Folks fretting about the coronavirus are forgetting there’s another virus already running rampant in the United States, one that’s killed nearly 20 times as many people in this country alone.
Influenza has already taken the lives of 10,000 Americans this season, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. At least 19 million have caught the flu, and an estimated 180,000 became so ill they landed in the hospital.
“Influenza is easier to pick up and there are far, far more cases,” said Dr. Alan Taege, an infectious disease physician at the Cleveland Clinic. “It’s already much larger than coronavirus has been so far in the whole world, in our own country alone.”
…
The CDC predicts that at least 12,000 Americans will die from the flu in any given year. As many as 61,000 people died in the 2017-2018 flu season, and 45 million were infected.
SOURCES: Alan Taege, M.D., infectious disease physician, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio; Bernard Camins, M.D., medical director, infection prevention, Mount Sinai Health System, New York City
Full story here at HealthDay
From the CDC today:
There have been 2,462 associated deaths worldwide; no deaths have been reported in the United States. Fourteen cases have been diagnosed in the United States, and an additional 39 cases have occurred among repatriated persons from high-risk settings, for a current total of 53 cases within the United States.
https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6908e1.htm
The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about this year’s flu season.
See also their section on the Coronavirus
China is not as politically stable as many think. The people there (at least where I was) are quite assertive. Protests are very common.
The powers-that-be have nightmares about losing control. They have to now demonstrate to the world and Chinese citizens that their extreme quarantine measures were successful. The Communist Party of China NEVER fails. Will we, or the people of China, be given the real stats should the outbreak spread throughout China? Pigs will fly.
Unless the virus in China is losing potency there is no reason to believe that there will not be a genuine Chinese epidemic. China HAS to open her factories. A deep recession spells doom for the CPC too
The way I’m see’n it
M
Apparently, those who “recover” from the corona, do not get rid the virus. It remains dormant in the body.
The second flash is then much heftier.
The Japanese female patient , a resident of Osaka in western Japan, tested positive for a second time on Wednesday after developing a sore throat and chest pain, the prefectural government said in a statement, describing her as being in her 40s. She first tested positive in late January and was discharged from the hospital after recovering on Feb 1, according to the statement.
The Japanese health ministry confirmed the case was the first in Japan where a patient tested positive for coronavirus for a second time after being discharged from hospital.
In an urgent move, Health minister Katsunobu Kato said in Parliament that the central government would need to review patient lists and keep tabs on the condition of those previously discharged, as health experts analysed the implications of testing positive for the virus after an initial recovery.
Sunny weather (high) helps in the fight against the virus in northern Italy. Temperature around 0 C and high humidity are conducive to the virus. Now it is snowing in western France.
Don’t Panic!
I live in a province (Northern Ireland) with a population of 1,880,000. China has a population of 1,440,000,000. – so there are about 750 Chinese (in China) for every person in N.I. There have been 2800 deaths in China from covid-19; that would correspond to 4 deaths in N.I. In the ‘flu season which is just winding down, we had 10 deaths from ‘flu, a bit less than average; the local media did not go ape or even mention it. After all, there are about 300 deaths from all causes per week in N.I., par for the course in the western world. Donald trump is right about this one.
You need to take account of the fact that with flu the NI population aged over 65 have a flu jab offered each year, same for folk with an underlying issue eg Asthma. Hence it’s reasonable to suggest that flu deaths would have been much higher without flu jab particularly as the major deaths are in those 2 groups.
https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/UU3_N-1ovJCBH29o9kNZEw
Eat enough to keep your antibodies healthy.
Take your vitamins.
Shorten your supply lines.
Don’t believe anything anyone wearing a mask says.
A new mutation of this virus has been detected in Italy.
ruh roh. do you have a reliable source on that?
When it comes to numbers. Deaths more or less in Wuhan and China from January 23rd
25
16
15
24
26
26
38
43
46
45
58
64
67
73
72
86
89
97
108
97
254
122
35
143
107
97
139
114
121
113
102
Now, This is All China. An ordinary day before the outbreak in Wuhan only there was about 400 deaths every 24 hours. So there is not many deaths above normal. Why the draconian measures ? Maybe the numbers don’t add up ?
Some unconfirmed reports circulating they could be under counting CASES by an order of magnitude. If they under reporting CASES but not deaths, that points to a lower overall mortality than otherwise indicated.
Good to hold in mind that the most dangerous thing in a situation like this is potential for panic and stampede of the herd.
Have commented on this subject in detail three times here before.
Comparing influenza to CoViD-19 is deceptively misleading for several reasons.
1. This years US flu vaccine was about 59% effective according to CDC last week prelimary. Better on B, fairly big miss on the A strains. Result is a preliminary R0 of 1.2. There is no vaccine for CoViD-19, so the R0 is about 3 meaning much more infective comparatively.
2. The routes of transmission is fundamentally different. Flu virions exist in exhaled aspirate, which in indoor dry winter air dries out and can remain inhalable for hours. That, plus the inevitable vaccine ‘miss’ is why there are tens of millions of US flu cases every year. CoViD-19 is spread by direct contact or exposure to cough microdroplets (near direct contact). That is why proper quarantine is reasonably effective for CoVid but NOT influenza.
3. Flu mortality is on the order of 0.1%, usually the young, or old with comorbidities. It never overwhelms national ICU capacity. CoViD-19 is looking to be at least 3 percent. A report from a Wuhan doctor translated into English adds more substance to my previous comment. In his personal experience, about 19% of cases do not recover. They progress to serious (14%) (supplemental oxygen)or critical with ICU ventilator (5%). In his experience, about 20% of the serious and about 80% of the critical die despite aggressive hospital intervention—which in Wuhan is overwhelmed. That works out to about 6.8% mortality. Makes sense, because the ~3% reported must be low in a rising cases epidemic with a 2-3 week lag time (incubation ~5, symptoms to recovery ~10, deterioration maybe ~5). My previous estimate was 5ish because of the critical cases only. This would absolutely overwhelm US ICU capacity, which was the real CDC concern I experienced personally with swine flu in 2009. See first guest post for that back story.
Pandemic? Now probable given Italy and Iran.
US crisis? Cannot be excluded, but not likely. As SM and PDJT say, be prepared and take sensible hygiene precautions.
In Italy, now 17 deaths out of 655 confirmed cases.
Mortality over 2% comparable to Spanish flu.
Rud Istvan
Thanks for the good comment, which probably won’t be read by those who in fact need it the most, e.g.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/02/26/some-perspective-on-the-coronavirus-covid19-from-the-cdc/#comment-2926516
But to Italy and Iran, you should add… South Korea.
Simply because while the former two have more deaths (20 / 26 vs. 13 on Feb 28), the latter shows by far more cases (1766 vs. 655/245).
This seems to be a hint on Korea’s difficulty in installing procedures with the necessary authority.
I think that it is dangerous to keep fixated on the death toll, which grew overquadratic 2 weeks ago but now moves below the quadratic estimate.
The number of cases and the speed of their propagation, especially with transnational character from Italy to France and Spain, is a little worrying.
Rgds
J.-P. Dehottay
Just saw this today. What are the chances?
“Coronavirus breakthrough? Israeli researchers make discovery that could lead to vaccine“
https://worldisraelnews.com/coronavirus-breakthrough-israeli-researchers-make-discovery-that-could-lead-to-vaccine/
There is this…
“Three Pieces of Good News on Coronavirus“
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/guybenson/2020/02/28/read-three-pieces-of-good-news-on-coronavirus-n2562164
Feeling any better?
In Italy, now 17 deaths out of 655 confirmed cases.
Mortality over 2% comparable to Spanish flu.
Thank you Anthony, for providing perspective using a comparison to the Influenza virus. It’s the first sensible article I’ve seen.
Being blasé about this makes equally little sense as panicking, IMO.
Well, I would like to bring up a slightly different perspective.
Since this is being compared to influenza, we should note that the world suffers variations of the flu every year. Is there any reason to believe this will be any different?
It appears to be very contagious. There is some evidence that surviving it does not necessarily confer immunity to it in the future. The quarantining has slowed the spread of infection, but not stopped it. The most we can claim is that slowing the virus’s spread is giving the medical community a chance to properly treat all the victims. But is there any reason to believe that there won’t be hot zones popping up randomly throughout the world for years or decades? For how long will we be planning and preparing?
We need vaccines to reduce the infection rate, and antivirals to cure people quickly, before they spread the virus. Then a decades long, massive program to track down and eliminate this like we did smallpox.
Until that happens, I fear there will be random quaranting of cities, travel disruptions, business issues, increased death rates and higher medical costs worldwide.
If you think a large percentage of the population has a natural immunity, or this virus will burn out and go away, please tell me your basis for that belief. I really would like a more optimistic outlook.
jtom
Good comment. Thanks.
Rgds
J.-P. D.
R0 for common influenza is about 1.28. The R0 for Coronavirus is somewhere between 2-6. (possibly higher).
That the R0 for Coronavirus is not determined at this point is an indication of how screwed up human response has been to this epidemic.
Have we ever tested in the U.S. for coronavirus before? If not, why do we think we never had it before? And why is all that reported assumed to be from what stated in China? Maybe rare cases here are not uncommon.