by troubleScottie » Mon Mar 30, 2020 11:25 am
The issue is the same for all viruses. How many people can be affected and what is the outcome of that infection.
Major problem viruses are being slowly defeated. Small pox, measles, even HPV all are being addressed with vaccination programs.
The flu is difficult to defeat. The virus is ever mutating largely due to the specific structuring of the genetic information and the size of the virus container. The health community does not really "tolerate" a 0.1% death toll in infected people. The vaccinations is only about 70% effective and not everyone gets it. In addition, with age, one is protected by having been exposed to other variants of the virus. Thus many more people are immune to any given exposure. Thus in the US, the typical 30,000 deaths out of 350,000,000 is significantly lower than 0.1% ( more like 0.01% ).
The COVID-19 has a mortality rate of between 1 and 10% depending on the age group. Since no one on the planet had ever seen this virus, it it possible that in the US that 3,500,000 (3.5 million or 1%) people could die. Though not as deadly as ebola or SARS or MERS, COVID-19 is significantly higher than most other viruses.
Unlike the last pandemic in 1917-1919, we do have some technology to help people. But at some point, we will run out of immediately available resources.
Until there is a vaccine (12-18 months if everything goes well), the fall back solution is to isolate. Very primitive but effective.
Michael Krolewski
Scottish Terrier Fancier