![]() But this paradox is largely due to the fact that we do so much testing. It might seem odd that testing numbers are going up even as attributed deaths drop. If 5 percent of the public has the disease at one time, a million tests will produce 9,500 false “new cases.” Take the 1 percent false-positive rate, cited by some. Over one million tests were conducted on several days.Įven a tiny false-positive rate at this level is a problem. According to The COVID Tracking Project, in September we averaged over 800,000 tests every single day. They are this year because of the huge number of tests given. The one causing COVID-19 is only one among many.įalse positives are not normally a big concern. The test can mistake past infections as current, or even tag infections of other coronaviruses. This is when the test says somebody has a current infection when they don’t. Unfortunately, tests for the presence of the bug are prone to false positives. In other words, most deaths attributed to the coronavirus were in very sick people. This implies a good fraction who succumbed had three or more comorbidities. ![]() These people also were on average elderly and had 2.6 other health problems. The remaining 94 percent died with and not exclusively of the coronavirus. ![]() Most of these deaths were in the elderly. The CDC itself caused a stir at the end of August by estimating that the virus directly caused only 6 percent, or now just over 11,000 of the 187,000 attributed deaths. Even so, it’s not clear how many deaths were caused by the coronavirus alone, how many died with but not simply from infection by the coronavirus, and how many died of other things but just happened to be infected around the time of death. This is the more important number, since it captures the disease burden better than CNN’s. Deaths were boosted to a hair under 300,000 after adding in pneumonia and flu. ![]() On the same day as CNN’s announcement, the CDC officially posted a total 187,072 deaths attributed in some way to COVID-19. (This lack of panics during past pandemics is detailed in our book, “ The Price of Panic: How the Tyranny of Experts Turned a Pandemic into a Catastrophe.”) Because, of course, none of that happened. Just as nobody remembers mask mandates or political leaders shutting down small businesses and locking the healthy in their homes. Those with good memories will recall seeing more “Wash Your Hands” and “Cough Into Your Elbows” posters. (The CDC never made a public announcement about this number, but you can count it yourself from data on its site, as I did in the chart below.) That was a bad year, noted at the time, but mostly by medical professionals. The CDC estimated that about 177,000 Americans died during the 2017-2018 flu season, from either the flu itself or by complications of pneumonia. Here’s a less biased, but less catchy, comparison: 2020’s attributed COVID-19 deaths were equivalent to having another 2017-2018 flu and pneumonia season boosted by 13 percent. Their best effort was an infographic blaring, “US COVID-19 deaths are equal to having the 9/11 attacks every day for 66 days.” 22, CNN triumphantly announced that 200,000 people had died from COVID-19 in the United States.ĬNN tried various ways of rubbing in the 200,000 figure. My daughter was diagnosed with dementia - she's only 19Ĭhina's ChatGPT rival bans users who ask AI about Xi and Winnie the Pooh House COVID panel invites departing CDC Director Rochelle Walensky to testify What is 'Disease X'? COVID experts warn it could cause deadlier pandemic ![]()
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