Read on Twitter
"What's Happening in Germany??" is a media narrative that never seems to notice what is, in fact, happening in Germany. See if you can spot it (there's a chart at the end if you don't).
AP @wirereporter 3/9 "Germany has confirmed more than 1,100 cases of the new coronavirus but — so far — just two deaths..." https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2020-03-09/experts-rapid-testing-helps-explain-few-german-virus-deaths
@Euronews 3/16 "roughly two people for every thousand cases. These numbers stand out" https://www.euronews.com/2020/03/13/coronavirus-why-does-germany-have-so-few-covid-19-deaths
The Week @iamjamesashford 3/20 "Scientists are struggling to understand how so many coronavirus patients in Germany are surviving ... a death rate of 0.27%" https://www.theweek.co.uk/106267/behind-germany-s-low-coronavirus-death-rate
Bloomberg @naomikresge & @TimLoh 3/24 "one country remains an anomaly... Germany’s mortality rate is only 0.4%" https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-24/coronavirus-less-deadly-in-germany-because-of-youthful-patients
WaPo @LovedayM 3/24 "a persistent question: Why, compared with other countries, are so few...dying? ... in Germany, it’s 0.4 percent." https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/germany-coronavirus-death-rate/2020/03/24/76ce18e4-6d05-11ea-a156-0048b62cdb51_story.html
NPR @rob_schmitz 3/25 "The conditions seemed ideal... Yet Germany's fatality rate so far — just 0.5% — is the world's lowest, by a long shot." https://www.npr.org/2020/03/25/820595489/why-germanys-coronavirus-death-rate-is-far-lower-than-in-other-countries
Vox @HJ_Mai 3/27 "Germany has the fifth-most coronavirus cases in the world, but only a fraction of the death toll ... the reason remains a mystery. ...the country’s fatality rate was a low 0.5 percent." https://www.vox.com/world/2020/3/27/21196246/coronavirus-germany-death-rate-covid-19-cases-italy-europe
CBS @annanorys 3/28 "The mystery behind Germany's low coronavirus death rate... surprisingly low... less than 0.5%... remarkable" https://www.cbsnews.com/news/coronavirus-death-rate-mystery-germany-italy-covid-19/
NYT @AnnaSauerbrey 3/28 "a fatality rate of 0.72 percent... The startling numbers are something of an enigma... What is going on here?" https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/28/opinion/germany-coronavirus.html
NS @JeremyCliffe 3/28 "One of the peculiarities of the Covid-19 outbreak... 0.7%... What could explain this?" https://www.newstatesman.com/world/europe/2020/03/why-are-germany-and-austria-s-coronavirus-death-rates-so-low
Time @billyperrigo 3/30 "just 0.9%... one of the lowest rates in the world... an outlier" https://time.com/5812555/germany-coronavirus-deaths/
AP @wirereporter 4/1 "one of the most interesting puzzles of the COVID-19 pandemic... The numbers are remarkable" https://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory/mass-testing-empty-icus-germany-scores-early-virus-69911783
Nearly every story actually quoted an expert (below the fold) explaining *exactly* what the answer is: German cases hadn't progressed very far yet, so don't read too much into it. If you chart the data, you can easily see what is happening in Germany and why.
Kudos to @thelocalgermany for noticing the trend and asking the right question. https://www.thelocal.de/20200330/explained-why-is-the-coronavirus-mortality-rate-in-germany-rising
I should point out -- something obvious to ppl who know how CFR is calculated and very non-obvious to the reading public -- that *none* of these absolute figures is the "true" or "real" fatality rate. Much more on that here: https://www.freethink.com/articles/what-is-the-coronavirus-death-rate
