My specific point is that people need to stop looking at a single IFR/CFR stat. It does no good. We look to be getting safer numbers there by simply increasing testing. (Of note, NYC has a strict lower bound on its numbers with how many in its population has died. But, do note they have more people over sixty than most cities do people. Such that most places will not be comparable.)

And that is the problem. The virus has not gotten safer as we get more data. Our understanding is just not focusing on helping the elderly. We seem to be taking a crap shot that everyone can stay home and we can out sit the virus.

I would wager we could have setup hotels and strict access controls on supplies into and out of at risk communities cheaper than what we have done. Certainly if you count on all of the job loss.

This is the narrative we keep getting fed over and over again, but it doesn't seem to be working out. There are a lot of people who were afraid to go to doctors for minor issues, a lot of important surgeries canceled for being elective, etc. On top of that, 80% of people who need a ventilator who are older or have other health issues, will die on them[0]. For the younger patients, it's almost a coin toss.

Some hospital systems are overwhelmed, but some are totally empty. Treating a region as large as the US as one unified geographical region, even with our unrestricted travel, didn't seem sound.

The devastation to peoples jobs, lives, savings, homes .. everything ... we keep saying Lives > Economy, but unless our leaders address how to deal with reconstruction (no one seems to be talking about this), there could be a lot of consequences worse than covid down the line.

0: https://www.webmd.com/lung/news/20200422/most-covid-19-patie...

We all acknowledge that it is deadly. Because it is. And you are right that this is in all the data. But the narrative is still holistic. We are locking down everyone to try and kill the virus.

Yes, it could work. But so could strict access to most nursing homes. Wouldn't be cheap, but could have even been more effective. Reasoning that we could reach herd immunity style buffer between the populations.

(Note that I flat reject just letting people die. I am not saying to abandon the older at risk crowd. I'm saying take pointed measures to explicitly protect them.)

Now, it says the cases are 33% above sixty, and the deaths are 91% above sixty. So that would be a CFR of 758/5011, 15%.

Contrast with below sixty. Which comes to a CFR of about .7%.

If I go with just under twenty, the paper doesn't give me enough data to calculate. They are 4% of the cases, but don't even get listed in the deaths breakdown.

Under forty, the rate is about 1.5%.

And note that more testing can drive down these numbers. But it's unlikely to do so for the elderly.

In New York City about 0.15% of the entire population of the city have already died from the virus, putting a lower limit on the IFR.

Estimates of the IFR have been consistently between about 0.5% to 1% by most authorities I have confidence in.