There is no answer that I know of with a statistically significant basis at this time. There are some reports that the vast majority of people get infected, show no symptoms and spread the disease. There are reports where dogs and cats have been infected by this virus. There are reports that the older you get, the better the cross hairs on your back. There are conflicting reports. There is a wealth of anecdotal reports showing dead children, dead teanagers and dead from all ages. There are reports of contributing comorbidities. There isn’t a single set of research documents that tie all of this together and there likely won’t be one for a long time because a huge amount remains to be learned before people can point to specific microbiological root causes beyond “virus”. For instance, we all have ACE2 receptors in our lungs, but we differ a bit from individual to individual, and so does our immune response. So what is it about individual A that renders him infected and asymptomatic and individual B that renders him dead if there are very few outward differences between A and B? We have an enormous amount to learn because this virus is novel to us.
Some of us immune? Highly, highly unlikely, but it can be a matter of degree. Apparently some of us fight it better and survive. That’s what natural selection and evolution is all about.
Public health scientists will be looking at this for a long time and I’ve personally got no good idea about when we’ll hear a good answer.
@schmed the problem with calculation a mortality rate is that the rate is based on the quantity of detected infections. There could be a HUGE number of undetected infections out there that would dramatically lower the mortality rate. Furthermore, survivability is dependent on quality of medical care, so if you overwhelm the hospitals you see the mortality rate shoot way high.
One truth about this pandemic is that we have had HORRIBLE testing availability and the federal government did nothing about this for months. So what happens to the mortality rate is the number of detected infections is 156,100 in New York, while the number of undetected infections in New York is well over one million?
It’s so infuriating to hear such a wide range of conflicting reports. Early on most experts figured antibodies would be certain. Then there was an early case of reinfection. Then it was doubtful that antibodies would work to any significant degree. Then there was the report that herd immunity would work; then it wouldn’t. Now NY claims 25% of residents have antibodies. What the hell is anyone to rely on when diametrically opposed reports come out?!
The numbers reported aren’t good enough. You can’t determine an accurate mortality rate from a number of infected that is not the total. The people who were “sampled” for the infection had to meet a specific criteria that dramatically increased the likelihood of their mortality. They did not include samples for people who were mildly impacted or asymptomatic.
What I’m saying is that the 7.5% you wrote about is also a guess based on a flawed testing regimen.
We’re very much in the scenario of being lost in the woods and trying to guess where the shortest path out is. It’s very hard for anyone to have anything definitive while we’re all in the forest. Until we’ve gotten out of the woods and someone’s had a chance to map it via helicopter or satellite images, we won’t be able to really analyze just what the situation truly was.
Which is small comfort for us right now, lost as we are.
The one demographic that is consistently left out of these studies is children. All the antibody studies so far have only tested adults, but children are very important to understanding the disease. Why are children doing so well during the pandemic? Are they much more likely to be asymptomatic from the infection or are they just less likely to get infected? When they get infected are they just as likely to transmit the disease or are they more likely to be dead end hosts?
There is a lot of remote work like you’re describing, which I’ve found out the hard way when I try to contact a doctor’s office.
Today I saw a message somebody had written in chalk on a sidewalk advising using zinc oxide and Vitamin C to cure Covid-19 if they had it. They helpfully also told you where you could buy this products.
Wishing everyone in NY can get back to work when they’re healthy.
I hope they don’t re-open May 15 in NYC or at least phase it in, because my manager is just the kind of guy who will try to encourage us to come back in to work and I like working from home just fine.
I’m not particularly interested in getting on the subway to Midtown any time soon which I would have to do or else walk over six miles each way—just a bit outside of my range especially after getting a bit out of shape during this.
Plus if they delay long enough I can bank a whole bunch of my vacation time and delay it even further.
If you’re allowed any latitude in deciding for yourself and simultaneously handing in your work on time, it’d be a good thing. Because we don’t want more of this.
I think there might be bits and pieces of evidence to indicate that children can spread the disease, even if it doesn’t generally cause severe symptoms in them. I’m not a medical person, but I wonder if the issue Josh brought up in the Editor’s Blog with blood clotting or thinning might play a role in children’s diminished symptoms. Since they are still growing, it seems like there would be physiological differences compared to adults in how the body regulates blood flow which may somehow inhibit the deleterious effects the virus can have.
The neighborhood CVS and family owned pharmacies have been short of vitamin C and zinc. Also barren shelves of some of the immune system blends with mushrooms. Thankfully I’ve stocked up and order by mail from Vitamin Shoppe.
However, which States are doing any kind of competent testing at the moment? And which State(s) is employing a statistical gold standard in either COVID 19 or Antibody testing? I think Supermarkets and Big Box stores are some of the only places where a representative cross section of the non-hospitailzed population are reliably and regularly going right now.
