Coronavirus by Numbers

According to Insider Monkey there are at least half a million people infected with the Coronavirus in China… the official figure is about 80,000.

“ In a separate article we calculated the new coronavirus’ fatality rate. The upper bound for our estimate is 0.5%. The actual rate is likely to be between 0.2% and 0.5%. COVID-19 isn’t as deadly as we feared. That’s the good news. Unfortunately, it is a very stealthy virus that can easily evade detection.”

At the risk of upsetting doctor Drew, and the various doctors on twitter auditioning for an expert slot on TV, let’s play along…

“ One major implication of our estimated fatality rate is that only one out of every 200 to 500 infected people will die from the new coronavirus. This also means that if we see 10 deaths in a country due to the coronavirus, it is safe to assume that between 2000 and 5000 are already infected with the virus.”

All of which is rather like straining water to drink through your underpants, when you have diarrhea. But for the sake of argument, let’s use their methodology, and apply it to the Los Alamos study.

With particular reference to these findings …

“ The growth rate of the outbreak is estimated to be 0.29per day (CI: 0.21to 0.37per day), a much higher rate than two recent estimates (1, 5).This growth rate correspondsto a doubling time of 2.4 days.”

The Los Alamos study also states ….

“ The estimated number of infected individuals is 18,700 (CI: 7,147, 38,663) on January23, i.e.the date when Wuhan started lock down. We projected that without any control measure, the infected population would be approximately 233,400 (CI: 38,757to 778,278) by the end of January(Fig. S3).”

The reason for pointing this out is that in December there were reportedly between 2 and 15 deaths in Wuhan from the virus. And, if you use the logic of the Insider Monkey article, that this would equate to some 400–7500 cases by New Year.

Applying the formula of the Los Alamos study to the period between the Jan 1st and Jan 18th, (when the banquet for 40,000 families was held in Wuhan) that would give figures for those infected, of between 51,200 and 960,000.

The latter figure is improbable, as it is roughly 1 in 12 of the city’s population, or two and half times the number estimated NHS planners when preparing later in February for a possible outbreak in the UK.

However, if you take the lower figure, and apply the Los Alamos formula to the lock-down date of Jan 23rd, (i.e two further cycles) it gives a figure of 204,800. Which would seem reasonable for local party officials to freak out, and take drastic measures, particularly as at the time the virus was spreading elsewhere within Hubei province and within China.

It is certainly more reasonable than the 18,700 ‘official’ figure, even allowing for a spike resulting from banquet… why it’s hardly more than the famous ‘10,000 Americans die of flu’ each year… and these are not dead people, just a bit snifferly.

The 204,800 figure is made more credible when, with the arrival of Ying Yong in mid February, preparations were made for 100,000 ‘hospital’ beds.

The point being it is harder to make the case for the official figure of some 80,000 in the whole of China, than it is for the ‘alarmist’ 500,000 figure in one city, Wuhan.

The interesting question, given the propaganda of ‘racism is the real virus’, is what happens to the Chinese figures when they start getting infected from outside China (or claiming to be so)…. particularly if they claim it came from America….

Still, not to worry…

It’s just flu…

Previous posts…

March

March 1st — Coronavirus Comes to Town

February

Feb 3rd — Coronavirus May Be Serious

Feb 4th — Coronavirus Spreading, But Rumours Contained

Feb 5th — Report Says Thousands Killed By Coronavirus in China

Feb 6th — Coronavirus Conspiracy Theories

Feb 7th — Coronavirus Misinformation

Feb 8th — Coronavirus ‘Self Isolates’ China

Feb 9th — China Comes Clean on Coronavirus

Feb 10th — Britain Braces for Coronavirus

Feb 11th — Coronavirus: Chinese Market News

Feb 12th — Coronavirus Relaunches As COVID19

Feb 13th — Coronavirus Figures Explained

Feb 14th — Coronavirus Phoney War

Feb 15th — Coronavirus And AIDS

Feb 16th — Creating the Coronavirus

Feb 17th — Coronavirus Kamikaze

Feb 18th — Coronavirus Conundrum

Feb 19th — China Coronavirus Crisis

Feb 20th — Debunking Coronavirus Conspiracies

Feb 21st — Coronavirus Goes on Tour

Feb 22nd — Coronavirus Grimoire

Feb 23rd — Coronavirus Cannibals

Feb 24th — Coronavirus Facts

Feb 25th — Matt Hancock’s Coronavirus Chaos

Feb 26th — Will Coronavirus be Donald Trump’s Waterloo

Feb 27th — ‘HIV-like’ Coronavirus Found

Feb 28th — The Politics of Coronavirus

Feb 29th — Coronavirus Hits France