Interesting. What line of work are you in? I know a few perfectly healthy people who have died from the virus and a very serious thromboembolic syndrome that happened after they started recovering. Perhaps you could shed some light on what really happened. I'm also interested in how those without serious comorbidities are able to fight it off.

 

He gives Trump his ideas..

 

Posted on the wrong page!

 

The official mortality rate for the Corona virus according to the latest figures from the CDC now stands at .026 percent and going down as more antibody testing results are factored in. That translates to 2.6 persons per thousand that contract the disease. This admittedly still is a little higher than the seasonal flu, but a very different number from the 3 or 4 per hundred mortality rate that our decision makers used when they decided to close down schools and our economy.

It is still very likely that the mortality rate for the Corona virus will continue to go down and reach levels comparable to the seasonal flu. Also, we need to keep in mind, as I have been reminding people, as many as 91,000 died from the seasonal flu just two years ago and we didn't even give it a name. In named pandemics in the past, death counts exceeded 100,000 with barely a ripple in the economy. Schools weren't closed and events cancelled. The Corona virus isn't the last pandemic we are going to see. It may, however, be the last pandemic we are able to spend four trillion dollars on.

People in special risk categories of course need to be take special precautions and be protected during the Corona virus outbreak just as they would from the flu and other dangerous diseases. If you are young, however, or even older and relatively healthy, you'll be fine going to a car show--or church--or work--or school. Heck, you'll probably be fine even if you were out lately rioting with a bunch of your "fellow travellers".

Sorry about the rant (again). I'm up early, and I guess in a bad mood--"Feeling Upset" is maybe a better way of putting it. I'm just frustrated as can be by the lack of perspective many people (state governors and our leaders in Congress I'm certainly including you) seem to have have when it comes to the Corona virus. I blame the unrealistic response we have had to the Corona virus on the blatant bias in the media.

Jim

P.S.

Just a little "perspective" on the $4,000,000,000,000 thrown at fighting the Corona virus and dealing with the economic fallout of the response--It's about the same amount in today's dollars that we spent winning WWII. And we are hearing from our leaders in congress and some state governors that more spending is desperately needed!! Can anyone imagine that we can do what we have done every time a world wide pandemic comes our way?

 

Jim. John Hopkins (a world wide respected research hospital) says this “ In the U.S. the 2019 – 2020, the CDC estimates that 24,000 to 62,000 people died from the flu. (The CDC does not know the exact number because the flu is not a reportable disease in most parts of the U.S.)” that number is for the year. Corona 19 has taken over 109,000 in three to four months. They are now saying the younger generation may be seeing long lasting effects that are much more serious than originally thought. They are now seeing the very young getting a much more serious after effect also. So no matter how you wanT to use numbers C19 is real and will get worse unless we all do our part. The top immunology expert in the world, Dr Tony Fauci ( who by the way works for The current administration) keeps warning us all about it also. The numbers I show are also from the CDC as a best estimate so your 100,000 baffles me.
Other countries have proven social distancing and the wearing of mask is the best preventive to stop this pandemic. It will be very interesting to see what the rates of illness and death are in a few weeks now that we have decided continuing a proven practice can be ignored. But everyone knows a car show is more important than life. I’m an older guy (73+) so I’ll skip The cars and coffee for a few months I wish you younger guys good luck.
Dave S

 

Both of you make excellent points. Jim, your analysis is good, and you make very good points. And I appreciate you not using words like "sham" or "conspiracy" or "hoax", etc., because people did indeed die and they will continue to do so. And I will say that I cannot (as a doctor) tell people they will be fine if they're not elderly or in an assumed high risk group. However, I'll respectfully suggest that your analysis is a bit of "Monday morning quarterbacking". Our leaders (of all political parties in all states and countries) were told very ominous numbers at the beginning. And the people telling them those numbers were indeed sincere. It was spreading like wildfire. The medical community started getting updates, and we were like "Oh my God. This could get very very bad." I'll never forget when I heard that 29 people in one single nursing home died in the first few weeks. I don't know for sure if that indeed did happen, but we were told about it. I, as a physician, was told very ominous numbers back in March. Quite frankly, it scared the hell out of us. I was told things like "You will get exposed. You will get infected. You will probably be quarantined. Be ready to turn your clinic into a hospital. You WILL have to make unthinkable decisions regarding ventilators, etc." I was being forced to study and review medical procedures that I haven't been forced to use in a very very long time. I do not believe that I was lied to. I think they had to make unbelievable decisions in a big hurry with the limited data we had. Some of those decisions were correct and saved thousands upon thousands of lives. Some of those decisions were rash and overreaching, and they just succeeded in pissing people off and making the citizens restless. But, again, I'm not gonna Monday morning quarterback it. I'm just truly and genuinely thankful to God that my area has been spared for the most part and our country has only lost what it has so far. One more thing--you mentioned the flu and how deadly it was a couple years ago. Before I say another word, realize those death totals with flu (and Corona) are never gonna be exact. But understand comparing 90K flu-related deaths (and trust me, a lot of those were probably incorrect) to the current Corona virus total is not reasonable at all. Here's the reason---we lost 90K people to the flu over the course of approximately 6-8 months while the country was running wide open with us practically sitting in each other's laps, slobbering all over each other, Christmas shopping, attending ballgames in 100,000-plus seating capacity arenas, shaking hands, eating, drinking after each other (I think you get what I'm saying). I cringe to think about what the C-19 number would be right now if we hadn't locked down at all. And, again, I'm not in the mood to judge anybody, because it's all uncharted water unless you're 125 years old and can remember past very significant pandemics like the spanish flu, etc. IF, by some horrible coincidence, we get through this one and experience another global pandemic within the next few years, we'll see a totally different approach and a lot less spending, etc. But now, the people with agendas are beginning to realize they will most likely survive, and the old political back-and-forth blame game is beginning to show its ugly head again. As far as the schools being closed, etc., I'm not gonna judge those people or say "You overreacted". They didn't have a big load of data and analysis in front of them with a lot of time. My state literally changed in one single 24-hour period. I was standing in Rupp Arena watching the state baskeball tournament on March 11th. I remember looking around the crowd literally trying to spot somebody who looked sick because we knew it was getting closer and closer. On the way home that night, my phone exploded with "I just heard they're closing..........." On March 12th, our whole world came to a screeching halt, and I don't remember too many braves souls arguing against it for a few weeks after that. Everybody was scared to death. You are correct about the media. They've lost all credibility.

 

My 91,000 number comes from the 2017-18 flu season and is admittedly on the high end of the estimated number of deaths. A consensus number might be somewhere in the 80,000's. I'm not convinced the current 109,000 Corona death number is quite real either. Some states, having taken a second look at their reported deaths, are revising their numbers down--some by as much as 25 percent.

My 100,000 number comes from the Hong Kong flu epidemic of 1968. I didn't really research death counts from any other epidemics, but they are out there. One thing we can all count on is that there will be future epidemics coming our way, and my point is that we probably aren't going to be able to close down our whole economy like we did this time. We simply will not be able to afford to. People need to work and pay taxes in order to pay for government services. Ventilators, field hospitals, hospital ships, masks, shields, personal protection equipment, vaccine development, etc.,etc. all cost real money that in the end must come from somewhere. Having the government pay people for an extended period of time not to come in to work is just not going to happen again anytime soon.

Jim

 

At this point, I think the big elephant in the room that nobody will acknowledge is that the vast majority of cancellations at this point are due to the fear of lawsuits more than the fear of causing an outbreak. Right? The lawyers are sitting back waiting for that first case of COVID-19 that can be traced back to the Hershey swap meet or a particular school system that resumed classes, etc.

 

Doc, I pretty much agree with everything you shared. We were looking at a very scary situation in the beginning. The Chinese were not helpful, and desperate situations do justify desperate responses. I believe many of the decisions that were made early on (think travel bans, school closings) were made in good faith and seemed justified at the time. But it did seem too that there was always sort of a rooting interest on the part of the media to make our situation appear as dire as possible. Then there was the whole hydrochloroquine thing. Almost the entire media establishment banded together to mock a potential treatment that had been shown in other countries to be safe and effective if used in conjunction with other drugs and administered at the proper time during the course of the illness. That's when I really started becoming cynical of what we were being told in the main stream media.

What's past is past, however. Now we have new information to guide our actions--There is the experience of Florida and Georgia to consider. They were late in closing down and early in opening back up. And there is the antibody testing that is coming in now (but not widely reported) that is confirming that the Corona virus is not nearly as deadly as first thought.

We can't go back and undo what we did, but we can start making decisions going forward based on the best information available. And please know, that "best information available", is sadly not what the main stream media is choosing to report.

Jim

 

From a personal standpoint it still scares the hell out of me and my wife. As I said I have a 75 year old brother with heart problems and some of the symptoms but not a high enough fever to get tested. My daughter is a college professor in VA at the largest univ in VA. After some students became ill they closed down. Over the last month or so she has been teaching on line classes as she is an asthmatic that has to be very careful in flu and this pandemic time. Teaching in a class room with no windows and 30-35 students is very risky. Teaching a lecture session of 200+ is just plain crazy. The univ had decided to only go online in the fall. Students complained so they started rethinking online only. Then parents started to get upset saying they won’t let their kids attend. The univ said both online and classroom. The professors said how could they possibly do that in the work week and at the same time stay safe? Now it’s all up in the air. My daughter has a deferment from the univ hospital docs ( thank god) saying she is not allowed to teach in the classroom until a vaccine is available, so now her job is in jeopardy.
This is the new normal as much as we don’t like it. Turn off the TV talking dummies, listen to the scientists and docs ( thank you very much doc - it’s like our own personal information expert on this stuff, please keep it up), so we miss a few good times in the next few months. Hopefully they will have a vaccine soon and it is effective so we can all sit down at a car event and tell lies about our cars.
Have fun, stay safe.
dave s