Quote:
Originally Posted by Tcoat
The flu and Covid are not the same thing. The flu is actually much more dangerous but since people are used to that they just don't panic. It is "just the flu" even though it kills tens of thousands in the US alone every year.
The flu numbers make the Covid stats look like a nice sunny summer day!
Hell the US numbers from last year dwarf the rates in even the worst affected Covid countries (so far)
"CDC estimates that the burden of illness during the 2018–2019 season included an estimated 35.5 million people getting sick with influenza, 16.5 million people going to a health care provider for their illness, 490,600 hospitalizations, and 34,200 deaths from influenza (Table 1). The number of influenza-associated illnesses that occurred last season was similar to the estimated number of influenza-associated illnesses during the 2012–2013 influenza season when an estimated 34 million people had symptomatic influenza illness6" |
This isn’t entirely accurate. It is like saying Ebola isn’t as dangerous as the flu or COVID or like sharks aren’t as dangerous as dogs based on absolute numbers of death cases.
The Spanish Flu was the flu yet the numbers of people who died was night and day different, and the amount of young that died was the worst part of it. Similarly, COVID has a greater virulence or ease of transmission than the regular seasonal flu. Moreover, the mortality and morbidity rates are likely similar to the Spanish Flu, which is about 10x what it is for the seasonal flu. If we allow the flu to pass through our culture like we allow the seasonal flu then imagine more like 340,000 deaths than 34,000.