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New Covid wave has begun and masks should be worn again, scientists warn
(www.independent.co.uk)
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this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2023
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Obviously it's better than before, but it's also worth keeping in mind these deaths are in addition to the flu.
Also, there are good and bad flu seasons. I see no reason for COVID to not be the same.
Even if we pedantically accept that 'almost double' is really 'just a few percent higher' while we're looking at a single digit likelihood, 'just a few percent more' than for the flu is a lot more people in overall numbers with something that spreads far quicker than the flu. We could get the death rate of Covid down to ½ the rate for the flu but if infections are more than double (this is just an example, I don't know the actual stats on this one), it still means Covid would be more deadly. Unless I'm missing something obvious.
COVID is basically a year round disease where flu is seasonal. So yeah it's gonna produce about an order of magnitude more death with just a few percent higher death rate.
That's how I understood it, too. Turns out it's a difficult thing to comprehend, though.