General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsLooking for meaningful statistics
I am not sure the Covid-19 scoreboards on the TV news are helpful.
Comparing the number of people who tested positive in each nation is pretty meaningless. Each nation has a different population. Belgium vs China? Belgium has 9,000 cases out of a population of 10 million. China has 81,000 cases out of a population of 1.4 billion. Other than score keeping, this doesnt reveal much.
Total confirmed cases is that positive Covid-19 tests? If, so then how many people were tested in each nation? If you get 500 positive tests out of 1,000 people its very different from 500 positive out of 100,000 people.
The Velveteen Ocelot
(115,719 posts)LakeVermilion
(1,041 posts)If you select the United States (click on it), the statistics are broken down by state.
Bmoboy
(270 posts)We still don't know the current spread of the virus.
As doctors have been saying, until you test widely (and not just high risk sick people) you won't know how widespread the virus is or how fast it is spreading.
Bmoboy
(270 posts)How many people are carrying the virus but have not been tested?
How soon after exposure does an individual become infectious?
What factors inhibit infection? What differentiates the people on the Diamond Princess who did not get infected? That was a petri dish for weeks.
At what point in their recovery does an infected individual test negative?
Does testing negative after being sick mean you are immune? For how long?
We are only at the beginning of understanding this virus.
Iterate
(3,020 posts)If I tried to explain logarithmic plotting, I'd take an hour, write pages, and still muck it up. But there is this, which at least clears up some things that you don't need to ponder.
Essentially, we're all on the same track, heading for the same cliff. The way off is to isolate small safe clusters of people, then test test test, and isolate larger safe clusters until the beast is starved. All with no compromise. Otherwise, out of every ten people you know, ~three will be infected without symptoms, ~four will be prone sick for a few weeks, and ~three will end up in hospital, of whom one or two will be dead. I'm sure those numbers are off by some amount, but good enough for a first approximation.
And remember this is only round one. The longer it stays in the population, the better the chance of mutation. Round two or three will catch out those from that first ten who managed to skate by without seeing the virus.