are lucky.

I just really want people to understand that vaccines are not some kind of magic pill. They ARE the virus; only they are in a lesser form, broken up, weakened, or even killed, to try to make your body turn on the "antibody generator" (so to speak). It doesn't always work though (b/c it's not the exact same fully loaded live virus but it is the virus). And you are STILL at risk of having side-effects (though in fairness they are quite low - but you also have to mitigate that with the fact that something like the flu vaccine is only 65% effective on average).

My Suggestion And Final Thoughts

You mentioned you are over 65 and you have diabetes.

Do I think you are at a "major risk"? Likely not.

The OVERALL risk to everyone is just ~.25% (about twice the rate of season flu). This is the TOTAL risk for EVERYONE, so it includes everyone up to even >110yrs of age (there have been plenty of centenarians who recover - plenty). Yes, go down to age 45-50, or, say, 40, and the risks becomes astronomically low. Dr. John Ioannidis, Middleton, Wittkowski and many others (there were >100 co-authors working on the Stanford study) basically put the risk for age <45 (no major health problems) at virtually 0%. It's statistically about .002485%. Even for under 70 yrs of age the median across now 50+ serology studies puts it at .04% (i.e. the common flu is 2-4 times as deadly if you are under 70).

NOW, that being said, do I think you should risk yourself right now? No, I do not. I would not advise it with the diabetic issue or if you have any major comorbid or concomitant conditions. Not until we know more.

[mathguy]

Very interesting reading. What are your thoughts on the excess deaths we are seeing in populations? Also, the belief that the vast majority of people will recover without complications is likely correct, but what if this virus is one our immune system will defeat but not destroy. There are several viral infections that can smolder for months or years. We have no way of knowing if there is a long term negative effect from having this illness.

If the "alternate postulate" is true, wouldn't we expect to see zero excess morbidity? Or maybe negative excess morbidity due to a decrease in traffic and work-related fatalities during lockdowns? (Just curious - not trying to be confrontational.)

Thanks for the input & questions guys. Since yours are both similar (about excess deaths) I put them together.

IMMUNITY
TA, you did mention immunity so I'll refer you to my reply to Camela where I discuss immunity:

Immunity Discussion Is Midway Down, Second Quote Section

---

EXCESS DEATHS
Regarding excess deaths you mentioned my current postulation is that largely we are incorrectly identifying deaths as COVID-19 deaths. I think the issue there comes in a few forms.

One is that medical professionals are biased and even scared themselves and we are seeing a form of the mass delusional panic I mentioned in the essay and that the psychiatrist I quoted/linked also talked about.

Secondly we are also the only country able to afford giving 3-10x the money to hospitals & docs & guaranteed money to insurers for "COVID" deaths. If they were on ventilator it jumps from $3500 to ~$40,000. Without the ventilator it's ~$11,000 as I last recall. That is certainly creating some extra death designations; even if it's done "harmlessly" or "subconsciously".

Also, a large number of deaths have no positive tests or any test at all (just a best guess). The CDC even recommended this approach back in early May (iirc). The recommendation was to use 'best judgement' if testing wasn't available or timely.

I think all of those things have contributed to hearing about more deaths from COVID-19. I don't think the US is really doing worse than other countries. They simply don't have some of the political and media influence, the money to docs & hospitals & insurers, and they are not hyper focused anymore on delivering that message or in designating deaths as COVID related (instead calling them as they see them - Streptococcal bronchitis, Streptococcal pneumonia, COPD, renal failure, heart disease, emphysema, etc etc). So they "seem" like they are having less trouble than us but I don't think there is much difference.

Another issue is we might still be experiencing some viral epicenter expansions as we are a geographically large country that is heavily populated as well. We have pockets that haven't become hit by the virus as much as others initially (i.e. NYC) and immunity will take a bit longer.

Other parts of the world were the first to get viral epicenters and they are not as large or populated geographically as we are. Not most of them anyway. And certainly the few that are I think are just going about business as usual as I said above. They are not hyper focused on confirming deaths or illness as COVID and their govts certainly don't provide incentives to certify COVID deaths like we do.

That's primarily what I think about the issue or "excess deaths". Deaths are already dramatically slowed even with our absurd media & compilation hungry nature. I don't think we have much to worry about now.

Read my earlier answers and essay post to understand more about some off those issues. So, for example, the fact that in 100+ years of scientific research we don't have a single shred of data or incidents to indicate the concept of "2nd waves" even though we have ~12-15 epidemic/pandemic viral outbreaks over that time; yet the news talks about it constantly. Dr. Wittkowski called it foolish and asinine in the video I linked inside my essay post.

[Kallie Bloomquist]

It seems like the US numbers recently topped out at 70K new infections/day, and the associated deaths (factoring a two week lag time) topped out at 1400/day. It seems like US hospital capacity would be maxed out at 100K new infections/day, and then 2 weeks later deaths would be 2000/day. If there are 320MM US residents and we get to 100K new infections/day:

1.The "real" infection rate is 100K new infections/day, then we have 3000 days for everyone to get infected and the cumulative death toll is 6 Million over 3 years (2000/day x 3000 days.)

2. The real infection rate is double the 100K new infection rate, 1500 days for virus to run it's course, 3 million deaths (3000 days x 2000/day.)

3. The real infection rate is 3X the reported rate of 100K new infections, then it takes 1000 days to infect everyone, and the death toll is 2 million.

4. The real infection rate is 5X the reported rate of 100K new infections and it takes 400 days to infect everyone, and the death toll is 800,000.

I do not think 4 is realistic(infection rate 5x reported infection rate), so i would say that the death toll is going to be 1-3million if we just let the virus infect everyone, and you can't just explain away that with an assumed lower IFR if we are currently losing 1400 people/day. 1400/day is 500,000/year, and that is not acceptable as a not-so bad outcome.

One potential error I see in MG methodology (and lawdy, I haven't had the time to wade through all of it) is to compare high risk covid groups to general influenza rates. It seems like you would want to compare high risk covid groups to high risk influenza, and low groups and adjust for the different # of members of each group. Also, 2019-220 influenza season deaths were projected to be 24-62,000, and we are headed for 500K Covid deaths (without a vaccine) so common sense tells you this is not worse than the flu(even if you toss out some of the deaths for co-morbidity.) I would also speculate that there is co-morbidity for influenza deaths, but i have no valid statistics to back that up.

[Kallie Bloomquist]

Oooops

...so common sense tells you this (Covid-19) is alot worse than the flu. It is a lot worse than 38,000 auto vehicle deaths/year.

[mathguy]

I appreciate the thought you put into this post KB and I absolutely agree that that wouldn't be an acceptable loss.

However, I have a few concerns about your first projections. You do make a good point about the risk groups but see that's the thing, we don't see age stratified risk groups or as many concomitant risk scenarios with the common flu as with COVID-19 (particularly where age is far and away the *defining* trait that results in serious conditions or even fatality - as a whole - not that edge cases don't happen, obviously they do). It's a good point though.

About the auto accidents I would agree if those numbers held true but see that's where I believe we are badly mistaken. I don't think they will. And I think they are vastly overcounted. Don't get me wrong, I also believe we certainly have undercounting occurring as well. The problem is I think the overcounting (due to some reasons I mentioned in my preceding post) is happening at a rate [currently] >4-8:1/undercounted incidence.

I'll post something more in depth when I have time to explain my reasoning about the year long projections as well as the overcounts vs undercounts.

Nice post and thanks for the open debate. Your info and posts are always appreciated, as usual KB!

[Kallie Bloomquist]

Thank you for being courteous in your reply. I strongly disagree about the overcounting. i am in Bexar county, and during the shelter in place phase, we had 1 or 2 deaths/day. Now, our 7 day total of deaths is 160, or 23/day. I am saying that increase is real because our 7 day total of cases is 1686, or 240/day. Back in May I was keeping a google sheet of the 5 day average of cases in Bexar county, and it was running 30-40 cases per day when I stopped updating it 05/13/20. So we see daily new infections going from 30-40, to 240, or 6-8X the May rate, and we have 23 deaths/day, up from 2. This leads me to believe the increase in reported deaths due to Covid-19 is real, and not someone's imagination at work.

I started keeping my sheet on 04/03/20 when the cumulative infections were 254, and when I stopped, the cumulative infections were 1972. Now the cumulative infections in Bexar County are 41,951, and total deaths are 705 and deaths lag. if there were no more new infections, maybe deaths would top off at 900, which divided by the total infections of 41951 gives you a death rate of 2%. When I extrapolated my numbers to the total U S Population, I used your lower number of .3% death rate, not the 2% rate in Bexar County.

Travis County has 22,256 infections and 288 deaths. If there were no more new infections in Travis County, maybe deaths would top out at 340, as the current deaths increase in Travis County by 3/day. 340/22,256 or 1.5%.

Since I live in South Texas, I find the death rate in Bexar and Travis Counties to be extremely relevant, but still I used a much lower number in projecting the infections to the whole US population.

[Kallie Bloomquist]

640,000 americans die of heart disease each year, and I would hazard a guess that there is a lot of comorbidity in those 640,000 deaths, but that does not mean that heart disease is not the largest cause of deaths in the US. Like Covid-19, heart disease does not affect that many people under the age of 40, but that does not cause it to be any less deadly.

Lastly, I went to a brewery and met a friend at 530PM and we each had two pints and we sat outside and had a nice time. I would not do it seven days a week, but being smart, using social distancing, using masking, having the table disinfected between uses, no paper menus, lowers risks. We just have to keep the infection rate from spinking too high until we get a vaccine. Anything else is just a crap shoot. People jamming into bars was a bad idea. IMHO I don't think children in school every day is going to work, as the teachers are the ones who are going to fall ill (and then you have no one to run the classes, and then kids are back home.)

If we all pull together we can get past the next six months until we have a vaccine. I agree that the press does magnify bad news to generate viewers/readers. The 09/11 death toll was less than 3,000 and look how that was seared into our conscious. This pandemic is much worse than that, and it troubles me greatly when people say the current pandemic is not that deadly.

[haveacold1atx]

I have too much to say, especially for a fucksite. So I’ll just say this:

This not hoax.
It is as bad as it seems.
The death numbers aren’t being fudged, this is a lie.
The data comes from people in the field.
It shouldn’t have been this bad, other countries (like S. Korea), is evidence of this.
It got this bad because American society, specifically, was not prepared for it.

H1N1 had 12,500 deaths out of 60 million cases. CDC estimates that, in a bad year, 64,000 people die from the flu out of 45 million cases.

Covid19 has killed 160,000 out of 5 million cases. It’s mortality rate is many magnitudes higher. The math is pretty cut and dry.

[kind69]

I have too much to say, especially for a fucksite. So I’ll just say this:

This not hoax.
It is as bad as it seems.
The death numbers aren’t being fudged, this is a lie.
The data comes from people in the field.
It shouldn’t have been this bad, other countries (like S. Korea), is evidence of this.
It got this bad because American society, specifically, was not prepared for it.

H1N1 had 12,500 deaths out of 60 million cases. CDC estimates that, in a bad year, 64,000 people die from the flu out of 45 million cases.

Covid19 has killed 160,000 out of 5 million cases. It’s mortality rate is many magnitudes higher. The math is pretty cut and dry.

Amen dude. This guy has a bunch of time on his hands, is super confident, and very incorrect, which is a toxic mix. For those of you reading this, please don't take your epidemiology advice from Ourhome2. Listen to the experts. Yes, if we just go about our lives and let everyone get this virus, eventually we'll develop herd immunity. If you're a freaking nihilist who doesn't care about Pappy and all his millions of peers dying a horrible gasping death, then by all means, that's a great plan. For the rest of us, wear a fucking mask and wait for the vaccine.

[mathguy]

^ No not Amen. You are also very disrespectful btw.

You came earlier & said the same thing. You are the one who's incorrect. How can anyone believe anything you say when you don't offer and data or hypotheses?

You are obviously like a cretin that watches the news and considers people like Fauci/Birx to be some sort of god & blindly follows what they say. Not only that but most of it doesn't even come from them it comes from journalists which make it hyperbolic.

The quote you are referencing above is incorrect. I can easily explain why but someone like you won't understand anyway.

You are sold on the "Fauci/Birx" (+ Dr. Ferguson - idiot scientist who caused this) vision of a horrible apocalyptic virus. Pappy is going to be fine.

Yes, I'm confident b/c I know what I'm talking about. The information, much like all other scientists of my opinion are doing, is being spread everywhere. Not just here. It needs to be to overcome the ridiculous panic and blind herd following that the information age has brought about (again, read the psychiatrists debate in the essay link regarding that one).

Do you actually consider CNN OR Fox News to be listening to experts?? Are you kidding me?
Do some of your own critical thinking.

Answer me this.... for one. How in the world does the US, the most medically capable, technologically advanced, wealthiest country on earth, *supposedly* have 25% of all deaths yet we don't even make up 4% of the world population? That doesn't raise some red flags for you as to what's going on?? Many other countries didn't even institute lockdowns or they were radically minimized. Without ANY of the other data, TONS of data, this single aspect should raise huge suspicion alone. Particularly due to the US vastly superior medical community, wealth, and technology. Yet somehow we *supposedly* have 25% of the world's COVID deaths with under 4% of the world population in THE most advanced nation this world has ever seen?! Either these other countries should have chaos in the streets, are simply ignoring it (which we don't see on TV), or WE are drastically over-counting due to the financial incentives AND/OR the incredible microscopic view we put on the virus. With no other data, and there is plenty, just that one piece, it's enough to postulate that something is wrong. I'm telling you, we are swapping death causation one for the other. Other countries don't have time money or resources for that BS. So they just go about life.

We are overcounting deaths by a fucking tremendous margin. Tremendous margin for every single undercount. The CDC has been recommending to docs and hospitals for fucking months now to "use their best guess" in the absence of a test. Countless tens of thousands are declared dead of COVID without even a PCA. The docs, hospitals, and insurers are guaranteed 4-10 times the money too for designating a death as COVID-19. Sheesh. Kidding me?

You didn't read the essay or the links. If you did you wouldn't be able to say what you are saying. I don't blame you for not reading it bc I realize you are incapable of understanding it. I know who you are too! Can you please stop with your BS. At least offer some data like others have.

Time will tell. And I guarantee you I will be right once again. I will be. Yes, I'm confident of that. I do concede it's within the realm of possibility that I'm wrong but I'm willing to openly say Im not wrong, and that I will be right again (just like I was BOTH times about the legal issues and the supposed blackout effects for escort sites). IF am wrong I'll eat crow. I won't be wrong though. Nope.

EDIT: And pls learn to read about vaccines. At best a COVID vaccine with have 50-60% efficacy, certainly out of the gate. That means up to half the people who get it won't even have immunity. Ugh. It's not a magic bullet injection. Vaccines are GREAT, they are. Wonderful science. But that is NOT our salvation here. Many "pappy's" won't get immunity even when it's available due to efficacy issues (oh and btw most pappy's won't die of COVID whether they acquire it or not).

[Kallie Bloomquist]

"How in the world does the US, the most medically capable, technologically advanced, wealthiest country on earth, *supposedly* have 25% of all deaths yet we don't even make up 4% of the world population?"

We have the highest number of absolute infections, so it makes perfect sense that we have the highest number of absolute Covid-19 deaths. There is no cure, so having the best medical care does not really help overcome the highest number of absolute infections.

You are asking the wrong question. The pertinent question is why do we have the highest absolute number of Covid-19 infections.