If you are scared of Covid19, read this

 If you are scared of Covid19, you should read the OffGuardian article, Flu Is Killing More People Than Covid, and Has Been for Months,  that I linked to in my last post. But in case you can't be bothered, here's the key point:

The top lines, solid blue and dashed grey, show respectively, all UK deaths in 2020, and the average number of deaths for the past five years. The rise in the blue line (i.e., the 2020 total death rate), beginning in March, peaking in April and returning to the long-term average in May, shows that over a period of about six weeks there was an abnormal rise in weekly deaths, the excess averaging about 5000 per week for a total excess mortality of, roughly, 30,000 — most likely due to Covid19 infection of  elderly people with other conditions, mostly in poorly managed care homes.

The lower lines show weekly deaths attributed to flu and pneumonia (blue lines dashed and solid) and Covid19 (red line). The peak in Covid19 deaths corresponds with, and accounts for, the peak in all deaths during the March–May period. Thereafter, the Covid death toll falls continuously, approaching zero by the end of July whereas flu and pneumonia deaths continue at what, by the end of August, is a rate many times that of Covid19. Thus, as Kit Knightly, the author of the excellent Off Guardian piece I am quoting states:

“Ah”, some of your may be saying, “this is just evidence that the lockdown, social distancing and masks have worked.”

But that is obviously not the case. Clearly, if these measures did anything to halt viral transmission, the flu deaths would have gone down as well. They have not. They are right in line with the five-year average.

Despite social distancing and wearing masks and hand sanitizer on every corner…the spread of the flu virus has not halted one bit in its usual annual progress through society.

Ergo – the “emergency measures” have little to no impact on viral transmission.

So much for those who keep saying this is not the seasonal flu. Well actually they are correct. It is now less deadly. Which will not, of course, deter the psychopaths in charge from continuing to terrorize the population with Covid fear mongering, while destroying large parts of the economy to the benefit of the big boys such as Amazon, Walmart and the chain stores that will gain greatly from the bankruptcy of many of their small business competitors. 

Comparing Covid-19 With the Flu

According to the Covid19 Dashboard maintained by folks at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, the world-wide Covid-19 death toll to date is 252,000.

How does that compare with the seasonal flu?

According to a paper entitled Global mortality associated with seasonal influenza epidemics, authored by an international group headed by John Paget of the Netherlands Institute for Health Services, it compares rather modestly, although obviously the final total will be higher.

 According to that paper, which was published last December, during the period 2002-2011:

an average of 389 000 (uncertainty range 294 000-518 000) respiratory deaths were associated with influenza globally each year during the study period, corresponding to ~ 2% of all annual respiratory deaths. Of these, 67% were among people 65 years and older.

So the mortality due to the seasonal flu has averaged 0.05% of the world's population, versus Covid-19's toll thus far of just 0.03%. If the final toll for Covid-19 is twice the toll thus far, then, at 0.06% it will slightly exceed the estimated death toll from flu in the worst year during the period 2002-2011, but it will likely come far short of the worst flu seasons in living memory.

Among the most deadly flu seasons was the year of the Asian flu (1957/58) that killed 70,000 out of 149 million Americans for a death rate of 0.05%, and 1968, the year of the Hong Kong flu (H3N2 virus), which also killed about one out of every two thousand Americans. A final American death toll from Covid-19 of 0.05% would be 280,000, or almost four times the current total. To match the lethality of the Spanish flu of 1918, the death toll would have to be in excess of a million and a half.

Related:
Off Guardian: Britain's meaningless Covid-19 death stats
ZH: Unemployment Kills: The Longer Lockdowns Last, The Worse It Will Get
CNN: More than 370 workers at a pork plant in Missouri tested positive for coronavirus. All were asymptomatic
Forbes: Apple Data Shows Shelter-In-Place Is Ending, Whether Governments Want It To Or Not

Covid-19, and the Weird World of Ron Unz

Ron Unz, publisher of the Unz Review, a web-based collection of articles -- many by odd-ball Hitler admirers, anti-Semites, and advocates of Communism -- has run a series of posts concerning Covid-19 in which it is asserted (a) that Covid-19 is a biowarfare agent directed by the US at China, and (b) that Covid-19 is a truly terrifying disease, and that those who compare it with the seasonal flu are hoaxers. Furthermore, comments of said hoaxers are mostly, if not always, deleted from Ron's Review.

Thus, on finding a statement in an article at Zero Hedge asserting, on reliable authority, that the Covid-19 death toll has been comparable to that of the seasonal flu, I was overcome by an irresistible impulse to post it at the Unz Review, as a comment on an article by Ron himself:

Here's a quote that Ron Unz will have to delete, unless, that is, he's an honest man: "... researchers at the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine at Oxford University estimate Covid-19 to have an infection fatality rate (IFR) of between 0.1% and 0.36%. Similar to seasonal flu. Source

Did Ron approve it?

Nah!

Here's another comment I attempted to make at Ron's Review, in response to a comment referring to a WHO tweet that was subsequently deleted:

"There is currently no evidence that people who have recovered from #COVID19 and have antibodies are protected from a second infection." First, to say that there is no evidence of X is no evidence of of not X. But in any case the tweet [by the WHO] was deleted, so it would appear that their claim (the WHO's claim, that is) was either unsupported by evidence or known to be false. Second, to claim, as you do, that antibodies for Covid19 are short-lived is not the same as saying they are non-existent. Third, if antibodies to Covid19 exist -- as they must or immunological tests for the disease would be impossible -- and as even the WHO now acknowledges, that implies a degree of immunity in those who have been infected. And remember, without an immune system response, every case of Covid19 would be fatal. The fact is, Covid19, like the flu, a virus of the same family*, is a relatively mild disease except in a minority of cases (chiefly the elderly afflicted by one or several other serious diseases). The usual mildness of the disease is evident from the fact that although a substantial proportion of the population where serological surveys have been conducted have been shown to have been infected, the death rate as a proportion of those with antibodies is low, in the order of no more than about 0.3%. However, the antibody tests are not known to be highly reliable and the actual death rate is likely much lower. So far, the reported US death toll is just over 60,000 of 328 million Americans, and with the daily totals trending down, the total is thus unlikely to exceed 120,000. If so, the disease will prove considerably less lethal than both the Asian flu of 1957/58 that killed 70,000 of 149 million Americans, or the 1968 Hong Kong flu (H3N2 virus) that killed about 100,000 out of 200 million Americans.

Does that sound like the comment of a hoaxer, or does it sound like the sort of comment that a hoaxer might delete in order to suppress the truth?

 Yes, the Unz Review is a weird world, which deserves further scrutiny.

Related:
Vox Popoli: Facebook bans The Unz Review

Ron Unz, has said he believes the reason for his being banned on Facebook is " 

Facebook’s plans to crack down on misinformation related to our ongoing Covid-19 epidemic."

Having been banned by Ron Unz for what I assume he considered to be "misinformation related to our ongoing Covid-19 epidemic," I am inclined to think that justice has in some way been served -- not that I would consider Facebook a reliable guide to what I personally should or should not read.