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United States Medicine Stats

1.5% of All Americans Have Been Infected With Coronavirus - 5 Million Cases (apnews.com) 379

Confirmed coronavirus cases in the U.S. hit 5 million on Sunday, reports the Associated Press, "by far the highest of any country..."

"The failure of the most powerful nation in the world to contain the scourge has been met with astonishment and alarm in Europe." Perhaps nowhere outside the U.S. is America's bungled virus response viewed with more consternation than in Italy, which was ground zero of Europe's epidemic. Italians were unprepared when the outbreak exploded in February, and the country still has one of the world's highest official death tolls at 35,000. But after a strict nationwide, 10-week lockdown, vigilant tracing of new clusters and general acceptance of mask mandates and social distancing, Italy has become a model of virus containment. "Don't they care about their health?" a mask-clad Patrizia Antonini asked about people in the United States as she walked with friends along the banks of Lake Bracciano, north of Rome. "They need to take our precautions. ... They need a real lockdown."

Much of the incredulity in Europe stems from the fact that America had the benefit of time, European experience and medical know-how to treat the virus that the continent itself didn't have when the first COVID-19 patients started filling intensive care units. Yet, more than four months into a sustained outbreak, the U.S. reached the 5 million mark, according to the running count kept by Johns Hopkins University. Health officials believe the actual number is perhaps 10 times higher, or closer to 50 million, given testing limitations and the fact that as many as 40% of all those who are infected have no symptoms....

With America's world's-highest death toll of more than 160,000, its politicized resistance to masks and its rising caseload, European nations have barred American tourists and visitors from other countries with growing cases from freely traveling to the bloc. France and Germany are now imposing tests on arrival for travelers from "at risk" countries, the U.S. included.

America has just 44% of the population of Europe — but 77% of its confirmed virus deaths, according to stats in the article from John Hopkins University. (It cites "America's world's-highest death toll of more than 160,000," while noting that the entire continent of Europe has over 207,000 confirmed virus deaths.) "In the U.S., new cases are running at about 54,000 a day — an immensely high number even when taking into account the country's larger population."

1 out of every 67 Americans has now had a confirmed infection.
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1.5% of All Americans Have Been Infected With Coronavirus - 5 Million Cases

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  • by ELCouz ( 1338259 ) on Sunday August 09, 2020 @12:59PM (#60382773)
    Virus was there way before test kit were released. I'm not surprised if 30 % of Americans got it in December / January. I suspect that I got it in early January, 1 week of intense symptoms almost wanted to go to the hospital.
    • by djbckr ( 673156 )

      Virus was there way before test kit were released. I'm not surprised if 30 % of Americans got it in December / January. I suspect that I got it in early January, 1 week of intense symptoms almost wanted to go to the hospital.

      And you can verify this hypothesis? Your post is invalid unless you can verify that you actually had it. My wife had something pretty bad for a while in December too. I didn't develop anything from her sickness. I'm in the high-risk category. It crossed my mind that she had COVID, but I don't think it was.

    • If 30% of Americans got it in December/January, USA would have another 500000 dead in just three months. Half a million dead is kind of difficult to miss.

  • by hdyoung ( 5182939 ) on Sunday August 09, 2020 @01:06PM (#60382809)
    From what I've read, every time someone does a population-level sampling and compares it to the number of confirmed cases, it's around a 10:1 ratio. That means that 50 million have been exposed or infected, most of them just fighting it off normally.

    That's more than 10% of the population. 6 weeks ago, it was plausible that I could move around a store and NOT be exposed to the virus. But 10% population means that I can't avoid it anymore, unless I take isolation extremely seriously. And... as we know.... maybe this is good, maybe this is bad, or maybe it's something in between, but Americans are absolute crap at following rules unless they are encoded into law and enforced by fines or prison sentences.

    If that's true, we might be right at the start of an inflection point where the number of cases quickly transitions from low-levels to saturation/herd-immunity.

    Whew. This fall might be a wild frikkin ride. We might reach herd immunity well before treatments or immunizations are available. People might think that sounds good, but remember, the overall death rate for this thing is roughly 10 times that of the flu. We're going to be dealing with several mountain-sized corpse pills before we reach that point.
    • by ELCouz ( 1338259 )
      We can't trust numbers! Covid-19 was there in North America before test kit where issued.
      • They way they tested gets around this. The two I read about... one was in NYC and the other in Italy. They actually went to a population and did truly random/blind sampling that was statistically significant enough to get a decent "this % of the population has ACTUALLY been exposed" number. They then compared it to the "this % has TESTED POSITIVE" number. The ratio was like 8:1 if I recall correctly.

        If this is the case, we're going to reach herd immunity quickly. However, THIS IS NOT A GOOD THING becau
    • Overall ratio of deaths to cases in the U.S. is 3.2%
      • If you go with the high-end of the WHO's estimate of a 1.0% case-fatality rate (including estimated asymptomatic people), then the actual infection rate is 3.2x higher than measured.
      • If you go with the CDC's estimate of a 0.4% case-fatality rate, then the actual infection rate is 8x higher than measured.

      There are only two possible outcomes here. Either enough people get infected via natural spread, fight it off, and develop immunity until we kill off

      • There are only two possible outcomes here. Either enough people get infected via natural spread, fight it off, and develop immunity until we kill off the virus via herd immunity. Or wait until a vaccine is developed, and enough people inoculated to kill off the virus via herd immunity.

        Actually there is a third option, that immune response does not last long, making immunization short lived and herd immunity unlikely. I know it's not a convenient idea but it would be wrong to exclude it from rational decision making until you know better.

      • by dryeo ( 100693 )

        We've never killed off a virus through herd immunity, at least in recent history. Even with vaccinations, we've killed off exactly one virus, smallpox.
        I've had measles, chickenpox, mumps, whooping cough, various colds, various flus, various noraviruses at least. All viruses that are/were prevalent enough to cause herd immunity and some now have vaccines but along with others such as polio, are still around.

    • From what I've read, every time someone does a population-level sampling and compares it to the number of confirmed cases, it's around a 10:1 ratio. That means that 50 million have been exposed or infected, most of them just fighting it off normally.

      That is not a number particularly many scientists agree on. The evidence strongly suggests that the asymptomatic rate is much closer to 45%.

      Some antibody studies have suggested much higher rates, however its been demonstrated that many of those antibody tests wi

  • by bumblebees ( 1262534 ) on Sunday August 09, 2020 @01:12PM (#60382837)
    I think one key issue is Europe have mostly free healthcare. If you go and get medical aid in US you will get a medical bill that usually is not very smal. And this will cause many to not seek medical aid unless they are in risk of falling down dead there on the spot. The same reason people call a UBER instead of aa Ambulance. And Europeans don't have that idiotic idea of "Freedom!" Americans are brainwashed with since birth. And i don't mean freedom itself that is great, i mean the idea that "nobody can tell me what to do" freedom. And i guess no European country is blessed with such a moron of leader either helps a bit.
    • by MrL0G1C ( 867445 )

      And i guess no European country is blessed with such a moron of leader either helps a bit.

      I'll give you that but our Boris comes close and up to now we (UK) have a higher death rate although it looks like US will pass us on that metric.

    • I think one key issue is Europe have mostly free healthcare. If you go and get medical aid in US you will get a medical bill that usually is not very smal. And this will cause many to not seek medical aid unless they are in risk of falling down dead there on the spot.

      The numbers contradict this. If Americans weren't bothering to get tested until they were dealthly ill, you'd expect to see fewer reported cases but more deaths. i.e. A higher percentage of cases turning into deaths. If you calculate ratio o [worldometers.info]

  • by sdinfoserv ( 1793266 ) on Sunday August 09, 2020 @01:29PM (#60382895)
    Even here, on a media site supposedly dedicated to “tech”, there’s arguing, infighting, wrong information, opinion over fact, Zero social conscience or community respect. Face it, tech isn’t for brain damaged. If the smart people are so distracted by pollical nonsense, the US is toast. Since when did a virus that kills people, and protection from it (like wear a damn mask!!) become a matter of politics and rights? Clue: it isn’t. The US can’t work together to accomplish anything anymore. We’re a global laughing stock and our ignorance/arrogance scares the sh!t out of the planet. I predict within a decade rest of the planet has had enough of our infighting and drops the dollar as the reserve currency. That is the moment the collapse of empire begins. We don’t make or produce anything anymore. Loss of control over the reserve currency instantly means nothing is affordable. Look out kiddos, it gets scary from there on.
  • Regardless of what Trump did it was severe negligence at the CDC for producing non working tests. The test quality at the CDC was so poor that college grad students could have done better, it is so bad it almost looks intentional. Then the FDA blocked the good tests that worked because they are inflexible and murderously incompetent. When you have a pandemic you just ignore the normal procedures and you let the testing you have available be used immediately because you have to start testing right away for your contact tracing to work . So these two factors really rise up to the level of criminal incompetence.

    The second factor was Trump and Pence Who were believing the virus was a hoax and they didnt need to worry about it, that it would disappear, that it would only affect Dem states, that it was just the sniffles, etc. So, Trump ignored it and went to the golf course. If we had a competent detail oriented president, he would have demanded readliness information from the CDC for the huge numbers of tests that would be needed and would have fired if necessary the FDA director and put in someone who would get testing approved in a day or two or an EO to immediately approve all testing systems for immediate use.

    Trump still does not seem to understand testing., because he does not seem to know that the point of testing is to find asymptomatic carriers so you need to contact trace and test everyone who was within 10 feet of an infected person using the cell phone apps. It is not to confirm people are infected only after they get symptoms. If you do the latter you are basically DOING NOTHING.

    Redfield is certainly culpable for failing, and Fauci had to have known as well and yet from the beginning he gave little or no warning or sound advice. This is more than an honest mistake, this is severe malpractice of public health.

    Ig you do what all of these criminals did not then you can be like Taiwan who has no new cases, very few deaths, by tracing, testing, sanitizing, masking, thermcamming the virus out.

  • by nospam007 ( 722110 ) * on Sunday August 09, 2020 @01:54PM (#60383007)

    'More than half of people who received hospital treatment for Covid-19 were found to be suffering from a psychiatric disorder a month later, a study has found.'

    https://www.theguardian.com/wo... [theguardian.com]

  • by VeryFluffyBunny ( 5037285 ) on Sunday August 09, 2020 @01:56PM (#60383021)
    It looks like after decades of gridlock, incompetence, & inaction from administrations & congressmen have left the American public with a severe case of learned helplessness: Even though there is a feasible way to cut down the rates of infection & contain the disease, too many people are arguing that it's pointless & they should just let people die or suffer permanent lung, heart, & brain damage. The economic impact is worldwide & it's already been done. It'll be worse when you have 100,000s (even millions?) of people suffering the effects of COVID-19 & needing medical care for the rest of their lives. What kind of miserable society do you want to live in? What kind of people are you?
  • by crunchygranola ( 1954152 ) on Sunday August 09, 2020 @02:38PM (#60383131)

    The AP story states that there are 5 million confirmed SARS-C0V-2 infections, which is well known -- by now -- are people who have had positive tests, and most of these people were ones who were significantly symptomatic. The portion that has been infected in much higher. One of the best models of the pandemic in the U.S. is one maintained by Youyang Gu who has a very good article [covid19-projections.com] about the relationship between confirmed cases and actual infections. His model currently has a central estimate of the number of Americans ever infected at 41 million (12.7% of the population). With the current actual death toll from the virus at something like 200,000 (there is a significant undercount, much of it early in the pandemic) this suggest another ~1.5 million would die if the pandemic goes to completion.

    BTW most the number you read about when herd immunity "kicks in" are not estimates of how many would get infected, but are only the threshold were it starts to converge (die out). Even a converging infection chain can infect many people, and with the structure of the U.S. pandemic, with many lagging but uncontrolled infection areas that will export new infections to areas already above herd immunity the actual total infection rate could top 90% before the pandemic has run its course.

  • by mveloso ( 325617 ) on Sunday August 09, 2020 @06:27PM (#60383853)

    Really, for everyone who isn't high-risk the cure is worse than the disease.

    I mean, let's put you out of work, let you run out of money, and throw you out on the street. But at least you're healthy.

    Life is more than survival.

Understanding is always the understanding of a smaller problem in relation to a bigger problem. -- P.D. Ouspensky

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