Dr. Jonathan Temte, associate dean for public health and community engagement at the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Medicine and Public Health in addressing the argument that numbers showing the prevalence of COVID-19 are overstated, Temte said that’s wrong.
Really? Let’s fact check this – be patient, read carefully, and take the time to walk through the data slowly.
According to Temte, an actual death count doesn’t exist, in part because of statutes such as Wisconsin’s that only require providers to report pediatric deaths from influenza. It’s voluntary to report flu deaths from adults. Additionally, Wisconsin does not require influenza testing to be reported. “Influenza ascertainment has always been nebulous,” he said. ‘In the best circumstances, we can assess what happens within a clinical population.” Temte has been part of a clinic-based surveillance program run out of five family medicine clinics in Dane County over the past 11 years.
Temte pointed to a graphic from the CDC that comes out weekly and reports the percentage of deaths in the U.S. due to pneumonia, influenza, and now COVID-19. During the 2009-10 influenza season, 8.1% of people who died had either influenza or pneumonia. Another bad influenza year in 2017-18 saw this pneumonia – and flu-related deaths peak at 10%. But the week ending April 11 this year hit a record23.5% of deaths by COVID-19, influenza or pneumonia compared to the total number of deaths.
Temte said each week, the CDC reports the percentage of deaths in the U.S. due to pneumonia, influenza, and now COVID-19. During the 2009-10 influenza season, 8.1% of people who died had either influenza or pneumonia. During 2017-18 those pneumonia- and flu-related deaths peaked at 10%.
First off, Temte assertion of the 23.5% is wrong, it should be 18.84%. Ok, perhaps we are being a stickler for details but accuracy is important. The point is that this number is a cherry-picked weekly number. When looking at the “to date” percentages it is 3.87%. Well within the norms of prior years.I have pre-downloaded and sorted the spreadsheet (see tab 2020-WorkSheet) here – but please feel free to do this exercise yourself. Note that the data could have changed since Temte made his assertions. For the year 2020 according to Temte citation (CDC data) the “All Deaths” rate through May 2, 2020, was 787,181.
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6 comments:
The CDC hasn't updated their numbers since the end of April because as convoluted and divided their numbers were, one could add them up and get a "Total number of deaths in the US from ALL causes" number that just happened to match the 2017 numbers for that time period when the US had 5 million less people.
So, if they want to keep this pandemic lockdown going without lying to us mathematicians, they just make statements to the press and keep all the latest numbers under the couch.
They were up to date on Mat 2, but are not up to date since then?
You Betcha!! IT'S OVER, FOLKS! The virus that went around the world in a month and a half has been exposed to ALL of us, and that was 6 MONTHS ago! We have herd immunity now. The Emergency room is EMPTY except for the occasional broken arm, drug overdose or other injury. Let's get back to work.
When will you people learn one basic fact of life....ANYTHING the government gets involved with eventually gets screwed up. Anything.
So so true 7:51
Everything they touch gets destroyed period
Where do I sign up - I don't 7se Facebook - never will. I deserve to be compensated 😂😂😂😝
ONE Death is TOO Many if it is your Family !!! ONE = Too Many !!!
The analysis of the CDC data conveniently ignores the data as it pertains to demographics. Looking at the stats in the aggregate completely ignores the deadly effect the coronavirus has on certain demographics. Again, it's the self centered, ignorant people that think the virus is not more dangerous than the flu,as long as it's not them that are dying, with no cure to stop their deaths, once infected. At least there is SOME defense from the flu with a flu shot. There is NO defense from Covid for the most affected demographics. The post is a selfish and ignorant point of view of aggregate stats. Thank God more reasoned, moral, and intellectual views are guiding our nation's policies in dealing with this pandemic.
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