IMHO, the real danger is not mortality, but the morbidity. In our sustems based society, what happens if %25 of the population is ill leading to an abseenteeism rate of ~ 40% (sick + those staying home to take care of the sick kids & spouses + the worried well).
Supermarkets have about 18 hours of food for normal demand, gas stations have ~ 2 days of supply. Everything from ATMs to downed powerlines need a human in the loop and we currently run at 99% capacity in most systems as there is no profit on redundancy and slack.
In Colorado, we had a small dress rehearsal a couple of years ago when we had back to back weekend blizzards. Food stores had great difficulty re-stocking. As an indicator of the inconnectivity, there were new stories about travelers stranded at Heathrow when Denver shut down.
My favorite failed system thought? The Methamphetamine distribution “system”. Oh yeah, note to self: Buy more 00 Buck...
Yes, I agree completely and should have included that in my post. Higher fatality rates will probably indicate more people struggling with more severe and debilitating symptoms, and as you point out greatly increased morbidity.
There are some similarities between the trajectory of this flu and what happened in 1918 - early outbreaks in the spring, with manageable outcomes then a lull in the summer, then it struck with a vengeance in the late-fall. I don't think we are going to see anything remotely as bad as then, but even with disease that's only fractionally as dangerous will cause problems in the modern era that didn't exist back then.