Covid-19 UK Vs India fatalities, I don't understand

[Thubten]

Dear All,
I'm finding the figures all very difficult to discern. Why are some countries infections/death figures so horrendous? Africa and India's figures are nowhere near as scary. Many people in India are living close together with no running water. You'd think the perfect grounds for spread but as of yesterday only 199 people had died in India. I just don't get it. What's going on?
(to be clear, long may the low death rates continue in those places).
Can NZ avoid it or will they just be infected once they open their borders? Is it as simple as closing till the worst of it is over? The virus will still exist, is it possible to avoid?

[Thubten]

@oralengineer
Good point re the elderly in UK

[redbushtea]

@Freddiefox
I think there is a lot of manipulation of figures going on. can I ask what you mean by this and by who? I’m interested*

An elderly friend with a serious heart condition was admitted to hospital last week. We knew he would not make it (because of the heart condition). And sadly he did die. But the reason for his death was given as corona virus because he tested positive for it. Given that most of us would likely test positive for corona virus now (the government themselves had said 60-80% of UK population would get it and develop herd immunity) I think the reason for death is questionable.

This scenario is probably happening a lot.

[CocoCorona]

India are releasing a lot of propaganda during this time. They’re obviously not coping with testing and reporting of cases/deaths so their government are deflecting blame by trying to accuse Pakistan and Muslims of spreading the disease. Latest one was a news report that Pakistan we’re sending infected men over via Nepal to infect the country.

India, will implode soon. They’ve already had 1 case of a man with covid19 in the slums in Delhi. Whatever happens now, will be catastrophic and probably hidden from the media to keep numbers down.

[Janet2014]

@Thubten
I couldn't have put it better myself, am often shocked at the level of poverty right here in the UK especially as we're supposed to be a developed country and a top 5 world economic power .

[Quartz2208]

Look at Iran - they have reported deaths in the range of 100 to 150 for pretty much a month - those kind of numbers just seem very artificial given the current circumstances just consistent flat 100?

[GrumpyHoonMain]

@CocoCorona - one thing you learn early on as an Indian is not to believe the Indian news. It is designed for the lowest common denominator and they often don’t report facts. The truth is India is hosting several large Muslim religious events right now which are important for Muslims across the world (including Pakistan) and Coronavirus was spread there by European visitors. It was recently also wedding season (due to the weather both Hindu and Muslim weddings are clustered at specific times of the year) which meant lots of overseas visitors.

[Thubten]

@Quartz2208
That's unsettling

[CocoCorona]

There have been reports from Wuhan residents that the real figure of deaths in Wuhan alone must be around 42,000. There are 500 families going to collect their family member’s ashes in Wuhan daily since this all began. ~3,000 deaths in the whole of China is absurdly wrong.

[CocoCorona]

Thanks @GrumpyHoonMain, which Muslim festivals are these?

[KrakowDawn]

They've handled this much better than the British

Yes, by the police beating citizens in the street, humiliating them when not socially distancing, spraying people with disinfectant from high-pressured bowsers.
Then making people queue for food handouts in places where social distancing is impossible.
I'm glad I'm never likely to be treated in this manner by the police where I live.

Rural areas of India are lacking in HCPs, particularly doctors. Let us hope that the spread of the virus is curtailed by the lockdown measures and the relative isolation of many villages.

I think it's utterly meaningless to look at immediate figures coming out of any country at the moment. Experts will study this for the next ten years before they can make any solid judgements on how many/what percentage of cases result in deaths from the virus, and how many people die from secondary factors associated with handling the pandemic.

[Stevienickssleeves]

India lockdown started 24th march, but 2 weeks before that on 10th march they had Holi festival with huge gatherings. I am really surprised by the statistics and sceptical about their accuracy.

[PicsInRed]

21 million Chinese mobile numbers are reported to have become usage inactive since Dec/Jan.

Which is approx. 1% of their population.

[midgebabe]

So 1% of the Chinese population have upgraded their phone already this Year? And in a typical year, say 20% of people change their phone?

[BunsyGirl]

People have become obsessed with the statistics but you can’t compare different countries as they are recording (or not recording) them in different ways. And, quite frankly, comparing the U.K. with NZ is ridiculous. The U.K. has a huge population for its land mass. Look at New York, why is that so bad? The same reason. Lots of people squashed in together.

[midgebabe]

Ther will have been thousands of normal deaths in wuhan over those 3 months.

[PicsInRed]

So 1% of the Chinese population have upgraded their phone already this Year? And in a typical year, say 20% of people change their phone?

This was factored in and found not to be the case.

Makes more sense to lock down an entire country over millions of death than 3000 across 2-3 months.

[CocoCorona]

The doctor who tried to notify his colleagues of the novel virus was seeing these pneumonia type cases in December. I think it was already circulating in October-November. Perhaps even September. All the Chinese students come back around that time to study again at all the universities around the world. Perfect hosts. Loads of people have reported saying they think they already may have had the virus back in November/December time.

The timing of this was either very unlucky or brilliantly planned.

[Kokeshi123]

There is no easy to way to count deaths in countries with poorly organized healthcare systems. A lot of deaths are going to be lost in the statistical noise because there are already a lot of deaths caused by other infectious diseases--and frankly, in poor countries someone of 70-ish dying of a respiratory complaint is likely to be seen as normal, not untimely. The populations are also relatively young in these countries.

[B1rdbra1n]

Lots of people squashed together is a very bad situation when it comes to infectious disease
Even worse is lots of people squashed together with lots of animals
Even worse is lots of sick stressed people squashed together with lots of sick stressed animals

[B1rdbra1n]

I wouldn't want to be a multi-generational household with lots of cats and dogs

[Thubten]

@BunsyGirl I was comparing India to UK in so far as polluted and lots of people. Realise that one is a majority world country and the other a minority. I found the difference in deaths startling but a few on here have helped me understand.
As for NZ, I was asking if they could entirely avoid the pandemic by closing borders

[BunsyGirl]

@Thubten I am not having a go at you, just the obsession with the statistics in general. People going on about how amazing Germany is but failing to understand that they are not reporting the deaths in the same way as us. The obsession with NZ which is such a different country to the U.K is crazy. We have so many people crammed into tiny houses and flats. It wasn’t long ago that Turkey had no cases and people were questioning that. Turkey has now rapidly moved up the “league table”. Unfortunately, I suspect that India will be next.

[GoldDay]

'Failure to test, failure to report deaths'

Yes. In the UK every person admitted to hospital is being tested. I would imagine in poorer countries that is not the case, so people dying with Covid will be fewer.

The country that interests me is Germany. To have the rest of Europe at 3 times their death rate doesn't seem believable. Are they reporting their deaths differently? it can't all be down to extensive testing surely.

[Devlesko]

Africa doesn't have 5G, maybe?
In India they are beating you if you are outside, and when they locked down, a lot sooner than we did, they made thousands of immigrants walk home, just turned them out and told to go.

[Thubten]

@BunsyGirl
I hear you but at the end of the day, regardless of location, we are all just people who are susceptible to viruses, especially virulent ones like Covid-19 and I wanted to understand more fully what I saw as discrepancies.