The relevant facts are, one, only much older people have to worry about it, and two, the cure already exists in washing yourself. This common flu is here to stay, the absolute risk to vast majority of people is extremely insignificant.
Even among young patients, the ICU rate is as high as 10%. A low mortality rate for young people assumes access to an ICU.
All of New York State only has about 600 unoccupied ICU beds. If the number of infections in New York breaches 6,000, the fatality rate among young people is likely to be 10-20x that of the flu.
Young people need to worry about Covid19/SARS2
"young patients, the ICU rate is as high as 10%."
Any links?
Sepsis aside, just plain pneumonia in adults is no laughing matter: pneumonia survivors are twice as likely to die as others in their demographic, be they rich, poor, old or young [4]. See the long term effects of SARS: if you survive, your health status and exercise capacity will be impaired for a long time, potentially for the rest of your life [5].
[1] https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...
[2] https://www.epmmagazine.com/news/new-drug-could-stop-sepsis-...
[3] https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/sepsis
> Sepsis was a common complication, which might be directly caused by SARS-CoV-2 infection, but further research is needed to investigate the pathogenesis of sepsis in COVID-19 illness.
> 91 (48%) patients had a comorbidity, with hypertension being the most common (58 [30%] patients), followed by diabetes (36 [19%] patients) and coronary heart disease (15 [8%] patients).
It's obviously bullshit. How would we know about "permanent" damage from a disease a few months old.
Some organs can and others can grow in size to compensate for reduce efficiency. Plus, there's no real evidence that Covid is causing organ damage.
> if your lung tissue starts dying, that's it
That's definitely not "it". Your lungs can repair damaged tissue and the system as a whole can adapt to compensate for portions that can't be repaired. And also no real evidence that long term damage is being done.
I don't think any other organs growing in size are going to compensate for reduced lung function. It's true our bodies adapt to damage but once the tissue is dead it's not coming back.
It is certainly not the message the CDC is putting out in the USA.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/summ...
The Seattle Times ‘Fact sheet’ is also singing a different tune.
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/facts-about...
Remember that low-risk people still get infected, and still infect others. The evidence is fairly conclusive at this point that you're infections even if you lack symptoms, so you can easily be putting the at-risk people in your life (or in communities around you) in significant peril by being careless and thoughtless.
Please be extremely careful with this disease. If you're not going to self-isolate or be more cautious and normal, please do not visit any at-risk people in your life
Could you say how're defining "average" because right now it just sounds like "me". There's a lot of people who are non-average and have the very same right to live as the average.
Maybe the Wikipedia article on bilateral interstitial pneumonia will change your mind?
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S120197121...
Highlights
- In the winter seasons from 2013/14 to 2016/17, an estimated average of 5,290,000 ILI cases occurred in Italy, corresponding to an incidence of 9%. - More than 68,000 deaths attributable to flu epidemics were estimated in the study period.
"only much older people have to worry about it"
That's false. There are a number of comorbidities that don't have anything to do with age. Immuno-compromised individuals, or individuals with pulminary conditions, are at risk regardless of their age.
Further, while the risk does go down for younger populations, only children seem to be fairly risk-free. Healthy individuals of all ages have died of this (at rates significantly higher than that of the flu).
Finally, younger people (even children) still get infected by the disease, still incubate it, and still spread it even if they have no or low symptoms. This means low-risk people can easily spread it to high-risk people without being aware of it.
"the cure already exists in washing yourself"
That's false. Handwashing is not a cure. Handwashing is a preventative measure. They are totally different things.
Once infected, handwashing will do nothing to protect you (though can still help protect others, so ill people should continue to handwash). There are no cures for COVID-19. There is no vaccine for COVID-19. There are no widespread treatments for COVID-19 (though some human trials underway). The only care we can currently provide care for people with COVID-19 is to treat the symptoms.
"This common flu is here to stay"
That's false. Coronavirus is not influenza. It is a type of coronavirus, and is closely related to SARS. The CFR of influenza is around 0.1%, while the Coronavirus is estimated to be around 1% (or higher if medical care becomes saturated).
"the absolute risk to vast majority of people is extremely insignificant."
That's unknown, but disagrees with pretty much all of the expert opinion on the topic. The infections disease expert in the US federal government (Anthony Fauci) thinks it's possible that a million people in the US will die of Coronavirus.
These fatality rate estimates assume top quality medical care. And this crisis is quite simply not "here to stay"; decisive measures can definitely "flatten the curve" and perhaps even lower R0 so much that the virus stops spreading altogether, and cases start dropping towards zero.
Actually many of the statements from your post were absolutely false.
"Fatality rate for 50 and below is a paltry 0.2%"
For a typical seasonal influenza, the fatality rate for that age bracket is around 0.01%, so this is much more lethal to those people than the flue.
https://www.businessinsider.com/coronavirus-compared-to-flu-...
Assuming no medical treatment because the medical system is already full? I doubt it.