CNN: Why We Cover COVID

[kpete]

There are 220,417 reasons to talk about the Coronavirus.

There are nearly 60,000 cases per day in the U.S. and rising. The person whose response failed upon most objective measures is not fixing his government’s approach to the crisis, instead he is suggesting we just ignore it. The president doesn’t even regularly acknowledge the huge loss of life that we have experienced here in the last nine months. In fact, he has instead questioned whether the horrifying number is accurate.

220,000 dead.

We cover COVID for them and the ones who they leave behind, forced to say goodbye through a phone screen.

We cover COVID for those who never got the chance to say goodbye.

We cover COVID for the children who bury their mother and then two weeks later their father.

We cover COVID for the ones that not only lost multiple family members to this virus but their livelihoods too.

We cover COVID for the millions who are relying on overwhelmed food banks for their next meals.

We cover COVID for the ones struggling to keep a roof over their heads, forced to leave everything they own behind.

We cover COVID for the students who can’t go to school safely and for the parents who are juggling their children and their jobs.

We cover COVID because at least 14 states report record hospitalizations in the last week because we just saw the highest number of cases on a Monday since the peak in July, because experts say the next few weeks are going to be the darkest yet.

And until these numbers on your screen slow down, we’re not going to stop.

~ Brianna Keilar

&t=455s

[Bernardo de La Paz]

1. Excess death tallies put the Covid death toll at more like 300,000 so far. . . . nt

[Hugin]

3. Yeah, and according to that number the difference is mostly in the 24-44 year group.

Terrible!

[genxlib]

5. I think that is a misunderstanding of the statistics

The percentage of excess is higher for that age group but the raw numbers are not so high.

In other words, "normal" deaths for that age group is really low so a significant increase in percentage is still a low number. There are a lot more ""normal" deaths in older groups so the increase percentage wise is not as great even though the raw totals are higher.

Example.

If you have 10 apples and I give 3 then you will have 30% more apples.

If you have 1000 apples and I give you 30 more then you will have 3% more apples.

The first looks bigger but the second represents 10x as many excess apples.

It is still an important statistic but I don't believe it really tells us what people have been interpreting.

[Hugin]

8. You may very well be correct.

What I find intriguing is that the overall number is so close to the reported number of COVID deaths.

The difference has increased some over the past two months, but, it's still representative. Since this raw number is calculated by subtracting a running average of the annual excess deaths from this year, I think it's a pretty accurate indication of the COVID fatalities. Also, that the unintentional/intentional manipulation of the reported COVID numbers are not having that much of an impact on the total reported as COVID deaths.

It looks like the manipulations may remove the spikes, but, we can still see the trend. Which is currently up, unfortunately.

Check out the CDC's excess deaths dashboard/calculator: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm

[genxlib]

9. I think it is a fascinating question

In the end, there will be a lot of study on this particular issue.

They will have to factor in for all other indicators.

Some excess death might be expected from non-direct causes like mental health and lack of access to ordinary health care during lockdown.

While at the same time, a lower death rate could be expected from less driving, less pollution etc.

It is an equation and we still don't know all the variables.

I look forward to the day when we can put the scientists back in charge so they can figure it out.

[dalton99a]

2. And it is getting worse

[Yavin4]

4. Brianna Keilar is a force of nature. n/t

[Satch59]

6. That was powerful...should be an ad

“I’m Joe Biden and I approve this message”

[malaise]

7. This was very well done

Rec