BOOOM! Two professors are writing in the WSJ what I have been tweeting for 3 weeks. Read away:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/is-the-coronavirus-as-deadly-as-they-say-11585088464

The speed of Corona causes headache at hospitals even with a low death rate. So there is an issue. BUT they write if Coronavirus is as contagious as feared, the US has now easily 6 million cases (just not known due to low testing), and the death rate is way lower than the flu’s.

BOTH TRUE:

1) Hospitals can melt with as little as a few thousand severe cases. Therefore we need to expand capacity even if it’s “only” a few K severe cases at once.

2) No country/region/province has two double dark numbers at once: 50% population infected + 3% of cases dying.

4/9

Simplify Italy:

60 million population.

70,000 cases.

7,000 dead.

Basically 10% of cases die. VERY high. Sobering levels.

Ok but only 70,000 have the Virus after all those months. Meaning, 99.8% Italy does not have it which means it is not so contagious as feared.

5/9

“YOSSI ARE YOU CRAZY? You think only 70,000 in Italy have Coronavirus? Sure 6 million there have it because it is so contagious.”

Ok. 7,000 dead of 6 million cases is a very low 0.11% death rate.

The next tweet is a summary of what I am saying for weeks:

If Coronavirus is as deadly as feared than it’s not anywhere as contagious as feared. If it’s as contagious as feared then it’s not anywhere as deadly as feared. NO COUNTRY has both numbers at once! Whichever it is, it IS stressing hospitals so we need to up capacity/slow spread.

7/9 This has been obvious for weeks. Finally two professors stress the same in the WSJ. (They take the approach that is is very contagious and hence not as deadly). When this will be over, no one in media will own up to their panic-spreading flawed math. I really don’t get why

8/9 leaders in government and media think that the only way to wake people up about the severity of Coronavirus is telling the public that everyone is getting it and also everyone will die from it. This spreads panic. People are draining the health system because they R freaked.

9/9 in a sane world, leaders would say “Coronavirus is either way more contagious than the flu or way more deadlier. It is stressing our hospitals. We need to up capacity and slow the spread.”

But alas. TODAY some said that 2.5% of the US (not just of cases) can die this year.

Cuomo says he needs 30,000 ICU beds. Considering that 12.5% of known NY cases need hospital and 3% of known cases need ICU, he is expecting

1 mill cases

125,000 (12.5%) hospitalizations

30,000 (3%) of the 1 million cases in ICU.

All of those within the same few days.

Cuomo said yesterday he expects apex to be in 14-21 days. That’s April 6-13. This means NY adds the following per day

10,000 on 3/25
20,000 on 3/26
40,000 on 3/27
80,000 on 3/28
160,000 on 3/29
320,000 on 3/30

630,000 total new cases. Hospital is a week+ later for April 6-13.

Over the last four days, NY added on average 5,113 (known) cases per day as follows:

4,812 Sat 3/21

5,707 Sun 3/22

4,790 Mon 3/23

5,146 Tues 3/24

If the NEW case count doubles every day for the next week, we are looking at 18,900 new ICUs at apex. I guess 30K is a buffer.

30K ICU by April 6-13 based on a hospitalization rate of 12.5% and 3% of cases needing ICU is as follows:

NY’s ICU count rose 132 on Tuesday 2/24. It doubles daily

264 on 3/25
528 on 3/26
1,056 on 3/27
2,112 on 3/28
4,224 on 3/29
8,448 on 3/30
16,896 on 3/31

33,528 Total.

NY says that they will need only 20K - 30K beds at the peak in a few weeks from now (which was supposed to be today at 125,000 beds but my thread above showed you two weeks ago that it makes no sense but what do I know).

It’s still tough out there so please social distance!

The obvious-flawed math led to the panic-policy of not letting anyone into hospitals (since you know everyone has Corona and everyone who has it will die). This led to many avoidable Coronavirus deaths. No one there to alert nurses that patients are chocking on their saliva.

Do you understand that the panic around Corona (based on double counting a dark number), led to stress on the hospitals (as I yelled will happen) which led to DEATHS? Do you get that the panic is keeping companions out/staff under siege which leads to DEATHS? Folks, you are not

hearing me enough. The deaths of Coronavirus does not prove that your panic was merited. It is your panic that is causing so much of the deaths by the system being more strained than needed and hospitals implanting crazy policies. Sure. Avoid crowds; social distance etc

becasue Coronavirus is no joke, but so much of the “no joke” is based on policies that have been implemented as a result of flawed reading of the math. Hospitals are firing staff due to elective services being shutdown fully. How does this help? Oh I predicted this all.

I am not an arm-chair loud louth and a Monday morning QB. I am talking DAILY to EMS, nurses and families, and I predicted this all starting early March. BTW my masks arrived Feb 27! You can prepare prudently without spreading panic by relying on data which was wrong all along!