Thread by @kurteichenwald

With a Fox News liar once again saying COVID-19 is just seasonal flu (cause, you know, TV commentators and lawyers know more about virus outbreaks than infectious disease experts)a quick lesson about both & proving, once again, how stupid people like @seanhannity et al are.../1

...3 items determine the threat posed by a virus: 1. Its reproductive number (called r0, pronounced r-zero or r-naught); 2. its fatality rate; 3. the existence of vaccines or other forms of external/internal immunities (which effects 2, but not 1), medical immunity in humans.../2

...the r0 reflects how infectious a virus is. As a result, that is the first thing virologists and epidemiologists want to know with a novel virus (one that has never been seen before, like COVID-19).

If the r0 is below 1, the virus will gradually disappear...../3

...above 1, it requires either some form of immunity, be it from vaccine or a partial natural immunity.

The seasonal flu has an r0 of 1.3. The smallest range of estimates of the virus that causes COVID-19 came in January, and was 1.4 to 2.5. Subsequent research found that.../4

...the r0 is between 3.6 to 4.0. Whatever the final analysis shows r0 to be, we already know its more infectious than flu by significant multiple.

Add this: There are vaccines for seasonal flu. There are none for COVID-19. And there is no natural immunity for a novel virus../5

...so, we already know it is much more contagious than seasonal flu, and cannot be stopped by any form of medical intervention. You touch it, you speak to someone infected and the droplets hit you, you are infected.

Next, fatality rate: The seasonal flu has 0.1% fatality.../6

...for COVID-19, the research estimates fatality rate at range of 1.4% to 3% (those numbers are hard to nail down because so many countries -particularly ours - have been terrible at testing.)

In other words, COVID-19 is as much as 30 times more deadly than the seasonal flu.../7

...and to put that in real context: The 1918 flu that killed between 50-100 million people had a rate of 2.5%. That means COVID-19, based on research estimates, is about a minimum of 56% of the fatality rate as the 1918 flu, or about 17% more..../8

...a big reasons why the 1918 flu killed so many people was that politicians and media folks - literally - proclaimed it to be just a nasty flu, no big deal, contained, blah blah. Same as now. So, there was no social distancing or isolation til the virus could not be managed.../9

...and just like now, epidemiologists, public health experts and virologists were jumping up and down, screaming "THIS IS DIFFERENT! MILLIONS COULD DIE!" But no, the Sean Hannitys and Ron Desantises of the time said "I know better. It's no big deal. Listen to me."...

...the next item: Yes, there is a dent in the growth of COVID-19 happening. Why? BECAUSE of social distancing and isolation. If the virus doesnt have somewhere to live, to infect, it can't infect, just like if you stay inside when there is a bear in your front yard, you..../10

...are far less likely to get mauled. But, if a bear expert says "the bear is just on the side of your house. It isn't gone" and you say "No! It's gone" and go running outside, the bear will not only attack you, but it will hang around longer..../11

...folks, none of us are smarter than experts. Im not. I speak to experts, read research and tell you what it says.

Hannity and his gang of morons are NOT experts. They know literally nothing. They know less than nothing, because theyre driven by what they WANT to be true.../12

...and in truth, if you listen to college dropouts like Hannity and Rush instead of infectious disease experts, in a way, you deserve to die. You are knowingly making a fatal choice based on what YOU want to be true..../13

...you can't wish away the bear outside. You can't say "It's gone!" because its not in front of you. And if experts tell you, "It's here, ready to attack" and Hannity tells you it's not, and you listen to Hannity, not only will you get mauled, but you may kill many more.

fin