Do you have any information of what "severe" actually means? I've seen that word and "serious" thrown around a lot, but nobody actually says what it means.

Not sure where you come from with antibodies. Of course we have none, just like we have none for the new strains of flu every year. We do have other antibodies, though and those seem to be doing a pretty great job at it considering how little people with a normal immune system are affected by it. We're not talking about the T-virus here. We also don't have really effective medication against the flu either. All we do is treat the symptoms and in more severe cases use antivirals which may or may not work a bit. We still have tens of thousands of deaths because we certainly do not have the flu under control.

I get that the diseases and viruses are different, which is why I'm not comparing them directly but rather the results and implications caused by them. All I can see for now are wrong numbers that are acted upon as if they were factual. It's cool that we are able to build such strong defenses and measures against this but I'm wondering where this will all eventually lead. If people dying from coronavirus are so preventable by using these measures, does that mean we'll have to use them for every other disease as well?

What do you personally recommend in our fight against preventable diseases?

Severe=people that can't breath by themselves and need ventilators. We're running out of those. When we do, doctors will have to decide who lives and who dies. This is what we're trying to avoid now. Most sick patients don't get hospitalized and aren't even tested because there are not enough test kits. In general, younger people without a serious medical history are just told to go into voluntary isolation. Unfortunately, weak and old people are not the only victims.

Your comment about the flu tells me you really have no idea...the flu virus changes every year, but vaccines are continuosly modified to take that into account and every year the vaccine is different, depending on the expected kinds of flu viruses that will be prevalent. Also, while the flu virus changes, it usually changes only slightly at a genetic level, so that previously acquired immunity and antibodies are still useful to an extent to avoid complications in most cases. The Covid-19 virus on the other hand is very different from the standard flu virus.

What I personally recommend is to stop spreading misinformation and presenting uninformed conjectures as facts. Listen to what doctors and scientists are saying.

Analysis of Italy

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2763188

ICU Admissions Over the First 2 Weeks

There was an immediate sharp increase in ICU admissions from day 1 to day 14. The increase was steady and consistent. Publicly available data indicate that ICU admissions (n = 556) represented 16% of all patients (n = 3420) who tested positive for COVID-19. As of March 7, the current total number of patients with COVID-19 occupying an ICU bed (n = 359) represents 16% of currently hospitalized patients with COVID-19 (n = 2217). All patients who appeared to have severe illness were admitted for hypoxic respiratory failure to the COVID-19 dedicated ICUs.

Within 48 hours, ICU cohorts were formed in 15 hub hospitals totaling 130 COVID-19 ICU beds. By March 7, the total number of dedicated cohorted COVID-19 ICU beds was 482 (about 60% of the total preoutbreak ICU bed capacity), distributed among 55 hospitals. As of March 8, critically ill patients (initially COVID-19–negative patients) have been transferred to receptive ICUs outside the region via a national coordinating emergency office.

During the first 3 days of the outbreak, starting from February 22, the ICU admissions were 11, 15, and 20 in the COVID-19 Lombardy ICU Network. ICU admissions have increased continuously and exponentially over the first 2 weeks. Based on data to March 7, when 556 COVID-19–positive ICU patients had been admitted to hospitals over the previous 15 days, linear and exponential models were created to estimate further ICU demand (eFigure in the Supplement).

The linear model forecasts that approximately 869 ICU admissions could occur by March 20, 2020, whereas the exponential model growth projects that approximately 14 542 ICU admissions could occur by then. Even though these projections are hypothetical and involve various assumptions, any substantial increase in the number of critically ill patients would rapidly exceed total ICU capacity, without even considering other critical admissions, such as for trauma, stroke, and other emergencies.

In practice, the health care system cannot sustain an uncontrolled outbreak, and stronger containment measures are now the only realistic option to avoid the total collapse of the ICU system. For this reason, over the last 2 weeks, clinicians have continuously advised authorities to augment the containment measures.

To our knowledge, this is the first report of the consequences of the COVID-19 outbreak on critical care capacity outside China. Despite prompt response of the local and regional ICU network, health authorities, and the government to try to contain the initial cluster, the surge in patients requiring ICU admission has been overwhelming. The proportion of ICU admissions represents 12% of the total positive cases, and 16% of all hospitalized patients. This rate is higher than what was reported from China, where only 5% of patients who tested positive for COVID-19 required ICU admission.2,4 There could be different explanations. It is possible that criteria for ICU admission were different between the countries, but this seems unlikely. Another explanation is that the Italian population is different from the Chinese population, with predisposing factors such as race, age, and comorbidities.5


They don't put people in ICU for nothing. The admission rate is likely higher since there probably are a lot more undetected cases. Not that it matters since the growth is the same and capacity runs out regardless. Most people are simply told to self isolate at home. Not the best plan since family members will likely get it as well, maybe only mildly, still go out to get food etc and the spread continues.

Containment is the only option. Hopefully the measures in Italy are starting to take effect and the growth will slow down. From Feb 29 to March 11 it was an average of 1.23x, from March 4 to March 15 it was 1.18x, from March 9 to March 15, 1.12x. So averaged out the growth factor is decreasing. However with the incubation period the peak for ICU admissions (and deaths) lags behind.

Neighbor just tested positive for the virus.

Yes. The Spanish Flu outright demolished some countries, specially tropical ones with no immunity to influenza viruses. 22% of the population dead in two months in American Samoa, for instance. And a lot of that, people in their 20s.

Also, we need to take into account, when estimating the need for hospital beds, the 50% - 95% of people getting the disease, but not ever being tested or needing hospital care.

^ when you start fainting, from even weak excersions (like trying to sit up, causes you to black out).... and when you have trouble breatheing.

Thats when sh*t is really serious... hopefully sometime before then, you got yourself to a hospital or called a amulance.
The idea that the hosptials is overrun by "normal" people that just have a running nose, is silly.

The hosptial spots are for people that will likely die from it.

"I get that the diseases and viruses are different, which is why I'm not comparing them directly but rather the results and implications caused by them." - Viv

^ this is 40 times more deadly than a common flu (with hospitaltions ect).
Also the % of people in need of medical aid (to do stuff like breath) is higher than with a flu. 
Which means you can run out of bed space in hospitals (doesnt happend from a normal flu)

You basically cant compair them.

New Jersey on curfew from 8pm to 5am.

Updating New Yorkers with the latest on the State's #Coronavirus response. WATCH: https://t.co/Ho4oV9GrV9

— Archive: Governor Andrew Cuomo (@NYGovCuomo) March 16, 2020

US now at 4000 total cases.

New day, new Numbers.  USA still tracking slightly ahead of Italy in terms of spread pr day. Granted USA is a huge country so it makes sense.

Yep 4060+ cases now.