Coronavirus in the United States - news and thoughts

many of those were dead for days, how could you possibly make a cause of death determination based on various temperature and condition changes to the body?i just feel that at the time doctors were overwhelmed and for lack of a better phrase, " took " the easy way out in stating cause of death.

 

what kind of evidence can prove they died from covid when they were not determined to have had it, show me what the doctors used to deternmine?

 

How do you explain all the excess deaths in NY that weren't accounted for by a positive test result? And why do you want to exclude those deaths from the total when a doctor determined cause of death to be covid?

 

I'm really not going to argue this particular issue with you anymore. Suffice it to say a lot of people in NY died from covid who weren't tested for covid. If you don't want to believe that obvious truth, that's on you.

Now can you tell me why the positive test rate is going up in Florida in June compared to May?

 

Why don't you ask a doctor? Paging @dingyibvs

 

because if a body has 20 gunshot wounds or 30 knife punctures, it would be easy to say what caused the death, how do you determine on a body decomposing for several days w/o most likely good tissue samples to examine? if they all were called flu deaths people here would scream cover up, that they were not, so, it goes both ways. were some covid deaths, most likely, were all, not a chance, so if you cannot be accurate, dont list any.

 

No we wouldn't. Yearly flu deaths aren't even calculated on an individual basis like covid deaths have been. For flu it's just an educated guess based on modeling. No one has a problem with that.

 

an it is also a educated guess, the key word being guess, on if a death w/o covid infection proof is from covid, guesses and hunches are not , to me, acceptable proof of cause of death. lets say we end this now so we wont get banned for a slip of the typing finger.

 

The non-tested NY COVID deaths were determined by statistics. During the outbreak, NY/NJ experienced more deaths than usual during the time frame. During this time, the city was all but deserted, meaning deaths from traffic related incidents or crime were significantly down, for example. If most other major causes of death were down, known, confirmed cases of COVID-19 deaths were spiking, what else would have caused all the additional deaths during this time period?

The number will never be perfect down to the last body, but when you're dealing with thousands of bodies, do you really need an exact number? You can get a very good estimate of non-tested COVID-19 deaths with good modeling. All you need to know is average expected death totals, total actual deaths, and what percentage down from non COVID-19 related deaths the area is experiencing.

Simple math, but say you would expect 100 deaths in a time frame with no COVID. Say the expected average is 10 traffic and 10 criminal deaths. Now, with COVID, there were actually 200 deaths, with only half the traffic and half the crime. Can you, with 100% confidence attribute the 100 extra deaths to COVID-19? No, but it's a very safe bet, because the area experienced 100 extra deaths at a time where deaths from other expected deaths are down.

The modeling is also disturbing today because percentage of positive tests may not be going up nationwide, but in several areas, like Florida and Arizona, it's rising. And again, the UW model shows other areas will experience a similar increase in the upcoming months.

 

Would it make you feel better if we called it 115,000 deaths instead of 120,000?

I can’t speak for everyone, but to address your earlier post, no one has a problem with you posting numbers because of your name. I don’t even have a problem with you posting them. I have a problem with you analyzing and interpreting those numbers because to put it bluntly, you’re awful at it. I also have a problem with your condescending style of “analysis” that doesn’t leave the option for people who a better suited to analyze these numbers to disagree with you. I also have a problem with you repeatedly misrepresenting the numbers despite others repeatedly pointing out your errors. I don’t believe it’s intentional, I believe it’s a result of you truly not understanding what you’re stating. Fix those things and I’d bet people would be more accepting of you posting the numbers.

 

I actually think the key word there is educated.

 

Yes I'm all for ending this inanity.

 

see, a slip of the typing finger

 

You are certainly speaking for me. I actually work in statistics. I help analyze clinical trials data. Suffice it to say, I'm pulling my hair out here with buckeye.

 

Well unfortunately for you it's doesn't matter what you think about this. It's the way it has been done with every other disease and it will continue to be done this way. There is no conspiracy.

 

Only 375 deaths today and a 4.1% positive rate on 450k tests. Some decent numbers. Hope those deaths stay where they are. As long as we keep nursing homes locked down maybe that number keeps dropping.

 

Cause of death often isn't exact science, it's often up to the physician's discretion. For example, a lot of the time we'd receive a patient whos' already dead, and then we try to resuscitate them with CPR and whatnot. Unless we suspect foul play, or the family requests an autopsy, the COD is usually just the physician's best educated guess. Nobody's gonna run tests on a dead patient unless one of those two things happens, but you always need to put down a COD, so you see how COD is not always backed by testing results.

 

but i thought numbers were increasing, according to some, 4.1% seems good to me,gee the same as i quoted for the last 10 total days, imagine that.

 

This map shows falling, flat, and rising number of new cases per state.



While the map doesn't show percentages, if we agree that the number of tests per day are flat or rising, then it's safe to assume states in yellow or a shade of green are showing a decrease in % positive. Those in orange are likely around flat or showing small % increase, and those in red, like Florida and Arizona, are showing % positive increases.

What this shows, there are several, warm weather states like Fl, AZ, TX, and CA, that are showing increases as the temperatures rise and more people enjoy outdoor activities. It also shows that these hot spots need to be dealt with.

The question that is yet to be answers is what will happen two weeks from now? Four weeks from now, when temps in the more northern states are warm, and people want to take advantage? Will they see a similar spike as the southern states, minus Mississippi?

Other questions that should be asked are when states began opening up and is there a correlation between a spike in cases after about 2 weeks of opening? What about mask wearing? Is there a map of % of people wearing masks that could be overlayed with the map above? It would tangential evidence of mask effectiveness.

The bottom line is this isn't going away anytime soon, and it doesn't look we're all on the downside at this point. Too many states in the red.

 

8.3% positive test rate for Florida today. Also, I get 4.6% positive test rate for the entire country today. That said, I'm not sure about calculating positive test rates for a single day because I'm not sure how well the number of tests and number of new cases correspond for a single day. It typically takes a few days to get test results back. So I don't know if tests and cases match up for a given reporting day.