And so are other studies meta-analyses, too. Bear in mind any meta-analysis relies on the strength of individual studies it is analysing, and some of these may not be so robust.
In general, you can't just cherry pick what you want to believe.
California no longer under lockdown - people freak out
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In general, you can't just cherry pick what you want to believe.
Who takes precautions to avoid tetanus? There's a vaccine, there's no reason to concern yourself over it. The reason anyone takes "precautions" against tetanus is because they don't want to cut themselves on a nail or whatever to begin with. Tetanus and many other things are basically eradicated, we don't have to literally eradicate them to no longer be of concern. Measles is not eradicated but you don't need to worry about it unless you're an anti-vaxxer. Covid doesn't have to be literally eradicated to no longer be a "thing".
People getting reinfected is going to happen, it's not 100%, some people's immune system don't work properly or the infection was so mild, their immune system didn't even have to kick in. Also, you have those situations where someone got exposed again that is immune and they merely got tested in that small window that they will test positive because the virus is in them obviously (it just gets taken out real fast) like the very 1st confirmed case of that Chinese man (in your linked article). For the vast vast majority of people, it will be a "one and done" situation. Nothing is 100% guaranteed and there's always going to be the occasional exception for pretty much anything. The article states reinfections are rare and there's only been 24 confirmed reinfection cases.
Excerpt from your article:
"Although antibodies can wane substantially within months—particularly in patients with less severe disease—they sometimes persist, even in mild cases. Neutralizing antibodies, the most important kind, as well as memory B cells and T cells seem to be relatively stable over at least 6 months, a preprint posted on 16 November shows, which “would likely prevent the vast majority of people from getting hospitalized disease, severe disease, for many years."
It's says the IFR can vary greatly from one place to the other based on many factors. I'm just going for the average IFR (so not the low end or the high end). England's own agencies put it at 0.3% and 0.49% in August and they're expected to be higher than average because a higher elderly population than average and they are up north as well. It's estimated that the US has over half infected, why is a seroprevalence of 53% unrealistic? NYC alone had 20% of it's population infected in April (google the 15,000 person survey they did). Higher seroprevalence won't necessarily cause a lower IFR.
I'm not basing my assumptions on best-case-scenarios, I'm basing it on general knowledge of viruses and its closest relative (SARS). That's not best-case-scenario, it's expected-case-scenario. Sure, epidemiologists should watch for worst-case-scenarios but it's nothing the general public needs to worry about.
I was merely thinking that a faster replicating virus would cause symptom onset faster (and spreading without symptoms is kinda covid's Trojan Horse so-to-speak), thus leading to less overall spread as the host then knows they have it obviously. It was merely a thought. Generally the more infectious strain will become dominant.
There's only been 20-something thousand cases of ebola, I'm not saying it was localized to only one place but saying was widespread is definitely at last some hyperbole.
I wasn't cherry-picking, you seem to be cherry-picking the highest ones. I even posted England's own analysis from August and they're quite a bit lower than your posted 0.6-0.7% IFRs.
Yes, you are cherry picking. There are studies showing IFR over 1%.
In practice of course one of the major impacts on covid-19 mortality is age distribution. The more studies sample from places with lower average age, the lower an IFR they will be likely to see. It would generally be more useful to consider IFR in terms of limited geographical areas than a single global figure.
Again, sounds like you're cherry-picking the highest, there's no way it's over 1% unless you cherry-pick high risk groups, just children alone are gonna vastly lower it because it's like 1 in a million deaths in that group (flu might actually be more dangerous to them than covid). Feel free to show me studies about finding the average IFR that shows vastly different numbers than the ones I'm posting. How many studies show IFR near what I'm posting in comparison to the studies that show your IFR numbers? I bet there's far more studies showing IRFs inline with what I'm posting than studies showing it at something like 0.6-1+%. I saw both the English analysis and the other one on WHO's website from Dr. John Campbell's videos, he doesn't have much interest in trying to prove covid is not dangerous or whatever, he's just commenting on the studies that he feels are best information we have. Also, when I google stuff all I do is put in "infection fatality rate covid", I don't try to lead google into giving me specific results. The data analysis was peer reviewed. Or feel free to show how the guy is purposefully only picking data from youthful nations or whatever. Wealthy western nations will have a higher IFR than average because their elderly population is probably at least double than the average. For example, the UK's elderly population makes up 18% whereas worldwide it's 9%, Japan is almost 30%. And England's own data analysis puts its IFR at 0.3-0.49%.
"At a time when we needed in-person interaction the most, we have it the least." In reference to just general debate and back-and-forth of different viewpoints and people planted their flagpole at one of two extremes.
"Just say the V word "VARIANT" and the press just loves it. You can just imagine Mr. Burns with his cat just sitting there, 'Well Smithers, it looks like the pandemic's going a little too well. What's new? Variants? Oh excellent, variants.'"
There was at least one park that removed every other swing, so fucking stupid.
Examples over 1%:
www.imperial.ac.uk
Examples ~0.5-1%:
www.sciencedirect.com
www.nature.com
The reality is that it's very hard to tell. Given the unreliability of establishing how many people have had covid-19 and that the reported covid-19 deaths are themselves estimates (and thought likely to be underestimates at that).
I would personally suggest 0.3-0.49 to be a reasonable range. Bear in mind 0.16% of the population of the UK has already died of covid. I seriously doubt 70% of the population has been infected to imply an IFR of 0.23. I think 50% having been infected is credible, although around 30-40% more likely.
* * *
I don't mean any disrespect to Dr. John Campbell, but he's a nursing lecturer whose PhD was on the development of open learning resources. He is not exactly the heaviest-hitter in the world of epidemiology you could find.
Report 34 - COVID-19 Infection Fatality Ratio Estimates from Seroprevalence
Report 34 - COVID-19 Infection Fatality Ratio: Estimates from Seroprevalence
www.imperial.ac.uk
Estimating the infection-fatality risk of SARS-CoV-2 in New York City during the spring 2020 pandemic wave: a model-based analysis
Our results are based on more complete ascertainment of COVID-19-related deaths in New York City than other places and thus probably reflect the true higher burden of death due to COVID-19 than that previously reported elsewhere. Given the high infection-fatality risk of SARS-CoV-2, governments...
www.thelancet.com
Examples ~0.5-1%:
A systematic review and meta-analysis of published research data on COVID-19 infection fatality rates
An important unknown during the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has been the infection fatality rate (IFR). This differs from the case fa…
www.sciencedirect.com
Age-specific mortality and immunity patterns of SARS-CoV-2 - Nature
The relative risk of COVID-19-associated death for younger individuals (under 65) is consistent across countries and can be used to robustly compare the underlying number of infections in each country.
www.nature.com
The reality is that it's very hard to tell. Given the unreliability of establishing how many people have had covid-19 and that the reported covid-19 deaths are themselves estimates (and thought likely to be underestimates at that).
I would personally suggest 0.3-0.49 to be a reasonable range. Bear in mind 0.16% of the population of the UK has already died of covid. I seriously doubt 70% of the population has been infected to imply an IFR of 0.23. I think 50% having been infected is credible, although around 30-40% more likely.
* * *
I don't mean any disrespect to Dr. John Campbell, but he's a nursing lecturer whose PhD was on the development of open learning resources. He is not exactly the heaviest-hitter in the world of epidemiology you could find.
5000 in a single day
(I checked if that's what our Google overlords are reporting for Feb. 4 too for the United States, and it is)
(I checked if that's what our Google overlords are reporting for Feb. 4 too for the United States, and it is)
Yep. I teach on a medical degree, thus I know the sort of level medical doctors are taught to. Doctors and nurses are only experts in are whatever they specialise in, with a leaning to practical application of healthcare rather than fundamental scientific understanding. Beyond that, they are "jacks of all trades", with often fairly basic understandings of biology, psychology and other health-related disciplines roughly equivalent to low BSc degree level.
More accurately, 5000 deaths went on the official figures in a single day. I expect only about 3000-4000 actually died on the day, the figure 5000 was achieved due to a batch of delayed paperwork.
What!? If one gets cut with a rusty nail, it's common practice to get a tetanus shot as soon as practical. That's the precaution. Fucking everybody takes precautions to avoid tetanus, including being particularly wary of areas with rusty metal. It's not just the fear of getting cut; if it was, people would be just as wary of rose thorns or brambles. The specific aversion to rust on metal derives from risk of tetanus.
They're not "basically eradicated". They're simply not eradicated. The risk from them is constantly minimised by precautions that we take and accept.
Yes, 24 confirmed, but that simply demonstrates it's possible. Think of how little time this virus has had to mutate and adapt; it can do so a great deal more in the years ahead. Think of how many people caught Covid, didn't get tested (because testing was damn impossible to procure in the first... 75% or so of the duration of the pandemic so far), and thus aren't going to be listed.
The short of it is: we don't know enough. And when we don't know enough, caution is the best approach. Look where a lack of caution got us.
You're going from one reported median, which is subject to specific and extreme data-points (several of which aren't peer-reviewed). This is so far from authoritative, it's exceptionally unwise to base public policy on it.
New York City is a densely populated urban centre, with a huge international community; a state capital and a city of global importance. The spread is likely to be higher there than the vast majority of other places in the US, even other cities. And you want to rest your assumptions on the idea that the seroprevalence in the US as a whole is more than twice what it is in NYC?
I'm sorry, but your basic knowledge of viruses is quite poor. You've been arguing thus far that viruses will naturally become less and less deadly, based on a surface-level understanding of natural selection, which is observably and demonstrably not the case.
One might point to your own example: SARS. SARS-COVID-1 was far less virulent; lower mortality rate, lower infectiousness. By your own assumptions, SARS-COVID-2 should not be so much, much, much, much worse. But it is.
I mean, I consider outbreaks covering over 10 countries over 30+ years to be pretty "widespread", yes.
But that's not the point. The point is it's been around for many decades; it's clearly successful at propagating, and an exceptionally high mortality rate hasn't stopped it from doing so.
The NYC one is kinda puzzling in how they are getting these numbers. They put 25-44 age group at like 1.00% IFR but they're calling it infection fatality risk, which I'm not sure is something slightly different than IFR or what. What other study is showing that age group dying at anything even close to 1%? The CDC puts the survival rate for 50-69 at 99.5% from this article.Examples over 1%:
Report 34 - COVID-19 Infection Fatality Ratio Estimates from Seroprevalence
Report 34 - COVID-19 Infection Fatality Ratio: Estimates from SeroprevalenceEstimating the infection-fatality risk of SARS-CoV-2 in New York City during the spring 2020 pandemic wave: a model-based analysis
Our results are based on more complete ascertainment of COVID-19-related deaths in New York City than other places and thus probably reflect the true higher burden of death due to COVID-19 than that previously reported elsewhere. Given the high infection-fatality risk of SARS-CoV-2, governments...www.thelancet.com
Examples ~0.5-1%:
A systematic review and meta-analysis of published research data on COVID-19 infection fatality rates
An important unknown during the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has been the infection fatality rate (IFR). This differs from the case fa…Age-specific mortality and immunity patterns of SARS-CoV-2 - Nature
The relative risk of COVID-19-associated death for younger individuals (under 65) is consistent across countries and can be used to robustly compare the underlying number of infections in each country.
The reality is that it's very hard to tell. Given the unreliability of establishing how many people have had covid-19 and that the reported covid-19 deaths are themselves estimates (and thought likely to be underestimates at that).
I would personally suggest 0.3-0.49 to be a reasonable range. Bear in mind 0.16% of the population of the UK has already died of covid. I seriously doubt 70% of the population has been infected to imply an IFR of 0.23. I think 50% having been infected is credible, although around 30-40% more likely.
* * *
I don't mean any disrespect to Dr. John Campbell, but he's a nursing lecturer whose PhD was on the development of open learning resources. He is not exactly the heaviest-hitter in the world of epidemiology you could find.
If we say there have been 5 infections in the US for every officially found/counted infection, which I'm sure you'll agree is probably an underestimate vs an overestimate, we get an IFR of 0.34%. Even at only saying there's twice as many total infections than the official count, you're decently below 1%. This is why I'm highly questioning these high IFR studies because they just don't make common sense.
460,000 over (5 x 26,900,000) = 0.34%
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I'm aware that Dr. Campbell isn't an epidemiologist but he also doesn't have a bias or agenda to be wanting to prove the pandemic is just the flu or anything like that.
I really don't get what you're point is here. So what if something isn't technically eradicated as long as it's something you don't even have worry about anymore? Measles is still around, nobody cares. It's like this clip from Jurassic Park. You don't have to completely eradicate covid for it to no longer be a "thing". Covid doesn't have to become smallpox for you to go back to bars, conventions, movie theaters, etc.
I never said it wasn't possible, I've only said those reinfection articles are mainly fearmongering because that's what they are. Sure, it's possible to get it again, but you can be confident with 90+% probability that you won't get it again. If people were getting infected again at something even as low as 10%, we'd have figured it out already. Are you one of those people who still think you need to social distance and wear a mask after getting vaccinated when I believe there's literally been no people that have been vaccinated and got covid so bad they needed to be hospitalized let alone died post vaccination? There's a point to be cautious to something that's somewhat likely to happen vs something that's 1 in a million shot or even lower than that. You can't live your life not doing things because there's a 0.00001% chance of something bad happening. I'm going to literally walk up about a 20-step ice-y stairway tonight, I could slip and die or break my neck, but I'm not at all worried about that happening. Also, there'll be at least 5 of us playing board games without masks and touching the same game pieces, I'm not at all concerned.
Like I posted above to Agema. If we ONLY assume there's been 2 infections for every 1 officially found and counted infection, the IFR in the US would be 0.86%. You just used as an argument that tons of people didn't get tested because they couldn't so I'm sure you'll that there's no way the IFR could possibly be higher than 0.86%, right? Even saying a conservative 5x people actually have gotten covid puts the US IFR at 0.34%. That 0.23% IFR (average for the world) isn't looking so completely unbelievable now is it? The point isn't what number is 100% right or accurate, it's that we know decently well how deadly the virus is and I'm sure each country has done their own data analysis for themselves like England has and NYC has. So you can base policy on those more local numbers vs the world average.
It's not my knowledge, I'm stating stuff that tons of doctors are saying (with regards to being at the endgame for covid). It took us longer to make vaccines back "in the day" and viruses were just as likely to mutate and make variants. Yet we accomplished making vaccines for measles and chickenpox when they almost certainly mutated more (since they had more time) than covid has in only about one year. Just looking at our modern vaccination history, there's no reason to think covid isn't going to be a thing of the past very soon. Sure, there's a rather small chance it manages to stick around like the flu, but it's a really small chance. What do you personally think the odds of covid being around (to where we need restrictions) past this year are? Just looking at past viruses, the odds of covid being a "thing" in 2022 and beyond are well under 10%. And, I'm pretty sure just about any epidemiologist and doctor would say the same thing if you asked them.
SARS from 2003 was far more dangerous as far as death rate goes.
Ebola is obviously not as transmissible as covid whether that's down to killing too fast, how it does transmit, if it's transmissible prior to symptom onset or a combo of all of that. We also have a very effective vaccine against it.
No, they put it at 0.116%, an order of magnitude lower.
What do you mean they don't make common sense? Common sense says to me don't throw around huge, nebulous estimates we know very little about and then try to pin down precise numbers.
Take what you were saying about New York Citry. It's quite straightfoward: about 20% infected by end of April (thus 1.7 million, give a pop around 8.5 million), and there were about 20,000 deaths: = IFR ~1.2%. The paper of course does a more accurate calculation from end of May, and comes to 1.39%.
Let's imagine a population distribution where 15% of the population are over 70 and they have a 10% chance of death. Under 70s are 85% of the population and have a zero percent change of death. So if everyone is infected, we would expect 1.5% of the total population to die. If the risk to over-70s is only 5%, then 0.75% of the total population will die. Hence it is extraordinarily plausible to have an IFR approaching or over 1%, just so long as the proportion of elderly in the population is reasonably high. It's that simple.
In terms of policy, if only 0.2% of Ethiopians or Cambodians die because they have a very youth-heavy population, that's not a good basis for the USA or Europe to decide policy when they have a much higher proportion of elderly and so their population is dying at a considerably higher rate than Ethiopians and Cambodians.
My point is that you said we'd "stop it completely", which would mean eradication. My point is that eradication is an unlikely prospect; more likely we'll have to learn to live with greater precautionary measures. Just as we have for measles, tetanus, etc. That's why the incidence is low: ongoing precautionary attitudes.
So you're still mixing & not bothering with precautionary measures? And people wonder how this situation has kept staggering on for over a year, with us making progress and then losing it again.
I'm not a fan of using numbers which are entirely speculative. But approximately a 1% IFR seems quite reasonable and has some supporting evidence.
You say estimating the infection rate at 5x official numbers is "conservative", but that's not at all conservative for your conclusions, is it? It's actually extremely helpful for the conclusion you're trying to draw. You're actually assuming the infection rate is spectacularly high so that the IFR will be lower. But all of these numbers are just being pulled out of your ass.
Where on earth are you getting these likelihoods? Which doctors and where? You're just spouting opinion with really vague references to "tons of doctors" and "looking at past viruses". Which doctors? What virus data?
Uh-huh. And despite all of that, it's continued to exist, and maintained it's massively high IFR. It hasn't magically lost its deadliness over time, as you seem to believe viruses do.
My bad, I saw the 0.9% number right after that age group and must've of missed the "and" when reading through it.
Nobody's trying to pin down exact precise numbers, they just want to know at least a good baseline (that's in the neighborhood at least). When you do the maths, you're going to end up with a precise number obviously. The IFRs in England have ranges for where they feel the "right" number falls. I can't actually find a good chart of deaths over time for just NYC, I can for the state itself. This here puts NYC deaths at 18,679 but that's through the entirety of May, and that 15,000 person survey finished in late April. I can't really find through the entirety of April or the say the 1st week into May (to compensate for lag). Also, the CDC puts the survival rate of those at 70+ at 94.6%. The IFR does drop over time as you learn how to treat the disease.
But anyway, like I said if you just double the current US cases (which would be extremely conservation number of infections that is definitely an underestimate), the IFR in that situation is at 0.86%. That's why I'm saying these 1% IFRs don't make sense.