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Rational CoViD-19 Discussion Thread: Science vs. Politics

Worldwide, the deaths reported today are approximately the same as those reported March 6, under 4K.

Worldwide, the new cases reported today are approximately the same as those reported March 30, around 70k. With a lot of tests being done, not just symptomatic diagnoses.

Speaking of testing, in the USA during testing, the positive antigen (sick) stat is running about 0.1%, or one in a thousand tests where there is no symptoms. This is now our %infective rate in the general population...…. Today, I saw a lot of people with masks walking along the streets. My wife says she's got one for me. I got one from my doctor. So here you are, in Utah, walking along a practically empty street, wearing your mask, encountering oh,maybe five people each block. You'd have to walk 200 blocks, or 33 miles on average, to pass one covid positive person.....
 
Taking the numbers given, if plotted on a scale with new cases versus 1 day's time progress, the curve is about two or three weeks past the peak number of cases, but with thousands of tests being done where available, we are now finding a significant number of our new "patients" with the positive antigen testS (sick+) though, perhaps, asymptomatic or probably mild cases.
 
Here's a report on a survey done with the antibody test..... in Colorado, one of the early hot spots....

https://reason.com/2020/04/17/antib...onfirmed-covid-19-cases-and-total-infections/

The article is written with an unblushing bias to make the worst of the news..... saying 1% or maybe 2% of the general population tested positive. Extrapolating this Denver area survey to the rest of the US, we would have 5M cases nationwide, and 30k cases in Utah..... 7X, 10x reported cases. I might note here that antibody tests will never err on the high side, but are prone to err on the low side, meaning you may not have developed an antibody to the same ligand as the antibody used in the test.... But hey, if you get the positive result, you can be pretty sure of the positive conclusion that you have immunity to the virus.

What this means is that far more people experience mild or no illness from Covid than we knew or expected.

In Utah, over 1% of people on the street have had it, and lived to not know they had it. That's about 30k people. Only 3k have had it at all, and only 2.5% of those died from it, for a death rate of less than one in 1000 Utahns. The probabilt of a positive infectious carrier is really less than 1%, maybe 0.5%

Looks pretty clear we've all been panicked, real good, and probably on purpose. Somebody needs to investigate Dr. Anthony Fauci…… uhhhmmmm…… well, it could be all that heavy drinking Utahns are known for, or the Jacuzzi Lifestyle of Mormonism...… or HCQ being pushed on the dark streets around Pioneer Park.

Sometimes I just hafta laugh.

I see a lot of people getting mad at the nonsense quarantine orders, governors run amok with their decrees. There's gonna be riots as the facts become clear this Great Panic was mostly just the flu.
 
So here is the graph for the flu this year. Peaked in January, went steeply to zero by March, when the Covid stats were increasing....

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/weekly/index.htm

however, before I shine my tin foil hat very much more, the data here is based on actual diagnostic tests for the flu strains, so I'm pretty sure, if these tests were done, the diagnosis would be accurate.

Just a question of presumptions being made on a few symptoms, without a diagnostic test, and how many cases were misdiagnosed without positive evidence.
The answer is assuredly non-zero, maybe 5% or more of the covid stats. who knows, no test done.
 
So, anyway, even the worldometer linear graph will soon level off to a flat line at the top of the chart. Under 1 M Americans ever going to a doctor sick, and over 10 M Americans now immune to Covid, and when properly classed, less than 40 k deaths in the US from Covid.

Most Americans, particularly those with reasonably good health, could return to work soon, with some social distancing practices understood. I'm worried about my wife, though. She is one of the front line workers.

I think now we will never have a good vaccine we can just rely on, any more than we have for HIV or SARS. Covid-19 is about 87% Sars and 10% HIV. This did not happen in a bat, or transfer in uncooked weird delicacies appreciated by the strangest of the strange Chinese. It walked outta the Wuhan virology institute infecting a worker, who passed it to her husband.

Sorry all you rabid JFC conspiracy theorists, Joe Biden did not wink at Xi and tell him..... " let the Corona Killer Pandemic Fly, this will ruin Trump for sure."

It was an accident, unintended, for it is certain Xi would not have released it on his own productive economy in the depths of a recession.

Still, it would be my hope that the Dems would just skip trying to score big gains on this epidemic, and our bureaucratic bunglers. Trump pretty much did what Hillary would have done. He listened to the panicky scientists with the bad models and no common sense, but he did ignore the dems and stop the import of the disease practically before anyone knew it should be done.

Just for that alone, Trump should be our choice in 2020, Besides, Trump is doing all the stuff socialists ever dreamed of doing... Not so sure working people who lost their businesses and jobs will vote for Trump now, but damn sure our dictatorial edict issuing governors and a lot of congressmen are gonna lose their jobs as well.
 
Scat said:
COVID 19 will end up being one of the biggest, and most destructive frauds in the history of mankind.
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It will certainly be portrayed as such. Sure, the NYC morgues have been so over-loaded that they are digging temporary, mass graves to hold the bodies and the Wuhan incinerators are working overtime, but why let that get in the way of a good conspiracy theory?
 
One Brow said:
It will certainly be portrayed as such. Sure, the NYC morgues have been so over-loaded that they are digging temporary, mass graves to hold the bodies and the Wuhan incinerators are working overtime, but why let that get in the way of a good conspiracy theory?
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Are they?
 
babe said:
So we have now, in the USA, tested over 2M folks for Covid. In every test, we need some stats regarding accuracy and precision. Accuracy would involve the idea of getting a "right" answer, "precision" would involve the idea of not missing cases. Poor accuracy would involve, say, getting H1N1 or SARS or other Corona viruses giving a positive Covid test result where Covid is not actually the exact virus giving the positive result. Poor precision would involve on getting positive Covid results some fraction of the time where Covid is indeed present.

We know nothing about either of these parameters, and could only expect or presume some value or meaning in our testing. However, we have judgment, from experience generally, about all of our methods.

A diagnosis based on clinical observations..... acute pneumonia, fever, dry cough, little upper respiratory congestion..... might be 90% accurate/70% if not obviously explained by something else known to be a cause....

Any kind of "crude" positive antibody or antigen assay might be 95% accurate/90% precise.

A good test developed with positive and negative controls in the panel could do much better, but still miss a case or two in a thousand, and still pick up a positive from some other source in a hundred or so tests. There will be no such thing as an inerrant test.

That said, I note a propensity in human psychology for seeing what we are looking for at the moment, for erring on the side of amplification of our concerns. I have no means to quantify this phenomena, but to say, it's possible it's significant, maybe ten percent, maybe one percent, who knows.

But in 2M tests, we report 400k positives.

Considering the claim, with some supporting data, that as many as 80% of Covid cases are not serious enough to prompt a doctor visit..... and that tests are being done only on people who show up to ask for the test, sometimes for good reason..... And that we are reporting ALL the serious cases and deaths...… we can write an equation....

Tot#Covid = #Positive Test Results + Untested/Unknown Positives. The latter can be estimated from available data.

For reasons I discussed a few posts above, we are probably overstating #CovidDeaths, but this number does claim a positive Covid test result. Our stats on #Critical Covid Cases is likely understated, because some people just don't get that attention. And if our psycology is normal, and our tests are pretty good, we are likely overstating the #Positive Test Results by, perhaps.... in my judgment, aroung 2%. Not really a headliner there. But I will include it in the equation.

The next thing is to evaluate the probable extent of Covid cases out and about, walking around unknown and undetected. The best data for estimating this would be the percent of positives being found in persons who have no signs or symptoms of Covid who have been tested, or the rate of positives in the testing lines where, presumably, worried folks with some signs are hurrying to get tested. The first subset would be an underestimate, the second a fairly large overestimate....

Another useful test for evaluation of extent in the general public would be an antibody test rather than an antigen test like what we are now doing. The antibody result would tell us how many people have been exposed and lived to show it.
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There's two tests that can be done; standard which can be detected in ~48 hours, and a quick test which results in about 45 minutes. It's a simple yes or no; is it identifiable or is it not. I can't speak for all hospitals, but the infectious disease staff I work with check over every case(Inpatient or Outpatient). I can say that we are required by the state to forward all positive results to the Health Department within 24 hours of a positive result.

We do not forward negative results. We do not forward assumptions, suggestions, or maybes. There is no overstatement. You simply do not have the expertise to make any claims here.
 
Harambe said:
There's two tests that can be done; standard which can be detected in ~48 hours, and a quick test which results in about 45 minutes. It's a simple yes or no; is it identifiable or is it not. I can't speak for all hospitals, but the infectious disease staff I work with check over every case(Inpatient or Outpatient). I can say that we are required by the state to forward all positive results to the Health Department within 24 hours of a positive result.

We do not forward negative results. We do not forward assumptions, suggestions, or maybes. There is no overstatement. You simply do not have the expertise to make any claims here.
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So here you disclose your professional expertise on the subject, and while I'm sure you understand your protocols, you missed the logic of my statement, which would be an "expertise" area few would really have unless you are either a mathematician or a test designer.

I'm not sure I'm fully qualified in either of the above, but I am aware there is an issue here.

You, and the State, presume that the test, if positive, is absolutely correct, and that a negative result is also definitive or dispositive of the case. There is nothing more to say, or think.

You make a great statists, but a poor philosopher, and a poor realist.
 
Scat said:
COVID 19 will end up being one of the biggest, and most destructive frauds in the history of mankind.
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While there is an objective reality to Covid 19, and it is a serious challenge to public health and to our healthcare capacities, it is pretty clear to me that our WHO and our CDC have not served the public as well as they have served those who think to convert a health crisis into a useful political tool. I think Trump got rolled on this one, and is done and finished as a real obstacle tp specialism or statism.

Nobody in their right mind believes Biden is competent to be Pres. The obvious reality is that our prime movers don't want a real President standing in their way. A useful tool is all they need.

Congress, and the Courts as well..... and State governance, all has to be neutered for the fascists to implement their dream world. No public leverage allowed.
 
Here's my two-cent opinion about the Panic Promoter site, Worldometer's, statistical presentation today.

My objection to the prominence of the linear data charts, above the simple daily data graph, has been heard..... lol.... under the misleading graph there is actually a daily graph. It is claiming we are holding on the 25k/d new case rate. About the same as March 31, less than the 35k peak. The data clearly reflects varying acquisition times for compiling the data. Some not counted one day, then counted the next, that sort of thing.

The graphs, once touted as "exponential", are now clearly linear with a declining rate of new cases. I think the claims of many unaffected or asymptomatic cases, as many as 20 X the symptomatic cases is being debunked by the testing. With a million new tests over about three days, where there is an abvious bias for heavily impacted areas and people presenting for testing because of symptoms, it is the fact that most of the asymptomatic cases are not cases at all, but misdiagnosed evaluations or tests.

So here's the rub. Sars-Cov 19 is not a new virus, it is splice of existing viruses. The PCR test is picking up unspliced parent viral pieces, and other variants of virus, the ELISA tests are also picking up related viruses.

Many of the deaths being attributed to Covid are due to the complex of similar viral entities, and most are people who would have died if they had gotten the ordinary flu instead.

Still, I want the antibody tests promoted, along with the antigen and PCR tests. What my speculation amounts to is the numerical data being bolstered and hyped to make a panic for the public, but if so, we do have a serious disease, with a smaller footprint and more deadly capacities, but which many more people have a sort of co-immunity against because of their exposures to related viral strains.

I don't think it has the potential to rage further on an exponential basis. I think we have almost 20% of the 70+ people with some immunity, and maybe more than 50% of the -30 age people with some immunity.

But who knows, without a well-designed study, which our gov with our opportunistic panic exploiters at work do not want done.

Socialists are like piranha swarming the bloodied waters of every crisis. Transform Society. Empower Government. Put the little peeps in their place, tip-toeing around with mother-may-I hopes and fears for every least aspect of human choice.
 
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So, this is for Harambe, and other more or less embedded socialists in our authoritarian system, people with jobs dependent on the State.

Of course, I know nothing. Nothing at all. All knowledge belongs to the authorities, and all knowledge is mutable for the sake of social progress. Of course.

But here is what I'm talking about when I say any test, however designed, needs to be evaluated for false positives and false negatives, and the causes of these discussed. While I must attribute most of my experience with testing and measurement to physical science applications more than biological science applications, I do realize that it is orders of magnitude more complex in the biological applications. Nothing so clear cut as elemental analysis with a spectroscope, I imagine.

While PCR methods amplify a small signal, they amplify the interferences as well. It is possible to do a good job of getting the more specific pieces identified, and a very high accuracy achieved..... but it still has to be studied with a well-designed study to prove that accuracy, and precision, that the clinician relies on in practice.

I worked for some time with a project to produce monoclonal antibodies. I had to worry about just what antibody my test was responding to. There are ways to check, and I would guess the time that has elapsed getting mass testing out there reflects the effort to check it out pretty good. But every such method needs the follow-up evaluation of results in practice, and absolutely there are no tests which will not have some liability for false results.

Hopefully, we are doing a really good job creating our tests.
 
One of the things that haunts my suspicious mind, is the possibility that the most deadly strain of Covid is a mutation from the original strain...…

This would be consistent with early claims that dissed the danger, from both the WHO and the CDC, and the Chinese government claims. But the fact is, I really just don't know anything about this pandemic.

Nothing at all.

I will have to put everything I think I know on the shelf and go get if possible the facts....
 
One Brow said:
Could you be more specific? I'm not sure which part you were questioning.
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The Chinese authorities have a pretty good lock on information there, at least online. I get your humor in working the conspiracy theorist slander, but it was a good question. We are given stats sometimes, and then again, later, different stats when needed. We have satellite surveillance good enough to see people on the streets but we don't strut that stuff. But, largely, the stories we get in our news are staged reality plays du jour. First, it's mocking the whole outbreak as ridicuolous, then it's the worst plague in human history. First the CT nuts are worried about nothing, then it's "Trump killed mankind by not acting faster. Should've shut down the world on December 10, and not waited until March. The whole problem with being a damn liar is remembering what you said yesterday. I try to skate around that indictment by professing that I'm only postulating what the information may be.... pretty useless in promoting a political cause, but helpful for debunking those with political designs.

We have refrigerator cargo holds parked outside every hospital in SLC, and we've had a trumped-up claim of 34 deaths or so, so far. We aren't going to just work the dead through the normal way if they're literally contagious corpses. No way. Gotta freeze 'em, burn 'em.

I tend to disbelieve the stories about 15 M to 25 M dead in Wuhan, well..... like I disbelieve the official stats. I think nobody knows, either, about NYC. Sure we have news organizations centered there, but they are not credible institutions with respect to having a good track record for getting facts right when there's a socialist agenda opportunity at hand.

To mock an honest question like that only discredits your objective status.

Calling people with any kind of concern about globalists/socialists/statists/fascist out for "conspiracy theories" is absurd. The progressive movement has achieved large-scale gains with broad political tactics and massive public support. To postulate that there are people who want to achieve any little piece of the plan, who are working together with conscious purposes, is not anything but the common understanding of socialists and any other kind of human there may be.

Exploiting a health crisis for political gains is nothing new.
 
Scat said:
Are they?
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credible stories from Wuhan would require at least a few hundred thousand deaths, and a rush for urns for ashes from the crematoriums...… and some temporary emergency facilities to process them. credible stories because that's about the threshold for government denials and policies admitted by the government despite a huge benefit for understating the cases systematically.

NYC reports of the number of deaths may conflate other causes of death because of the policy, admitted by our government, of counting all deaths with Covid symptoms as Covid deaths, whether the dead presented with a gun shot in the head or a sniffle with a heart attack. But there are enough honest doctors with enough patients to make it out as true enough we have an epidemic on our hands.

So rather than mocking the concerns, I just believe the answer in both cases is some kind of "yes". Exaggerated by some, understated by some.
 
"relying" on the Worldometer stats, in the USA, we have now tested 4.3 M people (1.2%) biased to outbreak areas rather than a uniform survey of Americans. We report 0.2% positive cases in the nation....850k total. We fear a large number of "asymptomatic" carriers out and about, that's why we think it good to do the isolation/social distance. Maybe as many as 95% of Covid infectives unknown/undetectable vaping out invisible covid globules to folks nearby. infective slime accumulating on every surface near where they stand.

Here's my attempt to unmask these irrational notions that are driving public policies.

If we have say 0.2 %(1 in 500) persons known to have the virus, some dead.... some over with it, no doubt, and if 90% of the infected are presently undetected, we would have 1.8 % (1 in 55) people presently infective carriers prowling about spreading the disease. That's 6.5M people out there with the virus. If we do a million tests in three days, and come up with 80k new cases, if they were a random set correspondent to the whole of the US, that's a positive rate of 8%. That would mean in all the US, we have 29 M infective carriers. So of course, we have to realize that maybe 80% of the tests are going to symptomatic folks, and most of those tests are still negative (less than 20% positive) So I say the 90% undetected is just wrong. The virus is not that inconsequential, but it is also not spreading exponentially. I think it safe to say that our stats are falsified by maybe 10% to 20% positive covid cases, and that maybe the death reports are inflated due to other real causes of death that would have been deaths for cause, but even taking the stats as given, the number of infective carriers we're hiding from is less than 1 in 200 people, with each infective maybe capable of infecting a large number of people if in contact with them. So, somewhere between Panic and Denial we need to find some line of reason.

Hard to say how much of our stats are due to better testing, and discovery of positives versus the already ill patients coming in to the doctors. But with testing 300 k/d, we are still at 25K new cases per day, as we were on March 31 with sketchy testing. But obviously, we are catching some cases earlier through testing, and thus better able to treat them effectively. But my guess is we have maybe half the infective population "out there", which combined with people's general caution will mean a lower transmission factor than we had around March 15. I also think we still under reporting recovered cases by half the claimed stat. But we are clearly way over the worst of the danger already, and there is room to discuss how to get back to productive work. A lot of people can go back to work now.

Just keep ramping up the testing. antibody and antigen/PCR tests, a couple million a day. Test business work groups, and let them go to work. With social distancing precautions in place, with masks. Without Mass Transit.....or with social distancing and testing measures, say temp measurements with those nifty laser thingys.
 
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