Originally Posted by GoodLife (Post 1760437)

You asked for epidemiologists expertise, I gave it to you. Now you discount their opinion. Nobody is talking about the end of the world here. If we are in the first few months of a pandemic scenario that could last 2 years, as these epidemiologists say, then saying the fat lady is just warming up is quite logical.

The CIDRAP report stressed that no matter which scenario actually occurs, governments must be prepared for at least another 18-24 months of significant covid 19 activity.

The CIDRAP report compared the current coronavirus pandemic to past influenza outbreaks, stressing that SARS-CoV-2 cannot be compared to SARS or MERS, as these two viruses behaved in “substantially different” ways than the current coronavirus outbreak and that influenza pandemics are more comparable.

Dr. Moore is medical director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy (CIDRAP). Dr. Lipsitch is the director of the Center for Communicable Disease Dynamics, Department of Epidemiology, Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health. John Barry is a professor at Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine. Dr. Osterholm is director of CIDRAP, University of Minnesota Regents Professor, and McKnight Presidential Endowed Chair in Public Health.

Be glad to see any experts you can come up with who have different scientific opinions.

Originally Posted by Ben Franklin (Post 1760446)

Thanks, but I didn't ask how Sweden was doing it, and you can not say, if one stays home and takes precautions, there is nothing to worry about. One still needs groceries and medicine, at minimal. Even if both are delivered, how many hands have touched the product? The virus stays active up to 24 hours on cardboard, 2-3 days on plastic and metal and 4 days on glass.

Now, about my only questions...

Originally Posted by justjim (Post 1760452)

Those who want to join the herd step forward. That’s what I thought.

Originally Posted by Ben Franklin (Post 1760446)

Thanks, but I didn't ask how Sweden was doing it, and you can not say, if one stays home and takes precautions, there is nothing to worry about. One still needs groceries and medicine, at minimal. Even if both are delivered, how many hands have touched the product? The virus stays active up to 24 hours on cardboard, 2-3 days on plastic and metal and 4 days on glass.

Now, about my only questions...

Originally Posted by davem4616 (Post 1759990)

.... this takes the post a little off course, but it is about the Swedes, so I'll share:

Back in the 1900's a manufacturing company in central Massachusetts, where I was raised, sent recruiters to Sweden and brought hundreds of Swedes over to America to work in their factory. Their research had indicated that Swedes were much more inclined to adapt and follow direction and far less likely to organize into a union than other nationalities or the local US workers at that time were. This one company wanted to avoid having to deal with a union. That company ended up with a predominant Swedish workforce and to this day never did unionize. All of the other large manufacturing firms in that same city did unionize.

Originally Posted by golfing eagles (Post 1760471)

Not at all. It is an interesting retrospective review of previous pandemics. They don't give a single opinion, they list 3 scenarios, and yes, we still need to be prepared for all 3. But it doesn't mean any of those nicely graphed scenarios will come to pass. What about scenario #4---the pandemic fizzles out and is not heard from again? I find that unlikely given that international travel will resume sooner or later and there are some mutations that may occur. I guess it depends on how you define "the fat lady singing". If it means there are zero cases for 5 years, then she is still singing. If it means the worst is over in 3-4 months, then she might still be whimpering, but all the major arias have been sung.
Most people don't know the difference in various scientific studies, but the best designed ones are multiple university sited, double blinded, placebo controlled prospective studies with at least 2500 patients. This type of retrospective comparison does not lend itself to such rigorous criteria. So take it for what it is worth and what it intended to show, but less so as a predictive indicator.

Originally Posted by Tom53 (Post 1760354)

Sweden has a rate of just over 12% deaths per infected, the US is just under 6%. If we followed Sweden's plan we could have conceivably had 2,526,486 infected and 149,620 deaths at this point.

Deaths per million is nothing more than a statistic, and leads to a false sense of security. San Marino has a death rate of 1208/million, over 4 times US and Sweden, which resulted in 41 dead, yes 41!

Deaths per infection is reality!

So it comes down to choice, do I put my money on the chances of getting the virus, or do I go all in on the chances of surviving it.

Numbers don't lie, but they can be misused.

Originally Posted by Tom53 (Post 1760354)

Sweden has a rate of just over 12% deaths per infected, the US is just under 6%. If we followed Sweden's plan we could have conceivably had 2,526,486 infected and 149,620 deaths at this point.

Deaths per million is nothing more than a statistic, and leads to a false sense of security. San Marino has a death rate of 1208/million, over 4 times US and Sweden, which resulted in 41 dead, yes 41!

Deaths per infection is reality!

So it comes down to choice, do I put my money on the chances of getting the virus, or do I go all in on the chances of surviving it.

Numbers don't lie, but they can be misused.

Originally Posted by graciegirl (Post 1760304)

Until and unless we get some hard figures, some genuine data that can be trusted on who is sick, what they are sick with, what did they die of …., until then, the virologists and epidemiologists with the CDC or WHO with a specialty in the pathogenesis of single stranded RNA viruses will have difficulty with their projections.

I bet a lot of them are ready to BITE.

Originally Posted by roscoguy (Post 1760179)

But this was also the point of the lockdown or self-isolation: IF people had strictly complied for a matter of only about 2 weeks, the same lack of hosts could/would have occurred.

Besides, herd immunity to COVID-19 is still only a theory. Nobody knows whether or not there is actually any immunity at all, and if there is, how long it lasts.

Other nations seem to have had very good results with their strict lockdown strategies, such as South Korea & Greece.

Originally Posted by Stuart Zaikov (Post 1759958)

Good question but hopefully one of the vaccines being tested now will be available by end of the year and stop the virus in its tracks

Originally Posted by GoodLife (Post 1760535)

Didn't we go over this already. Death rate per infection is not reality.

Death rate per infection is a statistic skewed by many things including number of tests performed, percentage of deaths that are from nursing homes (most likely to die), and how good your Doctors are.

Death rate per capita is best for judging a country's success in combating a pandemic.