There are different levels of underlying conditions. I bet, that those who died had the severe cases. And all you folks neglect the fact that infections, thinking rationally, are much wider then the data suggests. About 70% of people that i know, had flu symptoms, and haven't done a test. Imagine, on how much data were missing. And be it you, him or anyone else, it ain't gonna more credible than the words of Musk, that was timestamped in previous vid. (that should be obvious be a simple logic, it being extremely hard, to measure the scale of infections number) Continuing to do so, - writing as you just wrote in that line, will be the end of our communication. I do lack the empathy tho, if one doesn't care about his own well being in the first place.
First off, for someone who was just talking about data, degrading into "I bet" sure happened fast. But more importantly, let's get this straight. According to your line of thinking, if you have a "severe case" of diabetes or asthma or over 65, then screw you, you're not a real human we should care about and your death doesn't matter? Heck, 24 million Americans are morbidly obese, which is what we call "severe" obesity. Just forget about those 24 million humans? That's ethically defensible how exactly? I understand if those questions make you uncomfortable to the point you turtle up, they'd certainly make me uncomfortable if I held those positions!
Well, the conservative side of the numbers I gave you (30% bump in overall mortality) is not a prediction, it's a post hoc observation since these people are already dead. Also, it's not dependent on the infection rate, we are talking about OVERALL mortality rate (number of deaths per unit population over unit time). I think there is value in knowing that you are or are not part of the vulnerable population, at least in terms of precautions and monitoring. Unfortunately, the media has mishandled this information in the worst way possible. Liberal news have been droning on and on how young healthy people are getting sick and even dying (even though it's rare), with an understandable goal of making people take it seriously. Instead, people that see a conflict of data and news, lose trust and ignore the rest of the information all together. Conservative media has been pushing the message that we should let the weak die and move on, which turned into a perfect storm in the south of the US because people literally did not believe they will be susceptible. It is amazing that nobody, literally nobody, was offering a balanced message along the lines of "this is a real problem and we need to figure out a solution. Young and healthy people are less at risk, but should try to avoid killing others" etc. There, that's the key issue here. The American society has, at some point, decided that some people don't matter, especially if they are a marginal political force (fwiw, it's true for both sides of the isle). AIDS pandemic (which killed about a million people in the US and about 35 million globally) was pretty much ignored since it was gays, drug addicts and the poor that were predominant victims. It's only natural that now we are willing to expand the ignored population. It's a sort of passive eugenics and it is rather appalling.
Lets go back to your argument about 15% smokers. #1. Some teens smoke electronic ciggaretes, some more often than others #2. Some adults smoke a pack per month, some a pack per week while some a pack per day, and some few packs per day. Some feew ciggaretes per day/week/month/year #3. Some few cigars per month / year. #4. Some smoke pipe #5. Some smoke weed I won't mention other UC forms that you mentioned. Most of em have different levels of it. (Cancer - stages ? Diabetes - types ) Aaand, - the follow up of your argument about UC, was me being unintelligent and etc. Seriously Sig, - thought better of you... Bet is better than distorted view of the data & predictions.
It's all about the data, I agree. And no matter how you slice it, tens of millions fall under the umbrella of "underlying conditions". Which to me, who cares about those tens of millions of lives as much as any others, means any discussion that runs along the lines of "you all are worrying about this too much, it only impacts those with underlying conditions" is only a legitimate argument to the extent you don't care about the lives of those tens of millions of people.
I have been saying this all along about the situation in Southern Cal. The Governor, the Mayor all the Press told them they were going to die from COVID-19 if they didn't comply. They lost their job, their friends, quarantined in their tiny efficiency apartment and had to go to a food bank to get food. Then they found out though 1/2 of the infected were under 35, the mortality rate for the under 35 was < 0.05%, including those with underlying conditions. Many of them just said to hell with it, went out and party.
Yes we all know by now that it’s NOT just another flu. And that it definitely has no link with the season. It’s sad! The data still suggests though that the most vulnerable is the oldest and the youngest of the lot.
In the County (one of the counties in Southern Cal) I live, there were 38,711 confirmed cases, 697 total confirmed death. For the under 17 age group, the number of confirmed death = 0.