Coronavirus cases are rising but is death rate?

[whenthejoyreturns]

Been trying to work out if the death rate is rising proportionally. Does anyone have any good data?

If it isn't then it's probably because Covid is now circulating amongst the under 30s as they care least about social distancing and go to pubs and parties. Therefore death rate is artificially low as a result.

Think it’s younger people getting it currently which is surely a good thing for the winter. Herd immunity amongst younger people and all that jazz?

No.

There was an interesting news report where I am yesterday (not UK) saying in March less than 1% of cases were under 25. It's now 12.5% of all new cases.

So the main reason the death rate isn't rising proportionally is because the people now testing positive are often younger, and many are asymptomatic.

There were undoubtedly the same number of young people infected at the height of the pandemic but nobody was testing unless they presented with symptoms etc

I'm probably being naively optimistic here but although it was reported over 1000 new cases yesterday which is pretty scary, surely we dont know what level of cases there were in Feb/March/April because you were only tested in hospital...? There could have been thousands at home untested.
So more testing will identify more cases (although obviously not a good thing to have that many cases)

Not yet. There is a time lag though in being diagnosed and then getting very ill.

For quite a while US cases were rising but their death rate still steadily falling. Deaths are now sadly starting to increase again as well.

The younger average age of those with Coronavirus will hopefully mean less deaths but when the virus numbers increase and spread so sadly will deaths.

@Mothermorph

I'm probably being naively optimistic here but although it was reported over 1000 new cases yesterday which is pretty scary, surely we dont know what level of cases there were in Feb/March/April because you were only tested in hospital...? There could have been thousands at home untested. So more testing will identify more cases (although obviously not a good thing to have that many cases)

Absolutely. There would have been hundreds of thousands of new cases per day in march but we didn't know about them as only the sickest individuals were admitted to hospital and tested.

Number of people admitted to hospital and on ventilators is continuing to decrease. We would see these numbers rise before deaths and, although it has been 3 weeks since case numbers started increasing, there is no sign of increased hospitalizations.

@crossstitchingnana

If it isn't then it's probably because Covid is now circulating amongst the under 30s as they care least about social distancing and go to pubs and parties. Therefore death rate is artificially low as a result.

It's not artificially, it's just low.

"It's not artificially, it's just low."

That's what I was thinking!

@KitKatastrophe, good to see that graph, which seems to indicate that although numbers are going up due to more testing, deaths are steady/decreasing.

DH and I had it back in March (the consultant we spoke to on the phone was pretty certain, after a 30 minute phone consult), but we were not tested. As a pp said, probably tens of thousands of people had it in those early days but don't appear on any records.

1000 cases seem a scary number. However at out peak of new cases if we believed the ONS stuay that 6.8% Had antibodies in late June that would have equated to an average daily cases count of about 33000 over the period of hmwheb the virus started in the uk. So it's likely during our peak of cases that our Dail. New cases were between 60-100k which considering our highest ever number of new reported cases was under 10k.

So the 1k cases compared to the possible 100k a day we were at befor is not to bad at all if you ask me with all the restrictions that have been lifted.

It's not rising currently.

The age and cases statistics show an increase in the 15-44 age group contracting the virus.
Sadly there isn't a smaller breakdown which I think would be much more helpful.

Vulnerable were shielding until a week ago. The number of cases in the 65+ age group has significantly decreased and we know the risk of death in this age group is significant,y statistically higher.

What I'd be watching now is what happen re the age of cases. What's the impact of the higher numbers in the younger generation. How does it affect spread and growth. Which will affect the death rate eventually if spread moves into these high risk categories again.

I think in Germany they found that incidences after lockdown were higher in young people as they were less likely to be socially distancing. Many in the most at-risk older age groups are still much more likely to be cautious. Also hopefully there are more things like early oxygen treatment in place for those that need it, rather than the very strict triaging over lockdown.

There needs to be more research done now into the longer-term health effects of having Covid, even for young people, as anecdotally there are many people suffering months of respiratory problems and some indication of possible vascular effects. Hopefully these will only affect a minimal number of sufferers.

Sorry should have said increase in the number if 15-44 yo testing positive having contracted the virus. I don't think they didn't get it back in March and April. It was very badly worded

@MinnieMousse

I think in Germany they found that incidences after lockdown were higher in young people as they were less likely to be socially distancing. Many in the most at-risk older age groups are still much more likely to be cautious. Also hopefully there are more things like early oxygen treatment in place for those that need it, rather than the very strict triaging over lockdown.

There needs to be more research done now into the longer-term health effects of having Covid, even for young people, as anecdotally there are many people suffering months of respiratory problems and some indication of possible vascular effects. Hopefully these will only affect a minimal number of sufferers.

Yes I'm sure there is research happening into these medium to long term effects. Many viruses have potential long term complications, including mild illnesses like chicken pox and flu which people arent even vaccinated against. The numbers are small and the likelihood is that they are small for covid too, we are just hearing more about them because many people have had covid in a short time period. I think if these long term effects were very bad and common the press would be all over it - they love a bad news story.

I suppose it's still too early for there to have been much meaningful research into longer-term effects.

@Mothermorph

I'm probably being naively optimistic here but although it was reported over 1000 new cases yesterday which is pretty scary, surely we dont know what level of cases there were in Feb/March/April because you were only tested in hospital...? There could have been thousands at home untested. So more testing will identify more cases (although obviously not a good thing to have that many cases)

There were estimated to be 100000 new cases a day at the peak.

@Illusionordelusion

Think it’s younger people getting it currently which is surely a good thing for the winter. Herd immunity amongst younger people and all that jazz?

I was wondering this too?

No, the number of deaths is still dropping. As others say, it's because the majority of cases now are among younger people who are being less cautious/more social. Older people are still, in the main, being cautious and so fewer of them are becoming infected, plus hospitals and care homes are now much safer than they were at the height of the pandemic - infection control is better, PPE is used religiously, etc. The number of tests is also much higher than it was back in April, so the probably is that we're now catching more people in our figures that are +ve, whereas before loads of people had it, but testing was so inadequate that most people couldn't get a test. Remember when our figures only included those who were admitted to hospital?

Are cases rising? I thought I read that the latest ONS figures were lower than the previous ones. The rolling average death rate haen't risen since April has it?

There are lots of articles around saying that the rate of cases has not really increased from the low during June actually, it is increased testing in hot spots that is resulting in a greater number of asymptomatic cases being identified. For example, the latest ONS survey has not found a significant increase in cases - though this is a Relatively small sample.

Anyway, the death rate was high as it was spreading within hospitals and care homes at that time (our most vulnerable people), we hopefully won't see that happen again.

@KitKatastrophe

Number of people admitted to hospital and on ventilators is continuing to decrease. We would see these numbers rise before deaths and, although it has been 3 weeks since case numbers started increasing, there is no sign of increased hospitalizations.

Kitkat is spot on.

I think the virus has done its worst now

Deaths are falling

www.england.nhs.uk/statistics/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2020/08/COVID-19-total-announced-deaths-10-August-2020.xlsx

This has a good summary of the numbers- (Summary of the numbers is right at the beginning and takes about 5mins to watch - 50sec to 6 mins. Then the track and trace numbers immediately after that)

They seem to have a bit of a technical problem with the charts showing completely but the conclusions are clear:

• Numbers of infections are rising (small increase in last 3 weeks of July) and that the rate of infection is also rising so infection increases can't be completely explained away by increased testing arguments

• Deaths are stable/falling which is good news but we wouldn't expect to see rises in deaths until around the end of August so we need to wait to see on that one.

• Given it is the summer, the increase in cases is slightly worrying

• Track and Trace is a shower of shite and the centralised system is not working well enough at all to keep things under control.

Their calculations are based on a combinations of Government official figures, Government Track and trace numbers, the ONS infection survey and each nation's official death registries, so quite comprehensive