I don't think you were speculating that maybe half the country already got it and got over it, but I've been seeing enough people express that exact thought that I felt the need to weigh in.
While it's becoming evident that there are at least a significant number of asymptomatic carriers out there and an even larger number of minimally symptomatic people who already recovered, it doesn't make sense that it would be a huge chunk of the population. If this was going around like wildfire in January and February, I think our hospitals would have seen the surge in demand they're starting to see now.
Who said January and February? The discussion goes back to September/October. We only knew how to diagnose these deaths a few months ago. COVID is more contagious than the regular yearly flu strains. What areas are getting hit the hardest globally? How are lesser traveled areas (see:rural) getting it? By outsiders coming in.
I don't for a second believe the CDC tracked the first US case down on January 2020 from a passenger landing in Washington state or San Francisco from Wuhan. If they were contagious on the plan, then all those people were exposed as a portion of aircraft air does circulate, while the rest is drawn in from outside.
If this is just the beginning, then the presumed surge in 2 weeks will have to be modified to more than 30 days from now, and any current modeling is irrelevant if we go by what you're saying. You're also presuming people would need to be taken into ICU when presenting symptoms. Urgent care facilities may have had an influx of patients. Not every person who is positive for COVID requires hospital stays or ambulatory services.
If the current demand is the product of a super contagious disease with a miniscule death rate that's spreading super fast, that wouldn't make sense either because we'd see a lot more positive tests. Yeah, there can be a lot of false negatives, but we're seeing mostly negative tests even though our criteria for giving out tests basically assumes that you do have Covid-19 and we just want to make sure.
One of the best tests out there now that's been used for a while has only an 85-90% accuracy rate. Further tests have been approved by the FDA but how accurate they are is up for measurement. You're also bringing up a "miniscule death rate" on reported cases and confirmed COVID19 deaths.
So what about all the countries including the US that had COVID19 deaths prior to knowing what they were dealing with? Or the countries including the US who are covering up deaths? Mexico is listing their sudden spike in deaths as pneumonia related, not COVID. This paints a picture of minuscule deaths in the face of reported cases.
I've also seen lots of posts on social media from people saying, "You know. I think I probably got it in February. I had a fever and a severe cough that I couldn't get over." Surely for some it will be the case they had Covid-19, but for the vast majority who thought this, they probably had some other random respiratory virus, a cold, or the flu.
URIs are common in the winter. I'd place more faith in people who lived in busy areas of the country rather than some little down in Idaho.
Let me drive this home once more. We're very bad at testing. We're only testing severe cases in some areas, and other symptoms in other areas. It won't be long until the daily count rapidly rises for those who test positive for the virus. It's still not enough tests. No country was prepared for this. No state is prepared for this.
Now if we consider your post to hold water, then what we're seeing now is just the beginning assuming there isn't a decent chunk of the population with antibodies. We're going to see a dramatic spike in hospitalizations and deaths until a vaccine is developed.
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The disease is silent and very contiguous so people unwillingly will keep spreading it to others. So, tracking every person and those who affected will become a hard and time consuming task.
For example two weeks ago an African man with Covid19 flew from Norway to his country and tested posotive at the destination so there is high chance he unwillingly infected others.
Was there a point in reiterating my post in the first half or bringing up an example which I'd already explained earlier in the thread? It's clear you don't understand how herd immunity works or you wouldn't have asked that question earlier. Waste someone else's time.
That man infected those at the airport if particulate matter escaped his oral cavity and others weren't protected. If he coughed into his hands and touched a railing. If that railing was touched by a child who then scrubbed their eye or mouth without washing their hand or their parent didn't see them touch it. Airliner air is partially recirculated. Particulates in the cabin air may get trapped via filters or may be dispersed infecting others. Those sitting next to him may have gotten infected. Now this means nothing but it could also mean he alone with his actions eventually caused a few hundred to a thousand people to become infected.
How many don't show symptoms, how many that do on a variable scale, and how many end up dying is up in the air.
