NYTimes: Overly-sensitive COVID tests are dramatically inflating case numbers

*ahem* wrote:

Lead Foil Hat wrote:

We do not test for the flu and count asymptomatic cases, if we did there would be 100x as many flu cases each year.

This is false.

The CDC officially estimated that 60.8 million Americans were infected by the 2009 flu (which eventually killed ~13,000 in twelve months). If you're saying that the CDC's estimate represented only 1% of those actually infected, then "100x as many flu cases" would work out to six-plus billion--roughly twenty times the total American population at the time.

So it is *not* the case that "[w]e do not . . . count asymptomatic cases" of the flu--UNLESS you're saying that virtually all cases of the flu are symptomatic, which we know is emphatically not the case.

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/pandemic-resources/2009-h1n1-pandemic.html

Ok buddy; the 100x was not supposed to by an exact factor, but to make a point. Still, the CDC estimate how many actual illnesses (cases) occurred, not infections with the virus; 5x, 10x, 20x, whatever it is, the point is we typically do not try to assess asymptomatic cases and count them as "cases". This time we are counting everything we can detect and adding it to the cases total even when most of these detections are so minimal that those infected will never get sick. Nice try at being a smart ass, but the point still stands as generally true; we have never tracked a single virus around the globe like we have this current corona virus and we have never counted so many asymptomatic cases as cases ever before this time, so the case data we are looking at from around the world should not be treated the same way we have treated case data in the past for other viruses because the approach for data collection is vastly different. I also like how you traded the word "infection" for the word "case" which is used in the CDC article you posted.

6 months have passed since the first official U.S. COVID-19 death in the State of Washington on February 28.

Before COVID-19, 1.45 Million U.S. deaths in those 6 months were projected to occur.

The latest number from Johns Hopkins has U.S. COVID-19 deaths at 182,789. If all those deaths are considered excess deaths, then U.S. deaths from all causes is 12.6% above the original projection for the past 6 months – assuming that the 1.45 Million did indeed die and none of them were COVID-19 deaths. The 12.6% is a number that is hard to believe. How many of the 182,789 would have died in the past 6 months if COVID-19 did not exist ?

The dangers from COVID-19 have been wildly exaggerated with the intention of inducing fear, panic and hysteria in a Presidential election year.

Duh, it's 1 BILLION to 4 BILLION.

DanM wrote:

6 months have passed since the first official U.S. COVID-19 death in the State of Washington on February 28.

Before COVID-19, 1.45 Million U.S. deaths in those 6 months were projected to occur.

The latest number from Johns Hopkins has U.S. COVID-19 deaths at 182,789. If all those deaths are considered excess deaths, then U.S. deaths from all causes is 12.6% above the original projection for the past 6 months – assuming that the 1.45 Million did indeed die and none of them were COVID-19 deaths. The 12.6% is a number that is hard to believe. How many of the 182,789 would have died in the past 6 months if COVID-19 did not exist ?

The dangers from COVID-19 have been wildly exaggerated with the intention of inducing fear, panic and hysteria in a Presidential election year.

Really surprises me the stupidity on this board. In March and April, emergency rooms and COVID wards in hospitals were overwhelmed with patients dying of COVID... that's the scenario that politicians world wide are trying to avoid and manage by social distancing measures. Most countries have either (a) managed to suppress the curve through social distancing mandates, or (b) expanded hospital capacity to cope. I.e., governments public health officials around the world are getting on top of this thing.

If public officials had done nothing (as many on this board seem to be suggesting) then (a) the curve would have been a LOT steeper and a lot more people would have been dying in waiting rooms, in their cars, and sitting at home because the hospitals couldn't have taken them.

And so many public health officials have decided they'd rather be accused of doing too much to save lives than doing too little.

Sadly, too many selfish people in America who don't care about others.

I will break it down to a simple question.

1.45 Million people should have died in the U.S. over the past 6 months.

How many people have actually died in the U.S. over the past 6 months ?

rocky mtns wrote:

The Unkle wrote:

Still waiting for someone to tell me how many Americans have died this year and how many died in the first 8 months or recent years that allows us to calculate the number of excess deaths. I cannot find this data anywhere.

You're not looking very hard. Here's the first paragraph from the article I posted above:

"In the first 3 months of the US coronavirus epidemic, the number of excess deaths in the United States was 122,300, 28% higher than the reported number of COVID-19 deaths, according to an observational study published today in JAMA Internal Medicine."

Let me try again.

What months are we talking about? March thru May?

How many Americans died in those three months. How many Americans died in the corresponding months in 2019? 2018?

You know. Actual data.

[quote]Redonculous Maximus wrote:

[q

Really surprises me the stupidity on this board. In March and April, emergency rooms and COVID wards in hospitals were overwhelmed with patients dying of COVID... t

Really?

Where was that?

The Unkle wrote:

Really?

Where was that?

Right here in NYC. And they were storing the corpses in refrigerated truck trailers.

The Unkle wrote:

[quote]Redonculous Maximus wrote:

[q

Really surprises me the stupidity on this board. In March and April, emergency rooms and COVID wards in hospitals were overwhelmed with patients dying of COVID... t

Really?

Where was that?

They were so overwhelmned in NYC that the extra hospital ship sent to NYC never really even had to be used and all of the hospitals upstate were so empty they were losing revenue hand over fist and had to recoup costs by declaring every elderly death as a covid death for the extra $8000. Nobody is saying the virus is not real, does not kill the susceptible. I think of lot of people rightly believe the danger and the extent of the pandemic has been vastly exaggerated by the media and political actors for monetary and political gain. Obsessively monitoring and reporting asymptomatic cases, fear mongering that the virus causes death by all means known to man (from pneumonia to strokes to heart attacks to toxic shock to automobile accidents) seems a bit much. Trying to scare everyone away from living and going out into public by telling them they are killing old people via asymptomatic spread while every year we always kill old people by spreading the flu and other corona-viruses around. It is being overdone by liars and money hungry research groups, it is a half lie and a half truth that has destroyed lives and livelihoods and families and likely killed more than saved, and nobody is stupid for calling it out.

winners write history wrote:

I've seen no estimates of the excess mortality due to the economy being shuttered and jobs being lost. In The Big Short they claimed that 40k people die for every percentage point increase in the unemployment rate. It's definitely something for people to consider compared to the direct cost of dying from the virus

Excess death/million is tightly correlated with COVID death/million.

This suggests that more COVID = more excess deaths = COVID is the best explanation for excess deaths per state.

I have yet to see convincing data that suggests otherwise

The Unkle wrote:

Let me try again.

What months are we talking about? March thru May?

How many Americans died in those three months. How many Americans died in the corresponding months in 2019? 2018?

You know. Actual data.

These data have been linked on this board multiple times, but it is conceivable you missed them.

Here's one:

You'll have to scroll down and read the various caveats and definitions. Sorry about that. Here's one: "Percent of expected deaths is the number of deaths for all causes for this week in 2020 compared to the average number across the same week in 2017–2019."

And here's another:

Again, you'll have to do a little bit of work yourself to extract the data--scrolling down to the graph, clicking on individual weeks, and so on--but it shouldn't be too onerous. The data are there.

Do you think they would have tracked the 1918 influenza pandemic more closely if they had the ability to?

This is the first major pandemic in the age of modern biotechnology.

This is a bit funny. When the data supports your argument, you are all for counting every case -- such as calculating the IFR.

Other times you'd rather we only count symptomatic cases.

We don't have hard evidence for something like viral-load:infectiveness ratio. We have evidence for asymptomatic spread. What exactly is your proposed method for containing COVID outbreaks that doesn't involve testing asymptomatic people or at least asymptomatic contacts of infected people?

DanM wrote:

I will break it down to a simple question.

1.45 Million people should have died in the U.S. over the past 6 months.

How many people have actually died in the U.S. over the past 6 months ?

See my response to "The Unkle." If you truly wish to be informed, you can find the weekly totals and add them together.

assume the majority of tests used thus far are "overly sensitive." that may well be. one implication, in the absence of any other evidence, might be the possibility the allen/hardloper/dunes/jamin/wig/ymmv/facts/primo bot suggests--there isnt even a virus. :)

but, given all the evidence the bot ignores, why wouldnt we conclude from this additional piece of evidence:

1) holy crap, this thing isnt as infectious as we think (far, far less transmission than we were previously guessing),

2) holy crap, this thing is WAY more dangerous than we think (far, far higher cfr than the bot would concede) , and

3) holy crap, we are nowhere the population levels of immunity that would allow any vulnerable person and peace of mind at all??

... which would be reasonably consistent with even the very first models proffered in january.

(we're all just indulging confirmation bias)

I stopped reading after I saw “NY Times”. It’s sad, but it’s true.

But yes, I am sure that there are a bunch of false positives and also some false negatives.

Pan(ic)demic wrote:

Why so many excess deaths this year? Hard to explain away that.

People dying at home b/c the fearmongering media has made them afraid to go to a hospital/ER when they are having a heart attack. There are approximately 1.5 million heart attack and stroke victims in the US per year. Someone has a heart attack every 40 seconds.

In the spring and early summer, these people VANISHED from emergency rooms. You think they just stopped having heart attacks?

I work in a cardiac step down unit in NC and I can promise you people have not "vanished" from emergency rooms and people are certainly still calling 911 when they are having a heart attack. Im guessing you have never experienced, or had a loved one experience a heart attack or stroke because these generally dont manifest in ways you can simply ignore away.

The Unkle wrote:

rocky mtns wrote:

You're not looking very hard. Here's the first paragraph from the article I posted above:

"In the first 3 months of the US coronavirus epidemic, the number of excess deaths in the United States was 122,300, 28% higher than the reported number of COVID-19 deaths, according to an observational study published today in JAMA Internal Medicine."

Let me try again.

What months are we talking about? March thru May?

How many Americans died in those three months. How many Americans died in the corresponding months in 2019? 2018?

You know. Actual data.

its not that difficult to look up but since you need the data spoon fed to ya, here ya go!

Everyone stop. Seriously, stop. The original post removed a small quote from a full article. Not a single person posting here actually read the article where the snippet originated.

Here’s a quote lifted from the same article,

“... researchers say the solution is not to test less, or to skip testing people without symptoms, as recently suggested by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Instead, new data underscore the need for more widespread use of rapid tests, even if they are less sensitive.

“The decision not to test asymptomatic people is just really backward,” said Dr. Michael Mina, an epidemiologist at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, referring to the C.D.C. recommendation.”

Fascinating how different that is. Honestly, this is the first post I’ve read on this site in 17 years where I feel embarrassed to be part of this community.

your conclusion is "meh, seems like to many deaths, must be bullshit"?

well I have bad news for you, the true number is even higher at around 200K through mid august

https://weinbergerlab.github.io/excess_pi_covid/?fbclid=IwAR0pfhKepx-3X2MUcszEcrWFBqJghfDdBoKdR5ppX3aetkU9IYqRoZpKNTY

This whole thread is like a case study in data illiteracy. The 6% figure from the CDC is essentially meaningless. 80% of adults 65+ have multiple chronic conditions that are considered comorbidities and would be listed alongside Covid-19 on a death certificate. If you are a 65 year old with obesity and hypertension (e.g. most americans) and you die of covid, you still fucking died because of covid.