COVID-19 Outbreak (Update: More than 2.9M cases and 132,313 deaths in US)

Brees4prez said

I’m pretty sure he is talking about the people in the lower risk age group going to the hospital when they get a cough. That seems to be the case based on the stats we are seeing that less than twenty percent of cases need a ventilator or other breathing assistance.

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In an infectious disease context, 20 percent is a massive number. We're seeing 20% and higher in many localities, but that's as a function of confirmed cases (and there are many unconfirmed cases out there) - but also we know anecdotally that there are patients requiring ventilators for moderate to severe pneumonia that have not yet been confirmed as Covid cases (but almost certainly are) - so you have to consider those as well.

The real incidence is probably between 5% on the low end and 15% on the high end (with higher incidence in the older demographics). But those are still massive numbers if overall volume is significant.

In comparison, H1N1 was hospitalizing at a rate of .45% (less than half a percent) and flu is about half of that (.25%).