US Jumps Over Italy and China in Number of Cases
According to Worldometers, the number of US cases topped those in China and Italy for the first time today.
Hooray, We’re Number 1?!
Covid Tracking Project
On March 22, I started a series of charts based on data from the Covid Tracking Project.
My trendline at the time suggested we might hit 100,000 cases today.
On March 22, I received an email accusing me of hyping the data because “It is not presently feasible to get to 100,000 cases in the US by March 26th.“
The email also stated “These publications do more to incite hysteria and grab clicks than they provide any basis for decision-making.”
Here is my March 22 post: Covid Tracking Project: How Long to 1 Million US Cases?
The amusing thing about my initial post on this data series is my specific statement about trends.
“Those are not my projections, those are observations of what would happen if the current trends last that long at the same pace.”
2020-03-26 Observations
We did not hit 100,000 cases today. However, it is a near lock that we do so in the next three days.
Moreover, the data I posted is as of 4:00 PM Eastern. Other sources show we are at 83,672 for today, March 26.
That is about 1 day away from what the trend suggested on March 22.
The original trendline I posted is still close to intact. The US will hit 100,000 cases within a couple days.
New York
New York Trends
New York is likely to hit 1,000 deaths by the end of the month.
If the trends hold for a week, New York will top 10,000 deaths by April 3. That is not a prediction, it is a projection based on current trends.
The NY death trend is undoubtedly high as it is ahead of the entire US. The US trends are far more likely to be accurate than the US trends.
US Trends
On March 22, the trend for 1,000 US deaths was today. Unfortunately, we hit 1,209 deaths today. (So much for that email of accusing me of hype).
The March 22, the trend for 10,000 US deaths was April 5. Today the trend suggests 10,000 deaths by April 7.
The death rate has accelerated, and if you look at the slope, I downplayed the jump (the last 7 data points are all above the line I drew). Thus, April 7 might be optimistic. An alternate trendline suggests April 4, still in line with the March 22 trend.
Either way, the people accusing me of hype owe me one huge apology.
Hospitalization Trends
The critical trends are not deaths but hospitalizations.
We are overloading hospitals right now at 10,000 cases. The trend suggests we could hit 100,000 hospitalizations by April 5.
Without a doubt, that will blow hospitals out of the water.
New York Out of Beds
According to #NewYork Governor Andrew @NYGovCuomo , the number of #CoronaVirus cases in his state are “doubling every three days.” With that comes this alarming chart which explains why local, state and federal governments are seriously stepping up their efforts. It’s a race. pic.twitter.com/ecMrFv6H5g
— Mohamed A. El-Erian (@elerianm) March 24, 2020
Louisiana Out of Ventilators
WATCH: Louisiana Gov. Edwards says if coronavirus case curve isn’t flattened, New Orleans will exhaust ventilator capacity by April 2 and bedspace by April 7.
More coming up on @nbcnightlynews. pic.twitter.com/Fh00Z9BuYw
— NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt (@NBCNightlyNews) March 26, 2020
Guess who forgot to shut down Mardi Gras.
Alabama
“UAB announced in-patient COVID-19 cases had tripled in a 24-hour period, with at least 60 people hospitalized by Weds evening. The majority of the patients were requiring ventilator care.”
Cases +40% per day, 2nd death, 3 more deaths to be announced.https://t.co/Y7eu5aeuVB
— Ben Hunt (@EpsilonTheory) March 27, 2020
What About Gowns?
Please note New York Nurses Out of Medical Gowns Wear Trash Bags
Cuomo to Trump “You Pick the 26,000 Who Will Die”
I discussed hospital bed and respirators in Cuomo to Trump “You Pick the 26,000 Who Will Die”
Rhode Island Afraid of New York
https://twitter.com/kr3at/status/1243289219809841153
Go to New York for any reason then back to Rhode Island and you are subject to a 14-day quarantine.
For details, please see Rhode Island Restricts Travel to New York.
Conspiracy Theory
Every day, I still have people telling me this is No Worse than the Flu™
They side with Trump.
This a Conspiracy Against Trump led by Blue State Governors and the media. Just send everyone back to work and don’t worry about it.
It’s still just one big lie. Deaths are exaggerated.
And most importantly, this is No Worse than the Flu™.
Few are dying.
We are at 15 cases, soon to be zero.
Hello Trump Faithful and Conspiracy Believers
Her is my reply again: Hello Trump, It’s Not a Media Conspiracy, It’s You
Meanwhile, please watch that trend of hospitalizations.
We are out of beds in many places and will be 100,000 beds short possibly in a week.
Acute Care Hospital Beds
If you want to be 1,000,000 beds short, then hell, just send everyone back to work.
Meanwhile, please note: The current trend suggests that roughly 1 in 10 of those hospitalized will die from the virus.
Well, maybe that trend is wrong.
Carry On!?
Addendum
The NY trends are more than a bit quirky.
I added this comment above “The NY death trend is undoubtedly high as it is ahead of the entire US. The US trends are far more likely to be accurate than the US trends.”
A Word About Empty Statistics
Hospital beds filling up constitutes “empty statistics”
Out of masks “empty statistics”
Out of gowns “empty statistics”
Out of respirators “empty statistics”
So many “empty statistics”
Eventually we all die so everything is “empty” by this fine rationale! https://t.co/zshh8LkFX5
— Mike “Mish” Shedlock (@MishGEA) March 27, 2020
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
Interestingly, CHINA is curtailing the COVID-19 without new cases being reported. Hopefully they let others understand the secret behind the containment level. Notwithstanding, planning with BTCINVESTLIFESTYLE. secures me against any losses to my finance while I trade stocks personally too. There’s a lot of conspiracy to this outbreak. Hopefully after the vaccine is discovered and life returns to normal, then China would face some sanctions since their economy is still booming while other countries suffer
What are we going to do, when it comes to the 4th of July?! Clark co, Vancouver, Washington, is the biggest fireworks in the Northwest, from this side of the Mississippi! We cater to 100,000 people! & Then, there’s Halloween. Who is going to want to go to somebody’s house? Touch touch everything! Do we wash every wrapper?! Really.
Sad,. No more “blowing out the birthday candles”, like we did when we were a kid!
Excellent article and video from Dr John Ioannidis from Stanford University.
Brief article:” In the coronavirus pandemic, we’re making decisions without reliable data”.
1 hour video – worth watching! “Perspectives on the Pandemic with Dr John Ioannidis of Stanford University”.
He presents some well thought out perspective that is worth considering. https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=3&v=d6MZy-2fcBw&feature=emb_logo
I believe that you are right about the under counting. Also, it’s been here longer than is thought.
The 13% figure of requiring hospitalizations is wrong. It is much lower than that as 90%+ of those infected don’t appear in the stats as they are either asymptomatic or have very mild symptoms and are not tested. So the real infection rate is in the millions and the severe cases as a percentage of that is much lower. Sucks for those tens of thousands who will die but then again more than that die each year from the flu, plus most of those who die are already ill and elderly and had perhaps only a year or 2 cut from the end of their life. Does this warrant millions being made bankrupt and homeless by the shutdown? Will it be worth it in the many thousands of suicides the ruin will cause or the increase in family breakdowns, divorce, abortions etc etc.
All of the hypothetical results of the shutdown you propose are all the choice of the individuals making the decision and therefore 100% avoidable.
Some of the COVID-19 cases might be the result of foolish decisions (ignoring the situation/shutdown) made by those infected, but the vast majority are not.
a sober, rather more sanguine, perspective from a swiss doctor:
It appears to be one in ten overall presently, but if you’re over 65 and have an existing health issue, then when you show up in ICU with this thing, your odds of dying are roughly 50/50 and you’ll be on a ventilator when they pull the plug after it grinds down your immune system for a week or two.
Absent a vaccine, the trick seems to be staying out of ICU. The only purely prophylactic regimen that I’ve seen targeting the most vulnerable, with symptoms, is by Dr. Zelenko, north of New York City.
It appears to be working, based on several hundred being treated who are NOT going to ICU, NOT being hooked up to respirators and, most importantly, Not dying. He’s simply aiming at keeping the viral load down.
Had The Donald not publicly endorsed one of the antivirals being used by Dr. Zelenko, I’m convinced Hydroxychloroquine, Azithromycin and Zinc would now be routinely used to manage this crisis. Maybe they are; Dr. Zelenko says he’s beginning to run low.
Abstract: Lack of evidence on SARS-CoV-2 transmission dynamics has led to shifting isolation guidelines between airborne and droplet isolation precautions. During the initial isolation of 13 individuals confirmed positive with COVID-19 infection, air and surface samples were collected in eleven isolation rooms to examine viral shedding from isolated individuals. While all 15 individuals were confirmed positive for SARS-CoV-2, symptoms and viral shedding to the
environment varied considerably. Many commonly used items, toilet facilities, and air samples had evidence of viral contamination, indicating that SARS-CoV-2 is shed to the environment as expired particles, during toileting, and through contact with fomites. Disease spread through both direct (droplet and person-to-person) as well as indirect contact (contaminated objects and 20 airborne transmission) are indicated, supporting the use of airborne isolation precautions.
One Sentence Summary: SARS-CoV-2 is shed during respiration, toileting, and fomite contact, indicating that infection may occur in both direct and indirect contact.
I’ll ask again, does anybody know how many ventilators are needed to treat all the patients that need them in a particular time period? In other words, how flat does the curve have to be. Here are some numbers, perhaps. If anyone has better data, please let me know.
A respected epidemiologist estimates that about 2/3 of the population will get C19. In Korea, where everyone gets treated, the death rate is about 1%, in Italy it is about 6%. So we might assume that 6% of the victims need a ventilator… This is a WAG on my part. Again, does anyone have better data? If each patient needs two weeks on a ventilator, that is 26 patients per year per ventilator. If 6% of 220000000 in the US need ventilators for two weeks each, we need a few over 500,000 ventilators to accommodate all that need one. This assumes the load is flat over a full year.
Does anyone have better data? Someone please refute this with math and real data.
There will be riots. D
Based on data from Italy, cases in the US will roughly quintuple between when lockdowns occur and 12 days later when the peak rate of new infections occurs. Based on data from China, the number of active cases will then roughly double until about 10 days after that, at which point the number of active cases will stabilize and start to decline.
For the sake of argument, let’s say hard lockdowns started 4 days ago on March 23rd in the US in all the critical areas that need it. There were 43K cases on that date. Multiply by 10 (5×2) for the maximum number of cases which will occur 22 days later. That means on April 15th we should see the maximum number of active cases and there should be about 430K cases on that date, give or take. Assume serious cases are 15% that might need a ventilator. That is 64,500 serious cases that might need a ventilator. Recovery takes about 30 days and the peak should be spread over about 60 days. That means there will need to be about 32,000 ventilators. About half of those cases should be in New York.
I think you are more than an order of magnitude too high on your estimate. All this assumes the US implemented a hard lockdown everywhere that needed it starting 4 days ago, and also that there will not be any therapeutic drugs that are be a big help.
The US has the resources to enforce a truly hard, nationwide lockdown for a few months. And probably still better support logistics to make it viable than near anywhere (food production, distribution…).
But I suspect it will, literally, require the generals to take control…..
A few more months there will be no economy or government left…
I think your numbers accurately show what would happen if we simply allow the virus to spread. That, of course, is why we won’t.
the dyson venilator
10,000 bought by UK, another 1,000 donated to UK, 4,000 to be donated elsewhere.
Somehow I don’t think the US is pursuing donations when the president rejects the need for additional ventilators.
Still people with the same as any “ordinary” flu messaging…
Early days still in the US….that’s all that can be said for now. We’re just entering into the peak phase.
It this is “ordinary” flu, don’t you think it odd that there never was any record before of hospitals being overwhelmed with “ordinary” flu, such as is being reported throughout the world?
How would you respond to that…the evidence of the reports from around the world presented at your feet?
Mis-perception? All in our over-active imagination?
Many people have trouble comprehending exponential growth of a novel respiratory virus. If it doubles every week and takes 12 weeks to run its course, everything still looks pretty good in week 10, when only 25% of those who will be infected have become infected. Said in other words, everything looks pretty manageable for the first 83% of the spread.
In the last 17% of the spread when everything goes to hell because the number of cases quadrupled and people are dying in the hospital hallways then everyone understands, but until it actually happens many people insist it will not happen.
Covid19 will pass the annual deaths of the regular flu within two weeks, and still have another year ahead where it can be expected to kill many, many more people. In addition, soon we will have horrific video of hospital conditions in New York, New Jersey, Boston, and New Orleans, with people dying in the hallways, and refrigerated trucks full of bodies. Between these, I think most trolls will go away.
Great info Mish! Any reason you deleted your comments from the earlier edition a couple of hours ago? I think they are informative and some sarcastically entertaining.
Please put the 1-10 hospital admissions in context. So, yes 10% is the trend, if you head over to the CDC website and check out flu admission, do the math its 6-8% for a given year for admissions to death. Is this worse – Yes, but is it 10x worse – Not based on admissions. Here is the link: link to cdc.gov
Plus, we still don’t have denominator aka the ability to test for sickness or antibody testing, to enable mapping. Until then, fear and speculation will rule the day. Once we can map cases, the predictions will get wildly accurate.
While it is true that there may be undetected cases out there, it is also true that this is orders of magnitude worse than the flu. In no year since 1918 have there been so many people requiring hospitalization from the flu that the hospitals were overloaded to the point where a few people are selected for treatment while everyone else is simply left to die. That is the case in Italy and Spain, and soon will be the case in New York. Right behind New York it will happen in New Jersey and New Orleans.
Federal support for Ford/Ventech ventilator project scrapped so other options can be examined…
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
✔
Just finished a very good conversation with President Xi of China. Discussed in great detail the CoronaVirus that is ravaging large parts of our Planet. China has been through much & has developed a strong understanding of the Virus. We are working closely together. Much respect!
229K
12:19 AM – Mar 27, 2020
For all Trump’s faults, lack of flexibility and willingness to turn on a dime, is not one of them. Hopefully, he has really gotten the message this time, and stops mindlessly spinning around worrying about trivialities.
Dr Richard Epstein says virus spread can be slowed by testing everyone for less than the cost of the census.
This should come as news to no one, but the American public is just incredibly dumb or something. TEST-TRACE-QUARANTINE, politicians should be SCREAMING it from the rooftops. That’s the only way out of this shutdown.
It’s an interesting idea, but there are lots of problems with it. First, we don’t have anywhere that number of tests. Second, even if we had that many, we couldn’t test everyone simultaneously. Third, you have to also ban travel, or the infections start all over again. Fourth, there will be people who have been infected, but who don’t test positive yet, so you would need to retest everyone after a few days. Fifth, the tests are only about 70% accurate, meaning that 30% of the people who are infected will still test negative.
Thus, for this to work, anyone that tests negative would have to be retested a few days later, and perhaps a third time a few days after that.
The test kit shortage is the fault of the FDA and CDC. If not for the FDA, test kits would be available for $5 at any drug store.
One thing that I haven’t heard discussed is how the time lag between cases being reported and those people dying would affect the rate calculation. It seems to me, to find the correct rate, you should divide the number of deaths by the number of cases reported at today minus that time lag. With an exponential growth of cases, this could make a big difference.
It has been discussed on this blog and a few other locations. The lag is thought to be between 7 and 14 days. I have been using 7 days in my estimates because I find the calculations to be unbelievably grim when assuming a 14 day lag.
Yes, 7-14 days to die is the norm. It probably is 14 days in most cases, however many cases are not detected until very late in the infection, and thus the case and the death may be reported the same day. So, 14 days from symptoms, and 7 days from positive test result are probably reasonable.
One other thing is that the time to recover is much, much longer than the time to die, more like 30-45 days.
The questions to predict when this can be over with everyone getting good treatment are:
What percentage of the population will catch c19?
What percentage of those will need a ventilator plus support equipment and personnel?
How long will each need to be on a ventilator?
With this data, it is possible to calculate the number of ventilators needed to support the case load in any particular period of time. I’m sure that there is data to support an answer to each of these questions. Someone has done the math. All we hear is crap. Please, government weenies, tell the truth, make a plan, set a goal. Let us know what it is so that we can be prepared.
You don’t need to do the math. Trump “has a feeling.”
Trump on the subject of ventilators last night….
…In a Thursday night interview with Sean Hannity, Trump dismissed the pleas for more ventilators by governors like Andrew Cuomo. “A lot of equipment is being asked for that I don’t think they will need,” Trump said. “I have a feeling that a lot of the numbers that are being said in some areas are just bigger than they are going to be. I don’t believe you need 40,000 or 30,000 ventilators. You know, you go to major hospitals, sometimes they’ll have two ventilators. And now all of a sudden they’re saying, ‘Can we order 30,000 ventilators?’…
I cannot find a reference, but I understand odds of survival with COVID-19 are very low once someone is sick enough to be on a ventilator. Typical time on a ventilator with COVID-19 is 30 days instead of the usual 7 days. A person must be sedated the whole time while on one. Odds of death are 90%+ if that happens? If my info is correct, then the focus on “we need more ventilators” is a mistake, although not for the reason President Trump implied. It is not because so few people will get seriously ill; instead, ventilators are not going to help much even if we have them. Of course the hospital’s want them because there is no limit to the expensive care options they are willing to attempt if government is willing to pay.
Italy’s triage approach makes a lot of practical sense in this context. The big focus in the US needs to be on prevention and effective therapeutic treatment to keep people out of the hospitals.
Two types of ventilator – positive pressure (think mask and/or bubble helmet) and mechanical (think tube down throat). For the first, they aid survival by taking the pressure off the body to get enough oxygen and thus help save lives that way. For the second, the impact on teh body of mechanical ventilation is very severe and you are correct, one study i saw had 27 patients that required this and all died.
Trump is just trying to make sure that anyone who has a family member die from a lack of ventilator won’t vote for him. If it ends up that they “need” 140,000 ventilators, that will mean perhaps 300,000 who die from the lack of one, so that statement will only cost him a couple of million votes. No big deal.
“Trump is just trying to make sure that anyone who has a family member die from a lack of ventilator won’t vote for him.”
It does seem that way sometimes, doesn’t it? I understand he wants to be as optimistic as possible, but unrealistically downplaying the risks only to be proven wrong later is not the way to go. IMHO, he should stick to the facts that are known and policies enacted to address those facts. Stop downplaying the unknowns for goodness sake!
And then, today, he finally invokes the Defense production act, and promises 100,000 ventilators in 100 days. Assuming that he gets them, the next problem is that there aren’t enough people trained to operate the all ones we already have at the same time.
You’re assuming Trump can not only count, but also add. And, heck, even multiply.
OTOH, when your counting is limited to: One, Two, Many, I suppose two ventilators sounds like a lot….
Trump voters will be saying “who could have done a better job than Trump” while their family members drown in an ICU
You forget that he seems to be thinking that the therapeutics will come through. If they do, there will be far less need for ventilators. And I think you are right: once it’s so bad that you need one, the outcome isn’t good. The emphasis should be on doing everything possible so that as few as possible need one.
Someone please calculate the number of respirators necessary to handle this in a year or less. Big clue, it is bigger than 140000.
We need a couple million beds and respirators if there is no other treatment available.
Unfortunately your # are too rosy (or you’re making them look too rosy by rounding down to the nearest round #). My, conservative, estimate is 10,360 on 4/4 & 20,720 on 4/7. If we continue at the current pace of the last 6 days we’re at 15k on 4/4 & just under 35k on 4/7.
Mish and his crazy math. Everyone knows mathematicians are just using this hoax to get free money from the government. I know of a number of mathematicians, some as young as 7, who can show that Mish’s numbers are all wrong and are more in line with the President’s. This is just a conspiracy by liberals to take away our guns, take control of the economy, and turn America into another Venezuela.
Assume (hope) this is sarcasm.
Karl Denninger: “Ok, so Dr. Fauci and Dr. Birx have both walked away bigly from the “scare everyone” prediction that 2 to 10 million Americans are likely to die if we don’t lock down cities and stop going to the bar — in short if we don’t hide in our homes for the next six months.”
Apparently, someone’s math was way off.
Suppose 50% of population gets infected, 10% of them needs hospital care, 10% of these die, then CFR is about 1% (or 0.5% vs the whole population).
This virus forces emotionless rational choices where it hits hard. Consider Italy that denies treatment to older individuals due to the the small chance they recover (so they don’t occupy resources that are likely to save less-old people).
Looking at the chart listing the number of Corona Virus cases and deaths in the US compared to other countries and especially CHINA…….CHINA is definitely lying about the number of cases and deaths they had. They have been irresponsible from the get go.
…Unless China s got a miracle cure, they might come forward with when the US is on its knees…
We just don’t know what is going on in China, how they are really handling the epidemic, what true figures are. Until there is independent verification allowed it will remain that way.
We also don’t really care. What is relevant now is what is going on in places where we do believe the numbers.
FT has a page with charts showing China’s economic trajectory… they are not recovered, not even close.
I saw a new theory today about a method of transmission. I repeat this for information only. I have no idea if it is correct or not, but it was proposed that the virus can be found in the urine, and that when a urinal flushes, the virus is aerosolized. If true, you could easily inhale it, or it could get in your eyes. Also, when you dry your hands with a blown air dryer, it would be deposited on your hands.
That’s true for most viruses.
Use a toilet, close lid 1st then flush.
Anyone not using proper handwashing techniques then the hand dryers, will spread it. Towels can remove viruses and bacteria on your hands, given the choice I always use them.
This from a former food safety trainer, not a medical pro.
I have trained my whole family to close the toilet lid before flushing. Guests on the other hand are not so apt to keep that routine up.
This sentence is not what you intended “The US trends are far more likely to be accurate than the US trends.” I suspect you meant that US trends are more likely to be accurate than NY trends. I’m sure that NY death rate is about to shoot much higher as they have reached capacity. New Jersey will probably reach that point by Sunday. Louisiana is in third place, probably a week away from a rising death rate.
Here are the states with the most cases per 1/m population as of today:
New York 1999, grew 18% today
New Jersey 773, grew 56% today
Louisiana 496, grew 28% today
Washington 422, grew 24% today
DC 376, grew 16% today
Mass 350, grew 32% today
Michigan 286, grew 24% today
Conn 283, grew 16% today
Vermont 255, grew 28% today
Colorado 248, grew 32% today
Illinois 200, grew 36% today
Mississippi 163, grew 29% today
Once a state reaches 1-2000 per 1m, the death rate goes up because the hospitals can’t handle the flow.
There was a significant communication error today by Dr. Deborah Birx regarding Neil Ferguson’s data presented in UK. She apparently missed that Ferguson’s lowered mortality estimate applied to a lockdown scenario and his model was not revised lower with respect to uncontrolled spread of COVID-19. I watched her segment several times to make certain I did not misunderstand what she said. Birx suggested the potential spread of the virus in the UK was less aggressive than modeled, but according to Ferguson in the tweet referenced by@Mish , this is definitely not the case.
Regarding an accurate case fatality rate, the best case is probably represented by South Korea who did an excellent job of testing for and containing their outbreak (final CFR about 3%). The worst case so far is probably Italy (CFR of about 20%, assuming severely ill victims die about 7 days after hospitalized and tested). Italy’s actual CFR might be substantially lower if a large segment of their population was infected and recovered on their own without being tested. I think it is safe to say Italy’s all inclusive CFR in hindsight will still be worse than South Korea, even after accounting for cases not tested.
In the US, it is apparent that SARS-Cov-2 is highly contagious as has been forecast by Mish and others, and the CFR will be between 3% and 20%, depending on the population density and medical care provided. Uncontrolled spread should not be allowed, because about 75% of the US population would be infected and about 3% of those infected would die (best case based on South Korea).
Although many social gatherings in the US are now shut down, I still see photos of parks full of people and I still see almost no one in public is wearing masks in places such as grocery stores and hardware stores, so presumably the virus is still actively spreading. The final Worldometers count for 3-26-2020 is 85,435 total cases with +17,224 for the day. It looks like Mish’s 100,000 forecast will be very close (within 24 hours).
As of today, the US still looks to me like the next Italy. Sad situation.
Well yes, but she also mentioned that serological surveys may show a very large group of asymptomatic cases, which could mean we are not at the beginning of the wave but further along. How far? Depends on the number of asymptomatic cases discovered, the higher the better. If this number is very high, then we are looking at the tail end, with high mortality among people who could well have died of the flu or something similar shortly anyways.
“Serological surveys may show a very large group of asymptomatic cases…”
Or, serological surveys may not show a very large group of asymptomatic cases. Until there is a serological survey this is hypothetical. When the W.H.O. visited China, they reported there was not an iceberg of asymptomatic cases as had been hypothesized. Did they get that wrong? Maybe, but it is difficult for me to assume their conclusion was completely fabricated. Also, if infections have been close to burning themselves out rather than it all being due to containment, then why did both China’s and Italy’s exponential growth in cases peak exactly 12 days after total lockdown? Italy is at least two weeks ahead of the US. Based on that data, the US is not likely to be close to the end of its wave if it still does not have good containment.
We also have information from the Diamond Princess. Crew and passengers are about 3500. Total cases reported is 712 (Worldometers). If everyone was exposed despite the quarantine efforts, then that would be a silent attack rate of 80%. That would mean 1 in 5 who are exposed become infected. That would be the best case. In this case, 330 million x 20% x 3% = about 2 million dead in the US if not contained.
But if it’s more like .5% as many others are now calculating, it’s more like 330,000. Which is like typical flu * 10 but far below two million.
And you are assuming that no therapeutics will be found to dampen the morbidity rate. HCQ cocktail is looking highly promising. I took it last week (just the Plaquenil alone) and it knocked out a really bad flu in about 12 hours, which others have experienced. At the least, it seems almost certain that it reduces how much viral spread will take place by at least 50%, not to mention its use as a prophylactic.
Why are all these companies making hundreds of millions of doses if it’s all useless? My guess that it will soon come online and this whole thing will be largely taken care of within a couple of months.
It’s really interesting. This is still up on the gov.uk web site. The dropped COVID 19 from the HCID list (High Consequence Infectious Disease):
Status of COVID-19
As of 19 March 2020, COVID-19 is no longer considered to be a high consequence infectious diseases (HCID) in the UK.
The 4 nations public health HCID group made an interim recommendation in January 2020 to classify COVID-19 as an HCID. This was based on consideration of the UK HCID criteria about the virus and the disease with information available during the early stages of the outbreak. Now that more is known about COVID-19, the public health bodies in the UK have reviewed the most up to date information about COVID-19 against the UK HCID criteria. They have determined that several features have now changed; in particular, more information is available about mortality rates (low overall), and there is now greater clinical awareness and a specific and sensitive laboratory test, the availability of which continues to increase.
The Advisory Committee on Dangerous Pathogens (ACDP) is also of the opinion that COVID-19 should no longer be classified as an HCID.
The need to have a national, coordinated response remains, but this is being met by the government’s COVID-19 response.
Cases of COVID-19 are no longer managed by HCID treatment centres only. All healthcare workers managing possible and confirmed cases should follow the updated national infection and prevention (IPC) guidance for COVID-19, which supersedes all previous IPC guidance for COVID-19. This guidance includes instructions about different personal protective equipment (PPE) ensembles that are appropriate for different clinical scenarios.
Thanks for the link. Apparently, COVID-19 does not meet all the criteria:
Case fatality rate is not considered high enough and COVID-19 is no longer difficult to recognize and detect.
If one clicks on the “government’s COVID-19 response” link included in the HCID downgrade, one is met by a notice which directs people to “Only go outside for food, health reasons or work (but only if you cannot work from home).”
Still, that pretty much allows them to re-open all businesses.
“This a Conspiracy Against Trump led by Blue State Governors and the media.”
When I was young, I only knew of two conspiracy theories – those of John Birch (Society) and Lyndon LaRouche (USLP). I didn’t buy into either but since I started commenting on websites around 2006 or so, I have often been called a ‘conspiracy nut’ or ‘tin hat’ for questioning official government pronouncements, especially about things like Saddam’s WMDs or Assad’s CWs, etc.
I was right about the ‘WMDs’ but I doubt the government will ever admit to lying again even though it will still be lying.
Most people in government, (if not everyone) are utilitarianists – people who believe that the ‘greater good of all’ is more important than the rights of the individuals (the ends justify the means).
It’s okay to infringe on the rights of a ‘small’ number of (obnoxious) no-sayers if it serves the ‘national interest’, ‘public interest’, ‘common good’, etc. Utilitarianism is the ‘ethical’ basis for military conscription, eminent domain, taxation, war, communism and other bad things. It is even the ‘ethical’ basis of good things like libertarianism and free markets.
Before one accepts utilitarianism, just remember that the ‘national interest’ isn’t what you think it is; it’s what those with political power say it is and it is the rights of you, your family or friends that will be sacrificed for it.
That will be a bad thing, but the government people will actually believe they’re doing good.
Ron Paul, a medical doctor, was one who played down the virus. But that was early, I think many have adjusted their perspective as more facts have become known.
Less than 1 month from when he said, “One day it’s like a miracle, it will disappear”, Trump has Made America The Greatest!
It’s going to be HUGE.
“The death rate has accelerated”. I was optimistic a few days ago that this would not happen, but it has 🙁
Also the day is not over yet, so by tomorrow morning, the US might actually be at 100K. Next week will be brutal.
Math, statistics and science doesn’t lie.
The trend will continue until another variable is added to the equation that can alter results
Congratulations to Mish for showing the trend well and being more or less correct.
However, the infection rate is of relatively little significance. If you test more, more positives will be harvested. All that matters is current morbidity rate compared to average morbidity rate, i.e. how many people is CV killing that otherwise wouldn’t die? Or put another way: are more people dying than usual right now?
So far, the answer is No. But it’s early days. So far, the extreme measures are taken to prevent something terrible happening. Nothing terrible has happened yet. Important to keep that in mind.
If I die because of X, who are you to say it’s no big deal because I would have died anyway? We’ll all die at some point. 27,000 people are dead and it’s important to keep in mind nothing terrible has happened yet? Seriously?
I’m just providing some perspective, namely that what is happening thus far is not nearly as extreme as the coverage compared to typical death rate from pneumonia and flu this time of year. Hopefully you can see the chart but not sure if the link-in worked.
On this website you can check out NYC specifically, for example, comparing death rates from 2015-20.
I have noted that Oxford University reported that 1 in 1000 COVID 19 infected people are hospitalized. If Mish’s 1 in 10 hospitalized people die, then by my math 1 in 10000 infected people die using Mish’s and Oxford’s conclusions. Is my math correct? Does it coincide with the reported mortality rate? Seems lower than the reported mortality rate.
Italy’s population is about 60,500,000. Assuming everyone in Italy has been infected, 1 in 10,000 results in 6,050 deaths. Italy has over 8,000 dead and counting. It is probably a gross overstatement to say even half of Italy’s population has been infected. Accordingly, either far more than 1 in 10 die in the hospital and Mish has been very optimistic, or Oxford’s numbers are way off. Either way, that doesn’t bode well for the body count. My guess is Oxford was trying to model outcomes and has fallen victim to the garbage in, garbage out outcome. It is easier to track hospitalizations and ultimate deaths since they are known quantities unlike infection rates.
Yes, but it is relevant to note that a very high percent of the deaths in Italy are a) over 80 and b) with one or more critical health conditions.
The real data to get is: how much extra death is happening per month compared to normal death rate? This is important because although many of those dying are indeed testing positive for CV, how many of them are highly vulnerable to dying soon in any case? The only way to guestimate this is to compare current death rate to the typical death rate.
According to one Swiss analyst, so far in Italy there is no discernible difference. What IS different is:
a) people are all over this thing data-wise whereas with flu (same number of deaths in Italy this year) nobody is publishing those numbers every day and
b) if you get bad pneumonia from it, it’s super-nasty albeit
c) apparently there are quite a few different strains (which tests don’t reveal unfortunately), so only a small percentage of those who get it have the really bad outcomes which are truly scary
d) most diseases don’t get 24/7 hyperbolic coverage. More people will die of AIDS this year in US than of the virus, most likely (assuming the HCQ cocktail works soon).
I’ve seen Italian mayors saying the deaths this year far exceed last year excluding the COVID patients. In other words, they suspect people are dying at home of COVID but never being diagnosed. Perhaps they all would die soon anyway, but there is significant underreporting of actual COVID deaths. COVID certainly gets a lot of coverage, but there is a corresponding push to trivialize the death of the elderly and say it’s no big deal. Good luck to humanity if that’s where we’re at.
The reality is that everyone is grasping for data that supports the outcome they want. For example, you say the flu killed as many people in Italy this year. How can you assert that if COVID deaths are still climbing? Hopefully they start to fall soon, but today set a new high and your comment suggests you know the future.
I just looked up annual AIDS deaths in the US and I saw 13,000. You can’t be serious if you think the US will see under 13,000 COVID deaths. We’ll be lucky to see under 52,000 at this point (which I’ll admit is an average flu season). However, I’m open to a different AIDS figure if you have one.
My ongoing observation is that many people downplay this, and human life, largely based on Chinese “data” and they are consistently wrong. I hope they are right very soon because the bodies are piling up.
I also added a possible alternate trend line for US deaths on the lead chart
Addendum
The NY trends are more than a bit quirky.
I added this comment above “The NY death trend is undoubtedly high as it is ahead of the entire US. The US trends are far more likely to be accurate than the US trends.”
Not hard to imagine when you consider the amount of people riding the subway who use elevators in enclosed buildings. How much time is the average New Yorker cooped up in those buildings? Subways, elevators, and office buildings are the key.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Thursday that his stay-at-home order for the entirety of New York State was “probably not the best public health strategy.”
In a press conference in Albany, Cuomo said the smartest way forward would be a public health strategy that complemented a “get-back-to-work strategy.”
If you rethought that or had time to analyze that public health strategy, I don’t know that you would say quarantine everyone,” Cuomo admitted. “I don’t even know that that was the best public health policy.“
Cuomo stressed the need for both public health and economic growth. “We have to do both,” said the governor. “We’re working on it.”
Mish and Karl Denninger are on totally opposite sides on this, which is kind of unusual.
Karl Denninger is a hateful lunatic who makes endless violent threats and screams everything and can’t get through a post without bringing up anal sex. Keep that in mind.
Denninger is a fool in many ways. I realized this years ago.
Denninger is a tough guy to read. “You are Stupid, I Know Everything” is his style and it is tiring. He may be onto something, but I can’t take it. Mish I enjoy.
Wow, I stopped reading Denninger 10 years ago. But now I am in complete agreement with him. He is spot on with this and Mish is just trying to sow more chaos and panic.
He is arrogant but that is not relevant to the argument. On this issue he is correct. Running around like chicken little, shutting the economy entirely down, spreading fear with no real data is a horrible tactic.
Possible to bury with a bulldozer as in past wars.
Hei Mish, are you conflating the New York and US Trends? Take a look at the 10k number of deaths. Perhaps I am reading them wrong.
Thanks excellent observation.
I added this comment: “The NY death trend is undoubtedly high as it is ahead of the entire US. The US trends are far more likely to be accurate than the US trends. “
I also chopped off the lead chart on display. It now fits.
According to the CDC, there were 80,000 deaths in the US during the 2018 flu season.
Projections for the 2019-2020 season were between 29 and 59 thousand.
I know this Covid19 – SARS- COV2 is not the common flu, however are deaths from Covid19 being lumped in with common flu deaths?
During 2019 there were 89,000 deaths attributed to diabetes (death certificates)
Approx 10-11% of US citizens have diabetes – a high risk group for Covid19.
That’s for some perspective.
We can’t see what sort of death statistic that will eventuate at the end of this virus cycle.
If you look at the world meters corona virus site you can see the Column for Cases with an outcome. Recovered and deaths.
That’s the important statistic. The death rate is currently 16%
“I know this Covid19 – SARS- COV2 is not the common flu, however are deaths from Covid19 being lumped in with common flu deaths?” – not likely, as they test for Covid-19 in hospitals.
“If you look at the world meters corona virus site you can see the Column for Cases with an outcome. Recovered and deaths. That’s the important statistic. The death rate is currently 16%” – no it’s not. 16% is too high; Google this.
The 16% number resolved cases is far higher than the ultimate CFR for one simple reason. People who die tend to die quickly, in 1-2 weeks. People who survive take an average of 5-6 weeks to get well and be declared “cured”.
13% who gets the virus need hospitalization, 10% of those die, for a 1.3% death rate of those who are infected.
That’s true, but because hospitals will ONLY handle coronavirus, people dying from other diseases might be exposed to shrapnels and die as well.
I don’t think we can say with 95% confidence, Z-value 1.96, that X% get the virus and Y% die. That’s why all estimates including the ones I did at Marginal Revolution and including this Superforecasters site: link to goodjudgment.io (350k Americans will die within a year of Covid-19 is the consensus forecast) are guestimates only. It’s not yet an exact science, but the precautionary principle–same as in global warming–applies: better safe than sorry. I don’t see the “it’s just a flu” people volunteering to contract Covid-19 for the sake of immunity and to show how tough they are. I
We do not know how many people have been infected. We only know how many people present at the hospital and are given tests. The test itself is highly inaccurate. So we don’t know the death rate nor have any clue of the number of cases. We only know the serious cases which present to a hospital.
Most places I have tracked is 15% to 20% hospitalization. NY is at 15% hospitalization rate and New Orleans is right around 30% right now. They re getting hammered, about out of beds, and they are only a few weeks into this.
That being said, I think anyone who is hospitalized with COVID-19 will probably agree that extreme measures need to be taken.
Most people talk about the death rate but what about the permanent lung damage and future medical bills or disability payments that will be paid by future taxes.
I have a friend who was crippled by polio. He caught polio just a few months before they started deploying the vaccine.
A state that shows 30% hospitalization is like a country that does. That just means under-testing and/or underreporting of cases. If Louisiana is reporting 30% hospitalization, they probably have about 2.3x as many cases as they have identified.
Was reading a ZH thread yesterday where groups of people were calling the virus a hoax, with a high like-to-dislike ratio. Interestingly, that same thread also doubled as a Flat Earth circle jerk, with similar numbers of likes on those comments.
People are going to call the pandemic a hoax to the bitter, bitter end. Admitting error is verboten in our culture, so they’ll be doing Kevin Bacon “all is well” impressions the whole way. It’s all a big conspiracy against Trump by the blue team, the media, and the Chinese, Russians, Iranians, Europeans, Israelis, Turks, Indians, and everybody else. If only they’d get out of the way Trump could MAGA!
You pretty much nailed it. It’s America in a nutshell, one reason my kids will go to private schools. American ingenuity has done a lot, but the ignorance of Americans compared to most Europeans is appalling (not that Europeans are that much smarter; I read in Germany the youth had ‘corona parties’ where they cough on each other and on older people)
How you make the leap to private schools I don’t know. It depends on where you live whether private schools are a good idea. Where I am, the public schools are among the best in the nation, comparing favorably even to Scandinavian schools, while the most popular private schools in the area (Catholic) pay the teachers much less, have much looser accreditation standards, and generally are just a way for Catholics to isolate themselves and pretend like they’re better somehow. Enrollment in those schools is dropping, rightly so.
I read ZH as well and I honestly think a lot of those people are doing that for the lulz
I don’t really think they believe it.
I could be wrong….
but WHAT ISN”T GOVT TELLING US???
seems when herd with c-19 is allowed to mull around it mutates into L strain(deadly)
but GOVT isn’t telling us this BIO-WEAPON is mutating into very deadly strains
in mean time – global economy is dead, govts throwing fake money at herds
blowing up govt debt and FED BAILING OUT HEDGE FUNDS with $12,000,000,000,000 you aren’t hearing about unless you’re part of bailout
About that alleged UK improvement touted moments ago to my last post ….
Unfortunately pictures not uploading still. Here is a link to a 4-part Tweet
2/4 -This is not the case. Indeed, if anything, our latest estimates suggest that the virus is slightly more transmissible than we previously thought. Our lethality estimates remain unchanged.
I think most people around the country get it now or have at least sobered up. We know by now Trump isn’t the President you really want in this type of crisis scenario. You need someone who is a bit more sober and lot less political. There is going to be a lot of pain, heartache and death in the coming weeks. I would not wish this virus on anyone as it has become more unpredictable and erratic in how it affects people of all ages. I’m hopeful that they are able to get a treatment protocol that works very soon or that the virus starts dying off because of the warmer weather. No country has the sheer capacity to handle tsunami that is coming as no system was setup for this type of pandemic.
Exponential numbers have a way of sobering up. That’s how these ‘dumb’ vectors multiply. Even Dr. Ferguson (UK) overestimated Covid-19 new cases (he said a month ago the UK would have 100k new cases a day, hasn’t happened). BTW Ferguson himself caught Covid-19 while fighting it.
I don’t see Covid-19 skeptics volunteering to be infected with the disease (since you get temporary immunity for 1-2 years if you survive it, just like the common cold). Especially when it might cause long-term health problems even male infertility. Precautionary principle–same as in global warming–applies here. Why take a chance if you don’t have to? Sadly however, Trump et al’s negligence means, de facto, probably 60% of us will contract Covid-19 before the infection peters out. I hope I’m in the 40%, but there’s no telling, as random stuff happens. I live part of the year in the Philippines (I’m a European) and despite my best efforts at sanitation–and this is common around the farms where I live–I caught the scary but harmless L. ascaris worm (giant roundworm), 15 inches long, no symptoms whatsoever, what a surprise in the bowl that was, because s*it happens. A PH doctor told me he takes a deworming pill once a year as a precaution, sometimes he gets a worm, sometimes not. Same with Covid-19. All the feel good advice about wearing masks and washing hands is helpful, but frankly, it won’t guarantee you won’t catch Covid-19 before this is over.
The sickest of the sick admitted to hospitals. 10% die.
And that 10% is based on still-functioning hospitals. When there is partial staffing due to illness (due to lack of PPE), and no ventilators available, and perhaps no beds–what do you think the death rate will be then?
Google the phrase “pest houses”.
In a pinch, those empty NFL football stadiums can be converted to temporary field hospitals, “Wuhan style”…and probably will be. I’m maintaining my short positions in the stock market. DJ-30 to 15k then 10k IMO before the crisis is over.
WHAT ISN’T GOVT TELLING US ABOUT THIS bio-weapon
OTHERWISE FLU LIKE MUTATION s WOULDN’T BE BIG DEAL
BUT MUTATION L IS huge DEAL
I trust your data!
I hope the maniacal deniers are not out infecting innocent people.