Category Disease

Justinianic Plague

I have always had a certain morbid fascination with plagues. For example:

Plagues and Peoples | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)

The London Plague of 1665 | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)

And of course:

Plague? | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)

Coronavirus – One year later | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)

Anyhow, saw the following article yesterday and felt it was worth re-posting: We May Have Underestimated the First Known Outbreak of Bubonic Plague

Highlights:

  1. May have killed up to half the population of the Mediterranean region at the time.
  2. “Some historians remain deeply hostile to regarding external factors such as disease as having a major impact on the development of human society…”

Coronavirus – One year later

On 27 January 2020 I made my first post on the Coronavirus. It was appropriately titled: Plague? | Mystics & Statistics (dupuyinstitute.org)

The above photo was the one I used for that post a year ago. A few quotes from that post:

“This is tragic but the worse may yet to come. The human toll is going to tragically get worse. The virus apparently can spread before symptoms show. One wonder how bad it is going to be before it is contained.”

and:

“There could also be a significant economic cost”

and:

“Don’t want to be alarmist, but this does concern me. We have not had a major world-wide “plague” since the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918-1920.”

and:

“The Coronavirus will hopefully be contained soon like SARS was, but the scenarios are frightening if it is not.”

I ended up doing a lot of other posts about the Coronavirus over this last year. In part, as a historian I am kind of aware of the significance impact various plagues have had over time. While we have not had a lot of experiences with such problems in the last hundred years, there is no lack of exposure to them in history. I could argue that if people had really properly studied their history and applied lessons from it, less people would have died. On the other hand, I am not sure I want to make that argument in a briefing to DOD on the value of historical analysis. 

Coronavirus and Government Turnover

Some countries have done a better job than others in addressing and dealing with the coronavirus. This is reflected in the number of cases per capita and the number of deaths per capita, if the statistics by country are reliable and reported in the same manner. Dealing with the coronavirus also has a huge economic impact. I am not sure people have fully evaluated the economic impact of this disease which appears like it is going to be an issue until at least the end of 2021.

Needless to say, a government that has not done a good job of containing the coronavirus is going to be hit twice, once from criticism of how it dealt with the virus and a second time from the economic impact of having to deal with it over an extended time. This is magnified if they have to again shut down because of a failure to control the first wave, or a resurgent first wave, and fail to address a second wave. The ideal situation is that the virus is identified, brought under control and then kept under control. This is the case with Italy, even though it was initially the worse hit of the European countries. The cases by day for Italy are below:

As can be seen, even Italy is dealing with a resurgence in cases, although a lot less than some other countries.

The leadership of a country that fails to contain the virus is going to obviously come under considerable criticism and of course, they also have to deal with a declining economy in the process. Usually, in democratic countries, a declining economy means that the government gets voted out. In non-democratic countries, the situation is a little more complex, but often dictatorships are challenged when the economy declines. While I don’t have the current economic statistics for Belarus at hand, I do have their current reported coronavirus statistics. For a country of 9.4 million people, they have a reported 70,645 cases and 646 deaths. This is an infection rate of 0.75 percent or one case per 133 people and a death rate of 0.007 percent or one case per 14,551 people. This is assuming these report numbers are correct. It does report a death rate of those infected of less than 1%, which makes one suspicious that the number of deaths is being underreported.

The graph of daily cases looks like this:

If this is true, then it looks like they have brought the virus under control. This was done without any requirements nationwide for isolation or wearing mask. There is considerable suspicion that these statistics are not correct.

Just for comparison, the United States has an infection rate of 1.75 percent or one case per 57 people and a death rate of 0.05 percent or one case per 1,852 people.

So, just to compare the countries in the area:

……………………..Percent infected…………..Percent killed

Belarus……………0.75………………………….0.007

Russia……………..0.65………………………….0.01

Ukraine……………0.26…………………………..0.006

.

Poland…………….0.16…………………………..0.005

Lithuania………….0.10…………………………..0.003

Latvia………………0.07…………………………..0.002

.

United States……..1.75………………………….0.05

 

Now there are reasons not to entirely trust the numbers coming out of Russia. There may also be reasons not to trust the numbers coming out of Belarus, especially as Lukashenko has not be supportive of the efforts to control and contain the virus. It is clear that the virus is a bigger problem for Belarus (and Russia) than it is for some of their neighbors, even if their reported statistics are not as bad as the United States.

Therefore, if the virus is still a major problem in Belarus (which I gather it is) and the economy is in trouble because of it (which I assume it is), then these are two issues that Lukashenko must deal with that are potentially crippling to his chances of staying in power. He may not be the only leader in danger of being ousted because of their failures to address the virus.

 

P.S. Data is from 6:28:02 PM on 24 August 2020 drawn from Johns Hopkins CSSE

Two Generals

This article is interesting: ‘Protective bubbles’: How 2 Army generals stopped the spread of coronavirus among their soldiers

  1. In the case of Daegu, South Korea I gather they started closing down the base around 20 February.
    1. Total personnel is roughly 28,500.
    2. A total of 2 soldiers and I gather 1 dependent became infected.
      1. This is 3 cases out of 28,500 or 0.01%.
      2. For South Korea it is 10,062 cases (as of 3:21:42 PM) out of a population of 51,780,579 or 0.02%
  2. In the case of Vicenza, Italy they started closing it down 24 February.
    1. Total personnel is 15,500: 4,000 soldiers, 2,750 Army civilians and 8,750 dependents.
    2. “fewer than five” have tested positive.
      1. This is 4? cases out of 15,500 or 0.03%
      2. For Italy it is 119,827 cases out of 60,243,406 or 0.20%
  3. One notes “The Defense Department has since banned individual military organizations or headquarters from releasing number of confirmed cases.”

 

The commander in South Korea, General Robert “Abe” Abrams is the son of General Creighton W. Abrams,. Jr. He is the brother of General John N. Abrams. General Creighton Abrams was the commander of the tank battalion that relieved Bastogne on 26 December 1944.  He later replaced Westmoreland as commander in Vietnam. There is a tank named after him.

 

Picture is from this article: https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/2017/05/26/colonel-creighton-abrams-at-the-battle-of-the-bulge/

 

 

Is the difference leadership?

South Korea, with an estimated 2020 population of 51,780,5798 million, has had 9,976 cases of coronavirus (as of 10:00:04 AM). They have tested more than 300,000 people and have had 169 deaths. Of those 9,976 cases, 5,828 are reported as recovered leaving them with 3,979 active cases. Outside of China, there are currently twelve countries with more cases than South Korea. They are United States (population 330 million), Italy ( 60 million), Spain (47 million), Germany (83 million), France, (67 million), Iran (83 million), United Kingdom (66 million), Switzerland, (9 million), Turkey (83 million), Netherlands (17 million)  and Austria (9 million). Of those twelve countries, only Austria was less deaths than South Korea (although not per capita). There are an additional five countries with more deaths than South Korea (Belgium, Sweden, Brazil, Portugal and Indonesia). It is clear that South Korea has done a better job at containing the virus than at least 17 other countries.

This appears to be the case for many of the countries bordering China. Japan has 2,384 cases and 57 deaths (population 126 million), Taiwan has 339 cases and 5 deaths (population 23 million), and Vietnam has 227 cases and no reported deaths (population 96 million). Japan, South Korea and Taiwan are three of the five major trading partners of China (the others being the United States and the European Union). They are the closest to the source of the disease, were among the earliest to catch it, and yet they have certainly mitigated the results of the disease, and might even yet contain it. All three countries are democracies. Many other countries have had a longer warning period and do not seem to have done as well at containing the virus.

Is the difference leadership? Is the difference the responsive of the government and their health care system? What has South Korea, Japan, Taiwan and Vietnam done that the United States, Italy, Spain, Iran and so forth have not done?

Coronavirus in the DC area

As I live and work in Northern Virginia, just a few miles outside of Washington, DC, the local situation is of interest to me, as I suspect it is to a few other readers. Again, all the data is from the Johns Hopkin’s website (which I gather is also maintained in the DC area), as of 10:51:42 AM:  Johns Hopkins CSSE

The DC area is rather sprawling, with over 5 million people scattered across DC, Virginia and Maryland. Let me list the presence of virus by location. Population is the 2018 estimate from Wikipedia:

 

……………………………….Population….Cases….Deaths

Washington D.C…………..702,445……..507………9

Arlington, VA………………..237,521……..104………2

Alexandria VA………………160,530……….30

Fairfax County, VA……..1,150,795……..244………2

Falls Church, VA…………….14,772

Fairfax City, VA………………24,574

Loudoun County, VA……..406,850………..87………1

Prince Williams C., VA……468,011……….94………1

Manassas……………………….41,641

Manassas Park………………..17,307

Stafford Country, VA……….149,960……….24

Fredericksburg, VA…………..29,144…………1

Montgomery C., MD……..1,052,567……..447……..1

Prince Georges C., MD……909,308……..403……..7

Total…………………………5,365,425….1,941…….23

 

The Mortality Rate for the area is 1.18%. The population known to be infect is 0.04%. or one confirmed case for every 2,764 people. From my observations, most people are doing a reasonable job of self isolating. Probably easier to do in this more spread out suburban area than in some cities.

 

The Washington DC statistic area according to some also includes Warren, Clarke, Fauquier, and Spotsylvania Counties in Virginia, Jefferson County in West Virginia, Frederick, Howard, Charles and Calvert Counties in Maryland. I rarely go to these places.

Coronavirus Mortality Rates update 12

Well, the coronavirus is now the lead story of every news service. There are a lot of real experts now on TV talking about this. Not sure how much longer I will continue these coronavirus updates. But, since my last post the number of cases is up dramatically, sadly so are the number of deaths, and of significance, so is the mortality rate. In countries that previously had low mortality rates, like Germany, they have now risen to above 1%.

China continues to report very few new cases. On 11 March they reported 80.9K cases. Twenty days later they are at 82.3K cases. So it is only growing by around 70 cases a day. The Wednesday before last it was 81,102, last Tuesday it was 81,588 now it is 82,276. This is 1,174 new reported cases in thirteen days or 90 cases a day. This is not quite contained. The same story with S. Korea (and North Korea has no cases?). If one relaxes some of the restrictions for the sake of getting the economy working again, what happens? I understand that Hong Kong has had this experience.

 

Country……….Cases……Deaths……Rate

World Wide……803,650….39,033….…4.86%

United States….164,785……2,777+..….1.69%

Italy………..……101,739….11,591…….11.39%

Spain………..…..94,417……8,189….…..8.67%

China.……………82,276……3,290+.…….3.89%

Germany…….…..67,051….….682………1.02%

France……………45,209…..3,024……….6.69%

Iran…………….…44,605…..2,898……….6.50%

United Kingdom…22,465…..1,411…….…6.28%

Switzerland………16,176…….373………..2.31%

Belgium….………..12,775…….705…….….5.52%

Netherlands.……..12,662….1,039………..8.21%

Turkey…………….10,827……168……..…1.55%

Austria…………..…9,974…….128………..1.28%

S. Korea……….….9,786…….162………..1.65%

Canada………….…7,448……..84….……1.13%

Portugal.…..………..7,443……160…….….2.15%

Israel…….…………..4,831……..17…….…0.35%

Brazil………………..4,681…….167….……3.57%

Norway………….…4,599..…….36…….…0.78%

Australia……………4,559..…….12….……0.26%

Sweden…..…………4,435…….180……….0.83%

Czech Rep…………3,002………25…….…0.83%

Denmark..….………2,994………90………3.01%

Ireland………………2,910………54.………1.86%

Malaysia….…..……2,766…..….43…….…1.55%

Chile..……………….2,449……..…8….……0.33%

Russia…….…….…2,337….…..17……….0.73%

Romania……………2,245…..….72…….…3.21%

Poland………………2,215…..….32…..….1.44%

Philippines…….……2,084………88………4.22%

Luxembourg.……….1,988….…..22………1.11%

Ecuador.….…………1,966………62………2.87%

Japan………….……1,953…..….56.….…..2.87%

Pakistan……….……1,865….….25….…….1.34%

Thailand.…..………..1,651….….10.…….…0.61%

Saudi Arabia……..…1,563………10………0.64%

Indonesia….…………1,528…….136……….8.90%

Finland….……….…..1,418……..17………1.20%

South Africa….…..…1,326…….…3……….0.23%

India…………………..1,251………32.……….2.56%

Greece..….……….….1,212….….46…….…3.806%

Iceland…………..……1,135…….…2…….…0.18%

Mexico……………..…1,094……..28…….…2.56%

Panama……………….1,075….….27………2.51%

 

Forty-four countries around the world with over a thousand reported cases. Last week it was 26 countries, the week before that it was 16 countries. A few other entities of interest to this author that have less than a thousand cases so far:

 

Argentina…..……..……966……….25….……2.59%

Peru…..………………….950……….24….……2.53%

Singapore…..……..……926……..…3…….…0.32%

Dominican Rep..…….…901….……42….……4.66%

Slovenia……………….…802.………15………1.87%

Colombia…………….….798.………14……….1.75%

Serbia…………………….785.………16…….…2.04%

Hong Kong….……………714……..…4….……0.56%

Egypt…………..…………656……….41……….6.25%

New Zealand…………….647……..…1…….…0.15%

Iraq…..……………….…..630..……..46…..……7.30%

Algeria………..…..………584………35………..5.99%

Morocco………..………..574………33………..5.75%

Bahrain……….….………567……..…4………..0.71%

Ukraine…………………..549……….13……..…2.37%

Hungary………………….492.………16…….….3.25%

Lebanon……..………..…463..……..12…..…….2.59%

Bosnia………………..….411.……….12…….….2.92%

Andorra………………….370.…….…..8….…….2.16%

Tunisia……………….…..362.………10….…….2.76%

Taiwan………………..…322…………5………..1.55%

Burkina Faso……………246.…..…..12…….….4.88%

Albania……………….….243.……….13…….….5.35%

San Marino…………..…230………..25……….10.87%

Vietnam….…………..…207……….…0…….….0%

Afghanistan…………..…174….……..4…….….2.30%

Palestine…..…………….117…………1….…….0.95%

North Korea..…………..0……..…..…0…..….…0%

Syria……….……..……..0……..……..0…..….…0%

Yemen…………….……..0……..……..0….…..…0%

Libya……….…………….0………..…..0….…..…0%

Diamond Princess….712……………11……..….1.54%

 

Part of my concern is the spread of the disease across the Middle East and Central Asia. There are a number of countries in the region still at war, including Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and Yemen. How does one contain a virus in a country at war? Do they then serve as a vector for the rest of the countries in the region?

Data is from Johns Hopkins CSSE 3/24/20 as of 10:01.43 AM EST. The data page is no longer showing count of less then 3 deaths in their tabulation, but shows it on their map. It makes it harder to count all the deaths in the United States as they are reported by country. The United States now has over 3,000 deaths. It is here: Johns Hopkins CSSE

 

A few more observations:

  1. It does appear that at best the mortality rate is around 1% if: 1) there is good health care and 2) there is good reporting.
    1. The 1% figure appears to be borne out by the reporting from South Korea and the more contained environment of the cruise ships.
      1. Still the South Korean mortality rate continues to grow to now 1.65%. I gather they have tested more than 300,000 people.
      2. The Diamond Princess deaths are at 11, for a 1.54% mortality rate. Is the mortality rate for an older population hovering around 2%?
    2. There are now few European countries that are reporting a rate of less than 1%. In most cases, it would appear that the mortality rate is going to increase over time. This has happened with German, Switzerland, Austria, Norway and Ireland. Last week they were all around 0.50%, now they are all over 1%.
      1. Germany is at  1.02%. Switzerland is at 2.31%, Austria is at 1.28%,  Norway is at 0.78% and Ireland is at 1.86%.
      2. It appears that these numbers will continue to go up as more data comes in and unfortunately, more people become seriously ill.
    3. The actual mortality rate is a big issue if one is going to do any estimate of potential impact (population * percent infected * mortality rate and modified by improvements in care and developments of vaccines). I have been thinking about post about this at some point…but…
      1. Do I do an estimate based upon a rate of 0.5%, 1%, 1.5% or 2%? Makes a big difference.
  2. Needless to say, countries will high mortality rate obviously have a lot more cases than they are reporting. If mortality really is around 1% or less, then it appears there are already over a million cases in Italy and over a half-million cases in Spain.
    1. Now it could be that the natural mortality rate in Italy will be higher than what we are seeing for S. Korea. This will be explored in a future post.
  3. San Marino has a population of 33,562. With 230 cases, this makes it the “most infected” country in the world with 0.69% infected. San Marino also has a very high mortality rate at around 11%. They may well have over 7% of the country infected.
    1. The Holy See (Vatican City) is second with 6 cases in around 1,000 people (0.60%)
    2. Andorra with a population of 76,177 and 370 cases I gather is now third at 0.48%. Is Andorra a snapshot of the future of Spain like San Marino looks like a snapshot of the future of Italy?
    3. Italy with 60,317,546 people and 101,739 cases is fourth (0.17%), maybe (I haven’t checked every country).
      1. If they really have over a million cases then we are looking at almost 2% infected.
  4. I still suspect 44 U.S. passengers from the Diamond Princess are being double counted in CSSE database. They are now listed as a subset of the Diamond Princess button, but I suspect they are still being counted in the U.S. totals.
    1. Also, Hong Kong’s 714 cases are also counted under China. I just choose to separate out Hong Kong because there is/was a political protest movement of some significance going on there.

 

There is now a single line on this graph, which represents the entire world. The “Total Recovered” is reported at 172,869 out of 809,608 cases and 39,545 deaths (as of 11.11.10 AM).

Coronavirus Mortality Rates update 11

Well, this situation is now devastating and depressing. The coronavirus is now spreading across the world rapidly and does not appear to be under control in many countries. The curve has turned upwards sharply since early March. More than one national leader needs to be held responsible for their failure to properly and quickly respond to this. There was warning.

China continues to report very few new cases. On 11 March they had 80.9K cases. Fourteen days later they are at 81.6K cases. So it is only growing by around 50 cases a day. Last Wednesday morning it was 81,102, and it is now 81,588. This is 486 cases in six days or 81 cases a day. This is not quite contained. The same story with S. Korea (and North Korea has no cases?). If one relaxes some of the restrictions for the sake of getting the economy working again, what happens? I understand that Hong Kong has had this experience.

 

Country……….Cases……Deaths……Rate

World Wide……395,647….17,241….…4.40%

China.……………81,588……3,269……..4.01%

Italy………………63,927……6,077……..9.51%

United States……46,485……….551…….1.19%

Spain……………..39,673……2,696….…6.80%

Germany…………31,260….…..132…….0.42%

Iran………….……24,811……1,934……..7.79%

France……………20,149………860…….4.27%

Switzerland…….…9,117…….….43…….0.47%

S. Korea…….…….9,037………120……..1.33%

United Kingdom.…6,733………335…..…4.98%

Netherlands.………5,578.….….276……..4.95%

Austria………….…4,876..……….25………0.51%

Belgium….….….…4,269………122…..….2.86%

Norway……………2,715..……….12………0.44%

Portugal.…..………2,362….…….29……….1.23%

Sweden…..….……2,272…………36……….1.58%

Canada………….…2,088……..…24….…..1.15%

Australia……………2,044..…………8….…..0.39%

Brazil………………1,965…….…..34………1.73%

Denmark..….……..1,703……..….32………1.88%

Israel…….…………1,656…………..2………0.12%

Malaysia….…..……1,624…………15…..…0.92%

Turkey…………..…1,529…..….…37…..…2.42%

Czech Rep……..…1,289………..…2…..…0.16%

Japan………………1,140..……….42.……..3.68%

Ireland………..……1,125……….…6.………0.53%

 

Twenty-six countries around the world with over a thousand cases. Below is a list of some of the rest. Almost all of them will probably be over a thousand cases soon. These figures are heavily influenced by the degree of testing.

 

Country……….…Cases……Deaths……Rate

Ecuador.….……….…981……..…18………1.83%

Chile..……………..…922………….2….…..0.22%

Pakistan……….…….918……….…7….…..0.76%

Luxembourg.…….….875………..…8………0.91%

Thailand.…..…………827……….…4………0.48%

Poland………………..799……….…9…..….1.12%

Finland….……….…..792……….…1………0.12%

Saudi Arabia…………767…………..1………0.13%

Romania………….…762………..…8………1.04%

Greece..….……….….695……….…6………0.86%

Indonesia….……..….686…..……55……….8.02%

Iceland…………..…..648……….…2…….…0.31%

Singapore…..……….558…………2….……0.36%

South Africa…..…..…554……….…4……….0.72%

Philippines…….…….552………..35….……6.34%

India……………….…519…………10.…..…..1.93%

Qatar..………….…….501..……..…0………..0%

Russia…….…………495……….…1…….….0.20%

Slovenia….…………..480……….…4….……0.83%

Peru………………..…395……..…..5………..1.27%

Bahrain……….………390……….…3………..0.77%

Hong Kong….…….…386……….…4…..……1.04%

Estonia…..…….…..…369……….…0…..……0%

Mexico……………..…367……….…4…..……1.09%

Egypt…………..……..366……..….19……..….5.19%

 

A few other entities of interest to this author that have less than 366 cases so far:

 

Iraq…..……………..316..…………27…..…..8.54%

Lebanon……..….…304..……..……4…..…..1.32%

Algeria………..…….230…….……17………..7.39%

Taiwan………………215…………….2………..0.93%

San Marino…………187………….21……….11.23%

Hungary…………….187.………..…9…….….4.81%

New Zealand………155……………0……..…0%

Vietnam….…………123………….…0…….….0%

Ukraine………………97.…….….…3…………3.09%

Azerbaijan..……..…..87………….…1…….….1.15%

Afghanistan…………42….…………1…….….2.38%

Palestine…..………..26?……….….0….…….0%

North Korea..………..0……..…..…0…..….…0%

Syria……….…..……..0……..……..0…..….…0%

Yemen……….………..0……..……..0….…..…0%

Libya……….………….0………..…..0….…..…0%

 

Diamond Princess…712………11……..….1.54%

 

Part of my concern is the spread of the disease across the Middle East and Central Asia. There are a number of countries in the region still at war, including Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq and Yemen. How does one contain a virus in a country at war? Do they then serve as a vector for the rest of the countries in the region?

Data is from Johns Hopkins CSSE 3/24/20 as of 9:54.39 AM EST. It is here: Johns Hopkins CSSE

 

A few more observations:

  1. It does appear that at best the mortality rate is around 1% if: 1) there is good health care and 2) there is good reporting.
    1. The 1% figure appears to be borne out by the reporting from South Korea and the more contained environment of the cruise ships.
      1. Still the South Korean mortality rates stands at 1.33%. I gather they have tested more than 300,000 people.
      2. The Diamond Princess deaths have now gone up to 11, for a 1.54% mortality rate. Is the mortality rate for an older population hovering around 2%?
    2. There are a few European countries with a reported rate of around 0.50%.
      1. Germany is at  0.42%
      2. Switzerland, Austria, Norway and Ireland are also in this range.
      3. Is this the best case scenario….or will these numbers continue to go up as more data comes in and unfortunately, more people become more ill. The German numbers do keep going up.
    3. The actual mortality rate is a big issue if one is going to do any estimate of potential impact (population * percent infected * mortality rate and modified by improvements in care and developments of vaccines). I have been thinking about post about this at some point…but…
      1. Do I do an estimate based upon a rate of 0.5%, 1%, 1.5% or 2%? Makes a big difference.
  2. Needless to say, countries will high mortality rate obviously have a lot more cases than they are reporting. If mortality really is around 1% or less, then it appears there are already over 600,000 cases in Italy, over 250,000 cases in Spain, and maybe over 200,000 cases in Iran.
    1. Now it could be that the natural mortality rate in Italy will be higher than what we are seeing for S. Korea. This will be explored in a future post.
  3. San Marino has a population of 33,562. With 187 cases, this makes it the “most infected” country in the world with 0.56% infected. San Marino also has a very high mortality rate at over 11%. They may well have almost 6% of the country infected.
    1. Italy with 60,317,546 people and 63,927 cases is third (0.11%)
      1. If they really have over 600,000 cases then we are looking at almost 1%.
    2. The Holy See (Vatican City) is second with 1 case in around 1,000 people (0.10%)
  4. I still suspect 44 U.S. passengers from the Diamond Princess are being double counted in CSSE database. They are now listed as a subset of the Diamond Princess button, but I suspect they are still being counted in the U.S. totals.
    1. Also, Hong Kong’s 386 cases are also counted under China. I just choose to separate out Hong Kong because there is a political protest movement of some significance going on there.
  5. Palestine was reported weeks ago to have 26 cases. Now the CSSE database does not report on Palestine. Not sure where those 26 cases went to. Are they reported under Israel?

 

There is now a single line on this graph, which represents the entire world. The “Total Recovered” is reported at 103,317 out of 395,647 cases (and 17,241 deaths).

Coronavirus Mortality Rates update 10

Well, situation keeps getting worse, and in a lot of different places in the world. The number of cases outside of China is growing rapidly and does not appear to be slowing down. China continues to report very few new cases. On 11 March they had 80.9K cases. Ten day later they are at 81.3K cases. So it is only growing by less than 40 cases a day. Still. Wednesday morning it was 81,102, and it is now 81,250. This is 148 cases in two days. This is not quite contained. If one relaxes some of the restrictions for the sake of getting the economy working again, what happens?

 

Country……….Cases……Deaths……Rate

World Wide……246,276….10,038….…4.08%

China.……………81,250……3,247……..4.00%

Italy………………41,035……3,405……..8.30%

Iran………….……18,407……1,284……..6.98%

Spain……………..18,077………833…..…4.61%

Germany………..16,290….….…44….….0.27%

United States……14,250….…..205….….1.44%

France……………10,891………371….….3.41%

S. Korea…….…….8,652….……94….….1.09%

Switzerland…….…4,164….…….43….….1.03%

United Kingdom.…3,297……….144…..…4.37%

Netherlands.………2,468.……….76……….3.08%

Austria………….…2,203..……..…6…..….0.27%

Norway……………1,802..…..……7………0.39%

Belgium….….….…1,795……..…21……….1.17%

Sweden…..….……1,439……..…11…..…..0.76%

Denmark..….……..1,225……….…6……….0.49%

 

Sixteen countries around the world with over a thousand cases. Below is a list of some of the rest. They are mostly European but countries from all over the world are joining the list. Not sure how much more extensive testing influences these figures.

 

Country……..…Cases……Deaths……Rate

Japan………………943..……….33.……..3.50%

Malaysia….…..……900……….…2………0.22%

Canada……..………872…………12….…..1.38%

Portugal.…..….……785……….…4……….0.51%

Czech Rep…………694……….…0…..…..0%

Australia……………681..…..….…6….…..0.88%

Israel…….…….……677…………..0….…..0%

Brazil………………..621………..…6………0.97%

Ireland……………….557……….…3.………0.54%

Greece..….……..….464………..…6………1.29%

Qatar..………..…….460..……….…0…..…..0%

Pakistan……….……454………..…2…..…..0%

Finland….…………..400……….…0….……0%

Turkey……………….359…..….….4….……1.11%

Poland………….……355…………5……….1.41%

Singapore…..……….345…………0….……0%

Chile..……………..…342………….2………..0.58%

Luxembourg.….…….335…..…..…4…….…1.19%

Iceland…………..…..330……….…1….……0.30%

Slovenia….……..…..319………..…1….……0.31%

Indonesia….….…….311…………25……….8.04%

Bahrain………………278…….……1………..0.36%

Romania……………277………..…0…….….0%

Saudi Arabia…….…274…………..0…..……0%

Thailand.…..……….272………..…1…………0.37%

Estonia…..…………267……..……0…………0%

Ecuador.….…..……260……………3……..….1.15%

Egypt………………..256……..….…7….,,,.….2.73%

Hong Kong….…..…256……..….…4…..……1.56%

Peru…………………234…….…..…1……..….0.43%

Philippines………….217…………..17…………7.83%

Russia…….……..…199……………1…….….0.50%

India……………….…194….……..…4.…..…..2.06%

Iraq…..……………..192..…..….…13………..6.77%

Lebanon……..….…157..……..……3….……1.91%

South Africa……..…150……..…..…4……….2.67%

Kuwait……….……..148..…..………0…..…..0%

San Marino…………144…….…….14….……9.72%

UAE……………..….140……..…..…0……….0%

Panama……..…..…137…..….…….1…..…..0.73%

Taiwan…………..…135…..….…….2…..…..1.48%

 

A few other entities of interest to this author that have less than 135 cases so far:

 

Mexico…….….……118………..…1….……0.85%

Algeria…….….……..90……………9………10.00%

Vietnam….……….…85….…..……0……….0%

Azerbaijan..……..…..44…….…..…1……….2.27%

New Zealand………..39……………0…….…0%

Ukraine……………….26.………..…3….….11.54%

Palestine…..…..……26?………….0……….0%

Afghanistan…….……22….……..…0……….0%

North Korea..…………0…….…..…0…….…0%

Syria……….…………..0…….……..0…….…0%

Yemen……….….……..0…………..0……..…0%

Libya……….……….…..0…………..0……..…0%

 

Diamond Princess….712…………7……..….0.98%

 

Part of my concern is the spread of the disease across the Middle East and Central Asia. There are a number of countries in the region still at war, including Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq. How does one contain a virus in a country at war? Do they then serve as a vector for the rest of the countries in the region?

Data is from Johns Hopkins CSSE 3/18/20 as of 9:43.03 AM EST. It was only updated twice while I was writing this. It is here: Johns Hopkins CSSE

 

A few more observations:

  1. It does appear that at best the mortality rate is around 1% if: 1) there is good health care and 2) there is good reporting. That appears to be borne out by the reporting from South Korea and the more contained environment of the cruise ships.
    1. The S. Korean mortality rate is now above 1%. They have tested more than 240,000 of their people. This is about a good and complete reporting as we are going to see in the real world. It is getting harder to make the argument that the mortality rate is much less than 1%, even assuming a large number of cases were not reported.
    2. Most other countries with a reported rate of less than 1% I suspect have just recently gotten a number of new cases and these figures will be unfortunately changing over time (for example Germany).
    3. See the comment to update 9. The poster I gather is making the argument that the actual mortality rate is well less than 1%, based upon the example of Germany. This bears watching.
    4. Of course, what is the actual mortality rate is a big issue if one is going to do any estimate of potential impact (population * percent infected * mortality rate and modified by improvements in care and developments of vaccines). I have been thinking about post about this at some point…but…
  2. If mortality really is around 1% or less, then it appears there are already over 340,000 in cases Italy and over 120,000 cases in Iran.
    1. Now it could be that the natural mortality rate in Italy will be higher than what we are seeing for S. Korea. This will be explored in a future post.
  3. San Marino has a population of 33,562. With 144 cases, this makes it the “most infected” country in the world with 0.43% infected.
    1. The Holy See (Vatican City) is second with 1 case in around 1,000 people (0.10%)
    2. Italy with 60,317,546 people and 41,035 cases is third (0.068%)
      1. If they really have over 340,000 cases then we are looking at almost 0.6%, a figure similar to San Marino (which makes sense).
  4. I still suspect 44 U.S. passengers from the Diamond Princess are being double counted in CSSE database. They are now listed as a subset of the Diamond Princess button, but I suspect they are still being counted in the U.S. totals.
    1. Also, Hong Kong’s 256 cases are also counted under China. I just choose to separate out Hong Kong because there is a political protest movement of some significance going on there.
  5. Palestine was reported last week to have 26 cases. Now the CSSE database does not report on Palestine. Not sure where those 26 cases went to. Are they reported under Israel?

 

On the graph at the top of this post, the new top line is the number of coronavirus cases in “other locations” (meaning outside of mainland China). The original top line is the number of coronavirus cases in Mainland China (People’s Republic of China). The next line is the “Total Recovered” which is reported at 86,036 out of 246,276 cases (and 10,038 deaths). It has now just passed the Mainland China line.