FINALLY, Recoveries exceed deaths in 2019-nCoV (Wuhan Coronavirus) Outbreak

[Zolorp]

12,024 Cases
259 Deaths
287 Recovered

https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

Sounds like they've locked in effective treatment. I expect the overall death rate to drop now.

7 cases in the US, there was another in California. Shows it is mostly contained here and with flights to and from China stopped, the spread will likely die down in the U.S with only one person to person transmission being recorded in the US.

I see this entire outbreak as having somewhat of an upside now because it is preparing the world for how to react when a worse outbreak comes, and if the history of medicine teaches us anything it teaches that eventually, there will be a worse disease outbreak eventually.

[jpak]

1. Ummm... THERE IS NO TREATMENT

AND THERE IS NO VACCINE.

[MineralMan]

2. Supportive treatment only.

At least at this time, although a variety of antiviral medications are being tried as well.

[jpak]

4. The mortality rate is holding at 2.2%

right up there with the Spanish flu.

And it remains highly contagious.

Until there are zero cases - it will kill.

[icymist]

20. The mortality rate of the 2020nCoV is nowhere near that of the 1918 - 1920 Spanish flu

The global mortality rate from the 1918–1919 pandemic is not known, but an estimated 10% to 20% of those who were infected died. With about a third of the world population infected, this case-fatality ratio means 3% to 6% of the entire global population died.[2] Influenza may have killed as many as 25 million people in its first 25 weeks. Older estimates say it killed 40–50 million people,[3] while current estimates put the death toll at probably 50 million, and possibly as high as 100 million.[41][5] These estimates would correspond to three to five percent of Earth's human population at the time.[42]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_flu

If the 2020nCoV was to keep pace at all with the Spanish flu it would need a mortality rate of at least 10%. That means that of this writings' current confirmed infected of just over 12,000 there would be just over 1,200 deaths. So far all the deaths reported have been in mainland China.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1yZv9w9zRKwrGTaR-YzmAqMefw4wMlaXocejdxZaTs6w/edit#gid=1525235828

[jpak]

24. From the CDC (not Wikipedia)

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/12/1/05-0979_article

An estimated one third of the world's population (or ?500 million persons) were infected and had clinically apparent illnesses (1,2) during the 1918–1919 influenza pandemic. The disease was exceptionally severe. Case-fatality rates were >2.5%, compared to <0.1% in other influenza pandemics (3,4). Total deaths were estimated at ?50 million (5–7) and were arguably as high as 100 million (7).

<more>

Higher mortality rates occurred regionally, but the global rate was 2.5%

[Zolorp]

5. The drugs they are using to treat HIV have been effective in treating the more serious cases.

Keeps the patient alive until the virus can run its course.

[Zolorp]

3. They are using the anti-viral drugs used to treat HIV

Not a cure, but keeps the symptoms from killing the patient.

[jpak]

6. Any real data to back up the effecacy of these HIV drugs with CV patients?

Are these drugs free and in unlimited quantity?

Nope

Nope

and

Nope

[Ms. Toad]

9. Here's info about what they are doing

The Jin Yintan Hospital in Wuhan, China, where the first 41 known patients were treated, has already launched a randomized, controlled trial of the anti-HIV drug combination of lopinavir and ritonavir, according to a 24 January report by a group of Chinese scientists in The Lancet. The combination targets protease, an enzyme used by both HIV and coronaviruses to cut up proteins when they make new copies of themselves. (A spokesperson for the biopharmaceutical company Abbvie tells ScienceInsider it has donated $2 million worth of the combo, which it markets under the brand name Aluvia, to the Chinese government.)

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/01/can-anti-hiv-combination-or-other-existing-drugs-outwit-new-coronavirus

Real data - no, but they are working on it. Free and unlimited - right. Just like it is for HIV patients.

[jpak]

11. The only thing that this coronavirus has with HIV is that they are both RNA viruses

that use reverse transcriptase (RT - an enzyme - which is highly specific for its substrate) to infect their host.

To assume a protease effective against HIV RT is effective against a novel coronavirus RT is just whistling past the graveyard.

yup

[Ms. Toad]

18. It did not make intuitive sense to me-

so when I searched a few minutes ago I expected to see that no one was actually even trying to use the HIV meds against the coronavirus.

So - jJust reporting that they are actually doing studies. Aside from having friends with HIV/AIDS, it's not within my mathematical or medical areas of expertise.

[jpak]

21. Ooops - I responded to the wrong person

sorry

[Ms. Toad]

22. No problem. n/t

[malaise]

7. Someone who is supposed to know about these matters

told me things will be back to near normal by Feb 9

[Ms. Toad]

8. You are likely misinterpreting the data.

The only treatment for viruses is (1) antivirals - taken within the first 24 hours and (2) symptomatic care.

As to the antivirals, I'm not sure they would be effective here - since many people seem to be asymptomatic in the early stages. I don't know enough about anitvirals to know when the 24 hour clock starts ticking. Symptomatic care may be improving a bit, because how effective that is in minimizing deaths depends on identifying the symptoms/companion diseases that are killing people and minimizing the impact of those.

Beyond that, it's just riding out the disease.

As for the total recovered - it's likely closer to 1500 (the number ill last Saturday or earlier less deaths, and allowing for a portion who were just ill whose lllness runs longer than a week).

As I've pointed out in other threads, there is no routine way to capture recovery data. You just get well and go on about your business. My daughter had the chicken pox when she was 14 - counted in whatever statistics are kept for that year. If there are recovery statistics - she still has the chicken pox 15 years later. We have the means to track confirmed cases of X disease - the testing centers keep that. We have the means to track deaths (although not as reliably becuase with flu-like illnesses it is often the companion diseases that kill.) There is no place where recovery data is captured (aside from discharge from the hospital for the small portion sick enough to require hospitalization)

As for the death rate it is still holding steady at between 2 & 2.5%. And - 10,000 of the 12024 cases are less than a week old. I don't think it kills that fast - so I would expect the ultimate death rate to be higher, not lower. (Predictions I've seen from people who study these things have been around 4%)

The disease is still growing exponentially in China. Starting with last Saturday's confirmed cases (2019), if a generation was 3.5 days, an R0 would have put today's confirmed cases at 13,648. It is currently at 12, 024, a final report for the day8-10 hours away.) The first cases in the US only appeared last week (hard to believe). The incubation period is up to 14 days (based on what we know at the moment), meaning they may still spread, and if they grow exponentially we still could look like China.

That said, we are taking steps in the right direction - and started doing that immediately at least outside of China. I was afraid they would be really stupid about the folks evacuated from China, but they came to their senses and imposed a 14-day quarantine. So it likely won't get as bad here as it is in China (at least as long as it stays front and center in the news so people don't get complacent). But it's way too soon to celebrate.

[cwydro]

10. Good to hear.

That’s going to be sad news to some here eagerly awaiting a pandemic to wipe out the human race.

[jpak]

12. Did the Spanish flu wipe out the human race?

Nope

But it did kill tens of millions worldwide.

History much?

[cwydro]

13. No, of course not.

But there are some here who think it could happen. And apparently will cheer it on.

Go figure

[jpak]

14. Ummm...no

Try again

[cwydro]

15. Not sure what your point is.

I was referring to a thread where folks applauded the end of humans on this earth. They see that as an improvement.

I didn’t say it; they did. I found it amusing.

[jpak]

16. link?

[cwydro]

17. Ahh, good try, not falling for that one.

Let’s just say it was one of the virus threads.

[tblue37]

19. My guess is that survivors are the ones who got very early treatment, but since early symptoms

look like flu, many of the first cases were not treated aggressively enough or soon enough.

Now, with awareness of the corona virus uppermost in people's minds, they are catching it sooner and treating it more aggressively.

[lostnfound]

23. 11024 confirmed Plus 17988 suspected cases, in China.

Been watching to see when cured would exceed deaths, also.
But I would guess that the seats and the cures would represent people who generally were in the first 1000 to be identified as sick — they hit 1000 about 8 days ago?
Since they don’t have a “cure”, the ones who recovered would most likely be older cases.

If it’s 259 dead out of the first 1000, even if all of the others of the first 1000 survive... pretty terrible numbers.
Maybe a lot of people recorded as deaths were simply found dead or showed up in their final hours, in which case the denominator is much bigger, and the mortality rate lower.

Wish they would tell us more about the recoveries — how long did the course of the disease run?

Chinese website with totals (in Chinese). https://3g.dxy.cn/newh5/view/pneumonia