It's VERY HARD to compare the CFR of influenza to the CFR of COVID-19, because the DENOMINATORS (number of people tested) are very different But we CAN compare the IFRs
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The POPULATION IFR of COVID-19 is (very crudely) 0.5-1%, although this varies enormously with the age breakdown of people infected by the disease So, about 10-20x higher than seasonal influenza
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But EVEN THIS isn't an apples-to-apples comparison. The IFR of COVID-19 is calculated by dividing CONFIRMED DEATHS by ESTIMATED INFECTIONS The IFR of influenza is calcualted by dividing MODELED DEATHS by MODELED INFECTIONS
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Because we don't routinely test for influenza in every person who gets symptoms in a normal year, we use hospital coding and excess fatalities to ESTIMATE the total number of infections and deaths This pushes the IFR UP
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But EVEN USING THIS HIGHER FIGURE FOR INFLUENZA we see that the IFR of flu is 10-20x lower than COVID-19 fin.
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Why don't we have good serological estimates for influenza waves? I can't find any.
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We don't routinely run serology for seasonal influenza - it's costly, time-consuming, and usually the money goes towards vaccination instead. We did do it in 2009/10 for the pandemic influenza
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I was wondering when I would see someone cite Ewald's work.
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This is pretty nerdy - was there an important conclusion you are trying to make?
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People claiming that COVID is similarly lethal to influenza are wrong.
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