| haxxiy said: One repatriated Australian died AFAIK. The British man who died as well was being treated in Japan. Besides, cruise ships probably skew older than average, and not everyone is going to get it. Even H1N1, who was a far milder disease and became the dominant flu strain in 2009 - 2010, infected like 10 - 15% of people. The CDC in previous studies seems to think 33% of infected in a pandemic is possible or even likely, though. If that's a 1% death rate disease, with 5% of serious cases, that would mean potentially over five million people needing hospital care in the US alone. That's five times more than there are hospital beds. Of course, not everyone will get it at the same time, but it potentially opens up the door to quite dramatic situations where care needs to be withheld from certain patients and given to others. Man, that's why I hated bioethic classes. No easy answers there. |
If we just look at the stats for today (so far) 36 new deaths, 1716 new cases (Before China got added, this is all outside China)
That's 2.1%. The reported stats may be too low, however the deaths lag up to 3 weeks behind. 1% is certainly possible, but cnbc claiming 0.2% to 0.4%, nothing even suggests anything close to that.
A Harvard epidemiologist estimated it at 40% to 70% worldwide infection rate.
https://thehill.com/changing-america/well-being/prevention-cures/482794-officials-say-the-cdc-is-preparing-for
The USA is also more at risk since the CDC stated that among other things, those with diabetes (9.4% in USA), obesity (31%, 7.6% severe) and older people (25% over 60) are at high risk. (However the average age in the USA is actually not that high, Japan, Germany and Italy are at the top)
Luckily people won't all get it at the same time, but hospital stay can be long as well. Better slow it down while we can, spread it out as long as possible.
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