**FluBros and FluBras!!** (A place to see the Butchers Bill of "It's Just the Flu"

As of April 14, 2020, CDC case counts and death counts include both confirmed and probable cases and deaths. This change was made to reflect an interim COVID-19 position statement issued by the Council for State and Territorial Epidemiologists on April 5, 2020.

And which PDF states (added bold emphasis by me),

A probable case or death is defined by one of the following:

Meeting clinical criteria AND epidemiologic evidence with no confirmatory laboratory testing performed for COVID-19
Meeting presumptive laboratory evidence AND either clinical criteria OR epidemiologic evidence
Meeting vital records criteria with no confirmatory laboratory testing performed for COVID19

Not all jurisdictions report confirmed and probable cases and deaths to CDC. When not available to CDC, it is noted as N/A.

What Clinical Criteria and epidemiologic evidence means, respectively, is explained in the probable case or deathlink:

CSTE realizes that field investigations will involve evaluations of persons with no symptoms and these individuals will need to be counted as cases.

Clinical Criteria

At least two of the following symptoms: fever (measured or subjective), chills, rigors, myalgia, headache, sore throat, new olfactory and taste disorder(s)

At least one of the following symptoms: cough, shortness of breath, or difficulty breathing

Severe respiratory illness with at least one of the following:

Clinical or radiographic evidence of pneumonia, OR
Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS).

AND

No alternative more likely diagnosis

Epidemiologic Linkage

One or more of the following exposures in the 14 days before onset of symptoms:

Close contact** with a confirmed or probable case of COVID-19 disease; OR
Close contact** with a person with:
- clinically compatible illness AND
- linkage to a confirmed case of COVID-19 disease.
Travel to or residence in an area with sustained, ongoing community transmission of SARS-CoV-2.
Member of a risk cohort as defined by public health authorities during an outbreak.

**Close contact is defined as being within 6 feet for at least a period of 10 minutes to 30 minutes or more depending upon the exposure. In healthcare settings, this may be defined as exposures of greater than a few minutes or more. Data are insufficient to precisely define the duration of exposure that constitutes prolonged exposure and thus a close contact.

Which among other scenarios, means that a person that may be listed as a COVID-19 case if the person simply has a cough (for that alone qualifies as Clinical Criteria if there is no other more likely diagnosis) and has simply traveled to an area with sustained, ongoing community transmission of SARS-CoV-2, for that alone qualifies as Epidemiologic Linkage, and only one of each meets the qualification listing a death as COVID-19. <

And with money being involved, then liberal attribution of COVID-19 cases and deaths should be presumed in this fallen world, the reaction to it is unprecedented in America.

For as even USA Today affirmed,

Hospitals and doctors do get paid more for Medicare patients diagnosed with COVID-19 or if it's considered presumed they have COVID-19 absent a laboratory-confirmed test, and three times more if the patients are placed on a ventilator to cover the cost of care and loss of business resulting from a shift in focus to treat COVID-19 cases. [https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2020/04/24/fact-check-medicare-hospitals-paid-more-covid-19-patients-coronavirus/3000638001/]

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