Consider how many times you or anyone you know has gone to the doctor with a cold or flu? I know that for me and my family this is a very rare event. COVID-19 is a minor illness for most, therefore, before anything else it should be obvious that the confirmed cases reported on by Media are but a small fraction of the total.
Total Cases will be FAR more than the number of Tested Cases, we all know this is infectious, and yet Media will only tell you the Case Fatality Rate, ignoring the fact that the True Fatality Rate is far LESS. Whenever the news media does address that there are likely more total cases out there than prior estimates suggested, they always fail to address that this is a good thing. Why would this be good? Because it does not change the fatality count, and only shows that the risk of death is far less.
For a while the case numbers have spiked, but this is not an alarm of danger, and is simply attributed to an increase in testing. Testing is also rife with errors, and you have to question the point of testing: some references show False Positive as poor as 40% and False Negatives of 10%, making a coin toss nearly as accurate.
These tests were rushed to market.
To make matters worse, confirmed cases are skewed to high risk groups that show symptoms, due to a shortage of tests. But there has been a shortage since the beginning. Meaning…a large number of those tested are in high risk groups, and yet even then, over 80% of those cases are still mild.
In Southwest Washington State, as of April 17th, Clark County does not offer any testing, and even major hospitals such as Peace Health only offer testing to those noted above.
New data continues to come in: Stanford and USC have both independently produced new studies in mid-April that show the estimated death rate is in line with the flu at approximately 0.12 to 0.2%.
Original estimates showed 3.4%. At 28 times less fatal, this is a massive change, that has nothing to do with shelter-in-place.
This shouldn’t be a surprise knowing what we do about the logic of who has been the focus for testing. We can even look to the Diamond Princess Cruise Ship for an early case example, back in February:
3700 total onboard, 700 got sick (20%), 6 died. A 0.16% risk of death for the total population. This all in cramped conditions noted as unsanitary, high stress, confined to small rooms, many with no sunlight or fresh air, for weeks. If that’s the worst we get, then this is a nothing-virus.
Either way, results of this closed system cruise ship petri dish shows that transmission, severity, and mortality from COVID-19 are all less than media and government are trying to tell you.
Sources: USA Today, Business Insider
Unable to find health condition or ages of all deaths, it was found that 2 Japanese died in their 80’s, as well as 1 British man, the other 3 are unknown.
(Updated 4/27/20 to include additional data on death rate from Stanford, USC; and Diamond Princess Cruise Ship data.)