Comment by edejong | Hacker News Reader

Comment by edejong | Hacker News Reader

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I am a bit more worried. There is a recent study that shows a mortality rate of diagnosed patients at 11% [1]. This is not the true case fatality rate, but a sample of patients seen in Wuhan hospital. The true percentage is probably lower due to bias.

We simply cannot calculate #fatalities / #cases, for a multitude of reasons. One, there is lag due to the clinical journey of the patients. Since both numbers rise exponentially, we really have to take that into account. Secondly, both numbers are most likely under-reported. In Wuhan, patients might not receive any treatment and might not be admitted to the hospital at all.

The short answer is: currently there is not enough information on the true mortality rate.

[1] Epidemiological and clinical characteristics of 99 cases of 2019 novel coronavirus pneumonia in Wuhan, China: a descriptive study https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...

I'm too lazy to find the link but I've read the mortality rate is 3% - vs. 1% for a normal influenza infection. Obviously the information situation is really bad.

If it's really 11% that would be kind of worrisome. If it's just 3%, it's important to take care but in any case there's no point in panicking. The Chinese government indeed does well by building a new hospital complex so fast but the information politics is horrible. Also locking down a whole metropole region makes no sense. It's a signal to panic and people who are just a little sick might have a harder time to recover due to food shortage.

I'm sure, when this is over, the government will face some serious criticism, maybe this would even fuel protests on mainland China.

I don't think 11% is that worrisome. These are the cases where patients are ill enough to be admitted to the hospital. In the US, admitted patients of the flu have a 10% mortality rate, which is equivalent. We still don't have enough information regarding the virus but my guess is that its way overblown in the media.

Good point, also one needs to consider that is has been confirmed that there are people which got infected but practically showed no symptoms. That seems to be the case for the people that got infected in Germany.

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