The virus is frightening to a lot of people because it's new, but it will end soon. The world survived the Black Death, the AIDS virus, and the E. Coli bacteria and it will survive this.
That's true, and I can recall 3 or 4 other epidemics over the decades in the U.S. which were going to "kill millions", but turned out to be nothing extraordinary.
One interesting sidebar to the coronavirus epidemic is how many people will survive or be uninfected
without a vaccine being available, and to compare that to regular flu virus seasons where a large percentage have been vaccinated against it.
The CDC (Centers for Disease Control) states the following: "CDC estimates that influenza has resulted in between 9 million – 45 million illnesses, between 140,000 – 810,000 hospitalizations and
between 12,000 – 61,000 deaths annually since 2010." Now, I don't believe those figures because of the CDC's methodology. They admit that they don't actually know. From their website:
"Most people who die from seasonal flu-related complications are not tested for flu, or they seek medical care later in their illness when seasonal influenza can no longer be detected from respiratory samples."
When one sees the estimated typical number of deaths from virulent flu virus, and compares it to the statistics available for the coronavirus, the current threat may not even eventually rise to that level. And it certainly doesn't justify the high level of panic and disruption that it's getting.
Naturally those of us in high risk groups --the elderly frail, those immunocompromised, those who are already sick with some other disease-- should be cautious: wash/sanitize hands, avoid sick individuals, etc, just like during regular flu season. Some of us (like I) should avoid large crowds, or even limit exposure to certain other people.
~Doc
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