4000 people died yesterday. In one week we'll pass last years (2019) total flu deaths. Please, ride the subway sans the mask.
Even if we used the high-end figure for COVID deaths yesterday [4,406], that would equal 1,608,190 deaths in the USA in a year.
The CDC states that only 6% of those deaths are COVID-only deaths. Although if we include a comorbidity such as pneumonia, it would seem likely to me that COVID and pneumonia are associated in some way.
On the extreme end, let's take lung cancer. Can that fairly be related to COVID in some way? I would think that despite being a clear separate disease [in the case of lifetime smokers, for example - I acknowledge that not all lung cancer victims smoke/smoked], it may be related to COVID.
So my mathematical intuition tells me that about 12% of "COVID deaths" are actually COVID-only. Obviously a person who had Stage IV cancer and died with COVID can't really be said to have died solely because of COVID, and playing fast and loose with the numbers like that is disingenuous at best. I would call that medicine playing politics at worst.
So let's say that about 12% of the people who die of COVID this year [assuming yesterday's death toll becomes the daily average for 2021, which is unlikely, as these numbers will subside as the weather gets warmer], then we would have 192,983 deaths.
You posted the flu deaths last month in another thread [the Pfizer vaccine thread, IIRC], and you stated a figure of 22K, thinking I wouldn't catch you posting the low-end flu death figure.
The actual flu death figure varies, but is something like 22K to 64K...something like that. So I applaud you for correcting the correct low-end flu death figure, but it was a bit disingenuous of you to use the low-end figure.
If your argument is so good, it will speak for itself, without having to use a low-end figure, which is approximately 1/3 of the high-end figure. I mean, it's not like me rounding my height of 5'8.6" to 5'9" or anything [and in fairness - I don't do that. I just tell people I am "5-8-and-a-1/2".
So...let's take an average of the flu death range and go with [22K + 64K]/2 = 43K.
43K flu deaths versus 192.9K COVID deaths is quite the disparity. But keep in mind there is a flu vaccine...I don't think it's a big stretch to say that we would have 100K flu deaths if we had no vaccine.
Likewise, let's say my "adjusted" COVID death stat is off...ok, well how about 400K "COVID only deaths" as a more realistic estimation?
Therefore, I default to my previous position that COVID is Flu 3x or Flu 4x.
While at this point, the evidence seems to point me in the direction of stating that COVID is worse than the flu...it is not horrendously worse. And one thing to consider would be the age demographic figures with respect to mortality. Those being:
- COVID has a 99.73% survival rate for people under 70.
- 87% of COVID cases are among people over the age of 80.
- Long-term care home residents are 57x more likely to die of COVID than non-LTC home residents [stats as of 2020-12-11, in B.C., Canada].
- Only 26 Canadians under the age of 40 have died of COVID in Canada, out of a population of over 18 million in that age range, as of 2020-09-23, according to PHAC [the Public Health Agency of Canada].
American figures may be slightly worse than Canadian figures, but my suspicion about that is that since American hospitals are privatized, there is more incentive to rip off the federal government, like on March 23rd or 24th, when NY State Gov. Andrew Cuomo said that he needed 26,000 ventilators, and that Trump should "pick the 26,000 who die" if he doesn't give them to him.
Pretty snaky way to steal $1.5B to $3B worth of ventilators, IMO.
In any case, I'm curious to your thoughts on these figures, AbrahamG.
The impression I get about you is that you are a Democrat [leftist/liberal - or whatever left-"ish" label a person could give you], who is unwilling to lie to himself.
I was also thinking recently...this is like The Boy Who Cried Wolf...but one thing I forgot was that in the end, the wolf was real.
