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Comment by amluto | Hacker News Reader

I am suspicious that a lot of people in the Bay Area have mild cases of COVID-19. I also see no reason to believe that the total number of cases isn’t a couple of orders of magnitude higher than reported, making the overall fatality rate quite low.

Ideally, enough serological tests could be produced that a public health authority could randomly sample a population and get an actual unbiased estimate of the infection rate.

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I share your concern. Perhaps it is because of heightened awareness, but I don't recall any previous winter where so many people were sneezing and coughing at the office as there were this past week. No hacking rib crackers, just lots of muffled throat clearing. Are we the slowly boiling frogs?

I have flu right now and so does the rest of my family (got tested). We all had flu shots but I guess they aren't very effective this year. The illness has been very mild but that's likely because of the shot.

Our doctor said she's seen a ton of flu lately.

Where have you read about a lot of mild cases? Genuinely curious, information about this whole thing is super sparse and evolving too fast...

Last I heard the number of 'mild' cases was very low, and low enough to not make it a talking point as far as diminishing the seriousness of the situation.

Over 80% of covid-19 cases have been mild or asymptomatic. Stop spreading fear.

Ok, Comical Ali!

I’m not sure why you feel like this is an intelligent response, but it shows others that you aren’t worth taking seriously, so keep it up.

Ok, Comical Ali!!

EDIT: There's a point where engaging with nutjobs is mostly about the fun of it and warning others, whether it's the doomsday corona types or bizarre extreme deniers. You're part of the very rare latter group.

You have a point. I don’t know why I’m bothering to engage with obvious nutjobs.

Oh snap!

> I also see no reason to believe that the total number of cases isn’t a couple of orders of magnitude higher than reported, making the overall fatality rate quite low.

4 people died (so far) from the cruise ship, out of <700 infected (including asymptomatic), so statistically the case fatality rate can only be so low.

As I recall, the passengers in question were all tested, but a lot of those tests were administered long before the last time those passengers could have been exposed. I see no a priori reason to believe that the number of cases is accurate.

I've suspected the same in SoCal. DW and I have been feeling kind of bleh over the past few days, and as of today both of our families haven't been feeling great either. It could be something else too, but I wouldn't be surprised either way.

FWIW, try not to act on that assumption being correct. Because if you’re wrong, you now have two illnesses simultaneously...

Allergy season? It's hitting me as of mid-week. In the bay area here.

Allergies got me rubbing my eyes all the time. I'm screwed

It could be allergies. Whatever it is, it's fairly regular. I have a once a day spike in symptoms, only at night so far, where I feel like I'm about the catch the flu (runny nose, scratchy throat, a bit of coughing, and generally feeling poor), but the symptoms fade after an hour or two. Besides that I just feel tired, and at the start of whatever this is I had a day of loose BMs. DW and I's family also started feeling crummy a few days after we did, which could admittedly just be a coincidence.

On the flip side, it's also fairly common to think the flu is just a cold virus or allergies because most people don't display much in the way of symptoms.

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2014/03/17/2908789...

Odds are this is just some random virus (>90% chance), but I wouldn't be surprised if it was COVID-19 either (<10% chance).

Edit - I also have a cousin living in LA that developed pneumonia, which again could just be coincidental.

Everything is in bloom right now in Santa Clara County, which is certainly going to make allergies flare up. Anecdotally, there does seem to be something going around. It’s smart for people to take care of themselves regardless by getting rest, etc. Even if you’re down and out from allergies, caution is warranted and working from home if you’re able to is a good idea.

So you've been feeling bleh and a few others you know - and the conclusion is COVID-19? Not allergies? https://www.pollen.com/

It's more likely some other random virus, but it could be COVID-19. It's unlikely to be allergies in my experience. See my above response for more info.

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