Are we not taking Covid-19 seriously

[DG_player]

Originally Posted by DavidSauls

Positive tests, as a ratio of population, are 4.5%.

Your county sucks btw. My county is at 1.5% and we're mostly urban!

[dysmike]

Originally Posted by DG_player

If you're saying 4.5% of your population has tested positive to date, then yes if the 10x estimate is correct 45% are or have been infected in the past. If it's 5x then only 22.5%. I'm guessing it's pretty varied across the country though depending on when the cases happened and the accessibility of tests. The ratio was probably much high early on than it is now just given the availability of testing.

That would be infection rate, not positivity rate. Because of our rather bad testing policies we don't know infection rate.

[DG_player]

Originally Posted by dysmike

That would be infection rate, not positivity rate. Because of our rather bad testing policies we don't know infection rate.

I read it as ( confirmed cases to date) / ( total population), not positivity rate, maybe he can clarify.

[dysmike]

Originally Posted by DG_player

I read it as ( confirmed cases ) / ( total population), not positivity rate, maybe he can clarify.

Unless they're doing 100% testing, that is testing the ENTIRE population.. it's positivity.

[Monocacy]

Originally Posted by DavidSauls

Positive tests, as a ratio of population, are 4.5%. If the true rate is 10x that, does it mean that almost half the county population has been infected?

The 10x estimate is based on number of cases, not the percent positive tests. So if your county has 1,000 active cases identified by testing, the 10x estimate would be that there are 10,000 active cases (1,000 identified by testing, and 9,000 infected but not tested).

When the positivity rate is low, say in the 2-3% range, 5x cases might be a better estimate than 10x cases. Might being the operative word, of course.

Presumably most of the non-tested cases are either asymptomatic, have mild symptoms, or perhaps lack access to testing.

[dysmike]

BTW, all of this is why having to have symptoms to get tested is a bad idea. It creates huge amounts of confusion in analysis.

[Jay Dub]

Yesterday we (Ohio people) were told our rates are 2.5X the national rate. I'm pretty sure that's based on reported numbers. I also have no idea what's wrong with us that makes it this way.

[Monocacy]

Originally Posted by DiscFifty

I tend to agree there could be 5-10x the number of actual active cases reported. Still a bit confused if that would be a good or bad thing. The death rate would be much lower for instance.

The CDC is using the following best estimates for infection fatality ratio, by age range:

0-19 years: 0.00003
20-49 years: 0.0002
50-69 years: 0.005
70+ years: 0.054

Note that those are ratios, not percentages.

Edit: Keep in mind that there are 80 million people in the U.S. aged 50-69, so an 0.5% infection fatality rate and 70% infections is still 280,000 dead middle-aged people.

COVID-19 Pandemic Planning Scenarios | CDC

[dysmike]

Originally Posted by Monocacy

The CDC is using the following best estimates for infection fatality ratio, by age range:

0-19 years: 0.00003
20-49 years: 0.0002
50-69 years: 0.005
70+ years: 0.054

Note that those are ratios, not percentages.

COVID-19 Pandemic Planning Scenarios | CDC

It'd be interesting to know what the untreated fatality rate is. But not enough to actually measure it. (mostly because, for example, we know the treated and untreated fatality rates for bubonic plague, and many other historic plagues)

[Monocacy]

Originally Posted by dysmike

It'd be interesting to know what the untreated fatality rate is. But not enough to actually measure it. (mostly because, for example, we know the treated and untreated fatality rates for bubonic plague, and many other historic plagues)

Best estimate for somewhat-untreated fatality rate would probably be from early days in Wuhan. I'm sure someone has crunched those numbers but I'm not volunteering to look it up.