COVID19

[Marky147]

[Ironside]

Morning folks
Absolute Must watch documentary on BBC2 about the Covid 19 pandemic, tomorrow night 9.00pm..
2 brothers from the Wuhan research centre, where Trump suspects it was engineered, were due to get on Flight MH370 that miraculously disappeared.
Seems they were the guys behind the development of the new strain, and intending to use it as a weapon, someone caught wind of their plans and purposefully downed the plane. Neither of them got on the flight though. It’s really interesting. Have a look at it - it's called:
Two Wongs Don't Make a Flight!

[robbiebox]

There seems to be a few experts or casual COVID professors on here. So can anyone have a guess at what the true death rate of this virus is yet ? My amateur stab in the dark is between 0.2 % and 0.3 % .

[Ironside]

It's dependant on age group it's over 5% for the OAPs and about 0.1 for the under 40s according to latest figures I seen

[Jon MW]

There seems to be a few experts or casual COVID professors on here. So can anyone have a guess at what the true death rate of this virus is yet ? My amateur stab in the dark is between 0.2 % and 0.3 % .

What is your definition of "true death rate"?

Do you mean case fatality rate?

[Doobs]

There seems to be a few experts or casual COVID professors on here. So can anyone have a guess at what the true death rate of this virus is yet ? My amateur stab in the dark is between 0.2 % and 0.3 % .

The case fatality rate was estimated at about 1%, but is more likely to be less now because of improvements in treatments.  If the NHS gets overwhelmed, as is already the case in some areas, then 1% is likely to be a low estimate. 

It varies enormously by age as Ironside says, so it is probably best to focus on that.  I think 5% is much too low for the oldest patients,  but many of those will be vaccinated soon.

I haven't seen any conclusive evidence for lower mortality from the new variant.   I don't think the treatments and new variants are going to take it down to 0.2% to 0.3%, but the vaccines should.

[Doobs]

David Spiegelhalter, who is a real statistics guy estimated the risk of death from Covid as around the same as most people's normal mortality rate.

https://mobile.twitter.com/d_spiegel/status/1304376828577091585

So if you are at an age where you normally have a 1% risk of dying, then if you get Covid your risk of dying is then around 2% for that year.  The Covid 19 Actuaries group reached the same conclusion. 

The new variant appears to affect younger ages more than the old one, but it is too early to be confident on changes in mortality rate.  I think it is reasonable to stick to Spiegelhalter's conclusion for now

[EvilPie]

David Spiegelhalter, who is a real statistics guy estimated the risk of death from Covid as around the same as most people's normal mortality rate.

https://mobile.twitter.com/d_spiegel/status/1304376828577091585

So if you are at an age where you normally have a 1% risk of dying, then if you get Covid your risk of dying is then around 2% for that year.  The Covid 19 Actuaries group reached the same conclusion. 

The new variant appears to affect younger ages more than the old one, but it is too early to be confident on changes in mortality rate.  I think it is reasonable to stick to Spiegelhalter's conclusion for now

So if this is correct it would mean Covid deaths is 40000 instead of the 80000 quoted as the rest of them would've died anyway?

[Marky147]

For ~5m from 1hr 12m on goes into these, and that Spiegelhalter chart.

How they're misinterpreted by media as saying it wasn't increasing risk/deaths and actually means double.

He corrected it, but that got nowhere near the coverage of the misinterpretations.

Worth watching from 1hr 12m to the end actually, as they go into some other stuff that's interesting, too.

[Doobs]

David Spiegelhalter, who is a real statistics guy estimated the risk of death from Covid as around the same as most people's normal mortality rate.

https://mobile.twitter.com/d_spiegel/status/1304376828577091585

So if you are at an age where you normally have a 1% risk of dying, then if you get Covid your risk of dying is then around 2% for that year.  The Covid 19 Actuaries group reached the same conclusion. 

The new variant appears to affect younger ages more than the old one, but it is too early to be confident on changes in mortality rate.  I think it is reasonable to stick to Spiegelhalter's conclusion for now

So if this is correct it would mean Covid deaths is 40000 instead of the 80000 quoted as the rest of them would've died anyway?

I think additional Covid deaths are going to be about 73,000 as that was roughly the additional deaths last year.   Given many Covid people would have died anyway, then I'd say actual Covid deaths are significantly higher than the 80,000 the official figures sugest now.   This is consistent with poor testing availability in wave 1.  

Spiegelhalter's hypothesis is just rough and ready and isn't going to work perfectly, so that might change the maths quite a lot.  If it doesn't work very well for over 80s then that is going to make a big difference.  I think it works pretty well for 50ish males, which is where I am.

I haven't got time to put everything together now, but will have a think about it if I get time in the week.

[Marky147]

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/capecrusaders/the-covid-chronicles

2020 must be a 13 month year  

https://twitter.com/s8mb/status/1348042100777082881

https://twitter.com/EmergencyBod/status/1348215169038626818

Found that in here, and can' believe there are 7ppl that have chucked him £5,000, and almost £150,000 total.

£10k costs and £135k dividends?

[Doobs]

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/capecrusaders/the-covid-chronicles

2020 must be a 13 month year  

https://twitter.com/s8mb/status/1348042100777082881

https://twitter.com/EmergencyBod/status/1348215169038626818

Found that in here, and can' believe there are 7ppl that have chucked him £5,000, and almost £150,000 total.

£10k costs and £135k dividends?

Suspect so, it isn't like he even does any research for his videos, even the most important ones ever. 

That peerage thing is brilliant.  I saw Cummins had changed his tune, and almost posted it here.  Then I thought he had gone a bit madder than normal.  Now it is clear.

Allison Pearson and Carl Heneghan seem to have gone quiet.   

[Marky147]

https://twitter.com/jocami_ca/status/1307572931766165504

Gets a rinsing here, by the looks of the first few posts.

Might save it for breakfast, as I don't want to wind myself up this late at night

[Chompy]

Rumour is elite sport is being discussed today. Racing might be pulled as early as tomorrow. Not heard anything specific about football.

[Chompy]

Racing continues.