61 New COVID-19 Cases and 2 Deaths

And how can your number be anywhere near valid worldwide, when it's so dependent on time and location?

But they apply well only to a given time and place, and since you have to wait for cases to resolve, they apply to a time weeks past, since current, unresolved cases aren't used. Are you now saying you're switching to fatality/case ratio? That's a much higher number.

Test results only show cases. That is, people who are known to have the virus. It doesn't necessarily say much about the prevalence of the virus in the population, especially when you have poor testing coverage.

The CDC’s infection mortality rate? Those numbers apply to anyone who gets sick...They are the CDC’s best guess using he latest data from around the world as to what your chance of living/dying from Covid if you catch it... broken down by age.

And the 24-36 hours is for the low priority (but free!) tests that you can take at the revolving testing spots in sb, Goleta, Buellton, Oxnard, arroyo grande and Pismo...

I don’t follow... why weeks? The state Tests are all coming back within 24-36 hours now... those are going straight to the cdc. So it’s not their only metric... But the CDC is finding out quite quickly and it’s a useful number to know and have (what percent are testing positive). Part of the test is background data as they are trying to learn as much from every test as possible...

So, to what particular place and time do the numbers you posted apply?

But your response would be weeks late. Again, it seems like more concrete metrics would be preferable.

In my defense I did post that earlier with appropriate labeling... I do not count the copy and paste function on the iPhone as one of my friends (And on a side note: yes I did fail several courses in college.. though I think those were more attendance related than unit labeling related... not 100% sure... It was a wild sophomore year!!!).

Yes, it varies by place... But that’s quite useful! And you don’t have to wait for things to resolve. If % testing positive crosses a certain threshold you can implement a localized response. So say you get A spike in New Jersey, it doesn’t necessitate the closure of a school in Goleta kind of thing.

But percent testing positive varies by time and place. Such a number would only be valid for a certain local area, and only valid for an earlier time, since it would depend on cases having resolved (per 9:15 pm), which takes at least a couple of weeks.

In a rapidly changing pandemic environment, that doesn't seem to be a particulary good number to use for decision making.

@ 8:49 PM: For the purposes of these numbers, they actually do know the number of "infected". These appear to be mortality rates, which are derived by observing the outcomes from a given number of "infected" individuals. For example, you have 1000 people over the age of 70 who have tested positive for CV. 54 of these people eventually die, presumably from CV, and 946 of them recover completely. The mortality rate would be: Mortality = (deaths)/(deaths + recoveries) = (54)/(54 + 946) = 0.054 deaths/"infection". It's important to note that "infection" here are those which have had a concluded outcome, either died or recovered. It's important not to use derive a mortality rate based exclusively on positive tests, since the outcome of a positive test is ambiguous unless otherwise stated. However, in terms of infections among the general public, all of the CV test currently being approved via the FDA's EUA are using a 5% prevalence among the general population.

percent testing positive is the big indicator as it lets you make some quite reasonable assumptions on how many untested people are positive (the general sentiment being that when that number crosses 10%, containment in that area is going to be tough as it’s raging).

@ 8:25 PM: It reminds me of being a TA in grad school and all the careless students who turned in unitless numbers or plots without labeled axes. They usually ended up failing the course. I think these are mortality rates, prior to being converted into percentages. The units would then be "deaths/infections".

Also, given that the infection incidence is so variable from location to location, say comparing here to the White House, and also varies greatly over time, since this seems to be a super-spreader driven virus, rather than straight Rnought, how can anyone come up with a valid "vanilla" number that applies to the whole country?

How do they come up with the denominator (the number infected) without knowing how many people are infected, since not everyone has been tested, and various studies have come up with wildly different estimates of the prevalence of the disease in the general population?

Good point!!!!

It’s the CDC’s Infection Fatality Ratio

So if you are 70+, the CDC believes that if you catch Covid (on average) you have a 5.4% chance of dying from this thing (and on the other end, if you are 0-19 they are predicting you have a .003% chance). The CDC is averaging it out at .5% over all who get infected, which is a tad lower than the WHO (along with a few of the European and Asian models I’ve seen, which mostly say .55 to .65%).

Without giving the units you're working with for numerator and denominator to come up with those numbers, that's a pretty meaningless post! Are they furlongs per fortnight?

1:27: What a bizarre attitude. The fact that Utah's hospitals are being overwhelmed by the pandemic, and they may have to start triage on incoming patients isn't newsworthy? Just be glad you don't live in a state that resisted public health advice for so long, and instead in one took steps to keep its citizens safer. Assuming you even live in California, and not Russia.

Glad you brought up Utah. Their hospitalizations per million are lower than NJ's currently and they still do not have a statewide mask mandate. A lot of panic porn out there right now regarding Utah's covid hospitalizations, be careful what you read in the media (disclaimer: the media is not a news organization but a FOR PROFIT enterprise with the #1 goal of making money. Do you think a headline that reads "everting is OK" or "Utah hospitals could start rationing health care" would make them more money via clicks, ads and viewers? )

Utah is already implementing the dreaded "death panels" that repubs warned us about in the 90s when they were trying to offer universal healthcare. But this time it is the repubs implementing them, so it is okay, I guess. Don't tell anyone about your underlying health conditions when you go to the hospital or they might put you on the soylent green list.

Just want to applaud this post... that’s good Humor!!

Do you mean this quote?

A 1% mortality rate “means it is 10-times more lethal than the seasonal flu,” Fauci said. “I think that’s something people can get their arms around and understand.”

Last time I checked in 2020 the flu had killed more people under the age of 18 than Covid. The stats show for the young, the flu is more dangerous. This is the opposite for the elderly as covid is much earlier than the flu. The elderly get both ends of the short stick as the flu is also very dangerous for them.

Table 3 of https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid_weekly/index.htm#Comorbidities

Dr. Fauci says covid is at least 10 times more deadly than the worst flu virus since the 1918 pandemic.

These days, almost everyone has a qualifying underlying health condition due to the general poor health of our population. Lots of people are overweight, for example.

DUKEMUNSON for the WIN today! HAHA! Yessssss!

There have been at least 21 deaths of people without underlying conditions. I have been keeping a spreadsheet of deaths as reported by the PHD.

99 yes, 21 no, 6 unknown (not reported)

The truth is somewhere in the middle. Always remember that.