Look at it like a particularly nasty flu season. It's at least twice as infectious as the flu, and about a hundred times as deadly. Flu infects about 10% of the population of the US every year - figure somewhere between 20% and 50% of the population of the US will become sick with COVID-19. It kills through pneumonia. 57,000 Americans died from flu in 2018, or about as many Americans died in Vietnam. Flu runs about 20 per 100k mortality while COVID-19 looks to be in the 2% range - we're probably looking at between 1.3 and 3.3 million deaths in the US. Spanish Flu killed about 700,000 people in the US when our population was 106 million. This is no joke.
Let us hope that the mortality rate is much lower, due to a chronic underreporting of mild cases. Let us hope that the mortality rate is NOT much higher, due to chronic suppression of unfavorable statistics by the Chinese government. No worries, I trust my own government about as much. "Caronavirus" happened on @realDonaldTrump hours ago.
The former Obama CDC guy says the death rate is probably grossly overstated because he doesn't see how they're testing even a reasonable percentage of cases. In Wuhan, China, the reported proportion of diagnosed patients who die is now 3%. That's a substantial over-estimate; many patients weren't tested, many infected people don't have symptoms and hospitals were overwhelmed. The proportion could be as low as less than 1 in 1,000 -- 30 times lower -- and is unlikely to be more than 1 in 100. The actual rate makes a huge difference, not only to patients but also to decisions about interventions.
Where did you source these facts about COVID-19 from? (Being twice as infectious as the flu, about a hundred times as deadly)
If you look up "COVID-19 R0" you'll get a number between 2 and 2.8 (although LANL calculated 4.7-6.6 based on cell-phone data). If you look up "influenza R0" you'll get a number between 1 and 1.3. If you look up "influenza mortality rate" you'll get about 20 per 100k or about 0.02%. If you look up "COVID-19 mortality rate" you'll get around 2%. That was a week ago, though - my read of the tea leaves is that COVID-19 is more transmissive than 2.2 but substantially less lethal than 2%. However, I'm a guy on the internet with a theory, not an epidemiologist. Nonetheless, we're still probably looking at a particularly nasty flu season.
Thanks, kleinbl00! You're the man as always... admittedly I was telling my father what you had posted in the earlier post 6 days ago, and wanted to provide sources if he asked. If you had to wager a "guesstimate" of the total # dead at the end of this from COVID-19, where would you land?
I would start by pointing out that last year the flu caused a million hospitalizations and 61,000 deaths. I think any figures we get are going to be simultaneously overrepresented (the New York Times doesn't make your phone buzz every time someone dies of the flu) and undercounted (if the asymptomatic rate for COVID-19 is really 50% or higher, than it's going to be a lot more prevalent than we're expecting). Presume, though, that COVID-19 has a morbidity rate of "the flu" or 0.02%. Presume 70% of the world is going to get it. That's still a million dead.
I've been thinking about that all morning, actually. I'm in a position of rare privilege - my wife has prescriptive rights, we're on a first-name basis with a dozen hospital administrators, we know all the local EMS guys, my kid goes to private school and on and on and on. But I also have a medical clinic that cares for pregnant women, babies and small children so we're going to have to figure out some protocols ahead of time so we're not caught flat-footed. No part of our licensure required a pandemic response plan - I suspect that by 2022 or 2024 that will have changed. I'm anticipating a lot of Amazon orders, a lot of grocery deliveries and a lot of time at home with the kid. Thinking about it dispassionately my principle concern is my wife's parents, who are both healthy and hale, and a couple elderly friends who both have kids in the area so they're likely to be fine. My own parents, however, are fucked. Infirm, elderly, rural New Mexico, live alone. They also revel in ignoring my advice, and, as both have degrees in biology (my mother has a Ph.D in microbiology and single-handedly stopped two epidemics back in the '80s) there's very little I can do to help them prepare.