Perhaps the first people infected had the poorest immune response to the virus?
It could be something like that, but nobody has reported this possibility. It would also suggest that way more people were exposed to it than caught it “properly”.
France is doing quite badly:
but similarly to elsewhere the deaths are not going up
I find this pattern really weird. And no explanation…
Victim of its succes as a holiday destination ?
The graphs are not comparable without complicated adjustments for the numbers being tested, (and the kind of people being tested).
For example, the “Daily Deaths” graph seems to show an average of at least 700 deaths in the first half of April.
Current estimates of the Infection Fatality Rate (IFR) seem to be 0.7%,
so each of those daily deaths followed on from 700/0.007 = 100,000 earlier infections,
so on average there were 100,000 actual “Daily New Cases” during middle to late March.
Yet the “Daily New Cases” graph shows less than 7.5K for that period.
So increased testing accounts for a lot of the rise in cases, especially if you go back some months, but how much now?
An additional “Daily New Tests” graph might shed some light but even then, who is tested?
Are they typical of the general population?
How many are being tested after showing symptoms?
How many are routine repeat tests (e.g. for exposed health workers) and how many of those have already had it, without symptoms, and acquired immunity?
Good luck removing the biases from that!
One interesting statistic is the percentage of positive tests, which should show up the “extra testing” bias.
This does not get quoted much, but where I have seen it, it seems to be falling by less than the number of tests is rising.
Which is not particularly comforting, but once again, how typical are the people being tested?
BPeter wrote:
France is doing quite badly:
Suggest that the following might apply somewhat to the changes in outcome:
Back in April only those that went to hospital were tested, now anyone can get a test at any time.
The average age of those with the virus is now lower – younger people are getting it now.
Hospitals & Doctors have become more effective in how they treat those that have the virus.
Rwy20 wrote:
. It is mind-boggling how even after the word “therapeutic” being explicitly stated, the discussion is about vaccines or tests. The media seem really biased I have to say.
You think?
Death rates are down even if counting bogus numbers (in the USA I have no info on Europe) or with intensional higher monetary rewards to Hospitals and Clinics for a COVID Dx. So if the hospitals are not overflowing due to COVID infections and the death rates are way down then why the hysteria about further locking down because of an increase in infections?
Australia’s severe lockdown with a death rate of .000024 or .0024%. Resulting in economic turmoil.
Unless you do a total quarantine and by that I mean everyone is isolated in their apartments for 6 weeks with no exceptions, you can expect that the virus will spread to everyone eventually. Think of the Flu as an example. I dont know of anyone who has not had the flu at least once in their lives that is over 50 yrs of age.
skydriller wrote:
Back in April only those that went to hospital were tested, now anyone can get a test at any time.
The average age of those with the virus is now lower – younger people are getting it now.
Hospitals & Doctors have become more effective in how they treat those that have the virus.
All good points, but I suspect that younger people were always getting it, they just tended to be asymptomatic and so were never tested.
C210_Flyer wrote:
I dont know of anyone who has not had the flu at least once in their lives that is over 50 yrs of age.
I am well over 50 and I have to – the best of my recollection – never had the Flu. I might have had it as a small child, but never within my living memory.
As for the death rate: aside from the apparent change in demographic (i.e. much younger now), could it be that Covid-19 has already killed most of those it could kill? IOW, could it be that it’s slowly running out of victims?
172driver wrote:
As for the death rate: aside from the apparent change in demographic (i.e. much younger now), could it be that Covid-19 has already killed most of those it could kill? IOW, could it be that it’s slowly running out of victims?
Quite possibly — or herd immunity is achieved much earlier that we have thought. Consider the case of Manaus.
