as of today, 5 NBA teams have had a coronavirus RT-PCR test done on their players and 7 players are positive (a 9.3% positive result)
NBA players are the ONLY broad population sample being tested for the coronavirus, their positive rate is a strong data point for the general population
further, the RT-PCR test ONLY measures a living active viral infection.. after a few days the test doesn’t work even though you’ve been infected; thus, we can say there’s maybe a 3:1 infected to active infection rate (based on typical disease course and timing of testing)
this means up to 30% of NBA players could have been, or are, infected. as of now, almost all are asymptomatic - no fever, no cough, no pain
NBA players are no more likely to be exposed or infected with the coronavirus than a restaurant worker, retail worker, or bus driver.. probably equivalent human interactions per day. so, do we have widespread asymptomatic infections in the US? probably...
this paper shows that 86% of infected may be asymptomatic science.sciencemag.org/content/early/…
in korea they tested asymptomatic contacts of symptomatic patients and found many asymptomatic carriers. this shows up in the data comparing korea to italy, by age statista.com/chart/21134/ag…
it may be the case that we already have massive widespread infection. this NBA data point supports these findings. we are showing a 0.002% infection rate in the US but 10-30% of NBA players are infected, 2 out of 180 world leaders have exposure in their household,
1 out of the top 10 actors in the world has a positive result, ~3 CEOs of large public companies are positive. the NBA positive test data could be a harbinger of broad testing data to come (and we may bang our collective heads on the wall when we get it)
NBA players, actors, world leaders and CEOs are not unique, they just have access to testing. the positive test result rates indicate that it could be the case that a large percentage of Americans are already infected and asymptomatic
if those things are true (widespread infection, asymptomatic, <0.2% fatality rate) should we change our social isolation and lockdown policies? maybe
confirmatory data is possible... for <$0.10 per test kit, we can mass produce (today, in factories) IGG and IGM anti-COVID-19 antibody test kits. these things look like pregnancy tests.. using blood you can instantly determine if you’ve had, or have, coronavirus.. no lab send out
the accuracy of these tests are not as great for diagnosing desperately ill people but we can use them today to validate how widespread infection is, or has, been, how many people are asymptomatic, and a truer fatality rate
once we know those numbers, we can make more sound policy decisions about isolation and lockdown
better safe than sorry is a good adage except when data being used to make decisions is obviously lacking and being safe means cancelling surgeries and destroying millions of jobs and lives in the process. we should look at all the data not just what confirms our beliefs
