It can take up 14 days for symptoms to start and then it can 3 weeks plus before it is fatal. Some people are in ICU for weeks. They may well have been infected before the lock down.
Thsi is exactly the point and why the numbers of deaths rose almost exponentially during the first 3 weeks. Fortunately it looks like the number of people in hospital with CV-19 is gradually starting to decrease so the daily numbers (which are hospital deaths) should start to plateau and gradually fall.
What will be a shock will be next Tues and especially the following week (28th April) ONS data as these will reflect the very high numbers of care home deaths that are being reported this week but are compiled weekly with all the other deaths
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When we only test people who are so ill they're in hospital the death rate is guaranteed to be high. Had we tested everyone in the community with symptoms the rate would have been much lower. The comparison is meaningless.
But if you take the testing out of the equation their death rate is still very low in comparrison.
X
Exactly. The death RATE is the number of deaths from the disease as a proportion of the total number with the disease. We have no idea what this is as testing was abandoned once we entered phase 2 ie mitigate rather than contain. This was not forseen and should have been.
Once (if) there is an accurate antibody test, then population wide testing will determine what our infection rate was and thence our death rate. It will probably be similar everywhere.
Where countries will differ is in the total numbers of deaths per head of population but also this is not a really a proper measure either. I think the most useful comparison is looking at the trajectories of numbers of deaths over time since the first 50 deaths were announced and the number of tests carried out at the time as well as when lockdown and other measures were introduced. Also other strategies. Countries like S Korea I gather did extensive testing and rigorous and strict contact tracing and isolation (I think) like we did in our failed containment phase.
We are going to have to go back to that if and when loackdowmn measures are eased gradually otherwise we will get a second peak or more so the disease comes and goes in undulating waves as measures are lifted and then tightened. I think this was mooted some time ago actually right when Boris first introduced the very soft social distancing in the first week ie the waves of mini epidemics as restrictions were eased once we had come down from the first main flattened peak.
Hurdity x