*26 million known infected.

The CDC estimated 90+ million infections in the US as of Nov 30th. It's likely that a LOT of people have been exposed and either have immunity or just aren't susceptible.

cisgenderedAggie said:

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*26 million known infected.

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CDC projection is that 5-8x that number have actually had it.

That means 1/3 to 2/3 of the US has already had covid.

This sentence is also not correct

Quote:

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But is it right that for all age groups the chance you'll be okay is basically 98%?

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Nobody is saying this.

The odds are significantly better the younger and healthier you are.

I'm not going to post the graphic but their estimate was .331% IFR overall.

.028% for ages 18-49.

So no, the percentage in the OP is likely much too high

I had it and only know I did because I asked for an antibody test when I got bloodwork in a routine physical. Totally asymptomatic. Early 40's dad bod. I don't count in the stats for having it and I's guessing my there's a good chance my kids and wife had it too. I suspect thats the case for a lot of people. Such a weird virus.

Don't forget that there are a lot of people that have very bad experiences with the virus that do not die from it.

Just recognize that 1.7% number seems small until you compare it to every other infectious disease you are likely to catch in the US. it's somewhere between 5-20x deadlier than the flu depending on your age and underlying conditions.

What you're referring to is the case fatality rate, which is the reported deaths divided by the reported cases. Reported deaths is likely underestimated by some amount if you look at the excess mortality data and the number of cases is dramatically underreported given the number of asymptomatic/mild symptom people who never even know they have gotten it. Infection mortality rate is the number which I think you're trying to estimate, which is how many people actually die who actually get infected.

The infection mortality rate (IFR) is highly dependent on age and comorbidities. Changes in the age distribution of who gets sick can have a big impact on the death rate. For that reason, I don't like talking about the mortality rate as a single number, because it can be misleading.

Below is the best graph I found that showed the death rate by age, given multiple different estimates. It overlays it with the flu death rate, for comparison. So yes, it would appear that for many younger people, there is nothing more to worry about tis than the flu. However, for older people it's some significant magnitude more deadly.



As for whether the death rate is very small, I guess you could argue that. I would argue that we just had the deadliest year in modern American history by a significant margin, despite turning our lives upside down to try to avoid just that. Each person's individual risk factor is some equation of their age, comorbidities, etc. and for most people will be very small. However, the more community spread is going on, the more likely it's going to get to the people that wont' survive. Then that seemingly small percentage of people dying add up to truly staggering numbers.

I know A LOT of people who have had this and almost nobody knows how they got it. That tells me many,many more have had it without it being reported.

I also know of only person that got it and became seriously ill. She is suffering 5 weeks after and no end in sight.

My conclusion is I dont what I'd do if I were a policy maker. This thing is an uncontrollable virus that won't bow down to lockdowns and masks. But it only really harms a very small segment. Some of that segment is predictable but some are truly random (or so it seems).

Ag Natural said:

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I know A LOT of people who have had this and almost nobody knows how they got it. That tells me many,many more have had it without it being reported.

I also know of only person that got it and became seriously ill. She is suffering 5 weeks after and no end in sight.

My conclusion is I dont what I'd do if I were a policy maker. This thing is an uncontrollable virus that won't bow down to lockdowns and masks. But it only really harms a very small segment. Some of that segment is predictable but some are truly random (or so it seems).

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Keep in mind that the more people in that small segment of the population, the more it will indirectly affect everyone else. When ICUs fill up with the elderly, or those with high risk conditions, it doesn't leave room for the 18 y/o that has an anaphylactic reaction, the 20 y/o that gets into a bad car accident, or the 30 y/o with an infected kidney stone that is septic.

As HotardAg point out above, despite everything we've done so far (lock downs, masks, social distancing, increased handwashing, monoclonal antibodies, convalescent plasma, full ICUs, etc), there are still 450,000 dead Americans. Imagine if we did nothing other than load the hospitals.

HotardAg07 said:

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I would argue that we just had the deadliest year in modern American history by a significant margin, despite turning our lives upside down to try to avoid just that. Each person's individual risk factor is some equation of their age, comorbidities, etc. and for most people will be very small. However, the more community spread is going on, the more likely it's going to get to the people that wont' survive. Then that seemingly small percentage of people dying add up to truly staggering numbers.

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We've also never analysed flu deaths for comorbidity impact.