10% of Covid patients in intensive care unit

https://mailchi.mp/esicm/the-future-of-haemodynamic-monitoring-first-webinar-of-the-year-1009715

49 35 6 years ago

ctoth2• 6 years ago

Really really hope people are paying attention to this. Suspect we're just sleepwalking into a disaster.

smt882• 6 years ago

Literally tens of thousands of people (if not hundreds of thousands) are working on this outbreak. My friend works for the CDC in Atlanta, and the taskforce in that city alone is 1,500 people. They work 75 hrs/wk exclusively on this outbreak.

The idea that the many thousands of people with jobs and doctorates in public health, epidemiology, and medicine would be sleepwalking while you (and I assume some other people) are more aware of the impending disaster is ludicrous.

josh_fyi• 6 years ago

The problem is not the professionals, who work hard, but those in control who may have other motives like short-term stock market performance.

senordevnyc2• 6 years ago

Then why are we 8 weeks into this and the US has tested approximately no one, while other countries are testing thousands per day? Wtf are these 1500 people doing for 75 hours per week?

viggity• 6 years ago

I don't think the CDC is sleepwalking. I think the american public "iT's JuSt ThE fLu" is sleepwalking.

ctoth2• 6 years ago

It's funny how the same heuristics I have developed around the growth of artificial intelligence are useful here. Spotting long term indicators trending in a bad direction. Having the gumption to examine a repellent conclusion, even though my mind wants to shy away from it. Ignoring ridicule and trusting numbers over social cues.

Not that it's done me any good.

justinsaccount• 6 years ago

10% of all positive cases or 10% of the people who already are seeking advanced medical care?

Their wording is "10% of all positive patients."

yumraj• 6 years ago

I really wish that China had not filtered/hidden the data related to Covid-19 for its population. That would have really helped the rest of the World prepare better.

Right now the rest of the world is just grappling with if the mortality is 3.4% or is it higher or lower. How many, across gender and age groups and so on, end up in ICU vs have milder symptoms, and so on..

wetpaws• 6 years ago

The world had time since November but decided to ignore the problem.

ethanwillis• 6 years ago

This is a blatant lie. In November China was busy persecuting doctors and censoring social media.

wrmsr• 6 years ago

It's not China's fault that the US isn't even testing its own healthcare workers displaying symptoms.

erentz• 6 years ago

You can possibly try to blame China for hiding things up until mid January. But absolutely after that you can’t. At that point the entire world had more than good enough data to see how serious this was and that it was going to become a pandemic. Yet even still now the response in the western world is totally underwhelming for the seriousness of the situation. I’m in Seattle which is heading right towards becoming America’s Wuhan and they still aren’t even cancelling all events or closing all schools and colleges.

TheSpiceIsLife• 6 years ago

I wonder if the economic models of delayed action predict better economic outcomes vs cancelling all events and closing schools early?

I imagine there’s likely to be commissions probing bureaucratic response, and some scapegoating.

ourlordcaffeine• 6 years ago

There is a big "It won't happen to me" mentality I can see going around. In many people's minds, coronavirus is something people in Asia get, not something westerners get.

Students at the university in my town are bragging about going skiing in northern Italy, saying "It's overblown" and "It won't happen to me".

Even acquaintances are saying "It's just the flu, what's the big deal?".

zachguo• 6 years ago

If they faked the data, they would downplay it just like other bureaucracies who don't want to hurt the economy. The key is speed. As long as extensive tests and quick actions have been done, and hospitals are not overwhelmed, then there shouldn't be big problems. KR and JP will be fine.

ilaksh• 6 years ago

The problem I am having is that there is wildly contradictory information coming out. Some numbers that make it sound only a little bit more dangerous than flu, and then something like this that says 10% of positive cases need respirators.

I think until we can be very sure that is not true, we should take this much more seriously. Seems like they are not interested in testing people in the US if they can find any excuse. I hope the people making that decision will review this information.

drivebycomment• 6 years ago

I don't trust the numbers from Italy and China - Italy because they seem to have lost the control completely and there seems to be no proper testing of significant population or tracking of the infected patients, and China because...China.

So far, it seems Korea has the best data over the situation, and is likely the most applicable for countries with proper public health and medical systems.

Per Korea's Ministry of Health and Welfare - http://ncov.mohw.go.kr/upload/viewer/skin/doc.html?fn=158337...

As of today, 150K people tested, 5766 infected, 35 death, 0.6% fatality rate. Their age distribution looks interesting:

0-30: ~2k infected, and no death.

30-50: ~1.5K infected, 2 death (0.1%)

50-59: 1127 infected, 5 death (0.4%)

60-69: 699 infected, 8 death (1.1%)

70-79: 288 infected, 13 death (4.5%)

80+: 127 infected, 7 death (5.6%)

Their number of infected graph is showing some sign of deceleration - the growth rate seems to be leveling off or slowing down slightly.

eric-hu• 6 years ago

I think Italy is particularly worth paying attention to as a bad case approximation of what can happen in the US. About a week ago, Korea had tested 90k people while the US had 400 tests available and fewer tested.

Camillo• 6 years ago

I don't trust the numbers from Italy and China - Italy because they seem to have lost the control completely and there seems to be no proper testing of significant population or tracking of the infected patients

Based on what? Italy is the country that ran the third highest number of tests. Only China and South Korea ran more. [0]

I hope you don't imagine that the US is doing better than Italy, because you're in for a rude awakening.

[0] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/covid-19-testing/

flukus• 6 years ago

I'd love to see an age breakdown of infected from other countries, that alone could explain their lower fatality rate.

pfranz• 6 years ago

I'm surprised how many people can compare it to the flu and be dismissive. If it was possible to catch "the flu" early and never have to deal with it, how much would that be worth? 30,000-60,000 people die every year just in the US and there are herculean efforts to produce, manufacture, and distribute a new vaccine twice a year. So now we're cool with having an additional flu going around?

That's separate from the concerns of too many people getting sick quickly, overwhelming our health system, so people who otherwise would get medical attention die.

lurquer2• 6 years ago

So now we're cool with having an additional flu going around?

When people use the word 'flu' they are often referring to the illness and not the virus. That is, there are several viruses that can cause 'flu-like' symptoms besides the influenza virus.

Without definitive evidence that the covid-19 is 'new', it is reasonable for people to wonder if some cases of the illness commonly referred to as 'flu' for the past 1000 years may actually have been caused by covid-19. In short, are we absolutely sure that there is some statistically signicant increase in the number of flu-like illnesses in the past three months?

vanniv• 6 years ago

There is a difference between "you know, we should try to do something about this" and the "OMG, the best-case scenario is that 10% of the population is dead in six months! We're all gonna die! Summon the army and weld people's doors shut!" that people carry on about here all day long.

anonuser123456• 6 years ago

Worth pointing out that that the average age in Italy is 46 vs 37 in China. Given that old age is well known to increase mortality and morbidity, we should expect worse outcomes in Italy.

gnur• 6 years ago

Life expectancy between Italy and China differs by about 7 years in Italy's favor, so I guess it's not that big of a difference.

kid_atticus• 6 years ago

True, but the age distribution skews older in Italy.

Italy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Italypop.svg China: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Population_pyramid_of_Chi...

klmadfejno2• 6 years ago

The fact that Italy has an older population but a longer life expectancy does not mean the risk of disease to the elderly is any less for Italians. That observation would only make sense if life expectancy were # of years from right now, rather than # of years at death.

10% of Covid patients in intensive care unit

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