Posted on 04/22/2020 10:27:30 AM PDT by Kaslin
When she announced the startling results of a new COVID-19 study on Monday, Los Angeles County's top public health official emphasized that the number of infections far exceeds the official count of confirmed cases. She underplayed another important implication of the study: COVID-19 seems to be far less deadly than many people feared.
The way Department of Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer framed the study's results raises a question that policymakers across the country will confront as they consider when and how to loosen sweeping restrictions aimed at curtailing the COVID-19 epidemic. Will they be guided by emerging evidence, or will they use it to support the policies they already favored?
The Los Angeles County study, conducted by University of Southern California researchers in collaboration with Ferrer's department, tested a representative sample of 863 adults for antibodies to the virus in early April. About 4% of them tested positive, indicating that the number of adults in the county who had been infected by the virus was roughly 40 times the number of confirmed cases at the time.
Confirmed cases are limited to people who have tested positive for the virus, and testing so far has been skewed toward people with severe symptoms. Since people infected by the virus typically experience mild to no symptoms, it is not surprising that the official tally understates the number of infections, although the apparent size of the gap is striking.
"These results indicate that many persons may have been unknowingly infected and at risk of transmitting the virus to others," Ferrer said. "These findings underscore the importance of expanded (virus) testing to diagnose those with infection so they can be isolated and quarantined, while also maintaining the broad social distancing interventions."
Since the number of infections in Los Angeles County is much higher than the official numbers indicate, Ferrer told reporters, the risk of transmission is higher than expected, which reinforces the case for aggressive control measures, including broad business closure and stay-at-home orders. At the same time, she said, the fact that 95% or so of the county's adult population remains uninfected shows those measures are working.
In other words, no matter what the actual prevalence of the virus is, and no matter how you look at it, that information justifies maintaining the statewide lockdown. One wonders what conceivable results from the antibody study might have caused Ferrer to reconsider the wisdom of that policy.
The question is especially pressing in light of the fatality rate implied by the study. In contrast with the current crude case fatality rate of about 4.5%, Ferrer said, the study suggests that 0.1% to 0.2% of people infected by the virus will die, which would make COVID-19 only somewhat more deadly than the seasonal flu.
That finding is consistent with the results of an earlier antibody study in Santa Clara County. "The mortality rate now has dropped a lot," Ferrer conceded.
That point, assuming it is confirmed by other studies, surely should figure in any cost-benefit analysis of lockdowns, which are depriving millions of Americans of their liberty and livelihoods in the hope of saving lives. Politicians who supported those restrictions were powerfully influenced by terrifying projections of COVID-19 deaths that assumed a fatality rate at least four times as high as the data from Los Angeles County and Santa Clara County suggest.
Those projections also assumed "no intervention," referring not just to lockdowns but also to narrower regulations as well as voluntary precautions such as hand-washing, using face masks, limiting social interactions, avoiding crowds and working from home. It was never realistic to imagine that Americans would simply carry on as usual in the face of the COVID-19 epidemic.
Policymakers right now are not choosing between lockdowns and nothing; they are choosing between lockdowns and less costly, more carefully targeted measures. That choice should be informed by evidence that undercuts their worst fears.
Hmm.
It already is.
“The Emperor’s New Plague doesn't have piled of bodies or creamatoriums blackening the sky.”
The great pumpkin didn't come.
Look this is been obvious since the get-go !!!!
how can you possibly get this virus and not even know you have it and be a “asymptomatic carrier”???
That is all you need to know about this particular virus!!!
it is not SARS it is not MERS it is not EBOLA
Now the fact that it is a novel coronavirus - meaning nobody had ever quite seen exactly before - and there is a lot of asymptomatic spread - means that it’s kind of scary and a very tough little bugger
But now it’s two months later ;we completely understand this stupid virus ; have all the test we need ; have it under control nationally ; and the administration knows this !!!!
and therefore Trump has cleverly set in motion the three stage open up America thing and delegated it back to the states - and now the liberals are going to scramble
What else?
-”Fauxi” praised use of
hydroxychloroquine in 2013 to treat the MERS corona virus
-Fauxi sent a $3.7M NIH research grant to the Wuhan lab in 2015 to fund virus research that was illegal in the U.S.
-Fauxi in 2017: President Trump Will Be Challenged By a “Surprise Global Disease Outbreak”
-Despite his 2017 prediction, Fauxi was unprepared for the 2019-2020 pandemic.
-In a Jan 2020 interview, he said, “... this is not something that the citizens of the United States right now should be worried about.” - intentional?
-Fauxi back in February said malls, gyms and movie theaters were OK.
-Fauxi on March 9 told Americans cruises were OK.
-Fauci on CNN Easter Sunday suggested President Trump should have shut down the country in February
-Fauxi opposed travel ban from China - agenda?
-Fauxi is front man for Big Pharma, pushing expensive new drugs for COVID-19, rather than inexpensive proven cures like HCQ+zinc+zpack that have been around for decades
-Fauxi is delaying tests of U.S. vaccines
-Fauxi agenda is mandated vaccines to benefit Big Pharma
-Fauxi promotes fear with exaggerated models & high death rates
-Fauxi exaggerated need for hospital ships
-Fauxi has longtime relationship with corrupt WHO director, who covers up for the CCP
-Fauxi plotted ‘Global Vaccine Action Plan’ with depopulation advocate Bill Gates, pushing COVID panic and doubts about HCQ. Big Pharma $$$s.
https://childrenshealthdefense.org/news/the-truth-about-fauci-featuring-dr-judy-mikovits/
We may or may not flatten the curve but we’ve certainly flattened the economy. The economic damage caused is not commensurate with the danger posed by the virus. The Corona mortality rate will not even show up as a peak in annual national or worldwide mortality.
Bump!
‘and therefore Trump has cleverly set in motion the three stage open up America thing and delegated it back to the states/
Trump didn’t delegate anything back to the states; they always had full control over shutdown and reopening...the only thing Trump did tweak their paranoia by claiming he did have that power...
No, no, no...according to the Chicken Freepers we are saving lives. The exact count of lives saved does not matter because according to what I hear from them everyday sounds like this:
“...the fatality rate is high, errrr we mean the case fatality rate is high, oops look at how fast it is spreading, its the number of cases that matters, The experts listen to the experts, look at our scary graphs with cases and recoveries, and for God’s sake base everything off of NYC and Italy.”
“...we are old people collecting government checks and the rest of society must protect us because we are fearful,,,”
Save
The word is out to cook the numbers, and the Rats and their local minions only know to spread fear and hate.
RE: The question is especially pressing in light of the fatality rate implied by the study. In contrast with the current crude case fatality rate of about 4.5%, Ferrer said, the study suggests that 0.1% to 0.2% of people infected by the virus will die, which would make COVID-19 only somewhat more deadly than the seasonal flu.
One factor that must be taken into consideration is we now have learned that there are DIFFERENT STRAINS of this Novel Coronavirus, one strain perhaps being more LETHAL than the other.
California and Washington might have caught the less virulent strain. New York might have caught the more deadly strain ( i.e. the Italian strain ).
The lockdowns are bullspit at this point... outside the accela corridore and a few other places, the country should be business as usual... But nope... This whole thing is politcal.
Obvious for a long time now this thing was not what it was sold as... never going to be....
“Must make masks. For my neighbors, too.”
“Let’s all find ways to be HAPPY while locked up.”
“Here, I’ve been arrested 3 times, skinny dipped once, and hate asparagus. How about you?”
(Was citing social media, not fearpers)
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