Official Covid-19 Discussion Thread

[Kevin Willis]

You also have to consider land mass though. The US as a country isn't that much smaller compared to the entirety of Europe. Texas alone is bigger than every European country last time I checked. I'm not a statistician, so I don't know the best methodology to determine how rocked America is, though I'd think land mass has to play a part. The state of New York having more cases and deaths than any other country alone (that we know of since lying China won't reveal the truth) is alarming.

Yes, land mass, total population and population density could be a factor.

That being said, there are many countries with high population densities and/or small land masses who aren't experiencing nearly the same level of cases or deaths on a per capita basis as being experienced by others.

In either event, there doesn't appear to be statistically significant relationship

Coronavirus by country:
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries

Smallest countries by area:
https://www.countries-ofthe-world.com/smallest-countries.html

Randomly sampling from with the top 100 countries by are:

Monaco: 2,370 cases per 1 million, 76 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/monaco/

Singapore: 757 cases per 1 million, 2 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/singapore/

Lebanon: 97 cases per 1 million, 2 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/lebanon/

Slovenia: 610 cases per 1 million, 29 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/slovenia/

Belgium: 3,003 cases per 1 million, 419 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/belgium/

Taiwan: 17 cases per 1 million, 0.3 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/taiwan/

Switzerland: 3,089 cases per 1 million, 148 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/switzerland/

Netherlands: 1,075 cases per 1 million, 193 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/netherlands/

Most populous countries: https://www.countries-ofthe-world.com/most-populous-countries.html

Sample pulled from top 10 countries by population:

China: 57 cases per 1 million, 2 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/china/

India: 9 cases per 1 million, 0.3 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/india/

US: 2,015 cases per 1 million, 102 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/

Indonesia: 20 cases per 1 million, 2 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/indonesia/

Brazil: 137 cases per 1 million, 8 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/brazil/

Pakistan: 31 cases per 1 million, 0.6 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/pakistan/

Nigeria: 2 cases per 1 million, 0.06 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/nigeria/

Bangladesh: 10 cases per 1 million, 0.4 deaths per 1 million
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/bangladesh/

Since population density is calculated as the total population divided by the total land area, many of the countries listed above are also one of the top countries ranked by population density.

http://statisticstimes.com/demographics/countries-by-population-density.php

Would have to plot and graph each to calculate R squared values and correlation coefficients for them, but given the above, there doesn't appear to be a very strong relationship between the size of a country, its population density, or total population with respect to the number of coronavirus cases or deaths per 1 million people.

Some of those numbers are more correct than others. India is absolutely incorrect. So is China's, Nigeria's, Pakistan's. But some are doing better than others based off different factors like 'land mass, total population and population density could be a factor.' - even if you consider that each factor has a different weight

I don't like the fact we were trending close to California and now we're pulling away. I think California handled it correctly and it would be nice if we stayed in that range.

I also think the prevalence of long term facilities is like a catalyst to this fire. Reserves are going to be another catalyst. One group home can have 15 deaths in a day. Plus Quebec having an early spring break was disastrous for them. BC have a late spring break was great for them. So many factors to consider in any calculation. Look at the Scandinavian countries, there differences are mostly government policies.

[Lord_Zedd]

Almost 200 dead in Canada so far today? Damn man, it'll be a bad one...

Ontario and Quebec have been decimated by outbreaks in long term care(LTC) homes. Ontario alone has over 100 outbreaks in these homes.

Better late than never...... Ontario finally restricted workers from working in multiple LTC sites.

[yogimvp]

i would like to see all hospital workers restricted to one hospital and even one unit. all it takes is one infected worker to spread the virus to multiple units.

[YelloC]

Almost 200 dead in Canada so far today? Damn man, it'll be a bad one...

Ontario and Quebec have been decimated by outbreaks in long term care(LTC) homes. Ontario alone has over 100 outbreaks in these homes.

Better late than never...... Ontario finally restricted workers from working in multiple LTC sites.

Do other countries have less reliance on facilities to take care of their aging populations?
In other words, do other cultures look after their elders personally instead of sending them to old people prison. Not saying they are treated like prisoners but the general business structure is similar.
Having a grandmother who died of Alzheimer’s I understand the need for outside help when dealing with advanced stage illness but it seems like a lot of older people are sent to live at long term care homes for the sole reason of being old.

[beanbag]

Almost 200 dead in Canada so far today? Damn man, it'll be a bad one...

What about the 5 days prior to today...

Apr 15 = 107
Apr 14 = 123
Apr 13 = 63
Apr 12 = 64
Apr 11 = 84

What about the number of people who recovered the last 5 days...

Apr 15 = 744
Apr 14 = 479
Apr 13 = 584
Apr 12 = 744
Apr 11 = 415

37,600,000 people live in Canada.
29,929 of them have tested positive.
9,674 have recovered.
1,191 have succumbed to this virus.

% of population infected = 29,929/37,600,000 = 0.07% of Canadians have tested positive
% of population who've died from coronavirus = 1,191/37,600,000 = 0.003% of Canadians have died from this virus

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/canada/
https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/canada-population/

How do those numbers compare to the number of people who've applied for employment, been temporarily laid off, been let go from their jobs, or had their hours reduced as a result of the lockdown measures taken?

How do those numbers compared to the number of businesses that have closed temporarily due to these lockdown measures, the number who've reduced their hours, the number who've closed permanently, and the number of them who might never re-open when the lockdown measures are removed?

Even without looking up the numbers, would it be fair to say that more than 0.003% to 0.07% of Canadians have been effected by the ripple effects of these lockdown measures?

Does your statistics class explain these numbers are as low as they are because of the shutdown measures in place? Since you've got such a hard on for calculations, why don't you tell me what would happen if things didn't shut down the way they are? How many more people would be sick and/or dead and what would THAT do to your precious economy?

[Fairview4Life]

Stats

Read on Twitter

[NinjaBro]

Almost 200 dead in Canada so far today? Damn man, it'll be a bad one...

Ontario and Quebec have been decimated by outbreaks in long term care(LTC) homes. Ontario alone has over 100 outbreaks in these homes.

Better late than never...... Ontario finally restricted workers from working in multiple LTC sites.

Do other countries have less reliance on facilities to take care of their aging populations?
In other words, do other cultures look after their elders personally instead of sending them to old people prison. Not saying they are treated like prisoners but the general business structure is similar.
Having a grandmother who died of Alzheimer’s I understand the need for outside help when dealing with advanced stage illness but it seems like a lot of older people are sent to live at long term care homes for the sole reason of being old.

Spain and Italy has been rocked by this CCP virus. Their cultures generally involves multigenerational households. Children don't leave the house until they get married, hence where we get the term Italian mama's boy. Part of the reason why the virus was such a disaster there was that the young people traveled and brought the virus home and infected the whole family.

[Clay Davis]

Ontario and Quebec have been decimated by outbreaks in long term care(LTC) homes. Ontario alone has over 100 outbreaks in these homes.

Better late than never...... Ontario finally restricted workers from working in multiple LTC sites.

Do other countries have less reliance on facilities to take care of their aging populations?
In other words, do other cultures look after their elders personally instead of sending them to old people prison. Not saying they are treated like prisoners but the general business structure is similar.
Having a grandmother who died of Alzheimer’s I understand the need for outside help when dealing with advanced stage illness but it seems like a lot of older people are sent to live at long term care homes for the sole reason of being old.

Spain and Italy has been rocked by this CCP virus. Their cultures generally involves multigenerational households. Children don't leave the house until they get married, hence where we get the term Italian mama's boy. Part of the reason why the virus was such a disaster there was that the young people traveled and brought the virus home and infected the whole family.

Hmmm we have some immigrant populations that think the same. Serbian families, for instance, do.

[dohboy_24]

Does your statistics class explain these numbers are as low as they are because of the shutdown measures in place? Since you've got such a hard on for calculations, why don't you tell me what would happen if things didn't shut down the way they are? How many more people would be sick and/or dead and what would THAT do to your precious economy?

Compare the growth rate prior to lockdown measures to the growth rates after lockdown measures were taken.
Calculate the change in growth between each period.

Did the growth rates decline or increase after lockdown measures were taken? By which percentage?

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-cases/#cases-growth-factor

While not all countries decided to take measures at the same time, many of them started around the middle of March, about 30 days ago.

If you look at the daily cases growth rate factor before the middle of March, the average daily growth rate factor prior to March 11 was about 1.1117.

If you look at the daily cases growth rate factor after the middle of March, the average daily growth rate factor after most of the lockdown measures around the world were put into place has been about 1.1062.

So... by those calculations, these lockdown measures have been able to produce a 0.0055 decline in the daily growth rate factor of this virus.

We've gone from a 11.17% daily growth rate to a 10.62% daily growth rate.

Since I can't find any stats or run any calculations for any scenarios that haven't occurred, I can't offer an answer to the question of how different these numbers would be if not for the measures taken, but do you believe they're worth a 0.55% change in the number of people being infected?

[Fairview4Life]

Those numbers are inaccurate. They are extremely dependent on testing and classification which varies widely not only between countries, but also within different locations in a country and over the course of time.

I posted this yesterday, but there are some good criticisms of current numbers in there, without even getting into a discussion of the positivity rate.

Read on Twitter

[beanbag]

Does your statistics class explain these numbers are as low as they are because of the shutdown measures in place? Since you've got such a hard on for calculations, why don't you tell me what would happen if things didn't shut down the way they are? How many more people would be sick and/or dead and what would THAT do to your precious economy?

Compare the growth rate prior to lockdown measures to the growth rates after lockdown measures were taken.
Calculate the change in growth between each period.

Did the growth rates decline or increase after lockdown measures were taken? By which percentage?

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-cases/#cases-growth-factor

While not all countries decided to take measures at the same time, many of them started around the middle of March, about 30 days ago.

If you look at the daily cases growth rate factor before the middle of March, the average daily growth rate factor prior to March 11 was about 1.1117.

If you look at the daily cases growth rate factor after the middle of March, the average daily growth rate factor after most of the lockdown measures around the world were put into place has been about 1.1062.

So... by those calculations, these lockdown measures have been able to produce a 0.0055 decline in the daily growth rate factor of this virus.

We've gone from a 11.17% daily growth rate to a 10.62% daily growth rate.

Since I can't find any stats or run any calculations for any scenarios that haven't occurred, I can't offer an answer to the question of how different these numbers would be if not for the measures taken, but do you believe they're worth a 0.55% change in the number of people being infected?

It's not just about the increased amount of people infected, it's about an increased amount of people being infected at the same time, which will lead to a higher mortality rate as the overloading of health services mean a portion of those who would otherwise not die now will die as they do not have access to said health services.

You now have more dying because more are infected combined with a higher percentage dying. Then ask yourself, if that happens at some point the economy probably starts to shutdown on it's own as a result of people not wanting to go outside when they see hospitals being overrun. Either way, this was going to **** over the economy. At least here we are saving lives.

What is every person who does not die worth? Percentage wise.

[dohboy_24]

Those numbers are inaccurate. They are extremely dependent on testing and classification which varies widely not only between countries, but also within different locations in a country and over the course of time.

I posted this yesterday, but there are some good criticisms of current numbers in there, without even getting into a discussion of the positivity rate.

Read on Twitter

All statistics are inaccurate to some degree. How they're collected, how they're tabulated, how they're measured, how they're presented and many other factors can have a great effect on the predictions and interpretations made from them.

As quoted from the article you posted:

The positivity rate is not the same as the proportion of COVID-19 cases in the American population at large, a metric called “prevalence.”* Nobody knows the true number of Americans who have been exposed to or infected with the coronavirus, though attempts to produce much sharper estimates of that figure through blood testing are under way. Prevalence is a crucial number for epidemiologists, in part because it lets them calculate a pathogen’s true infection-fatality rate: the number of people who die after becoming infected."

Because the number of Americans tested for COVID-19 has changed over time, the U.S. test-positivity rate can’t yet provide much detailed information about the contagiousness or fatality rate of the disease. But the statistic can still give a rough sense of how bad a particular outbreak is by distinguishing between places undergoing very different sizes of epidemics, Andrews said. A country with a 25 percent positivity rate and one with a 2 percent positivity rate are facing “vastly different epidemics,” he said, and the 2 percent country is better off.

Not every epidemiologist feels as comfortable drawing conclusions from the test-positivity rate as Andrews. “If you want to interpret [the positivity rate] as a hint to prevalence in a particular location, you have to assume lots of other things stay constant,” Daniel Westreich, an epidemiology professor at the University of North Carolina, told us. He warned that too little was still known about who exactly is getting tested, and how reliable the tests are, to draw large conclusions from the positivity rate alone.

As a result, the positivity rate numbers aren't any better or accurate than what we have.

None the less, let's assume there is validity to the statement that these numbers are inaccurate and there are more people infected and dying than being reported.

Given that hypothesis, by which factor would these numbers have to be off for the real and observed numbers of cases and deaths to be double or triple what's being reported?

At present, the total cases/1 million population for the world is less than 300 people (286).

What factor would these numbers have to be under-reported for the total cases/1 million to be 1,000 people (0.1% of the population)?
Answer: 249.65%

What factor would these numbers have to be under-reported for the total cases/1 million to be 10,000 people (1% of the population)?
Answer: 3,396.5%

What factor would these numbers have to be under-reported for the total cases/1 million to be 100,000 people (10% of the population)?
Answer: 34,865.03%

Is it reasonable to assume these numbers are off by factors of this degree?

[hankscorpioLA]

Almost 200 dead in Canada so far today? Damn man, it'll be a bad one...

What about the 5 days prior to today...

Apr 15 = 107
Apr 14 = 123
Apr 13 = 63
Apr 12 = 64
Apr 11 = 84

What about the number of people who recovered the last 5 days...

Apr 15 = 744
Apr 14 = 479
Apr 13 = 584
Apr 12 = 744
Apr 11 = 415

37,600,000 people live in Canada.
29,929 of them have tested positive.
9,674 have recovered.
1,191 have succumbed to this virus.

% of population infected = 29,929/37,600,000 = 0.07% of Canadians have tested positive
% of population who've died from coronavirus = 1,191/37,600,000 = 0.003% of Canadians have died from this virus

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/canada/
https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/canada-population/

How do those numbers compare to the number of people who've applied for employment, been temporarily laid off, been let go from their jobs, or had their hours reduced as a result of the lockdown measures taken?

How do those numbers compared to the number of businesses that have closed temporarily due to these lockdown measures, the number who've reduced their hours, the number who've closed permanently, and the number of them who might never re-open when the lockdown measures are removed?

Even without looking up the numbers, would it be fair to say that more than 0.003% to 0.07% of Canadians have been effected by the ripple effects of these lockdown measures?

Does your statistics class explain these numbers are as low as they are because of the shutdown measures in place? Since you've got such a hard on for calculations, why don't you tell me what would happen if things didn't shut down the way they are? How many more people would be sick and/or dead and what would THAT do to your precious economy?

Exactly.

Midway through cancer treatments, the patient is in a state where their symptoms are significantly worse than before, but the cancer isn't cured yet. It's been attacked and weakened, but more treatment is still needed, which will result in worse symptoms. But if you stop now, the cancer will just grow back, and probably be even stronger.

You wouldn't tell your oncologist not to treat you because it will make you feel sick. You understand that it's something you have to go through if you want to survive.

That's where we are right now. The virus is the cancer, social distancing is the treatment, and the economy is the symptoms.

We have been weakening the virus with social distancing, which has kept it from overwhelming our society. But we haven't controlled the virus, so if we stop now, it just comes back. And we must bear the economic hurt because the alternative is significantly worse.

[dohboy_24]

It's not just about the increased amount of people infected, it's about an increased amount of people being infected at the same time, which will lead to a higher mortality rate as the overloading of health services mean a portion of those who would otherwise not die now will die as they do not have access to said health services.

You now have more dying because more are infected combined with a higher percentage dying. Then ask yourself, if that happens at some point the economy probably starts to shutdown on it's own as a result of people not wanting to go outside when they see hospitals being overrun. Either way, this was going to **** over the economy. At least here we are saving lives.

What is every person who does not die worth? Percentage wise.

Just as many people are and have been infected with the flu, pneumonia or other communicable diseases at the same time.

In most cases, the total cases/1 million and total deaths/1 million for each of those are typically greater than what is being experienced with this virus.



Why don't we put similar lockdown measures in place each year to help flatten the curve of flu deaths? Why don't we put similar lockdown measures in place each year to help flatten the curve of pneumonia deaths? Why don't we put similar lockdown measures in place each year to help flatten the curve of deaths from other communicable diseases?

Why didn't we put similar lockdown measures in place to help flatten the curve of deaths from SARS, MERS, swine flu or any of the similar outbreaks we've experienced in the past?

Are the lives of the people who've died of those causes any more or less valuable than those being affected by this virus?

[dohboy_24]

Exactly.

Midway through cancer treatments, the patient is in a state where their symptoms are significantly worse than before, but the cancer isn't cured yet. It's been attacked and weakened, but more treatment is still needed, which will result in worse symptoms. But if you stop now, the cancer will just grow back, and probably be even stronger.

You wouldn't tell your oncologist not to treat you because it will make you feel sick. You understand that it's something you have to go through if you want to survive.

That's where we are right now. The virus is the cancer, social distancing is the treatment, and the economy is the symptoms.

We have been weakening the virus with social distancing, which has kept it from overwhelming our society. But we haven't controlled the virus, so if we stop now, it just comes back. And we must bear the economic hurt because the alternative is significantly worse.

Please provide quantifiable and measurable support for this statement: "We have been weakening the virus with social distancing, which has kept it from overwhelming our society."

"But we haven't controlled the virus, so if we stop now, it just comes back. And we must bear the economic hurt because the alternative is significantly worse."

If that were a universal truth, how can you explain what's happening in Sweden or what's been happening in countries like China, Iran, Germany, Czech Republic, Norway and Denmark who've begun to ease their restrictions?

Have they been experiencing a rise in cases and deaths since those changes have been made?

[dohboy_24]

That's where we are right now. The virus is the cancer, social distancing is the treatment, and the economy is the symptoms.

The treatment isn't working as well as expected. In the meantime, many more people are being affected by the ramifications of the treatment, not the virus itself.

Compare the growth rate prior to lockdown measures to the growth rates after lockdown measures were taken.
Calculate the change in growth between each period.

Did the growth rates decline or increase after lockdown measures were taken? By which percentage?

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-cases/#cases-growth-factor

While not all countries decided to take measures at the same time, many of them started around the middle of March, about 30 days ago.

If you look at the daily cases growth rate factor before the middle of March, the average daily growth rate factor prior to March 11 was about 1.1117.

If you look at the daily cases growth rate factor after the middle of March, the average daily growth rate factor after most of the lockdown measures around the world were put into place has been about 1.1062.

So... by those calculations, these lockdown measures have been able to produce a 0.0055 decline in the daily growth rate factor of this virus.

We've gone from a 11.17% daily growth rate to a 10.62% daily growth rate.

Since I can't find any stats or run any calculations for any scenarios that haven't occurred, I can't offer an answer to the question of how different these numbers would be if not for the measures taken, but do you believe they're worth a 0.55% change in the number of people being infected?

[Fairview4Life]

You keep drawing conclusions from numbers that are very obviously wrong though, is the thing.

[beckham23]

Jesus...

[beanbag]

It's not just about the increased amount of people infected, it's about an increased amount of people being infected at the same time, which will lead to a higher mortality rate as the overloading of health services mean a portion of those who would otherwise not die now will die as they do not have access to said health services.

You now have more dying because more are infected combined with a higher percentage dying. Then ask yourself, if that happens at some point the economy probably starts to shutdown on it's own as a result of people not wanting to go outside when they see hospitals being overrun. Either way, this was going to **** over the economy. At least here we are saving lives.

What is every person who does not die worth? Percentage wise.

Just as many people are and have been infected with the flu, pneumonia or other communicable diseases at the same time.

And the numbers to support this claim are where? Also, the mortality rate here is significantly higher.

I ask you again, what are your calculations on what a saved life is worth?

[execoftheyear]

It's not just about the increased amount of people infected, it's about an increased amount of people being infected at the same time, which will lead to a higher mortality rate as the overloading of health services mean a portion of those who would otherwise not die now will die as they do not have access to said health services.

You now have more dying because more are infected combined with a higher percentage dying. Then ask yourself, if that happens at some point the economy probably starts to shutdown on it's own as a result of people not wanting to go outside when they see hospitals being overrun. Either way, this was going to **** over the economy. At least here we are saving lives.

What is every person who does not die worth? Percentage wise.

Just as many people are and have been infected with the flu, pneumonia or other communicable diseases at the same time.

And the numbers to support this claim are where? Also, the mortality rate here is significantly higher.

I ask you again, what are your calculations on what a saved life is worth?

it's based on some media outlets spewing false information. Don't worry, once the numbers settle in less and less people will compare this to the flu.